Ravings of a Textual Deviant

This week, Ginger asks

Name three games you might use to get someone who has never roleplayed before into roleplaying.

All three games that I would choose have the following in common:
1. Reasonably simple mechanics
2. A concept that easy to explain and understand
3. A complete adventure could be played in one sitting

The first three games that come to mind are Toon, Teenagers from Outer Space, and Paranoia. The disadvantage to those three games is that they are all in the same genre, more or less. If I wanted to go with something a little more complex, or in a different genre, I’d probably start the new player with a pre-generated character and sit the new player next to my most patient experienced player. However, no single individual should be responsible for initiating a newbie into the hobby. It takes a group to make a gamer.

There’s nothing like getting out of a bad situation. For me, it starts with a long sigh of relief and an even longer nap. Even though I know I don’t have to go back to what was getting me wound up in knots, I still have to get rid of a lot of stress and anxiety. But at least now, I know that it’s decreasing, rather than increasing.

Part of the problem, at least for me, is that when I am so worked up over my bad situation, and I feel so trapped, it’s really hard to get enough perspective to look at other options. I can’t think straight under that kind of stress. I am very fortunate in that there were plenty of people who were willing and able to help me realize that nothing is worth being so stressed out that you can’t eat or sleep…and who would put up with me when I hadn’t been eating or sleeping. I can be such a bitch sometimes that I don’t even want to be around me.

Thanks, all. You know who you are.

Q: Has Lady Hester managed to collect anything from Vroomfondel?s estate? Small point winning the largest court award ever if she doesn?t get to spend it!

A: It will take some time for her to collect, but she will indeed do so in time to have a very good time with it.

Q: What happened to the Theopolis menage?

A: After a long and fruitless search for enough fuel for the dirigible, the unlucky group carefully disassembled the airship, wrapped it up in tarps and oilcloth, and buried in the Siberian forest. They made their way (with the help of some friendly Yakut hunters) to Lake Baikal. The maid and footman gave notice in Irkutsk and opened a pub there. Selena, Aunt Lavinia, the pilot, and the airsick Poms made their way to Moscow, where they had an audience with the Tsar, who provided them with everything they needed to return to England in grand style. Upon his return to Texas, Mr. Brown continued with his airship hobby, but put his money into railroads.

Q: What was the nature of Lady Hester’s wager, and who was the other end
of it?

A: Lady Hester had bet on Shirley to win the Grand Ellipse. The other party was her old childhood friend and third cousin, Lady Kendall.

Q: What was Addison’s part and interest in the Ellipse, or in individual Ellipsoids?

A: Addison was employed by Lord Percy. He actually had no personal interest in the Grand Ellipse, and organized the disruptions (through Nicky Finn) at Lord Percy’s behest. He also had no personal interest in any of the other Ellipsoids. Of course, Lord Percy isn’t Addison’s ultimate employer; the Kaiser is.

Q: Who shot Lady Bonnet’s companion and why?

A: Addison, because he recognized Lady Bonnet’s companion as an agent of Her Majesty’s government (unbeknownst to Lady Bonnet; she provided the perfect cover for him to travel in disguise to the Ottoman Empire).

Q: Who exactly killed Jimmy Pilkington? Was it for speaking out regarding
the attack on Shirley?

A: Nicky and Ricky’s sister, Victoria, talked Ricky into doing it, partly for retaliation and partly to keep him from going back to the Yard with nore information about the Finnegans. Nobody likes a snitch.

Q: What was the point of the Malta “protest?”

A: Lord Percy was hoping to disrupt passenger traffic by stirring up a labour riot on the docks.

Q: Did Addison in fact have plans to revenge himself on Shirley? What were
they?

A: No; Shirley was only in danger if he prevented Addison’s return to Prussia.

Q: Who impersonated Libby Wells?

A: Victoria Finnegan, at her own initiative.

Q: Did Father Dean (of Rangoon) die of natural causes?

A: Yes; the man was in his late nineties and in poor health.

Q: Who is Addison working for? The Prussians? What were his goals in
England?

A: Addison’s was indeed working for the Prussians. Hs job was to pay attention to the affairs of the British aristocracy; first, to see where the money was going as far as industry was concerned, and second, to look for blackmail candidates or people to recruit.

Q: What was the hole in his record about?

A: Time spent in Prussia training for espionage and various assignments under another name (Heinrich Adler).

Q: Who attacked Arthur Byrd? Was it for the questions he was asking, or
for other reasons?

A: Victoria Finnegan’s lackeys, to keep him from finding her.

Q: Who else knows Shirley’s secret, besides Margaret, Esperanza, Second
Uncle, and Duck? (And Angus, subconsciously.)

A: Lady Hester suspects, but doesn’t know. Nobody else even suspects.

Q: Did Scotland Yard really have its thumb up its butt re: Addison, or was
there a deeper game being played?

A: Scotland Yard had suspicions, but no proof. By the time they got close to having proof, they’d played out too much line. It was a botched operation, but there was an operation.

Q: How did Percy escape Irkutsk?

A: Bribed a Russian custodian at the Consulate, combined with damned good luck.

Q: How did Colonel Davis come from the middle of the pack to win?

A: Lord Percy became ineligible, Lady Bonnet got delayed investigating the fires in Siberia with the Addams, Selena’s dirigible was stranded, Ian Caine hit his head on a rock in a koi pool when he fell off a bridge after a night of drinking and got himself comatose, and Captain O’Neill got distracted by another adventure.

