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Where do you want to go on ETS?

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#76983 - 11/16/06 05:16 AM Re: Maybe it's just me...
ironraven Offline
Cranky Geek
Carpal Tunnel

Registered: 09/08/05
Posts: 4642
Loc: Vermont
Well, if your GM provides one and it isn't terrificially out of character, you can use an RPG in an RPG.
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When a man dare not speak without malice for fear of giving insult, that is when truth starts to die. Truth is the truest freedom.

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#76984 - 11/16/06 06:08 AM Re: Maybe it's just me...
OldBaldGuy Offline
Geezer

Registered: 09/30/01
Posts: 5695
Loc: Former AFB in CA, recouping fr...
"...GM..."

You're talking Chevy, right???
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#76985 - 11/16/06 06:10 AM Re: Maybe it's just me...
OldBaldGuy Offline
Geezer

Registered: 09/30/01
Posts: 5695
Loc: Former AFB in CA, recouping fr...
I'd rather have a good old LAWS anyway, smaller and easier to carry...
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#76986 - 11/16/06 06:24 AM Re: Maybe it's just me...
ironraven Offline
Cranky Geek
Carpal Tunnel

Registered: 09/08/05
Posts: 4642
Loc: Vermont
Ooops, my bad.

GM = Game Master, aka "storyteller", aka "Game Operations Director", aka the friend who's got the rule book. They set the tone and create the scene. They are director, producer, special effects, writer (not editor- the players make you change things as they go along), property master and fight choriographer. (Players bring food, so you at least get out of being caterer.) You don't find RPGs in Bunnies and Burrows, for example (think Rats of NIMH or Watership down, and you get to be a bunny), but you might in a different setting, such as, say, "what if HG Wells War of the World happened today; what would your characters do". If you find something like an LAW, sure, feel free to use it.

The results can be quite funny if the character doesn't know how to use it. I'm thinking of a particular character who tossed a flash bang into a fuel dump.... Nonleathal, right!

Roleplaying games, all the propaganda and xenophobia aside, are nothing more or less than a sand table exercise with some mechanics to simulate probability/chance/TSHTF. That's the "playing game" part of it.

The "role" part of it is becuase you generally try not to play you, it isn't as much fun, but every single one of us playes a public character that is a little different from thier private person- if you work with the public, and want to just slap the next idiot who calls you with a stupid question that you've already been asked fourty times in the last six hours and you need to pee but the phone keeps ringing and the supervisor has been giving you the evil eye all week so you can't park the call and sprint for the head, well, you just have to put that part of you away for a bit and roleplay being a nice, calm person. Not the axe murderer lurking just under the surface.

Although thinking about what you could do with that person and an axe if there was no repercussions can be soothing after they hang up. <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />
_________________________
-IronRaven

When a man dare not speak without malice for fear of giving insult, that is when truth starts to die. Truth is the truest freedom.

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#76987 - 11/16/06 03:24 PM Re: Maybe it's just me...
311 Offline
Enthusiast

Registered: 03/12/06
Posts: 285
Loc: NY USA
If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. That includes disagreeing nicely.

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#76988 - 11/17/06 01:21 AM Re: Maybe it's just me...
AROTC Offline
Addict

Registered: 05/06/04
Posts: 604
Loc: Manhattan
I play in a fantasy RPG. It reminds me of a quote from a book by Terry Prachett called "Going Postal" (not exact since I have the audio book)

" 'Ah, you can learn all of an enemy's strengths and weaknesses on that board.' 'Really? I thought you were supposed to be learning your own.' "

Even playing a different person in a fantasy world, I still learn a lot about how I reach to situations and deal with other people. I think roleplaying is a valuable tool. Time machines, magic sticks and dragons, those are just props. They aren't important. What's important is what goes on in the player's heads.
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A gentleman should always be able to break his fast in the manner of a gentleman where so ever he may find himself.--Good Omens

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#76989 - 11/19/06 06:56 PM Re: Maybe it's just me...
halogen Offline
Journeyman

Registered: 12/09/05
Posts: 54
Though I'm not an RPGer, it strikes me that there's a relationship between that and the ability and inclination to think-through survival scenarios. As I said, I don't play RPGs, but I do read quite a lot of sci-fi/"what-if" fiction.

In general, this seems to be the opposite side of the fence to the "nothing bad can happen/if it does I can't do anything about it anyway" viewpoint that I'm sure many of us have encountered. On a wider level, this is a failure of imagination, in the same way that precautions* against people hijacking planes and flying them into buildings weren't taken until after it had happened; despite the fact that the idea had been around for years beforehand.

It's only a quarter-formed idea, but if we wish to encourage the preparedness meme, communities of, for example, fiction writers may be fertile ground.

eeph

* Most importantly, the abandonment of the "do whatever they say and we'll sort it out when you're on the ground" approach.

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#76990 - 11/19/06 08:38 PM Re: Maybe it's just me...
Jeanette_Isabelle Offline
Carpal Tunnel

Registered: 11/13/06
Posts: 2946
Loc: Nacogdoches, Texas
The only purpose of a time machine in a role play world is that it allows people to get to the scene. Other than my time machine and my custom built ambulance, every piece of equipment I use in the role play world, I can obtain and use in the real world or without extensive training be able to use in the real world. My reason for choosing a medical role is because in real life I have some academic level medical knowledge and some practical, hands on level medical knowledge.

Jeanette Isabelle
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I'm not sure whose twisted idea it was to put hundreds of adolescents in underfunded schools run by people whose dreams were crushed years ago, but I admire the sadism. -- Wednesday Adams, Wednesday

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#76991 - 11/20/06 03:33 AM Re: Maybe it's just me...
AROTC Offline
Addict

Registered: 05/06/04
Posts: 604
Loc: Manhattan
Exactly, you play a medical character because that reflects what you know and I suspect how you respond to crisis. My characters seem to always be jacks of all trades, I always seem to spread out ability into lots of different skills. Same happens in real life.
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A gentleman should always be able to break his fast in the manner of a gentleman where so ever he may find himself.--Good Omens

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#76992 - 11/20/06 03:38 AM Re: Maybe it's just me...
Blast Offline
INTERCEPTOR
Carpal Tunnel

Registered: 07/15/02
Posts: 3760
Loc: TX
Quote:
Exactly, you play a medical character because that reflects what you know and I suspect how you respond to crisis. My characters seem to always be jacks of all trades, I always seem to spread out ability into lots of different skills. Same happens in real life.

Uh-oh. I usually play a Half-Orc ranger.

-Blast

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