Why do we do it?

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

So, why do we play rpgs? Why do we gm rpgs? Or larps or pbems, if you prefer?

I'm not asking for abstract reasons. I'm asking for up to 10 moments in an rpg -- or larp or pbem, if you prefer -- that you point to and say, "That. That's why."

Comments

[mneme]

1. In Cthuhlupunk, The Firemaker vs Glacki stories.
2. Quetly storming out of a room in the Arisia Mad Scientists game.
3. In Altclair, The Michael story where he retrieved Delilah's soul.
4. In Cthulhupunk, The moment when I realized that Firemaker was going to go back in time for Margeret -- that someone who had made a marriage as a joke had fallen for his own lies -- and been transformed.
5. Everway: The end of the Celestial Mechanic, with Eugene's character taking on a divine mantle. And realizing in the aftermath of that game that I had a new replayable character if I wanted to work those events into Many Questions' future history.
6. The finale of the "Dragons" Everway adventure run by imogena -- with Manifold (the renamed Many Questions) showing off her transformative magical abilities by freeing the prisoners, a winged maiden and a dragon.
7. Playing John Steed in the Airship LARP. Playing a secret agent in disguise was cool -- falling for my opposite number and realizing that I was disguised as this world's "Clark Kent" was even cooler.
8. Hub, Slipping into Jealousy Jones in her first fight scene, and realing it was going to more or less fulfil my imaginings for the character.
9. Altclair: Michael fighting Michael for an exception to the bigamy prohibition.
10. Running Everway, the finale of the Deliveror plot, complete with the dirigible reveal.

Those? Yeah, those.

[jl8e]

I'd have to say I don't play for the moments. That said, here are some of them, in roughly chronological order:

Sorcerer: The Andreas-Leonardo scene, from "...and he heals!" straight through the demon summoning.

Circus LARP: watching my "brilliant" plan come crashing down around my ears, and then not even being able to successfully burn down the circus out of spite.

GURPS Supers: the "oh shit!" moment when my players put two and two together and figured out what the bad guys they were infiltrating were planning to do.

GURPS Supers: in the process of running about like chickens with their heads cut off in the wake of the above realization, one player deciding to rescue the bad guys' supposed resident precognitive, who was forced to spend most of her time in a drug-induced trance.

...and who was actually the home body of the bad guys' Extremely Evil, Extremely Powerful, Telepathic Enforcer, who just preferred to spend most of her time wandering around as an astral projection.

Then, not knowing any of this, the player seized upon a minor point of my world background, and had his character, a super-gadgeteer, build something to protect the two of them from said EE,EP,TE, effectively neutering the character entirely by accident.

Stellae Cognitae: Surprising not only the GM, but also myself to a degree, when my character embraced the transformation that he was probably undergoing. Not because he wanted it. (He didn't.) Not because he needed it, but just to get the question settled once and for all.

GURPS Horror(ish): Old Man Marley, who I am totally going to steal and play if you guys ever do a third Mad Scientist LARP.

D&D, Keep on the Borderlands: My first session of any RPG ever. Also the first session ever for the GM and the other players. I was eight. We ride into town, get the mission, and go exploring. One of us gets killed by spiders. We make camp for the night. And get utterly slaughtered by lizard men. I don't even recall if we killed any of them. Doesn't sound like a lot of fun, but I was well and firmly hooked.

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

I should do this as well. In no particular order:

1. Player moment: When Josh ran an adventure I'd helped him design, in a plotthread he designed for my PC without telling me, so I could be surprised, my Malkavian vampire was temporarily relieving Atlas of the weight of the world. As the weight became a problem, I said that she took her sword and mimed using it to pin myself against a big tree. The look on Josh's face was great. The general idea of my Malkavian, who already was trying to do her bit for Gaia, having something of a religious experience by bearing the weight of the world for an hour and five minutes was tres cool.

2. GM Moment: The look on Matt's face when he and his PC, Jacob, learned that Jacob's girlfriend, Diane, had sprouted an extra pair of arms. I'd planned that two years earlier, and it was worth the wait.

3. GM Moment: Matt's portrayal of a bisexual pornomancer named Chuck. This was for a playtest of Unknown Armies. Chuck was the big man of the frat house, and he'd just given permission for another guy to sit in his chair for five minutes.

Guy: Wow, you really mean it?

Chuck: I'm timing you.

4. GM Moment: Actually tempting Avram, not just his PC, Harry, with an alternate world in Cthulhupunk where a lot of things were not so good -- but one of Harry's enemies, Kenerake, was dead.

