Introduction to the Roleplaying Page
Last updated June 8th, 2005
The Basics
Welcome to my page devoted to roleplaying games and other games that might be
of interest to you. There are, of course, many different games out there, but this
page is devoted to specific game types, notably several roleplaying games. One
never knows what I might add at the spur of the moment to this page!
The most obvious question that one can start with is, "What is roleplaying?" There
are many answers to this question, but I have written a small article that attempts to
answer the question of what roleplaying
is. Or not. You will have to decide whether the answer is satisfactory for yourself,
but there are other considerations to take into account here.
Gaming is a hobby for most of the people who roleplaying games and other such
games. Roleplaying games are very interesting, have a lot of creativity and
imagination that has gone into the creation of the adventures for the roleplaying
experience. Many times the person who runs the game, called the Dungeon Master,
GamesMaster, Storyteller, or any other number of titles, has gone to great lengths to
research one or more aspects of the adventure, also called a scenario, that he or
she is about to run. Some fans devote way to much time to playing roleplaying
games, but this is equally true of all hobbies where it turns into an obssession.
One of the most positive aspects of the roleplaying game is that it is a social game,
very much involving interaction between players and allowing those who play to
develop their social and cultural skills. Roleplaying games teach rules, they teach
a form of etiquette that is unique to roleplaying (but which translates well into other
settings), and they teach the ability to think on one's feet and to deal with unexpected
situations. There are plenty of other positive aspects of roleplaying games that one
could discuss, but there are also the negative sides.
The Issues
There are many issues that come up in roleplaying games, issues of morality,
violence, and other questionable behaviour and idiosyncracies. I have chosen not
to deal with these here in the Introduction, but have devoted a separate page to these
issues that you can click on here.
My Roleplaying
With that out of the way, I guess we can now talk about the roleplaying pages that
are in front of you. I have been roleplaying now for almost thirty years; some would
argue a large chunk of my life, but for me it has always been a means of expressing
my creativity and imagination. Everyone begins roleplaying in different ways...so
I guess I should tell you a little bit about this.
Fantasy Roleplaying Games
I was first introduced to roleplaying games in 1970, at the age of 15, by David
Fisher, a friend of mine at the school (and later, the CEGEP I was attending in
Montréal). A small group of players would get together and play a
game that one of the folks called "Laertia." It was a world and a set of rules that
he had created, since he was fond of a set of sf and fantasy books that he had
read once, and he wanted to play in that world. In 1974, David picked up and
showed me a copy of the game that later became the major fantasy rpg of the
day, Chainmail . I was enthralled by the game, and took it up myself
and started to run my first campaign; I switched to the Dungeons and
Dragons game when they came out in late 1974 or early 1975, but didn't
play that for long, because in 1975, the first edition of Empire of the Petal
Throne , based on the world of Tékumel created by Professor
M.A.R. Barker came out, and I was hooked on this truly innovative game world.
I ran (and played on the odd occasion) games in the world of Tékumel
using that first set of rules for a good two or three years, on and off, playing in
Dave's Dungeons and Dragons until the advent of
RuneQuest , and Chivalry & Sorcery , Both of
these games had worlds that were interesting to me, moreso than the world of
D&D , especially the RuneQuest RPG by
CHAOSium. This was a game that really stretched the imagination moreso than
D&D had ever done, simply because the world created for
this game was one that was more of a storytelling world, as opposed to the type
of world created by the TSR people. Sometime in this period, I also discovered
the original Traveller, and found the entirely new side of the gaming
within the science fiction genre.
I abandoned the world of Tékumel and the Empire of the Petal
Throne in or about 1978, as I had had enough of the Dungeons
& Dragons system. In 1979, I was fortunate enough to obtain a copy
of a game system called DragonQuest , a game system that was
different enough from most of the other fantasy rpgs out there, but which had a
lot of elements that I really liked, notably the magic and magic item creation
mechanics. I ran DragonQuest for several years in the world of
the basic D & D system, and then decided in 1983 to adapt
the world of Lyra, created by author Patricia C. Wrede in a series of novels, to
that world. While I have run several other fantasy rpgs - notably Ars
Magica , Talislanta , Lace & Steel ,
GURPS , Agone and The Dying Earth
(set against the world created by Jack Vance, with a creative set of rules
by Robin D. Laws), and Arrowflight - over the years, I have run
DragonQuest for the most part for almost 25 years now, even with
the dabbling with several other fantasy rpgs.
And then came the real twist of fate... In 2005, Guardians of Order (the company
best known for the BESM rpg) released a Tri-Stat version of
Tékumel: Empire of the Petal Throne . When I looked at
the game, I realised that I had finally found a truly gameable roleplaying game
based on the world of Tékumel created by M.A.R. Barker, that I had
been searching for all these years subconsciously. I picked up some of the
Tékumel world-related materials off the internet, bought the game
itself, and have joyously gone back to running stuff in M.A.R. Barker's highly
detailed game world. So my fantasy rpging experience has now come full
circle.
Science Fiction Roleplaying Games
On the science fiction side of things, let's see... I first discovered the science fiction
rpg in the late 1970s with Traveller and Universe , but
over the years I've found that I'm not all that much of a science fiction rpg fan, even
if I did run Universe for the longest time, heck, not quite for as long
as I have the DragonQuest fantasy system cited above (this should
come as no surprise, since the two games were created by SPI within about a
couple of years of one another, before the company collapsed). In another twist,
one of the games that I have run sporadically on and off over the years, that I
have always considered science fiction despite the fantasy-like trappings, has
been Skyrealms of Jorune , an rpg that was first published in 1984.
