Review of Houses of the Blooded - RPGnet

A long time now I've been thinking about running a game of Houses of the blooded. In the meantime I have to settle for reading the review on rpg.net. It's long, well written and gives a good image about the game.

Review of Houses of the Blooded - RPGnet: "A bunch of sociopathic hedonists more fixated with image than substance."

Can RPG's be used for all genres?

Lately, one question has been nagging me more and more. What if not all genres are suitable for RPG's?

So far in life, I've been more or less convinced that most genres could be simulated in a roleplaying game, given a decent rules-set, good gm-ing and well written adventures. Now, I'm not that certain anymore...

For instance, the occasions where I really feel that I'm in an action packed session.. well, they are few and far between. Same thing goes for when I'm playing super hero games (which, admittedly, was a while ago). I don't have the same impact, the same geist as when I read the comics or watch the movies. Mind you, I'm not saying it's bad, just not the same.

So... maybe... When I run or play a roleplaying game.. maybe I shouldn't try to emulate genres from other media, but rather from rpg's themselves. Maybe the game in itself is unique enough! I don't need my super hero rpg be like the comics or the movies. Instead, the rules and the form gives other aspects, other experiences that are enjoyable. To find these, perhaps, I shouldn't look at other media, but instead look more closely at what I enjoy to play in a roleplaying game.

What a novel idea! ;-)

Icons! playtest review

Some Space to Think: Nerdy Saturday: "This weekend ended up having the right combination of scheduling openings to allow for a bit of pickup play, so I gathered some friends to try out some newly acquired games, one RPG and one board game."

These words is the beginning of a well written review of the new Icons! rpg. The sum of it all is that it's a fun game that has its' issues. Go read it, it seems to give a good impression of the game.

[CoC] Carl Sagan Helped Me Understand - RPGnet Forums

This is from a thread on RPGnet where the poster(s) talk about how to use Carl Sagans explanations of cosmos and the fourth dimension to get how the Cthulhu cosmology works. I think he is dead on with this!

[CoC] Carl Sagan Helped Me Understand - RPGnet Forums: "So, now I understand that many mythos monsters move through more than three dimensions, hence they would have a constant and terrifying undulation to their appearance, with different parts appearing, moving, and shifting in an unpredictable fashion, including occasionally going completely invisible. This also makes the Powder of Ibn Ghazi make more sense."

Superman and Batman - Relative attributes in RPG's

One of the classic tests whenever a new Super hero Roleplaying game arrives is if it can handle both Superman and Batman in the same scene.

The core problem is that if you give Superman stats that compares to what he can do in the comics, he will completely outshine Batman (who is still an ordinary human) without even trying.


This leaves the player playing Batman sitting at the table feeling that he can do nothing.

In the comics, they solve this in two ways. First, they can script so that the focus is on Batman a specific time (which "forces" Superman to be in the background), and second, they usually makes Superman slightly weaker/slower/dumber when he is around Batman (or the rest of the Justice League).
It's this last point that got me thinking:
Could you build a RPG where the abilities of a character is relative, and not absolute. When the player playing Superman is by himself, he has one set of abilities, but as soon as he works with others, he loses some of his abilities in favor of others. Same thing goes for Batman. By himself, he is a complete warrior, detective and inventor. When in a group, he moves towards being "just" the detective.

There are games that have done this (the Amber RPG comes to mind), but it's still not particulary common.

When the players create their characters, they don't do it one-by-one, but instead they together create the group as a whole. They choose the level of intelligence, the strength, the prowess etc. Then they have to distribute which character that best represents that particilar ability or attribute. When you play with your group, that character is connected to that ability trumps all other characters within that area.