The Black Campbell

We play role playing games because we want to be something, if only for a few hours in the safety of fantasy, extraordinary. The brave fighters, the canny wizard or hacker, the fighter pilot, the plucky thief, the social diva — whatever…we want something larger than life.

Most games are set in different periods from ours. Maybe it’s the faux medieval fantasy world, Renaissance or Enlightenment pirate settings, Victorian science fiction,  interwar pulp action, or futuristic settings. the draw is the difference from your modern day life. Even espionage games typically do the spy-fi settings where you drive expensive cars, sleep with comely enemy agents, shoot things indiscriminately, and maybe — if you’re lucky — you get to blow up a volcano secret base. The point being: it’s not reality.

However, the need for verisimilitude in a setting is important for audience (your players) buy-in. So how real should you go? The societies of pre-industrial nations aren’t known for their open-minded stance on gender, race, or sexuality. Combine that with class issues and the thought of living pre-1920 should put most people off. Set that reality dial too high and you will exclude certain character types, and by extension, certain demographics of players.

Race relations were not exactly stellar prior to …well, ever. And being a woman before the first sexual revolution of the 1920s was not conducive to a life of high adventure and being treated as an equal. And what if you were poor? Not a lot of crofters had the option to race off and explore the world unless they were wearing army red. How do you handle this?

First off, no matter how real it is for the NPCs, the players are special. There are always exceptions to the rule in history. Boudica was a warrior woman who wasn’t about to take crap from anyone, but lived in a world where women were second-class citizens of the Roman Empire. We’ll get back to her in a moment. Joan d’Arc was a peasant girl and maybe a lunatic, but she was an excellent general. Mary Read was a successful pirate. Jane Digby and Lola Montez were different stripes of female adventurer when is was not acceptable. Tom Molineaux was a successful boxer, despite being black, in the 1830s. The Lafayette Escadrille had a black pilot, and plenty of women and minorities found escape in early aviation.

They are the exceptions, the special ones…the ones the players are playing.

Gender and class come together here very well — the women mentioned are not middle-class. The typical view of the domestic goddess raising kids and doing what her husband told her, while quaint, was typically a middle class thing. Aristocrats like Boudica (a Welsh queen), or Jane Digby (the former Lady Ellenborough), or the spy Lady Hamilton had the freedom to buck convention because they were wealthy or well-connected, and their eccentricities — while decried — often made them popular figures. Conversely, the poor woman could find herself with more options than the middle class woman by sheer virtue of having nothing to lose, and that they were “invisible” to proper society. By the time you get noticed, like Lola Montezz, you’ve used you talent or sexuality to become the lover of the King of Bavaria. Lower-class women pretty made the West — that madam, that landowner whose husband died…they were the ones that made Western society, not the cowboys and prospectors.

Similarly, even during the height of the slavery issue, freed or scaped blacks like Frederick Douglass traveled freely and openly spoke their mind. Jews might find themselves in a sticky situation in Nazi Germany — unless the were much-needed scientists — but with money and connections, you might still slip by. The exceptions should be the exceptions.

That doesn’t mean you should shy away from race or gender or class issues. Giving your players realistic impediments can (and should) be frustrating, but they should be able to outsmart, outfight, or out-politic their foes. They should have detractors who decry their stepping out of place or take steps to ruin the character socially, but there should always be those folks that back them. It’s actually pretty realistic, historically.

Example 1: I often ran Victorian sci-fi games. One of the players chose to play aristocrats almost exclusively. Why? Because of the freedom than money and connection gave her characters to flaunt convention and get away with it. She played almost exclusively characters that were socially adept and attractive — the sort that thrived in the nooks and crannies of the Victorian period.

Example 2: A young Chinese street urchin, female, who was able — because she was young, a girl, and Chinese was the perfect spy and go-between for the Western male characters in 1936 Shanghai. She was always in danger of physical or official abuse, was often hungry and dirty…but her utility allowed her to tag along on adventures.

Example 3: A black woman who had gone into prostitution in our Victorian game, but who managed to seduce the right men, gain some level of financial stability and notoriety, then launched on a series of adventures with the other characters who — being the exceptions to the rule — were at least tolerant of the character.

