Pen and Paper RPGs vs. Computer RPGs - Part 1

Once again i take to the typing machine, and bring you another DM ramble!

Today I am tackling (mostly attempting) to answer my own personal question...

Pen and paper RPGs vs. computer RPGs, which s better?

Okay, where shall I start? Of course!

Back in the mists of time before the gaming industry really took off and we were stuck with pong yer back too the good old 70s!!

We as people didn't have a lot to choose from, granted there were the ultimate board games of the time dealing with war, strategy and seeing how many times your little sister could land on that row of hotels around Piccadilly!

The concept of 'role playing' is a simple one: you take the persona of a warrior or a crafty thief but really its only an upgrade, dare I say, from playing games as kids using your imagination to well and truly live out your favourite cartoon or comic (many times when I was younger I'd be a Power Ranger or Michelangelo from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles).

But I digress...

Role playing 'games' as we know them was a concept drempt up by David Wesely with the Braunstein Game.

In 1967, Wesely served as referee for a Napoleonic war game set in the fictional German town of Braunstein.

Two players acted as commanders of the opposing armies, but because he was interested in multi-player games, Wesely also assigned additional, non-military roles. (For example, he had players acting as town mayor, banker, and university chancellor. When two players challenged each other to a duel, Wesely found it necessary to improvise rules for the encounter on the spot).

Needless to say initial experiments were not exactly popular (from all reports simply chaotic) the Braunstein game was never published but in the eyes of the world 1967 had sown the seeds of role playing games.

It wasn't until 1974 when arguably the corner stone of all pen and paper RPGs was invented! Dungeons and Dragons!

Giving us poor mortals a chance to use our imagination to play out those fantasies of being Gandalf or Conan in a structured way! And it kept people from murdering each other playing diplomacy.

Now with the concept of RPGs established and the gaming industry growing it was only a matter of time before the popular 'table top game' became a console game only a year later!!

In 1975 Claremont graduate university student wrote the first Computer RPG. The game was an unlicensed implementation of the new role playing game Dungeon and Dragons!

Granted it was in text format, it was still the first game to use line of sight graphics, as the top-down dungeon maps showing the areas that the party had seen or could see took into consideration factors such as light or darkness and the differences in vision between species. Truly revolutionary!

Okay people lets do the time warp *cue Dr who theme tune.*

Fast forward and we find ourselves at the ever developing peak of technology and social interaction known simply as....err, today?

Anyhow!

Where does this lead us? Do I even need to to list the hundreds upon thousands of role playing games out there? Most people can name at least 4 console RPGs... but can they name 4 pen and paper RPGs?

Once upon a time getting your mates around, grabbing some dice, some soft drink, order a pizza and once again assailing the heights of Wizard's Tower, was cool, popular and of course dictated the basic core concepts of console RPGs!

Epic back story, <check>
Player characters, <check>
More monsters and booty and exp! <check>
And of course the dungeon with optional sewer level (because there's always a sewer level). <check mate>

But somewhere along the line we became geeks, pen and paper games became unpopular and so shunning sunlight and girlfriends (or boyfriends. After all, girl gamers do exist - I know 4) it simply became a stereotype, but once again I'm going off point...

Wait what is my point...?

Oh yes...

You see, with time comes innovation with that we look back and go "hmm, how can we make that better?"

Both console games and pen and paper games have come a hell of long way: rules, graphics and dozen other things.

But which is better?

Find out in part 2!

Call of Cthulhu RPG.

Once again another text biased review! Its been a few days since we've finished filming, editing is cracking along nicely so all being well we shall have our first video review up soon!

Until such time you have to deal with me and my keyboard.

Since then I have been working upon my AD&D vs. D&D4th review, but circumstances do get in the way i.e. a lack of time and players in which to refresh my memory.

But we shall soldier on.

In an effort to bring you the fan of work in progress more role-playing geekness.

I present to you (which recently has been a bit in topic recently) call of Cthulhu 6^th edition!

Now back ion the day when I were but a figment of hypothetical conversation.

D&D ruled the role-playing community, along with as time went on traveller and call of Cthulhu!

CoC as it’s normally abridged to, is mythos and world set within the writings of H.P. Lovecraft of New England. Exploring the idea that strange things lie within the shadowy corners of the world, wired tales of horror and mystery and his more popular works dealing with the 'Cthulhu' mythos; a series of elder beings from beyond the stars inhabiting our world waiting for there moment, or perhaps simply being stumbled upon by wandered investigators or explorers suddenly finding the cults and worshipped of these elder gods.

Now CoC has a unique system and with 6^th edition they’ve lovingly gone back to the original cleaned it up and remade it for the modern audience.

This I cannot argue too, simply because it is a variant of percentile system, with different method of assigning stats but in this game you make your character to last!

I did find it curious that there are no levels, no levelling what you have in front of you is your character and you pray he will survive assuming his sanity doesn’t break before hand!

With CoC I’ve only a few issues and strangely it’s not necessarily with the game itself more the players and even myself as DM

Ill admit I'm not exactly the best by long way; and this game is 'horror role-playing'

It’s about atmosphere, and investigation! Crawling through the dark dank sewers the smell of rotting fish rising through your nostrils makes eyes water as you trudge on following the trail of greenish ichors across the blighted moss infested walls the intermittent starches and scrapes of you can only assume claws marks your only reference to the distance you have travelled.

See that’s ideal, me I'm a bit lazy. As DM I like to give the players a chance to view the situation within there own imagination, a quick description and leave them to fill in the details.....which alas has lead to confusion on a few occasions, so that my fault there.

