Erratica Reduex

Golden Sky Stories: Actual Play, "The Little Shrine in the Forest"

"Not that I care or whatever, but this is the story about me, the most important character in the story, and how I, OK, with the help of some other animal spirits, saved the world- make that a town- OK, a strawberry patch. And made a young girl's life better. Not that that's important to me you see. Because I'm a cat. And I just do what I want, just because." Mako, the black cat

This last weekend, at a small "Not going to Pacificon or Celesticon" NonCon, A one-off game of Golden Sky Stories happened, with five players who had never played GSS before, and a GM who had hadn't run a game in years.. This is the story of what happened, as related by Mako. The Most Important Character in the Game.

Golden Sky Stories is a game rather different from other role playing games. Rather than wandering dungeons, slaying monsters or the like, the players take the role f minor animal spirits who help the people in a small rural town in Japan. They help with minor crises, that are still quite important to the people involved. This is best described as a slice-of-life supernatural story, in the vein of Japanese anime such as Natsumi's Book of Friends, Totoro, Kamichu, Pon Poko, and Gingitsune. The emphasis is not on violence, but on solving minor problems in a heartwarming fashion.

( Part 1: Character Creation )

Next: the first Scene! Rivalries will be enacted! Shrimp and strawberries will be eaten! Rocks will be thrown!

Warning: this post contains a lot of triggering concepts, such as rape.

RPG writer James Desborough has caused a controversy that brings up issues of sexism, gaming culture, and censorship. Desborough, author of works such as The Slayers Guide to Female Gamers (review here), Nymphology (review here), and The-Quintessential-Temptress, posted a blog entry titled "In Defense of Rape" (NSFW edited blog here) where he contended that rape was an excellent plot device. In response, Malyn Cooper first asked game companies such as Mongoose and Steve Jackson games to stop publishing Desborough's work, then started a petition drive on Change.com (altered petition here).


( Cut due to length and content )


That's the controversy in a nutshell. As to what I think?

James Desborough to me obviously covers a high degree of misogyny under a cover of satire, and he has an unhealthy fascination with rape. But is that a reason to censor him?

Well, no. And what's happening is not censorship. Even as writers like James Desborough have a right to write whatever they want, customers have a right to complain, and a right to pressure companies through words and collective purchasing power. Those who support Desborough on the basis of defending against censorship are misguided.

More importantly both Desborough's work and the ongoing rape threats against Malyn Cooper points out that the problem with sexism in rpgs is even worse than it commonly is thought to be. For a long time depictions of women in artwork has been problematic, and there['s been an attitude that rape and sexual assault in rpgs is either juvenile fun or a plot device. This attitude in my view is strongly inimical toward women being comfortable around gamers, not to mention the role playing hobby as a whole. Worse, it trivializes rape as a concept, making it easier for rapists and sexual harassers to operate.

If anything good can come out of this, at least this dialogue is being held, and there are people willing at least to take a stand. It's discouraging to see how many people are supporting Desborough, especially those who minimize the misogynistic elements of his work. But the fact that people are at least willing to complain is a sign of miniscule progress. Changing the culture is an excruciatingly slow task, one where there will be a lot of resistance. But if we really want to get to the point where gaming culture and the culture at large find rape and sexual harassment unacceptable, then things such as the Desborough controversy are necessary.

Sometimes mash-ups are brilliantly funny, and sometimes they are incredibly stupid. And sometimes they are both at the same time,


Case in point:


Ponycraft II: ( The Starcraft II trailer...with ponies.  )



( And for a special bonus... )

Comes from my continual mishearing of a name. It sounded something like this:

"The Camorra family is on good terms with the Gandalf, but the Runorata are fighting them for control over the area."

So the idea is Middle Earth, where the Mages are immortal alchemists, and they've divided the world up into competing crime families, ala Baccano. It would be a wild tangle between Mafioso assassins, explosive-tossing street gangs, shadowy information brokers, and immortals. And of course the most accomplished and ruthless alchemists of all have their armies of homonculi that are only seen in the shadows, but are still known as elves and orcs...

Behind the pastoral background, shadowy figures make deals and go to war. Because a life of crime CAN go on forever.

So with the recent release of the 2nd. edition of the Mongoose Runequest rules, the question arose about which was the best version of Runequest. I was amazed at how many people favored Runequest III (Mythic Earth- ick!) Or MRQ II (I guess I'll have to have a look at it). Things do change, I guess. As for me...

For me, the best version of Runequest is always going to be the version I started playing over 25 years ago: Runequest 2nd. It had chargen that was simple and straightforward without adding up fiddly percentages, and included enough examples of extended experience that player could create their own previous experience templates. Likewise the rules for combat, encumberance and magic were simple and straightforward, a quality later editions lost. The basic set gave one enough world to build on, without overly constraining the GM or players. And if one wanted more cultural info, the supplements were wonderful. Sure you could still see bits and pieces where Runequest was derived from D&D, but at the time it was the go-to game for people who wanted things like a skill system, flexible character advancement, gritty combat and hit locations, all that stuff.

Best of all, the modularity of BRP let us combine stuff from other Chaosium games as they came out to make a melange that would make game world purists cry: Superworld? Yay! Japanese schooolgirls with superpowers invade Glorantha! Ringworld? Yay! There's a colony of prehistoric Kzinti on Glorantha! Call of Cthulhu? Yay! My Kzinti schoolgirl Rune Priestess tries to bind Cthulhu!