Q: What happened to Roland Carter?

A: No irony points for washing up at the same spot as Jimmy Pilkington. Roland skivved off to Jamaica under an assumed name.

Anything else?

Hello all–just wanted you to know that I haven’t forgotten to answer Grand Ellipse questions or anything else. Life is a bit hairy right now, and as much as I’d like to give a very detailed description of exactly what has my knickers in a knot, I can’t. Suffice to say that until my stress level goes down enough that I don’t feel like I have the flu, missives will be somewhat fewer and farther between. Mea maxima culpa.

This week Ginger asks about metaplot. Specifically,

What do you think of metaplots (plots developed in the rules and supplements published by the game company)? Are they good, bad, or indifferent? Have you played in a game with a metaplot? What was your experience?

Personally, strict and/or intensive metaplotting strikes me as a game designer’s way of working out yearnings to be a novelist. There’s nothing wrong with writing stories set in your game world, but…my thinking is that when you release a game world to the public, you have to let it go. Let’s get really metaphysical for a moment. Up to the point that your game is released, there’s one universe–let’s call it the Prime Universe. Each GM who plays in that universe creates an alternate version of it. Each campaign run by each GM splits off another alternate version from that GM’s alternate version. If you’re lucky, before you know it, you’ve provided the impetus for perhaps thousands of universes. (And if that’s not cool, I don’t know what is.) If you want to tinker with the history/future Prime Universe, go for it. But you have to expect that not every alternate universe will end up with the same past or future.

Back in the real world, or at least my personal Prime Universe, I don’t have any strong objections to metaplot, because I feel entirely free to discard it. It’s one of many options, and if it’s one that a GM likes, that’s great; go with it. Personally, I prefer my games a little less canned. I don’t run nearly so many games as my two long-time, long-suffering GMs, and I am probably not as good at it. However, when I do run something, I try to use the very best ingredients– and as any cook knows, the best ingredients are fresh. That’s not to say you can’t take a canned metaplot and give it your own spin; if your players don’t know the difference, then you’re doing a good job. I think that part of being a good GM is a willingness to personalize any campaign, original or out of the box, for your specific group. Furthermore, I enthusiastically agree with Ginger that “the metaplot shouldn?t ruin the ability of PCs to act in and affect the game world. In other words, so long as the metaplot is sufficiently flexible, it’s neither good nor bad; it’s how you play the game.

Some of my coworkers were having a discussion about a topic that had raised its ugly head more than once. One of them said “Well, I’m new here, and I haven’t raised it yet.” Another coworker replied “Go ahead and raise it then; maybe it’ll be the straw that breaks the camel’s back and we’ll see some action on it,” to which I added, “Or maybe we’ll just have a big, stinky, dead camel on our hands.”

I’m for it. Specifically, I’m for orientation-neutral laws that cover long-term relationships in general.

Here’s my thinking. Marriage, as we know it, has at least three facets: social/culture, civil/legal, and religious. There are all kinds of social conventions about how married people are treated, from how one properly addresses an envelope to sleeping arrangements for married guests. Fortunately, most social conventions are easily adaptable to most relationships. Social conventions are the easiest to change, and if you look around, there’s already been a lot of change in the way non-marriage LTRs–gay or straight–function socially. Not that there isn’t quite a lot of room for improvement, but it’s a good start on a very long road. If you ask me, people who choose to live together, share their income(s), and argue about whose turn it is to take out the trash function as “married” for social purposes.

Civil and legal conventions are harder to change. They cover how people and property relate to each other, and you know how people are about their property…not to mention other people. It’s sad to say that one of the best practical arguments for a legal relationship that functions as a marriage–gay or straight–is that it makes things neater when the relationship breaks up; it’s assumed that assets belong to both partners. Decades ago, there were horror stories about housewives who were left destitute by a divorce. The same thing can happen to a home-making person in any non-marriage relationship. Furthermore, why make people fill out tons of extra forms for every possible legal, medical, or financial contingency when you can give them one all-encompassing piece of paper, and they can have a party and a vacation afterwards? We all have to live in civil society, so why not treat all adults equally for civil and legal purposes?

Religion is a little different, in that membership is optional and it’s not hard to figure out the basic rules going in. Religion also probably the least likely and slowest to change, although it does happen…eventually. However, it’s done from within, by the most vocal members of the group advocating for change. Those who don’t like the change can either split off a separate congregation or come to terms with the new way of doing things. And, different religions have different views of marriage; when I was listening to NPR today, someone defending George W’s new personal crusade said that marriage “has always meant one man and one woman from the beginning.” Setting aside the question of “the beginning of what,” most premodern socities weren’t monogamous. Polygamy is not only rampant, but socially acceptable…even in our own culture. (How else do you explain the perception that men with lots of partners are “studs,” but women with lots of partners are “sluts?”). Finally, religion is none of the government’s business and I like it that way. I don’t want the government trying to regulate the religious facet of marriage–or any other aspect of religious life.

In closing, I feel compelled to highlight the irony that the people who are trying to promote “family values”–presumably, long-term, monogamous, stable relationships–are the ones fighting against that very opportunity for others. I won’t speak for anyone else, but discrimination and selfishness aren’t values I want for my family. Let’s grow up and treat all consenting adults with some respect, shall we?