Example 4: A female Martian in a Space:1889 game got involved with an American cowboy wandering the Red Planet. Despite their string of high-profile adventures and relative acceptance by Martians, human religious types viewed their union as “bestiality.” this caused them troubles, but not insurmountable ones because they are the heroes.

Here’s a briefing sheet that went along with a briefing to the characters regarding the history of Kobol. This is, of course, specific to our campaign, so feel free to ignore it — but it also shows what can happen when youtake the bit and run in a different direction than “canon.”

History of Post-Exodus Kobol

Analysts: Gaius Baltar, PhD — Colonial Science Minister; Ambra Gallardo, PhD — Chief Astronomer, Galactica

Based on ELINT and SIGINT collected by the ships of the fleet, and the data recovered from Basestar 32, the intelligence compartment of Gaactica, in conjunction with the science ministry, has gleaned certain facts about the history of Kobol from the time of the Exodus of the 12 Colonies to current day.

BF is Before Fall, or the year of C Day.

~2200BF: The Thirteenth Tribe flees Kobol ahead of the War between Man and Gods. They settle on a place called Earth.

~2200-2100BF: War between Man (those rejecting the leadership of the Lords of Kobol) and the Gods. The population of Kobol is seriously reduced.

~2000BF: Arrival of “the Blaze” — an “angry, jealous god” — who we now believe to be the Lord of Kobol, Hades, returned from his efforts to find the Titans to aid in the war.

The Twelve Tribes of Man flee to the Colonies. The trip takes almost six months.

~2000-1500BF: Collapse of Kobol civilization and rise of the Blaze. Rules from the Tower of Dis.

Population of Kobol about 6 million — about 0.01% of pre-war levels. Pogroms of polytheists reduces this to a million or so. Tech level collapses to about TL2-3 (Iron Age.)

The Blaze was apparently not “present” through most of this period.

~1500-1000BF: Slow development of Kobol civilization to TL5 (industrial revolution). Humanism and religious schisms.

991BF: Creation of the Holy Kobolian Empire.

978-765BF: Religious wars between monotheists, polytheists, atheists, etc. Rise to TL6 (Advanced industrial revolution.)

789BF: Creation of the Republic of Cumae.

764-760BF: First World War. Destruction of HKE .

760BF: Establishment of multiple new countries in HKE territory.

760-700: Rise to TL8 (Information Age.) First spacecraft launched. Population rises to ~2 billion.

697BF: Small scale nuclear war between Soldiers of the One and Cumae. Destruction of most large political entities. Collapse of population to 500 million. Drop to TL5-6

509BF: Return of the Blaze and the Gift of “the Twelve”, also known as “Seraphs.”

508-500BF: Resistance to the Twelve. Population drops to 160 million. Establishment of the Rule of the Seraph (the Twelve.)

509-450: Rise to TL9 (Microscale engineering and early space travel.) Discovery of signals from The Twelve Colonies.

440BF: Development of the jump drive: TL10.

430-400BF: First of the Seeks — looking for other human settlements.

425BF: Discovery of the Twelve Colonies. The political situation is deemed too volatile to intervene.

401BF: Discovery of the remains of the Pleiades Colonies of Man. Recovery of the Aurelian Prophesies.

375BF: Rise to TL11. Development of the Cylons — cybernetic servants for the Seraph.

350-300BF: The Second Seek (for Earth.) Unsuccessful. All vessels lost.

299-200BF: The Third Seek.

299-250BF: First introduction of monotheism into the Colonies by Kobolian agents.

276BF: Discovery of New Ophiuchi — a small colony of the 13th Tribe.

275-200BF: “Recovery” of the Ophiuchi settlers.

250BF: Loss of Seekers to possible location of Earth.

120-55BF: Involvement in the establihsment of Soldiers of the One and other monotheist groups, including the Eleusinians, in the Twelve Colonies.

Seraph involvement in the development of the Cylon.

52-40BF: YR1947-59 — The First Cylon War.

40BF: Seraphs stop the First Cylon War to save Mankind.

