Reduced enjoinment playing RPG
Rocco:
I would also like to explain better the reason for my actual disenjoinment as I feel it:
1) Part of the problem is with my actual gaming group. We are 7 (GM included) and here is how I perceive the other players: two of them play with us only to stay toghether: for them playing in a RPG, playing a video game or going all toghether in a pub and having a beer is the same. I'm happy that we stay toghether, but I don't really like to play with them because they are not commited to "play". One of them is difficult to understand as a player (he is usually the mastermind, acting after having thought about every possible consequences. For him is more like playing chess than a RPG) but I like to play with him, even though I think that he should partecipate more in actual play. Another one I completely dislike as a person. Period. I don't like to play with him but....he cannot be excluded (because I'm the only one that has this strong adversion of him). He is the one that usually try to force his rules on the game, with th GM avail. He also usually play for himself alone, never trying to include the other players in his PC actions. Then there is the last fellow player, which I consider a friend. Even though we don't like excatly the same things in a RPG we play well toghether. And then there is the GM, which recently I started to dislike.
2) The other part is that I don't find anymore D&D as appealling to me as it used to be.
Point 1 is a big part of my problem and actually I'm trying to leave behind my old group and trying to find new people to game with. Part of the problem is that not all of my friend like RPGs and I don't have so many friends to start with.
Point 2 is what drived me to the Forge. But I think that the two are interwined and that I can understand better my favourite hobby talking here with you.
Rocco
Ron Edwards:
Hi Rocco,
I apologize for the lateness of this reply. The good part of the delay is that I decided exactly what I want to do with you.
Let's start with Color. I mean, nothing but Color, just the fun and image-rich description of some topic or genre or whatever that you'd like to play. In fact, try to forget anything you ever knew about what role-playing games are about. Never mind dungeons, vampires, or anything of the kind. Never mind any sort of subculture you share with others and the way you may dress or talk when you're with them. Think instead about books, movies, comics, history, biography, sex, politics, music, humor, cartoons, advertising ... anything you like to experience as media. What's a topic that turns you on? Or for that matter, pisses you off to the extent that you'd like to do something about it?
I ask this because role-playing begins with Color, and it is effective only insofar as the content deep within the Color - a highly personal thing - finds expression through the processes of play. The essence of Exploration, or if we talk in terms of process, Shared Imagined Space, is giving the primal and initial Color some kind of weight among as a group of people who are talking and listening to one another.
Let me know!
Best, Ron
Rocco:
Hi Ron
Thank you for your help. I hoper I have clearly understood what you would like to know, so if it's not correct, please let me know. There are many things that I really like. I will start with some of them:
1) One of my first love was "The Silmarillion". I like a world inhabited by creature greater than mere human, like the elves of the First Era. The elves were fighting for something greater than themselves and they almost succeded. But what really caught me in the Silmarillion is the impending tragedy always at the door, the sense of sadness of the elves...and at the same time the struggle to succed no matter what (especially, in this regard, the frail human).
2) I like the stories told by G.R.R. Martin in " A song of Ice and Fire". I like the idea of an almost real medieval country, rich in misteries but at the same time more real than the Middle-Earth. I also like the political maneuver behind the stories of Martin, seeing them as a struggle to put reason and consequences above mere luck.
3) I like a lot of different Japanese Anime. I can cite a few and the reason why: Escaflowne (great story with epic characters struggling against lot of powerful enemies), Neon Genesis Evangelion (mistery and machinations), Trigun ( I really like the character of Vash the Stampede, powerful but at the same time humble), Saint Seya (I was a child and I liked great heroes fighting in shining armors...)
4) Star Wars (the films): flashing laserswords and people trying to uphold their higher moral ground in spite of a gritter reality.
If you want me to give you some other information on my interests or if I completely missed what you were asking me, I will do my best to correct myself.
Thanks
Rocco
Ron Edwards:
Wow! That is fantastic, exactly what I hoped for. This is one of those times I wish that the internet would just stop for a while so we can talk in peace, and I both apologize (and am myself frustrated) that you've had to wait so long for me to reply. I'll summarize a bit ...
