Quote from: Dumarest;984816So you've read works by the vast majority of gamers,  have you?

Getting together to play a game sounds like fun. Getting together to "tell a story" and "explore deeper themes" sound like a bad assignment in Creative Writing 101 taught by Professor Failedwriter.

Well, I've read a lot of published rpg material.  some of it is quite good...as rpg material.  I haven't read a lot that I'd say got very close to a good novel.  But I don't mean to be critical of rpg writing.  I'm only suggesting that trying to "go deep" with the story-telling in RPGs requires a higher order of ability from a GM...and from the players too.  In my admittedly limited experience, the GMs who feel they want to do stuff that hits on more complex themes often seem to over-estimate their own abilities to accomplish the task.  I certainly agree though that you can do almost everything with any number of sci-if games that already exist if you are inclined to do so.  In fact I think it's a great idea to throw in the occasional adventure or challenge that doesn't revolve around action and combat.  Variety is good.  I just think an entire campaign based on say 2001 a Space Odyssey would get old pretty quick.

Quote from: Itachi;984772I've experienced three very interesting sci-fi works in the last year. Black Mirror (tv series), Arrival (the movie) and SOMA (the videogame). And looking to the genre in the tabletop environment, it occurred to me there is no way this medium can translate in an effective manner the kind of experiences those works provide.

Then I tried to come up with an reasoning. Why is that? Well, I think a good sci-fi work is one that has the changing of humanity through technology in the center of the story. Black Mirror does it. Arrival does it. SOMA does it. And no RPG I've seen does it. What sci-fi RPGs they do is have sci-fi as a veneer, or coat of paint, for stories or situations mostly about action and combat. Perhaps the best shot the medium had at depicting the kind of (actual) sci-fi seen in the aforementioned works is the game Shock: Social Science Fiction. But honestly, it's a gaming style so far from usual RPGs that I dont know if have the interest to try it.  

So, thoughts? Are there genres the tabletop medium can't really do? If so, should we accept this fact and move on, or is worth trying to find a way to do it?

RPGs are not novels, movies or tv shows. They work in a different way.  That said, I think you are confusing the mechanics for the medium.  I don't need mechanics beyond classic Traveller to Black Mirror.  What I need is a GM and players who want to do Black Mirror.

In short it is not Sci Fi RPGs that suck, but rather Sci Fi RPG gamers.  The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in our stars, but in our selves.

Quote from: Voros;984809I don''t think all RPGs are only good for action/adventure. That is more a reflection of nerdculture's tastes than what you can and cannot do with any RPG system.

What games break this paradigm in your opinion?

Quote from: DavetheLost;984867RPGs are not novels, movies or tv shows. They work in a different way.  That said, I think you are confusing the mechanics for the medium.  I don't need mechanics beyond classic Traveller to Black Mirror.  What I need is a GM and players who want to do Black Mirror.

By this logic we could discard role-playing games altogether. In other words you agree with my original supposition that RPGs are only useful to facilitate stories involving action/adventure and nothing else. If that's the case, fine.

Is that really the case, though?

Quote from: Zevious Zoquis;984813Sadly, the vast majority of gamers are not actually very good writers and while they might like the idea of exploring deeper themes, they don't actually have the creative chops to pull it off in any non-lame manner.

I ain't sure good writing skills is the answer. I think the ideal way to tackle the genre is to make a solution that speaks to the medium strengths, that is, something interactive, dynamic and that could be engaged as a group in an interesting manner. Don't really know if here is a viable wa to do it, though.

Quote from: Itachi;984882I ain't sure good writing skills is the answer. I think the ideal way to tackle the genre is to make a solution that speaks to the medium strengths, that is, something interactive, dynamic and that could be engaged as a group in an interesting manner. Don't really know if here is a viable wa to do it, though.

I am following an old school Classic Traveller pbp right now and I see very little "action" and a ton of roleplay and it comes across very much like a face to face game except a lot slower. I don't see the problem to be with the game at all, it is entirely what the ref and the players want to do.

I was skeptical of the skills when I first started following the game, but they are not in your face and the bad part about skills is mitigated by some of the players having the skill Jack of all Trades.

Quote from: Itachi;984879By this logic we could discard role-playing games altogether. In other words you agree with my original supposition that RPGs are only useful to facilitate stories involving action/adventure and nothing else. If that's the case, fine.

Is that really the case, though?

Yeah, that's largely the case.


But go ahead and describe for us just what sort of game mechanics it is that you are looking for to do whatever it is you want to do, that don't essentially come back to action/adventure.  What is it that you envision a group of players doing in your game for extended periods of time that doesn't come back to action/adventure?

Quote from: Itachi;984877What games break this paradigm in your opinion?

GURPS: Transhuman Space is a setting that allows for some action/adventure (you can be a military person in one of the conflict zones, or a cop anywhere, etc.), but the big issues/ political events/social changes/etc. going on are well outside of the scope of "can be solved with violence."