39-30BF: Incorporation of the remaining Colonial Cylons into Kobolian society.

18-1BF: Third Recovery of the Twelve Tribes — influencing Colonial society and preparation for possible war.

17BF: Assassination of President Guderian before Cylon infiltration can be revealed.

5BF: Replacement of Lord Lucan and insertion of Seraphs into Colonial society in an attempt to prevent war.

1BF: Operation UNDERTOW and discovery of Cylon infiltration. Seraph realize war in imminent and decide to move early on “recovering” the Twelve Tribes, hoping to force them to Kobol and submission to the Blaze.

THE FALL OF MAN: Cylon attacks on the Twelve Colonies. Galactica leads a rag tag fleet to safety.

C+64: Battle of the Blaze. Major Crius Muir, an oracle and CAG of Galactica, leads two and ten vipers to strike at the Enemy through the fire. The Blaze disappears without warning after Muir rams the “Ship of Light” with his fighter. The Cylons flee the field and no contact is made until C+77.

C+66: Caprica 6 releases the centurions from behavioral control. 60-70% of the centurions revolt against the Seraph.

C+67-70: Spread of the Cylon Revolt in the fleet.

C+70…: Cylon Civil War (Second Resistance to the Seraph.)

C+77: Discovery of Basestar 32. Intelligence on Cylon strengths, location of the Tomb of Athena, and other important strategic finds in Colonial hands.

Battle of Kobol between Cylon fleets. At least 14 basestars engaged in combat with each other.

C+105: Operation PARTHENON — Colonial mission to find the “map to Earth” from the Tomb of Athena.

Apparently, the role playing community has a problem with women and minorities — at least that what a bunch of the designers have been squawking about recently. “We have to get more [insert token] into gaming!” Here’s my response:

NO WE DON’T.

We don’t need to categorize our players into sex, race, or wrestling weight class. If they aren’t jerks, you just have to treat them decently and let them play. “What if they’re gay?” So what? Unless they’re hitting on me, I don’t care. “Or transexuals?” Had one (Phrasing!) in a game back in 1990. He/she was a bit odd, but was a good player. Hell, I’ve had a stripper show up in BDSM garb. I don’t care. It did tweak one of the players, which is why I asked her not to do it again…but the rest of us were cool with it. One of the women held her leash for her.

We still got through the session without too much distraction, the player got the attention she was seeking, some of us enjoyed the show. But we didn’t say anything. ’cause we weren’t jerks. Conversely, you could make a good case the said stripper was, because she was looking for a rise (PHRASING!) out of us. (And most likely got it.)

Inclusion is trendy, right now. Wizards of the Coast has a few paragraphs extolling how gamers should let people explore different sexuality in their game. Sounds good…if you don’t have kids at the table. I didn’t think this much vaunted bit of verbiage was necessary (or appropriate) for a book that was going to be read by young kids and early teens. A few people lost their minds on a Facebook thread when I said this. the sorts of self-important turds that feel the need to show you how much more cultured, understanding, and tolerant they are — but really, they just love to be offended, and they love the attention their offense brings them.

I’ll admit it — I’ve never understood the side of gaming culture where a bunch of supposedly geeky man-boys think sexually harassing female players is acceptable. I’ve rarely seen it, and can only think of one instance since about 2000, and that was a few years ago when my ex-wife shut down a player who was making some pretty off-color remarks about a female character (but not the player…) But it still happens, which isn’t a character of the role playing community, as it is a confirmation that some sexist dicks like to play RPGs. Supposedly, it’s worse online — which I can believe; anonymity breeds obnoxiousness.

Outside of that aforementioned moment, I remember two instances that really stuck out — one was a Dungeons & Dragons game with a GM that was either Aspergers or Asshole…not sure which, but I suspect the latter. He handed out characters after reading from his 80 page historical treatise on his world (new GMs…don’t do this), and my ex-wife was given the cleric. Who was mute. Because women are best seen, not heard, is my guess; it seemed to match the way he treated his own wife. We didn’t go back. The other was a Shadowrun campaign where the players spent much of their time treating the female player’s character as a pet, really — they would “protect” her, harass her, talk over her, ignore her input while they caroused at a bar. Part of the problem was the GM, who was hands off to the point he disappear to go work on his garage queen Porsche 911, and the male players — all SCA types that croak about chivalry and protecting women, but really see them more as possessions (much like the knights of old) to be petted when convenient. One of these jerks would eventually drive his wife absolutely bughouse crazy. His brother was a long time friend (and the guy from the first anecdote) who, as he got older, the misogynistic side of his “chivalrous” personality crept out. Needless to say, we’re not friends anymore. Unlike many friends that have passed out of my life, I don’t miss him.