The world of Jorune is quite unique and has a distinctive feel to it, and to be
honest, reminded me a lot of both the world of Tékumel and the world
of Talislanta - not surprising since it was influenced by both of
those worlds and Vance's Dying Earth as well. I ran
Skyrealms of Jorune sporadically over the years, and have never
really regretted it at all. The world of Jorune gave me a playground in a science
fiction setting that made a nice alternative to the Universe game
system with all its star-spanning action. In addition to these two systems and
Traveler , I have run a few other systems even more sporadically
over the years - Ringworld (based on Larry Niven's books),
Space: 1889 (Victorian science fiction and still a favourite),
Doctor Who (the FASA version of the game), Fading
Suns , Blue Planet , Orbit , and several others
that I have forgotten about.
Meanwhile, 1999 saw the release of what has to be the most innovative,
creative concept for a time travel roleplaying game to come along in a very
long time. While I have been a fan of Doctor Who for a long time (and
even ran the FASA version of the game), I have always wanted to find a
decent, scientifically based time travel roleplaying game. I have been a fan
of the Continuum: Roleplaying in the Yet rpg now since its debut,
and have enjoyed many hours of running this game (although I do wish I could
play it as well), although the gaming groups that I play with have decided to
play the game only once in a while, as they find it to be both somewhat complex
and a bit mind-numbing. Oh, well, c'ést la vie and all that.
Modern-Day Roleplaying Games
Horror roleplaying games are not something that I've played or worked with a
lot in my life, simply because I prefer to read about that kind of stuff, rather than
play it. On the other hand, the faerie and urban fantasy genres has always
interested me (especially after Emma Bull's wonderful War for the Oaks
novel), but there had never really been a solid modern-day roleplaying game
that allowed one to deal with this subject adequately. I began running horror
roleplaying games with the Call of Cthulhu rpg, based on the works
of H.P. Lovecraft, back in the 1980s and stuck with that for the most part,
although I did run the Chill roleplaying game as well, and there
were a couple of others as well in that time that I've forgotten about. In addition,
I ran Jonathan Tweet's marvellous Over the Edge rpg of modern-
day surrealism, although I haven't run that in years for various reasons. In 1996,
the WitchCraft roleplaying game of the supernatural came out from
Myrmidon Press (and later evolved when it was picked up by Eden Studios,
and given a make-over; I was heavily involved in the Eden Studios' creation
of the 2nd Edition of the game, but won't deal with that here - you can read the
credits on the game, if you like!). While I ran Eden Studios wonderful
WitchCraft RPG for several years, the game system and the
manner in which the Unisystem rules are divided amongst other books in
their various lines, has grated on me (sort of like GURPS), I switched between
various systems over the years. I have run various systems - including
(not to be confused with the movie of the same name),
Principia Malefex , Dreamwalker , and
Noir (the roleplaying game of film noir, set in the 1920's and 1930's),
among others.
However, I soon came to recognise that I didn't actually want a horror rpg,
per sé, so much as one that was set against the world of faerie tales
and modern urban fantasy. Late in 2003, I discovered that Phil Brucato had
created just a roleplaying game that was being marketed by Laughing Pan
Productions, called Deliria: Faerie Tales for a New Millennium ,
and I fell in love with the game when I picked it up. It was exactly the urban
fantasy roleplaying game that I had been looking for, and had an element of
the gothic and the horror to it that was just right. I've been running the
Deliria rpg ever since, and have been pleasantly surprised with
its sheer scope and quality.
Other Roleplaying Games
Over the years, I've played and run a few roleplaying games that don't
really fit neatly into the genres covered above. I've been a fan of the
super-hero comics for a long time (being a long-time Golden Age and
Legion of Super-Heroes fan!), and ran the DC Heroes roleplaying
game, originally from Mayfair Games (now the deathly generic Blood
of Heroes rpg from Pulsar Games), although I had looked at
Champions , Villains & Vigilantes ,
Golden Heroes , and a couple of others that I've forgotten
about. I've also run a wonderful game from West End Games called
Torg: The Possibility Wars , a game that still bears the
distinction of being the first multi-genre game, positing as it did alternate
worlds and dimensions set against specific genre types. There was
also SteamLogic's Mechanical Dream , a very interesting,
very alien rpg that had a game world unlike many that I had seen (but
which can be best compared to Tékumel and
Skyrealms of Jorune . Finally, there is Malcolm Craig's
wonderful astate rpg that is very much an apocalyptic
Dickensian vision of the future, with a marvellous game world, a sense
of mystery and "Big Brother is watching you" to it, but a game that is largely
oriented around PDF game products and the like.
Final Thoughts
And there you have it, my life with roleplaying games and this hobby. In the
years that I've been playing roleplaying games, I've probably played and
ran at least fifty different roleplaying games - some of which I've mentioned
above, and many of which have good memories for me, and some of which
have very...sour memories. I've run/played some of these games as
strictly "one-shots" (where players have decided they didn't really like the
game or wanted to really play something else. I've pretty much enjoyed
my (roleplaying) gaming hobby over the years, although I have to admit to being
more creative and enjoying myself more as a GamesMaster than as a player,
although being a player is a good way to keep one's "hands" in the playing
side; it provides a balance to the GMing side, and never lets one forget...
And I've played some pretty enjoyable, and memorable, characters in my
time.
The rest of the pages that you see in front of you present all manner of
material on the roleplaying games that I favour, and have a few things of
interest for others as well. I like to think that you, the reader, will find
something of interest for your personal tastes in roleplaying here. So
enjoy!
You can send me questions, comments, or thoughts via e-mail at jkahane@comnet.ca.
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This page first went on-line November 26th, 1996