#RPGaDay2025 - 20 Enter

Traditionally, when the characters enter a dungeon they cross over from the real to the surreal, they move into a liminal space where anything can happen. This reflects the overall ritual of a roleplaying game where everyone sits down at a table and enters a safe space where an imagined world is shared by the players and the GM/Narrator/DM/(or whatever the system designates the person running the game).  We’ve looked at the journey a few times during the questions this month, but the journey needs to start somewhere, it needs to be begun.

A lot of the standard mythology around roleplaying games can be linked back to the ideas of the hero’s journey. A lot of games have deviated from this since the 90s, but the core of the hobby is still about that heroic escapism…or at least it claims to be. The crossing of the threshold is an important part of that. The ritual space of the storytelling medium, whether it’s a single raconteur or a communal storytelling project, also uses that ritual space. The GM screen, the dice, the table, the maps and figurines (if you use those), are all a part of the entry into the imagined world. Those who struggle with imagination often can’t see past these props, but these are just gateway items that lead to the story inside. 

I’ve seen situations where the physical barrier present by thew dice, character sheets, and rulebooks has faded away. It’s often occurred during long term LARP games, and in that context it’s often referred to as bleed. The real world bleeds into the game, and the game bleeds into the real world. The relationship between players becomes impacted by the relationship between characters…and vice versa… for better or worse. I’ve seen players fall in love through the interactions of their characters, I’ve similarly seen long term feuds and friendships break up over the choices made by characters. Having a distinct entry point for the game, and a distinct point of closure can help to mitigate these issues. What happens in the game, stays in the game.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Guide to Geomorphs (Part 7)

Image
A working computer and scanner...that means it is time to get back to work on the geomorph sequence. A lot of the discussion in this set of tutorials has been focused around square geomorphs. They're the easiest for most people to wrap their heads around.  But my preferred form of geomorph is based around the hexagon, these tend to produce more organic and interesting shapes. This is true for natural environments, but it's no less true for urban environments. The example set of geomorphs above as a simple two-phase system. One edge type is plain, the other edge type has a road piercing the centre. There could be dozens of combinations and permutations for each of the two phases around the hexagonal edges, but a quick look at the variety of buildings and road shapes shows that there could literally be hundreds of possible options when drawing these map fragments. But you certainly don't need to create hundreds of designs for the system to be effective. Usin...
Read more

A Guide to Geomorphs (Part 1)

Image
After numerous requests to get back to map tutorials, it's time to start our new series. This time focusing on the concept of geomorphs, modular map fragments that can be mixed and matched. We'll start with a couple of theoretical tutorials before sinking into a few more practical posts. I'm predicting a dozen or so posts in this sequence, but let's see how long it lasts.
Read more