As for race — plenty of folks have sat at the same game table as me. Some dark skinned, some so white the reflection of sunlight caused retinal damage, giant tall to dwarf-like short, many fat (some dangerous to my furniture so0 and others not, glasses or no, handsome/pretty and…not so much. Social awkward. Some glib. Male and female, homosexual, bi, and heterosexual. Guys who couldn’t eat around other people due to anxiety, the wannabe actors and actresses (the worst!), the introvert that wouldn’t stop knitting while playing and the extroverts that wake my kid up with their brash pronunciations (I leave those ones to the wife to discipline…again, phrasing!)

It shouldn’t matter. If it does, that a reflection on you, not the hobby.

Angela Murray had a neat little piece on Gnome Stew that I thought was a good starting point for an examination of death in an RPG, and how appropriate it might be due to expectations of conventions of genre. She only dips her toe into the matter, but I it raised some interest questions for me.

Character death is always a bit of a hot topic among gamers. While it’s not quite as common today as it was back in the days of yore, the issue can still bring out vehement opinions on both sides of the argument. One school of thought pushes for ‘realistic’ outcomes to dangerous choices and doesn’t flinch at the idea of a dead character when the roll of the dice turns against the player. Conversely, many modern games emphasize the idea that character death is a rare thing and should never be taken lightly.

Thinking on it, as a game master I like to avoid killing off characters when it isn’t cinematically or plot appropriate. (A point she brings up regarding Boromir’s death in The Fellowship of the Ring.) As a player, I’ve strangely been less worried about that — maybe because having been stuck with the GMing role for most of my 30 years playing, I’m used to having to off favorite NPCs when needed.

One of the mechanical points I dislike about FATE, for instance, is the use of stress over an “injury” rating for combat. I think stress could be wholly appropriate in, say, a superhero game like Marvel Heroic, where the players can take mental or social or spiritual injury that is not immediately life threatening. Even stress for minor injury seems a nice mechanic…but it just didn’t tend to have that level of finality that combat — to me — should have.

On the flip side, Dungeons & Dragons, with the armor class and hit point system that allows a guy to get hit with swords for half the afternoon also didn’t work for me. While there’s a nice quantitative method of measuring damage, the realism is so obviously non-existent as to pull me out of the experience.

I always rather liked James Bond: 007‘s approach, with light, medium, heavy damage, followed by incapacitation and killed. You could use hero points to “get out of death”, holding the reaper off until it was cinematically appropriate, or succeeding where a bad die roll might scotch a great plotline.

There’s where I think I break with the modern idea that death should be rare — your characters are typically involved in hazardous adventuring. Death should be a real, present danger, but unless you are a favorite second-string character in a Joss Wheedon story, death shouldn’t just pop up and punch a big wooden spike through your chest. Or as Murray explained,

…in recent years I have had characters die in games where I didn’t have a problem with it… I never had an issue with losing a character in a horror game like Dread, or even a full-bore military-esque Shadowrun game. Eventually it struck me that my problem with character death has more to do with the genre of the game than it has to do with actually losing the character. Nobody likes losing a character, but when it fit with the story, I was okay with it.

It’s the conventions of story-telling or genre vs. the simulation/wargaming approach of gaming. Her mention of horror games is very apropos here: the horror genre has certain conventions. You’re going to lose folks, and probably messily — even if you don’t split up to cover more ground, walk backward into the monster a dark room, decide to take a shower or strip down to your underwear in the middle of events, or have a high melanin count in your skin that requires the others to elect you to go out “and see what that was.” Horror=death, or in Lovecraftian games, insanity at the very least.

