Hello Everyone,

Recently I found my homebrew rpg based on Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman. At the time I was very excited to run it, but my players were feeling nostalgic for CoC and I never turn down a chance to run CoC. So Neverwhere went into storage. That was back in 2003. Now looking at it, I've no desire to run it and I can't remember why I was so excited to run the setting in the first place.

This got me thinking. There are some settings that I'm really just not interested in exploring as a player or GM. Some of the ones that leave me cold are Star Wars, Star Trek, Lord of The Rings (been uninterested ever since MERP camp out), Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Dr. Who. The thing is, I can't really nail down why I'm so ambivalent about running them. I certainly enjoyed these fictions when they were first released.

On the other hand I have no problem running Stormbringer/Elric, Call of Cthulhu (technically falls into the category) and my homebrew of John Carter's Warlord of Mars.

So I was wondering if any other players/gms have games based on media that just don't interest them and perhaps why? Note, I'm not really interested in whether or not the game rules are good just if the settings themselves are uninteresting to you.

It is usually because you don't love the setting, you love the characters and the story. Once you are done with it, you are done.

I read about half of Neverwhere. I hated the odd couple god slayers or whatever the fuck they were. The whole book felt like bad Ravenloft GMing to me.

I take your meaning, after a fashion.

For me it's not always about the setting per se, but how open that setting is to further use in games. Like Babylon 5. I love that property and would love to run or play in that universe, but it's a self-contained, and finished, story. Sure, you could tack on another Babylon station, or RP through some of the actual episodes, or just re-write the thing with your PCs as the main cast. But in my mind that ruins the thing. Same for Lord of the Rings. It's a neat, encapsulated story with a defined beginning, middle, and end. The great thing about that setting to me, is that story. And that story is concluded, so fiddling with the story to allow for gaming just spoils it all. To me these are closed settings or properties.

Some open properties, ones that can be used for gaming without any trouble, are the more never-ending episodic stuff. Like Star Wars, Star Trek, and Dr. Who (just to keep to your list). I could definitely see DW as a corner case for use in gaming, but damn do I love me some Doctor Who Adventures in Time and Space.

But for SW and ST, those are set in such vast universes with so many entertaining and cool possibilities I wouldn't bat an eye dropping into a game of either. For ST, there are hundreds of other ships or stations to work with, and for both there are millions of millions of (yes, twice) planets to explore. Yes, there are "closed" stories in both properties, but they are also suggestive of other interesting stories with other characters.

And as for your homebrew you don't want to play anymore, I chalk that up to the "neat" factor. When you hear a cool idea and say something like, "That's neat," you're there. But, you sit with the idea and it starts to fade a bit. Because it's just neat. Nothing wrong with neat. But it's just neat. Not staggering, amazing, revolutionary, or any number of other over the topic descriptors used in reference to something that can at times quite literally make your jaw drop on first blush. Those are the ones I want to play in.

There are plenty of games based on settings that hold no interest for me at all.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Serenity are two good examples. I'm not a Whedon fan at all, and have found his world and character creation to be grating, at best. I know people love 'em, but they have too much of a hipster-ish attitude of winking at the camera and relying on everyone to be in on the joke. I also don't think either setting is unique enough in its own right to be interesting. A lot of what makes Whedon successful is his dialog and characterization, neither of which can really be duplicated at the table without simply doing a read-through of episode scripts. I think Cranewings hit the nail on the head, and Whedon's material is a good example of that principle.

I would run a Star Trek game, but only one set during the time of the original series. After that, the setting seems too rigid and intent on maintaining the status quo. I could ignore that and do my own thing, true, but if I have to ignore a large part of what I feel is integral to Next Gen and the rest, I might as well run a game in an entirely different setting.

Quote from: Grognard;406105Same for Lord of the Rings. It's a neat, encapsulated story with a defined beginning, middle, and end. The great thing about that setting to me, is that story. And that story is concluded, so fiddling with the story to allow for gaming just spoils it all. To me these are closed settings or properties.