1. Gritty tough reality. Most people have a hard time just getting by. Injustice is wide-spread, and privileged people can indulge their petty power-trips and feuds at the expense of the under-privileged. The privileged are making a tough situation really bad, unnecessarily, because they are really dicks.
2. Moral fibre under fire. There are codes and viewpoints which a person can learn and try to uphold, and they are indeed valid - effective and admirable. But those who uphold these views are marginalized for any number of reasons, and they have an uphill social battle as well as dealing with the more direct dangers and injustices they encounter. A lot of the time, they suffer and die, and their victories are often local, or one small step in a larger struggle they'll never see.
3. Friends and relationships. Other characters' opinions matter. The hero's own values don't really come under question or doubt, or not much, but they can be threatening to others. Or inspire others. The hero is a catalyst for bringing out others' core values, or helping those core values mature for either good or evil.
Conclusion: the most exciting conflicts in this role-playing game (the one you and I wish existed) concern a character who is very powerful, but facing foes which are socially better positioned and absolutely uninterested in his or her ethical views, in circumstances which are very adverse, with the fate of individuals and probably communities at stake. The hero may well be already paying a terrible price for doing this, and has done so in the past, and bears the mental and physical scars for it. The real point is that there is no guarantee he or she will prevail this time either. Maybe "prevailing" will consist, after the hero is dead or horribly maimed, and after the victimized people have been killed and further abused or oppressed, of one small child remembering the event and vowing someday to revive the fight. And even if the hero is victorious, it is likely that he or she will have to flee or otherwise move on, with little reward.
Do I have that right? Would this kind of thing be the personal payoff for you in play, at least if we're talking about this one role-playing game which you and I wish existed?
If so, then it's clear that no version of D&D will facilitate this. Oh, it's possible you might get this kind of play with nominal use of D&D (again, of whatever version), but only with a group which is 100% on the same page as you, and almost certainly by re-writing and selectively editing the textual rules pretty extensively.
And furthermore, it's clear that your current group is not going to be fun for you to play with. I can't put that any better than you have described yourself.
I suggest one thing: find two people who are as jazzed about that material as you are. Maybe one from this group and one from somewhere else, maybe one from this group, maybe from somewhere else entirely. I don't think you need more than that.
That now leads to the next question ... given those exciting moments of play, what about them would be most gratifying, especially if everyone at the table were committed to it? (i) Your personal, real-person strategy and guts in using the game system to beat the odds? This would be more like a video game version. (ii) Your personal and perhaps conflicted involvement with the issues exemplified by the conflict, and eagerness to see how it plays out in terms of a thematic statement? This would be more like becoming a weird blend of both author and audience. (iii) Your excitement about the source material cast into a new mold? This would be more like fan-style celebration of the original material or certain aspects of it.
Correct me if I'm off track about any of this. If I am, then ignore the above paragraph.
Best, Ron
Rocco:
Hi Ron
I always like to discuss my interests with people who can understand them and like to elaborate on them, even if we disagree on the matter. And don't worry for the timing of your reply, life is busy and every help comes in its own time. I'm happy that you (and everybody else here in the forum) found out enough time to reply to my posts.
Now, for the matter at hand: You perfectly caught what I meant with my previous list of interesting topics. That's what I really like to see in play.
For your second question my answer resides between point II and III. I will explain myself better: as I said earlier I like to discuss principle and ideas important to me with other people. Their inputs can spin my mind on paths I never thought of, or make me reflect upon what I think is "carved in stone" and elaborate on them. Therefore I think that point II is what I'm searching.
However, even though principle and ideas are "abstract" matters, they have a strong reflection on the material world, and this interaction goes two-way, from abstract to material and viceversa. Thus the material aspect of certains idea must be reflected upon, and different situations and different settings can lead to very different interaction between "abstract" and "real" aspects of a certain topic. Different source materials can lead to different answer to the same question. And that's something that I like to explore. So maybe, point III is not far away from what I search, even though is not the principal object of my interest.
I hope I have made clearer what I meant.
Thanks
Rocco
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