The problem is without supplements or indeed a vast knowledge of era specific times and places its very hard to describe to a player (especially living in England) what a colonial Gothic building even looks like, or even what you would expect to see inside?

Don’t get me wrong there’s no saying hey you have to set in Arkham New England, but sometimes you need to harken back to the mythos' home town in hope to give the players some idea of the background.

My second point is the players,

Now I'm not saying my players can’t role-play or in anyway a defamation of character.

What it is is really the silliest of things. With CoC you can play in any time/ era you choose (some of the more recent supplements for medieval or Roman times) but with the core rule book you have 3 eras the 1890s the 1920s or the 1990s (which seem years ago to me now lol)

Now personally I like the idea of 1890s call of Cthulhu game! Slightly Sherlock Holmes-esque running through old London town, finding the cult lock deep with the basements of the national museum only to realise that the cult was sired by none other than the members of parliament themselves!

To me that just seem to cream cult investigation starts here!!

But I found my players are more willing to try ears they can identity with, something a bit more recognisable, obviously modern times and even 1920s onwards. I’m not saying that’s all players everywhere it’s just an observation, and hell I have enough trouble thinking of scenarios as is.

Otherwise there's the fact were not serious we like a bit of fun, even in the heavy dark world of dark heresy there’s always a bit of light heartedness.

But this is call of Cthulhu horror role playing!! And yet there’s always one who is going to make a joke of it, and ruin the moment. But that’s life. And id is damned role playing with the lights off going by candle light! Just for atmosphere!

Character creation:

It’s not the quickest but it is comprehensive. Usual idea really roll up stats, enter number, add numbers together or times by 5 write down those number and your characters core set is done! Then you have the skill land occupation points (multiply education score by 20 and allot to certain skills as job points. then multiply intelligence score by 10 and these are personal interest)

Ok, ok maths is never my strong point, but really all these are needed!

As well as usual stats (str, dex, con, appearance, int) you also have sanity, power, education and size.

Also luck know and idea!

Luck naturally can be used as a last min oo hang on did I bring the matches? Or were you lucky enough to get across that gap?

Know: represents what’s stored in the brains intellectual loft, good if you playing scientist or biologist trying to figure out that missing link in the equation

idea: this is neat roll simply because its good back up if no skill (and trust me there’s lot of skills) seem appropriate roll on your idea...see if you can figure it out

size will give you bonus to damage rolls, and a vague indicator of your height

power and sanity are quite possibly the most fluctuating of stats, power representing the physical nature of your inner soul (relating to magic) and being a call of Cthulhu game where would it be with out the inevitable loss of sanity (and yes, you will lose it!)

Everything else relates to what sort of character you want to be, era specific of course there weren’t many computer technicians in 1890s London after all.

You have some general pre-set/ concepts for characters, such as the antiquarian, police office, military personnel, cleric, rouge, paladin...

OK not paladin but you get the idea

After that assign you job points! Since each job has various skills that would relate

So: clergyman has accounting, history, library use, listen, other language, persuade, psychology and 1 skill of your choice.

After that you assign your personal points to what ever you like so say this particular priest has great interest in photography, and maybe some skills with a lee Enfield rifle...

Why? Well why not, personal skills can help make your character, in this case our would be cleric may have fought in ww1, came to America after the war, decided to atone for his sins, become member of the church and on weekends he like to photograph the village for the church newspaper

The last thing is money, roll d10 flick to back of book spend it.

Yes OK not everything is on there and yeah some people might not like present characters but it’s not hard to create your own, or even throw in a few prices for something the book doesn’t list.

We invented a high school jock, since his appearance was so high he automatically became womaniser thinking sneak, and persuade coupled with his athletic skills and being form a rich family knowing how to drive and credit rating already we had this near obnoxious wise talking rich kid. Who did find the folly of trying to buy prohibited whiskey (not that he didn’t have the cash)

Game play:

with everything sorted your off into the world, the game is or can be quite linear series of investigations, plot hooks moving form one to clue to the other.

For the player and even the DM in control of a pretty hefty selection of nasties and creatures (form zombies, serpent people, he who must not be named to cthulhu himself!) combat and playability is simply a case (once all stats are up and running) rolling a percentile.

Its easy and quick to pick up, I’m a man of make notes of the rules for quick reference, and its only magic casting that slows you down. (But considering that anything out of the normal will mean you haemorrhage sanity you don’t have to worry about over used spells)

The game can be as fast or as slow as you like depending on your style of play.

It is very story driven game, granted you can have very serious oppressive story line, in which your players must find the clues steal the artefact defeat the cultists stop the ritual and pray they don’t have to run away form the shambling monster form beyond!

It is a game of the player character is not the super hero fighting men of yore! But average humans thrust into unusual situations they will die! Unless they can run faster than there mates, its highly possible, but look how quickly the party gets stuck if they’ve sunk all there pints into doge but have no idea how to read the Latin inscription left a the crime scene, let alone find that one reference book that’s vital for the campaign.

That is of course you don’t pass out when confronted by a dead body, let alone the shambling form of the deep one freshly risen and hungry of your skin!

It is a game that needs a certain amount of seriousness an understanding of your eras and good twisted mind, an involving storyline and some lucky dice roles! And hell even the odd comic relief character any excuse to get some hammy acting in there

me personally I love the system, love the setting I am fan of H.P. Lovecraft, but people like me struggle to get the campaign started let alone going, sometimes you just need to get back to basics.....

This is the DM putting his quill down and finding a cup of tea!