The Black Campbell

It’s pretty much always in the background in modern life, and a lot of people might turn to games to avoid it, but politics is a setting element that can greatly enhance your game’s flavor.

There are a few obvious genres and settings where politics is almost a necessity: Star Wars campaigns set during the Clone Wars is one that leaps immediately to mind, or any modern-day espionage or law enforcement game.  But political intrigue and machinations show up in Stargate, in Star Trek (and if you don’t look at the Federation as a monocultural bloc, can make for a very interesting story arc), as well as in historical settings.

Politics doesn’t just provide plots for the GM, but can give characters motivation.  An anarchist in a Victorian-period setting would have certain beliefs and goals, and this would lead to actions that could spawn adventures…is he honked off at the Austrian aristocracy?  the British empire?  Capitalists?  What would he do to make the world a better place:  is he a still on his ass and write manifesto type like Mazzini?  Or is he a throw the Austrians out of Italy type like Garibaldi?  Or is he the crazed lone gunman looking for a few minutes of fame by knifing a defenseless Empress Elizabeth of Austria?

Even those motives and actions could change over time — an anarchist from the late 19th Century is a lot different than one from the 18th Century, who is less likely to be a violent ideologue, and more of a Thoreau-esque man of letters, looking to avoid the entanglements of “modern” life or a woodman, exploring the wilderness of the Americas and trying to stay ahead of civilization.

As bad as the Star Wars prequels were, they did show that people can have a multiplicity of viewpoints on politics — how a government should be run, what it should do, and what the role of the individual is.  Westerns often had cowboys pitted against the robber baron or the grasping politician…but is that politician really just out for himself?  Perhaps, he honestly wants to create an oasis of civilization in the midst of the wild, and to do that, he needs to control adventurous, individualistic young men like your characters.  Or needs to hire guns like your players to help him in his quest to bring order to the chaos of the West.

Modern espionage campaigns should see politics as intrinsic to the missions they are on.  The characters are most likely working for a specific agency (or corporation, if it’s a cyberpunk-inspired campaign) and there is an institutional character to their agency, there are allegiances and antagonists in other agencies that you are friendly with.  Sometimes, for expediency, those friendlies might see it as advantageous to work against your group, and could provide a foil that is as simple as not getting your intel you need in time, to sending out a burn notice, to sending out another team to stop you forcedly.  (How many times has Jack Bauer’s own people tried to do him in?) There’s the motivations of the people that you are spying on, recruiting, or running as assets — these are tied up in their beliefs, and they are pressure points for the characters to influence their allies and enemies.

For medieval or fantasy settings, politics and the machinations of nations provides a more nuanced and interesting campaign for the players than an endless series of dungeon crawls.  The players can be real movers and shakers in these universes.  It gives the players something to shoot for beyond getting the next cool magic item or weapon.

Characters, like players or people in general, could find that their friendships and allegiances change as their politics beliefs collide.  An autocratic-leaning character like Anakin Skywalker is bound to run into trouble with a democrat like Obi-Wan Kenobi not just because it’s being pushed down your throat by a bad screenwriter who has written a couple of punks, but because their visions of society are radically different.  they work together, but their animosity grows as they find themselves diverging on what they believe, and how much they can trust each other.

Nothing says you have to go Star Trek on your players and hit them with a thinly-veiled allegory for [insert social issue here] each game session.  But adding a fleshed out political system, series of entities, and politically-driven conflicts can certainly help your campaigns, no matter the setting.

It’s been terribly busy this month, between getting the new house ready and moving, and getting things set for my next hurdle in the dissertation nonsense, but things are starting to calm down and I can finally punch out a few posts on ideas that have been churning about for the last few weeks.

There should be a couple of Setting the Scene posts on the use of religion, politics, and other hot topics in your campaigns.  I’m hoping to have a few ideas to post on the Serenity / Firefly and Battlestar Galactica settings ready to go soon, as well.