HOME | DD
mindflenzing — RPG The Female Racial Power
Published: 2010-02-11 03:16:56 +0000 UTC; Views: 3037; Favourites: 32; Downloads: 32
Redirect to original
Description
R.P.G. (Ransack People's Gold) is the tale of four D&D/Star Wars/RPG players and their DM, who wishes he were a player. These intrepid players are, from left to right:Kenneth, the over-achieving, yet under appreciated DM.
Adam, the guy who has a theater background but needs a girlfriend.
Barry, the munchkin power-gamer with a bad case of arrested development.
Josh, the straight-laced guy who just wants to play the game.
Kassi, Josh's homicidally-minded younger cousin, whom he regrets inviting.
You've gotta love the ways gamers try to get bonuses. I've been the guy fishing for the +2 circumstantial bonus but there are limits to what you can get away with. I have no idea if this could be considered an even-handed treatment (since the guys are kinda jerks and the girl protested) or if it will be considered sexist (for even bringing the subject up). I suppose I'll know soon enough.
*Edit* it seems the lady gamers find this one funny.
Related content
Comments: 30
This reminds me of the ways that my friends and i try to get past guards so we dont have to fight them. We ask ourselves: What would we not stop even if we werent allowed to let anything through? The answer was obvious enough, so my character couldnt follow them... A stampede of 4 naked people consisting of a dwarf, an elf, and two halflings that have begun shouting at the cobblestone path for 30 seconds and then while the guards finally go to escort out of the city, the 8 ft. tall bone armored Snow Titan can just waltz on in. XD aaaahhh fun games, fun games...
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Its much funnier than what we usually do, which is have a changeling or somebody with a good disguise/bluff check makes a scene. Then again, Snow Titans are harder to sneak into cities than Tieflings or Drow.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
I get a bonus to intimidate every month, but all my roommates tend to disappear into their respective bed-holes until its gone.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
+2 Fear bonus to Stealth!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Thanks. This one has proven to be surprisingly popular with the lady gamers.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Oh really?
I love the art style on this! It looks cartoonish and realistic, all in 1!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Thanks. I tried to make the characters look like their personalities but a couple of them look a lot like the players of mine that I more or less modeled them after.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Awesome work XD This is the kind of thing I try to pull during our SW RPG sessions... tends not to work haha. It's work a shot though
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Well, one of the first rules of a home game is that you don't know what you can get away with unless you try.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I've tried everything in the book... my boyfriend's just really stubborn XD
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
At the end of the day, having a significant other DM not give you everything you want probably keeps the rest of the party off of the warpath. Some players get really touchy about having a "DM's pet" PC.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Very true. We used to play World of Darkness and didn't quite understand the system so my best friend, his girlfriend and myself used to get away with a lot more than we should have and it became tiresome after a while. The Star Wars system is a lot simpler and my boyfriend understands it having played it as a child so it would make it a lot harder to get away with random bonuses. However, by cheating you only cheat yourself and there are methods for temporary bonuses anyway so who needs to cheat? Hahah
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Besides, cheating is for the DM. I use John Wick's rules for GMing, namely:
Rule 1: There are no rules.
Rule 2: Cheat anyways.
I subtly change situations, tactics, etc during sessions and use the rule that anything the players have not seen does not exist to allow me to adjust the game to keep up the pace and keep the drama level appropriate. My players know that if a battle seems too easy early on that the other shoe is waiting to drop. But they also know that I don't generally try to kill them without a story reason.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Good system! I get chucked in to things left, right and center! But hey, it's fun all the same
My boyfriend's currently being used as a cushion and is asking whether you can provide him with any GMing tips? He says thanks in advance
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Here are a few tips:
1. Never give freebies. Unless you really know how the game mechanics work you run the risk of unbalancing the game and then you either have to take the freebie away or try to balance it out by altering the enemies, the first causes hurt feelings, and the second can make matters worse.
2. Bonuses with time limits. Anything you give the party that makes them better (and is not inherent in the game like magic items in D&D are) should be given with the understanding that they will lose it after some time period. This way if you give them access to a ship, a circumstantial bonus, storm trooper armor, whatever you know that if it does effect game balance, it will not be for long. By the same measure when you penalize players it should be for a limited time (just to keep things fair). By making short term adjustments you can test things and make sure you don't give to or take away from the party anything that you will have trouble correcting later.
3. Know your group. If they are creative thinkers with short attention spans you should be sparing with box-text and choreographed scenes and practice running off of an outline using improvisation and pre-generated NPCs, scenes, etc to allow you to go with the flow of the group. If they are hardcore munchkins, learn how to use tactics or specialization to give them a good fight, or if you aren't the tactical type, bump up the difficulty a touch and see how they handle it.
4. Along with #3, you should know yourself. Capitalize on your strengths as a DM and work around your weaknesses (unless you and your group are willing to let you try to work on them, which many older more busy groups aren't). If you can't invent, learn how to steal from movies, TV, books, etc and hide your tracks by blending elements from multiple sources and changing names. Remember that you will enjoy the stuff you are good at and if the DM ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.
5. Get buy in. If the players don't feel they have personal stakes in the story they won't care and you risk losing the campaign. Back stories and fates are good for tying characters into the story and if you can't get players to come up with those for you normally, see if there are small bribes you can give them to participate. Maybe a bit of bonus XP or gold will work, or the promise of extra XP for roleplaying their background well when it comes up. Perhaps even just giving them a fate bonus to rolls during their background scenes. It depends on the group and the game but involved characters make interested players.
6. Learn the art of yet... but. When the 7'5" dragon man rolls twice the hard difficulty number to intimidate the fanatical cultist he should get something, just not necessarily what he had hoped for. Maybe instead of surrendering, the NPC takes a surprise round to duck behind his altar and he now begins to concentrate fire on the dragon in subsequent rounds. Maybe when the bard talks so well with a functionary who really can't help the party out, he gives them some other useful information, becomes a contact, or helps the party to find a more useful NPC or course of action. If the party fails their checks wading through the swamp maybe they arrive to find their adversaries waiting for them, trenched in, or they arrive injured rather than failing to arrive.
7. Remember its a game for the DM too. Of course you play to have fun but as a DM, "you win some you lose some". Your worst sessions may not have been as bad to the players as you thought, and with practice and advice from other DMs you can continue to improve your skills and make more exciting sessions. If there is a bad session learn from it and move on, try something new, and focus on the stuff that you and the players enjoy.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Your advice is priceless! Thank you for all your help. If it's possible could I give you my email address so that if I need any more tips and tricks I could email you? This is because I don't have any GMs around me here. I would love to keep in contact, if that's okay with you?
Thanks again,
Steven
(I've just read over this too, and Steven's right. This advice is really, really good! - Vic)
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Yeah, if you want. But I'd suggest you send it as a private message so your email is not visible to spam bots.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Haha, we've actually discussed this in my group as well and it wasn't the guys who brought it up. Unfortunately it was dismissed as silliness and no bonuses were allowed... Though if I remember correctly we agreed that if we at some point had a pregnant char she would get bonus for that.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I have been told by fellow gamers that pregnant wife aggro is some of the worst to draw.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
If they judge it sexist they have no sense of humor. I really loled on this one.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I think that's the problem. Too many people have no sense of humor. But I'm glad you liked the comic. It's the kind of thing that players in an all guy group might try, though trying it in a mixed gender group is "bad form".
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
I'm now considering demanding bonuses for PMSing characters myself, but I'm not the best judge of whether people are going to consider something sexist or not.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
It may be worth trying a couple of times in a campaign.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0