Quote from: Itachi;984882I ain't sure good writing skills is the answer.

This was deliberate, right?

I don't know if the Sci-Fi RPGs "suck" so much that the modules seem very target to specific interests.

I've recently been looking for modules to adapt for our science-fiction campaign using my homebrew rules. What I found is that most sci-fi modules are "empty" exploration modules.

The exploration is usually lots of "empty" rooms with little combat, often concentrated on one or two rooms. Some exploration adventures are mostly empty areas with generally unconnected animals found wandering about.

This works great if you have the time and desire to populate the empty modules. (I know the Classic Traveller modules are supposed to be done this way, so it isn't a fault of those modules. But a lot of later adventures seem to have been written the same way, as complete modules, without realizing the CT modules were frameworks to be fleshed out.)

My players like having intelligent dungeon denizens to deal with. B1 I populated with feuding orcs and goblins, with trolls and "death lizards" downstairs. My players are really interested in seeing if the goblin princess and the orc prince hook up and bring peace to their tribes.

I ended up switching the game to sci-fi/steampunk (without travel between planets) and simply adapt fantasy modules. Based on our fantasy game, this should end up working pretty well. We play Sundays, with the first Sunday of the month being the sci-fi game. The fantasy game has been running through B1 In Search of the Unknown for several months, and they've just now reached the second floor. So I expect to be set for quite some time with the B2 setup for fantasy and coincidentally enough the BFRPG JNI1 which I didn't realize at first is based on B2, but different enough that I think the players may not even notice.

I go through the PDFs on my tablet with Xodo and redo hitpoints and weapons and levels or HD into my homebrew system. I also come up with personalities for the members of the tribe/groups and for the group leaders, and add some notes for how the groups interact currently. I also throw in a couple groups with mecha and/or other vehicles, so we can exercise those rules and equipment.

Quote from: Zevious Zoquis;984864Well, I've read a lot of published rpg material.  some of it is quite good...as rpg material.  I haven't read a lot that I'd say got very close to a good novel.  But I don't mean to be critical of rpg writing.  I'm only suggesting that trying to "go deep" with the story-telling in RPGs requires a higher order of ability from a GM...and from the players too.  In my admittedly limited experience, the GMs who feel they want to do stuff that hits on more complex themes often seem to over-estimate their own abilities to accomplish the task.  I certainly agree though that you can do almost everything with any number of sci-if games that already exist if you are inclined to do so.  In fact I think it's a great idea to throw in the occasional adventure or challenge that doesn't revolve around action and combat.  Variety is good.  I just think an entire campaign based on say 2001 a Space Odyssey would get old pretty quick.

I see you've confused "gamers" with "RPG writers" in your earlier post then. But writing what is essentially a technical manual is nothing at all like writing speculative fiction,  so you can hardly judge their fiction  abilities based on a rulebook.

Quote from: Zevious Zoquis;984889Yeah, that's largely the case.


But go ahead and describe for us just what sort of game mechanics it is that you are looking for to do whatever it is you want to do, that don't essentially come back to action/adventure.  What is it that you envision a group of players doing in your game for extended periods of time that doesn't come back to action/adventure?

I don't  need rules to resolve a bunch of people sitting around talking...I need rules to resolve action-adventure...

Quote from: Dumarest;984904I don't  need rules to resolve a bunch of people sitting around talking...I need rules to resolve action-adventure...

Yeah, I agree.  Pretty much the point I've been trying to make...

Quote from: Dumarest;984903I see you've confused "gamers" with "RPG writers" in your earlier post then. But writing what is essentially a technical manual is nothing at all like writing speculative fiction,  so you can hardly judge their fiction  abilities based on a rulebook.

Well I'm talking more about setting material really since that's really where the problems would be.  Basically, I don't think a rule book is really needed to do what the op wants to do.

Quote from: DavetheLost;984867RPGs are not novels, movies or tv shows. They work in a different way.  That said, I think you are confusing the mechanics for the medium.  I don't need mechanics beyond classic Traveller to Black Mirror.  What I need is a GM and players who want to do Black Mirror.

In short it is not Sci Fi RPGs that suck, but rather Sci Fi RPG gamers.  The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in our stars, but in our selves.

The way I view is that RPGs are good at throwing the players into situation and seeing what happens. So if one wants to do a campaign based around the Arrival then the referee needs to create a situation similar where the Arrival starts out at. Then it has to be fun and interesting enough so that the players want to deal with what is happening. And that always been the trick. The episodes of the Black Mirror, the Arrival, etc all depict very specific situations so the odds are not good that an arbitrary group of hobbyist want to experience it to see how they do.

So you are right in a sense that it is the SF Gamers fault.

What I recommend is read and watch as much as you can, and use things like Arrival and Black Arrival as template for something more unique that more tailored to the group's interest. That would have a better chance of success.

The developers are obnoxious ideologues who can't run a forum like thinking adults, but what about Eclipse Phase?