For those who don’t like our characters drawing on rubber walls with out feces, or having our head ripped off after we go nuts and lose our crap…well, maybe horror is a genre to steer clear of. (Also doing horror well at the gaming table is hard I find…)

What about a military game (which Shadowrun is not…)? Say Twilight:2000 or Battlestar Galactica — life should be cheap unless you are in a story with an overarching metaplot like BSG and are playing a main character important to the plot. The post-apocalyptic genre where “life is cheap” (more the Twilight:2000 end of things) however, might be good to play troupe style, with multiple characters per player. (This is how I run Battlestar Galactica due to high attrition. Marine or Viper pilot..? Unless you are an angel or have a destiny or something…you might want to have another character in the offing.) A Western is another good example. Everyone but the lead is pretty much open season, if we’re running a spaghetti Western, and even the lead in a modern deconstructionist piece like Unforgiven.

Spy games tend to have a lone or small group of folks fighting the bad guys. It’s spy-fi like 24, or James Bond or MI5, not espionage fiction like LeCarre (which would make for a dreadful full game) or The Sandbaggers. The characters are supposed to get tashed up, hurt, have setbacks, but ultimately you stop the master plot, get the bad guy in a big raid of their volcano base, or (unless it is that unfortunate string of ’90s movies) you stop the bomb. Maybe you get killed, but it’s at an appropriate time. “Aren’t you dead yet?” “Almost, Starchild…”

In a sci-fi universe like Star Wars, however, heroes should do very well. Fate, for instance, is an excellent system for Star Trek or Star Wars precisely because the convention of that setting is heroes don’t die…they get beat up, the might lose a hand, they might have cheated or tricked their way out of death, but unless the actor thinks they’ve got a shot at a movie career, they’ll be there next week. Random character death here is not appropriate to the genre. That’s why you knew Groot was going to be okay. It’s why Lando was going to get Millennium Falcon out of the exploding Death Star, and why fire and explosions only travel linearly and as fast as the hero can run/drive/fly. It’s the in joke that must be told, even though we all know it’s crap.

It was interesting she brought up Doctor Who — the main companions always do alright. They don’t die. They might get abandoned here or there, left in an alternate reality, retire to Sussex; they don’t die. The Doctor dies(ish.) And everybody else around them — especially since the Eccleston run — have a good chance of corking it…but the companion? Nope. Their challenge is coping with all the horrible stuff that happens around them.

So how does this all fit into your game campaign? Hopefully, the players have talked about what they expect from the new campaign, and everyone has bought it on the conventions — is it grand space opera? We know what we should be getting? Is it a post-apocalyptic cars-and-deserts game? We know we might bite it. Horror — have a backup character?

Knowing the conventions of the setting you chose is important not just to setting expectations, but will help with the mechanics you use. (No, GURPS is not the only game you’ll ever need…) Fate is great for those settings where the challenge is overcoming rarely-fatal obstacles (superheroes, Star Trek/Wars, . Cortex and Ubiquity are a nice middle ground systems that have death built in, but also mechanics for avoiding death (until appropriate.) Dungeons & Dragons or d20 — at least at lower levels, is a great game for “oops! You died” games.

Match the system to the setting, and the play style to the expectations, and you’re halfway to an enjoyable game or campaign.

Wired has a nice article of the High Energy Laser Mobile Demonstrator (HEL MD) by Boeing being developed for the Army. The system will eventually run a 50-60kW energy weapon, rather than the 10kW here. And controlled with an XBox controller…soon your fat game kid might be able to join the military and shoot stuff from your basement.

Click for video.

I’ll be participating in the Distinguished Gentleman’s Ride in Albuquerque on September 28th. The proceeds are going to prostate research. Photo to follow.

If I get up to $250, I’m riding the event in my kilt. That’s right, I’m risking burning my knees on the heads of my Triumph for your entertainment and SCIENCE!

There will be photographic evidence posted, so pop over to my DGR HOME PAGE or cut and paste this into your googlamatic whatsinator — http://www.gentlemansride.com/rider/BlackCampbell — and give generously. Or stingy-like!