I don't see it that way at all for the Lord of the Rings. The setting is a character in and of itself, one rich with potential for gaming. Don't want to fiddle with the story? Then don't; a Fourth Age Middle-earth campaign has a ton of stuff to do. Just because the One Ring is gone and Sauron with it doesn't mean the setting itself is useless; it just means the MacGuffin for Tolkien's story is gone, and Middle-earth is now an open field like Greyhawk. I did an extensive overview of all the possibilities of Middle-earth as a game setting, specifically in the Fourth Age. If you're interested in why I think all this, check out this thread.

I don't mind using movies or books as springboards for settings. Where I usually run into problems as a player isn't the setting that the GM chooses, but it's when the GM tries to shoehorn us into a prefigured plot that plays just like the movie or book.

Some of the movies I'd love to play in but haven't:

-The James Bond Universe

-Gangs of New York (this just struck me as a cool backdrop for a game)

-Bubba Hotep (playing a bunch of quirky characters in an old age home
fending off supernatural assaults)

-Bladerunner (seemed like it had lots of gaming potential)

-Goodfellas (I've run tons of Goodfellas inspired campaigns, but actually taking on the roles of the characters in the movie seems like fun)

Every time I read Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, I start creating a game based around it. Once we used For Faerie, Queen & Country to actually run one, but it fell a little flat.

Seanchai

I'm not a fan of Whedon in general, but I do like Firefly A LOT. Which surprised me at the time. I do not care for Buffy at all, and the rest of his stuff feels dull and teenagey to me.

Quote from: ColonelHardisson;406148I don't see it that way at all for the Lord of the Rings. The setting is a character in and of itself, one rich with potential for gaming. Don't want to fiddle with the story? Then don't; a Fourth Age Middle-earth campaign has a ton of stuff to do. Just because the One Ring is gone and Sauron with it doesn't mean the setting itself is useless; it just means the MacGuffin for Tolkien's story is gone, and Middle-earth is now an open field like Greyhawk. I did an extensive overview of all the possibilities of Middle-earth as a game setting, specifically in the Fourth Age. If you're interested in why I think all this, check out this thread.

Right, but you're ignoring that the setting itself it utterly changed by that story.

The elves have left for the Far Shores. The dwarves are retreating from Middle Earth and staying in their halls. The Enemy is destroyed, and the orcs scattered. It's called the Age of Men for a reason. So sure, there are more stories to tell in the Fourth Age, but by the mere fact of it being the Fourth Age makes it barely resemble the Middle Earth that is an attractive place to game. Hence the disconnect and the resistance to using "sort of Middle Earth" to game in.

Quote from: Benoist;406167I'm not a fan of Whedon in general, but I do like Firefly A LOT. Which surprised me at the time. I do not care for Buffy at all, and the rest of his stuff feels dull and teenagey to me.

Same here. Benoist. Same here. I almost missed Firefly because of it. S. John Ross slapped me on the head and shoved me at it, for which I am eternally grateful to him, along with many other things more game related.

-clash

Quote from: Grognard;406176Right, but you're ignoring that the setting itself it utterly changed by that story.

The elves have left for the Far Shores. The dwarves are retreating from Middle Earth and staying in their halls. The Enemy is destroyed, and the orcs scattered. It's called the Age of Men for a reason. So sure, there are more stories to tell in the Fourth Age, but by the mere fact of it being the Fourth Age makes it barely resemble the Middle Earth that is an attractive place to game. Hence the disconnect and the resistance to using "sort of Middle Earth" to game in.

How am I ignoring anything? I used Tolkien himself as the source for the thread I linked to. I think you're ignoring what Tolkien actually wrote (or just wanting to argue). Read the thread I linked to and check the source material I cite. I reply strongly to this stuff because I've actually done the research.

Tolkien explicitly tells how elves remained in Middle-earth - the Noldor left, but not the Wood Elves. They remained until the present day. So did hobbits. So did dwarves. They became more reclusive over the centuries, but they already had been reclusive anyway.

Besides, he also explicitly talks about how during the Fourth Age the elves and dwarves actually became more visible as they came out to help rebuild what had been destroyed. Dwarves moved into Aglarond. They also helped rebuild Minas Tirith. Elves repopulated Ithilien, as well as cleansing Mirkwood and creating an even larger elf realm.

The orcs have scattered. OK. Scattered tribes of orcs haunting the hinterlands sounds like how orcs are used in a lot of fantasy games.

