I've mentioned my son before.  He's 10 years old and plays "D&D".  I use the ellipses because the game that he and his friends play is, from what I can gather, a wild-ass, freeform, munchkinised encounter therapy session that is, for all intents and purposes, diceless.  Frankly, it sounds like a blast.  I mention my son again because he knocked me for a loop just the other day.

He and his mates at school are all mad for the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series of novels.  The books seem to be a lot of fun, sort of an American Gods for the young set, and all the kids are looking forward to the upcoming movie.  So mad are they for these books that my son and his classmates have spontaneously developed a sort of freeform LARP based on the novels, where they all choose up divine parentage and one-up each other in demi-godly fashion.  After my son described how they play their game, I thought about it, then offered to help him develop a more structured RPG format that they could play.  He thought it sounded like a fantastic idea and was sure that his friends would love it.

So, as we began bashing out the basics, I proposed a character creation system where the players get to choose their divine ancestry from among several cultural pantheons, and then start with some basic powers and.... He cut me off there.  What fun is it, he asked rhetorically, if you know what you are from the start?  Instead, he suggested, characters should start our normal, with no powers, and only later discover who their divine ancestor was.  Furthermore, he insisted, the ancestor god should be determined randomly -- no good just picking your favorite; that's not how it was done in the book.  And you don't get powers right away, either; you earn those as you go up in "levels".

Like I stated above, he knocked me for a loop.  So accustomed have I become to players designing their characters to suit their tastes in wish fulfillment, I hadn't considered that a bunch of 5th graders might prefer a non-predetermined path of discovery.  So, that's the way we're taking it.

!i!

Children have more sense than all those basement-dwelling adults clutching their copies of GURPS and Hero protectively

Brother, this is one of the coolest stories I've heard in a long time. Try this with most adults and you get " you are deprotaganizing me...."

Regards,
David R

Not evryone is into randomization of character concepts, but hey, if some "players" want it that way, have fun!

Quote from: David R;358712Brother, this is one of the coolest stories I've heard in a long time. Try this with most adults and you get " you are deprotaganizing me...."

I think it's more a case of them trying to emulate an element of the setting than a desire for random character creation.

Seanchai

Quote from: Seanchai;358715I think it's more a case of them trying to emulate an element of the setting than a desire for random character creation.

Seanchai

Of course! The clearly expressed desire for random character creation was only a clever facade.

Quote from: Seanchai;358715I think it's more a case of them trying to emulate an element of the setting than a desire for random character creation.

Seanchai

Sure, but I admire the spirit of doing that. IME, this would not fly with most of the players in my past groups if we were emulating this kind of setting.

Regards,
David R

Are you saying randomized character creation is for kids?

Quote from: The_Shadow;358717Of course! The clearly expressed desire for random character creation was only a clever facade.

I haven't read the books, and I'll only go to the movie if someone drags me, but from all appearances Seanchai's on the money here.

Not that I'd argue it isn't fun to have random character stuff, but here whether it's fun or not, it sounds like the kid wants randomization because it emulates lack of knowledge. The idea is to put the player in the character's shoes.

Quote from: Elliot Wilen;358727Not that I'd argue it isn't fun to have random character stuff, but here whether it's fun or not, it sounds like the kid wants randomization because it emulates lack of knowledge. The idea is to put the player in the character's shoes.

Honestly, I think everyone's onto something here.

Part of the random character development is emulation of the adventures in the book.  Another part, though, is that this also represents the game, the element of chance in not knowing what cards you're going to be dealt so to speak.  I also think that the desire for randomised character creation does tend to appeal to kids more than adults, who I think want more control over the type of experience they're going to pursue in the game.

So, with regard to the game itself, I'm producing about 24 divine parentage cards, each with a god's name, the cultural pantheon, a brief mythical synopsis, and a short list of divine attributes.  The kids can all get together and draw the cards at random and keep them.  Later on, I'll produce cards for the attributes themselves, appropriate to each god chosen, and the kids can then draw those one at a time as the game develops.

!i!

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;358710Children have more sense than all those basement-dwelling adults clutching their copies of GURPS and Hero protectively

...and Kyle Aaron. Seriously, different strokes. I like the OP's story though.

Random char generation can be fun.  I know it's not for everyone, but I've never had a bad experience because of it.  Of course, even in point-buy, I'm not the type of guy to play Super McTwinks, but to each their own.

Quote from: The_Shadow;358717Of course! The clearly expressed desire for random character creation was only a clever facade.

"...that's not how it was done in the book." 'Nuff said.

Seanchai

But, as I stated in my last post, it's a bit of both. Definitely part genre emulation, but also part of the fun of gaming chance.

!i!

Quote from: Ian Absentia;358748But, as I stated in my last post, it's a bit of both. Definitely part genre emulation, but also part of the fun of gaming chance.

Have you read the books?

Seanchai