Avram: Kenerake dead, you say? Is this such a bad world? Do we have to restore the timeline?

Lisa: Well, Alan will die if you don't.

Avram: Hm, who's Alan again? Do we like him?

5. GM Moment: Collapsing over the arm of the chair in the Follow the Bouncing Love Potion episode of Cthulhupunk because I was laughing so hard. I hadn't planned the hijinks that ensued.

6. GM Larp Moment: After burning out on game prep and monstering out at Game Intro, hearing Beth, picking up on a subtle touch we put into the character sheets. Her PC's last name was Montmarte, and that last syllable is pronounced TAY! The idea was that everyone would pronounce it wrong. The game started, and about a minute later, I heard Beth shout, indignantly, "That's Montmar-TAY!" I gave my co-gms a thumbs-up, and clicked into floor GM mode.

7. Player moment: When Josh was GMing the Altclair Antho-Classics Department War, and my character, Justin, was trying to get a peace treaty signed in the middle of, um, the god of that particular war personified doing its best not to get killed by having the war end. While the god was distracted, I did a quick double finger snap and pointed, which was Justin signalling "Get those people to sign that". It was the fact that gesture came naturally out of the immersion and mindset.

8. Player moment: In Erik Hanson's Ars Mystica game, my PC, Roggerio, said that he had to go pray for forgiveness for his sins. Rachael Tang, playing Bella, who didn't have the foggiest idea of his past, in or out of character, said, "My dear, what have you done?" Roggerio, who had done quite a bit, gave a strangled cry and ran for the chapel.

9. Player moment: In Ars Mystica, when Roggerio's former fellows, Diabolists, showed up in the sidhe realms where the PCs were trapped, and proved likewise trapped, Roggerio read them the riot act for agreeing to the condition that trapped them there, wearing a badge of allegiance to someone. Diabolists don't do that!

Roggerio (winding down): Has Renier taught you nothing?

Antonio (a diabolist): Apparently not as much as he taught you.

10. Player moment: When Naomi was playing Jennifer in her Altclair game, Justin saying to her, on the phone, "It's Thorne -- I mean Justin -- I mean -- it's me." Again, this is because of the immersion factor. I wasn't just saying the words; they were the only words in my head -- I was thinking them. It was also a nifty bit of Justin getting confused about which of his various social masks he should wear.

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

Wow. I had to cut my comment on my comment on my 'blog. Guess what? There's a maximum comment length of 4300 for lj. Here's the rest.

Man, limiting it to 10 is hard, especially if one GMs vs plays. I could easily pick as many more, for playing, gming, and larping as a separate category. Tomorrow, my answers might be different.

I was tempted to say, "Michael Miller's Weekend at Bernius -- all of it", which mnemex thought instructive because it points out the flaw in the question I ask. There were many good single moments, but the gestalt was grand. We were all older, fairly serious gamers in the sense of being serious about play, and about half of us had played together a year ago, in another of Michael's FVLMINATA games. And the name tags and the way they kept getting moved around were just delicious.

[jl8e]

I was cheating in that way for the "Old Man Marley" one, since he was a PC in a more-or-less semester-long game.

But damn, he was a work of genius.

Why we do it

[selki.livejournal.com]

1) Realizing from a player's portrayal (not being told) that his char could only talk in one-syllable words
2) Boggling the GM (e.g., after we'd killed a bunch of henchmen and were about to fight the big bad guy, our Machiavellian char said to BBG, "You appear to have a staff shortage. Let me tell you about our rates.")
3) One of the players threatening me after he'd realized he'd been humming a song I (my bard) had made up, weeks later.
4) My bard's use of a low-level prestidigitation spell to clean a horrid filthy scrap of cloth (ichor, ooze, etc.) my group was overlooking, and it turned it to be a cloak of protection. Group now refers naturally to my cloak of fashion merchandizing and protection, and to my dry-cleaning spell.
5) Teamwork during combat clobbering enemy in ways our GM had not forseen.
6) After our showy paladin's attempt to bless a dark cursed temple failed, my bard cast the dry-cleaning spell offhandedly on the altar on the way out -- no more effect from former blood sacrifices, atmosphere much lightened. Still waiting for the other shoe to drop (on my bard) from that one.
7) Application of filking to come up with lyrics for my bard (and to amuse/impress my fellow players and GM).

Re: Why we do it

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

#3 is very cool. #5 happens a lot. Players should come up with things that the GM hasn't thought of, and, for the most part, the GM should probably let these things work (where "work" can also mean "have a chance of working").