ROLEPLAYING GAMES

 

What are Role-Playing Games (RPGs)

Roleplaying games can be viewed as a theater play. There are characters, each one played by individuals that act and think like their character in order to bring them to life. There is a script, where the main plot and the storyline is carefully built. There is the writer, who knows the wherabouts of the plot, the characters that are to be the nemesis of the main characters, the events that become turning points or give climax to a story... And there is a setting, a background, a visual display that anchors the time and place and ambience of the play. Well... Roleplaying games have characters, some are played by the players (threfore called PC's, player characters) and some played by the storyteller (therefore called non-player characters, or NPC's). The storyteller is a writer, and he keeps a storyline or script. He also provides the setting through mental pictures and descriptions. The only difference between a play and rpg's is that in a play we know the outcome of a character's action. In roleplaying games, each character is controlled by its player. The storyteller reacts and molds the storyline to those actions, and decides in a neutral fashion the outcome of the events through the roll of dice. The process is neverending, a character is viewed as a living person and his/her adventures keep going until he/she decides to retire, or gets killed. Roleplaying games give the players a chance to be someone else in a foreign time, develops creativity and multitasking skills, and is a lifestyle in itself.

"As the warrioress stumbled upon the dark wooden coffin, mist appeared from underneath, covering her feet at first, then slowly crawling around her body until it started to reach her torso. The warrioress garped. The mist had a crimson tint over it, and although her whole body was covered by leather, her upper arms were naked. She started to feel as if small ants were crawling underneath her skin, and she noticed in horror how her arm started to become paler by the second while the mist that kept on going upwards became tinted by droplets of blood."

"The mist keep rising, almost reaching your face, what are you going to do?"

This is an example of what a dungeon master would say to a player who has a priestess character that has just stumbled into the tomb of a very special type of undead… The player has only seconds to react to this event, and the dungeon master will let him know when he should say what the character (PC for player character) would do.

The dungeon master has no power over the actions of a player, only power over the environment and every event of the story that he created. The player behaves as if being part of a theatre play, only that he controls the charcater's will and behaviors. At the end of a story, almost as a sketch of a play, experience is awarded to the character to increase (or decrease in some cases) his abilities. Thanks to he power of imagination and make-believe, you can be any creature, from a spellsinger to a half-orc priest of Sune. The sky is the limit.

The RPG's described here belongs to the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd ed. line from TSR (now Wizards of the Coast). There are many worlds in the AD&D game, such as Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, Dragonlance, Dark-Sun, Ravenloft, Planescape and Spelljammer. My idea of the perfect game setting is Spelljammer, since it deals with the entire universe, in which diverse spheres (planets) go on with their on life… Each sphere belongs to a different world (Toril is the sphere of Forgotten Realms, Shadowspace is the sphere of the Ravenloft negative plane, Dragonspace the sphere belonging to Dragonlance, Greyspace belongs to Greyhawk, etc.). In other words, Spelljammer is a campaign in which you can be in any of the other worlds, or in completely new worlds, therefore there are no limits to adventures and possibilities. Nevertheless, here is a brief description of each world and it's highlights.

RPG Blast: The pictures

Here are some old pics of my favorite AD&D players and games

Zordak the Mage gets ready to face the Falcon!	Captain Blaze Darkstream challenges an oponent
Groundel the Ugly reacts towards some travestite trolls

Favorite RPG novels

I am an avid Forgotten Realms and Ravenloft reader, these are my favorite worlds.

The following is a list of my favorite rpg novels...

Where to find more information about RPG's

Wizards

White Wolf Company

E-bay (getting good deals on RPG books)