Oh yeah, we were young and didn't know any better, we were the original "Plug and Play" generation, and we made Rifts look well thought out. What we lacked in professionalism or literary merit we made up with in enthusiasm. Good times, good times.

In a recent discussion thread the question was brought up: visualize a modern world where D&D magic was developed in the middle ages. After considering what D&D magic is capable of, my personal view is that it would resemble nothing like either our world or the standard D&D world. For example, consider the effects of:


1431: Roun France
Joan of Arc: "You. Are going to burn. Me. Me. Do you want fire? Here's some fire- FIRE STORM! And while we're at it (summon) Talk to the Arcon about God and heresy."

(High level clerical spells and summonings could easily start, or end a crusade, and have really strange effects on religion.)


1512: Italy
Machiavelli: (hand gesture) "You will stop supporting the Medici's attack against Florence."
Pope Julius II: "I will stop supporting the Medici's attack against Florence."
Machiavelli: (hand gesture) "You will appoint me as your personal adviser."
Pope Julius II: "I will appoint you as my personal adviser."

(The effects of Dominate, Charm Person and similar spells can't be understated in completely warping he political state of the world. Just consider how many events in history could have been changed if a single ruler had decided other than he did.)


1540; Germany
Martin Luthor: "How DARE the Papists monopolize Healing Altars and Hero's Feasts for the wealthy! My Healing Altars and Hero's Feast Altars will serve everyone for free!"

(The ability to create magical devices will have the greatest effect on the world. It's possible in 3.X to create immobile chargeless at-will devices for spells up to True Resurrection. Sure they would be expensive, but the ability to bring back any deceased with no ill effect would massively change warfare, and the costs could be amortized over thousands of people. Similar devices for curing diseases could render plagues irrelevant, and at-will Heroes' Feasts devices could render most agriculture redundant.)


1505: Florence
Leonardo de Vinci: "And so we see by guiding the stream of water from the Decanter of Endless Water against the vanes of the screw, we have a source of motive power for pumps, cranes, carriages and an endless assortment of other devices. In fact, I am now working on a self-propelled balloon which will..."

(I've mentioned before that medieval and Renaissance engineers were very talented and ingenious in their own right, and their main limitations in construction were materials and power. Magic eliminates those restraints. Spells like Fabrication and Wall of Stone could revolutionize construction and engineering.)


In other words, very shortly the world will look nothing at all like history. We're talking about a Renaissance Singularity where the major limitations of the era are eliminated, and the political landscape subject to shifting at the whim of people with the right spells. And I think that considering what powerful magic could do to change pre-industrial Europe may be useful in thinking about creating unique fantasy worlds, and making them look more unique than a faux-medieval Europe.

So does anyone have any ideas of what bizarre things do you think could come out of a D&D/Historical Renaissance?

So it occurred to me the other day that it's been over 20 years since the Cold War ended. An entire generation has grown up not understanding the resonance of the terms we used for what we thought would be impending mutual Armageddon. And so it occurred to me that perhaps fantasy metaphor might help explain things to younger fantasy buffs in shorthand.

For instance, this picture  by Chris Curran could explain to gamers at least, the concept of Mutual Assured Destruction:




Yeah. I think this one has M.A.D. down.

In retrospect, the Under the Green Moon game last Saturday went pretty well, considering that a) I changed my mind about the scenario four days before the game, b) I lost a day to a computer virus and c) it was a party and there were a ton of distractions. It seems that people. Had fun, and the Heroquest system worked well, even though I forgot the rule book. I also didn't follow the recommended rules for increasing or decreasing difficulties according to the time in the game, and the final battle looked nothing like the rules in the book for extended contests. Oh well The only thing I regret is that the ending/denoument was rushed so that no proper explanation could be given. An epilogue needs to be written.

I did get some feedback from RacerxMachina, to the effect that I need to give myself more time to write the game, and that it would benefit from the sort of sandbox setting and player investment that comes from an extended campaign. Also, to get that investment, I need to write more. To all of which I agree completely. I myself was concerned about the game being linear- part of which comes from being a convention game.

She had another comment that took me by surprise, but which in retrospect makes sense: the UTGM games have been too focused on the past. It's been all about dealing with ancient wonders and threats, which overshadows the current age. Where, she wondered, were the new discoveries of the current cultures? What was going on in politics, art, and the like? They can't all be obsessed with the past, can they?

That's a valid concern. I confess I've been emphasizing "applied archaeology" both to emphasize some of the differences of the setting (being our far-future Earth), and because dealing with ancient artifacts, whether in a fetch and retrieve quest or a free-for-all McGuffin chase makes for a simple, obvious convention game. But she has a point- there is a lot that should be depicted as going on in the setting that has nothing to do with the past.

So my next project will be to do a list of some of the current events in the setting. That, and I need to get a map posted one of these days.

So does anyone have any additional comments, either on the game last Saturday, or in general?

Post from mobile portal m.livejournal.com

Over at the 20 Sided Women's Project, there is An Open Letter to the Gaming Industry, where a group of gamers make some complaints about how their gender is depicted and treated in the hobby. It's made a bit of a stir, here and there.

My thoughts? Things have improved in the last decade or so, but there is still huge room for improvement, especially in the way that women are depicted, both in game, and especially in art. The trope of "sexy useless female armor' for example, is pretty much a cliche, and has been for years.  And the discussions over this letter have revealed that there's still a large mix of misogyny and general cluelessness out there.

But what do you all think?