So Sauron is gone. So are the Nazgul. That doesn't mean all evil has fled; again, look at my thread and see where I quote Tolkien about the decades spent pacifying Sauron's allies. Plus, surely some of his lieutenants survived.

EDIT: I'll just post a couple of relevant quotes here:

"After the fall of Sauron, Gimli brought south a part of the Dwarf-folk of Erebor, and he became Lord of the Glittering Caves. He and his people did great works in Gondor and Rohan. For Minas Tirith they forged gates of mithril and steel to replace those broken by the Witch-king. Legolas his friend brought south Elves out of Greenwood, and they dwelt in Ithilien,
and it became once again the fairest country in all the westlands."

- The Return of the King, Appendix A, part III, Durin's Folk

"For though Sauron had passed, the hatreds and evils that he bred had not died, and the King of the West had many enemies to subdue before the White Tree could grow in peace. And wherever King Elessar went with war King Eomer went with him; and beyond the Sea of Rhun and on the far fields of the South the thunder of the cavalry of the Mark was heard, and the White Horse upon Green flew in many winds until Eomer grew old."

- The Return of the King, Appendix A, part II, The House of Eorl

Can't quite see what I'm ignoring...

Quote from: ColonelHardisson;406197Can't quite see what I'm ignoring...

As you stated yourself, "and Middle-earth is now an open field like Greyhawk." And "The orcs have scattered. OK. Scattered tribes of orcs haunting the hinterlands sounds like how orcs are used in a lot of fantasy games."

The changes brought about in the Lord of the Rings change the very setting that makes it so attractive. All these changes alter the setting fundamentally, so it can be played just like any other generic fantasy setting. Which makes it pointless to do, because you can just skip all the research and just play any generic fantasy setting.

What makes Middle-Earth interesting is the combination of elements in the setting in the Third Age. Once you move past that, once you change it, it's no longer unique. It's any generic fantasy setting at that point, it just has a well documented history.

Using the famous place names may be enough to make it "Middle-Earth" for you, but nowhere near enough for me.

(Note: It's not just that I want to argue. That's a great dismissive attitude by the way. It's that I actually disagree with you. People can do that you know.)

Ditto that Flying Mice. Didn't care for many of Joss Whedon's earlier works, with the exceptions being Alien: Resurrection and Titan A.E. (Both of which are totally awesome!) and am not impressed with the lastest show either (Dollhouse), however have the pilot (is that counted as episode 1?), and all eight Firefly episodes on DvD, as well as Serenity. That show rocked!

Anyone care to comment or have an opinion on Captain America (In filming) & The Avengers (Preproduction)?

Also in keeping with the spirit of this thread, once many seasons ago, ran a campaign based on The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever, set in The Land, that was very popular, so much so, in fact, I had to calve the group and spin off a secondary campaign to bring the player count to less than ten for each session.

The Urviles with their enchanted staves were fearsome... and I had some great Bloodguard players, as well as some awesome fighters (and fights) in that campaign.

Quote from: GameDaddy;406262*snip*
Also in keeping with the spirit of this thread, once many seasons ago, ran a campaign based on The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever, set in The Land, that was very popular, so much so, in fact, I had to calve the group and spin off a secondary campaign to bring the player count to less than ten for each session.

The Urviles with their enchanted staves were fearsome... and I had some great Bloodguard players, as well as some awesome fighters (and fights) in that campaign.

I would have payed to play in that! I think it is one of the coolest un-tapped settings for neat games and the first three books are classic IMHO. I recently acquired 'The Atlas of the Land' used (NM condition) and it is a treasure! I read those books almost every year...to play a Bloodguard with ranyhyn (sp.?) companion AWESOME!

Wayland Drews 'Erthring Cycle' tril. would be cool as well.  

Quote from: GameDaddy;406262Also in keeping with the spirit of this thread, once many seasons ago, ran a campaign based on The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever, set in The Land, that was very popular, so much so, in fact, I had to calve the group and spin off a secondary campaign to bring the player count to less than ten for each session.

The Urviles with their enchanted staves were fearsome... and I had some great Bloodguard players, as well as some awesome fighters (and fights) in that campaign.

Sounds pretty cool. Just out of curiosity, what system did you use?