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Rumble and Rant.
First of all, I had a lovely Christmas. :) I'm in a good mood, all things considered, although a bit bummed about the closing of Brass and Steel. I'll miss the place. And, after reading the metaplot, rather bummed that things never really started to heat up. It was a cool idea. Ah, well.
However, inspired by a rather snarky (but true) rant on fanfic, is one of my pet peeves on RPGs.
People playing the same damn character all the time. This was a real problem in my gaming group back in high-school and college with one or two people. No matter what the genre, they'd essentially play the /same/ character, with a couple of cosmetic changes. Not character templates, but the /same/ /character/, with just the names (and sometimes species) in the background changed.
I hate this. I hate it with the big hatey hate. When I'm GMing, a lot of my fun comes from seeing how the PCs react to the events in the world around them. I like to see the conflicts, the moments of cooperation, the revelations and all of that. When the party remains basically the same, I already know how they're going to react to anything I throw at them. /They/ already know how they're going to react to any given situation. There's no growth, no surprise. It bores me, and I lose the desire to make up cool, interesting NPCs for the PCs to interact with.
I can understand being attached to a character, or just not wanting to go through the fuss of creating a new one, but I just wish that more people would sit down, and try to play something they've never played before. If they usually play heroic characters, try a villain. Play the leader type? Try a loyal servant, or someone with stage fright. It can be much fun, and even if it doesn't enchant them, they might gain some sort of new spin to put on their next archetypical character.
But, eh. I'm weird.
However, inspired by a rather snarky (but true) rant on fanfic, is one of my pet peeves on RPGs.
People playing the same damn character all the time. This was a real problem in my gaming group back in high-school and college with one or two people. No matter what the genre, they'd essentially play the /same/ character, with a couple of cosmetic changes. Not character templates, but the /same/ /character/, with just the names (and sometimes species) in the background changed.
I hate this. I hate it with the big hatey hate. When I'm GMing, a lot of my fun comes from seeing how the PCs react to the events in the world around them. I like to see the conflicts, the moments of cooperation, the revelations and all of that. When the party remains basically the same, I already know how they're going to react to anything I throw at them. /They/ already know how they're going to react to any given situation. There's no growth, no surprise. It bores me, and I lose the desire to make up cool, interesting NPCs for the PCs to interact with.
I can understand being attached to a character, or just not wanting to go through the fuss of creating a new one, but I just wish that more people would sit down, and try to play something they've never played before. If they usually play heroic characters, try a villain. Play the leader type? Try a loyal servant, or someone with stage fright. It can be much fun, and even if it doesn't enchant them, they might gain some sort of new spin to put on their next archetypical character.
But, eh. I'm weird.
Re: beware!
Heh. I probably should have put my rant in different, more positive terms. Instead of saying 'my pet peeve is', perhaps I should have said, "I really /love/ to see it when people play character types that I haven't seen them play before. It gets me interested and all happy when someone who usually plays cynical loners comes up with a character who's a devout, politically-minded priest, or when the guy who's almost always the leader of the party turns in a sheet for the devoted servant of another PC. It inspires me to think of whole new things and plots and relationships in a way that getting new versions of old characters (even old, cool characters) doesn't. Simply because it's fresh, and new, and there's more Stuff to play with, as a GM. New party dynamics, new subplots to explore (having a party that is normally up for hack-and-slash turn in characters which are manipulators and courtiers is close to my definition of sheer bliss), and I--as a GM--tend to get more 'into' the game, because I don't know the characters as well. I have to discover them through events and setting, just as the players are discovering them, and /that's/ what really gets my motor revving. It makes me happy."
That's what I was trying to say in my post. However, since I'm a bitter misanthrope with communications issues, it came out negatively instead of positively. :)
Re: beware!
I freely admit to having most of my characters be fairly similar. It "just happens", but to me at least, they have individual personalities and minds of their own. :) But I do try hard to make sure that I am not playing two too similar characters at the same time. If I have a friendly, golden, happyjoy cleric going in one D&D campaign, I will be playing a grumpy, codger with a different religious focus in the other. (-If- I play a cleric at all, which I for some reason seem to end up doing...) I tend to play nice and friendly characters, and am totally inept at playing the backstabbing kind. Which is why I find playing Beleth both fun and challenging. Every RPer should at one time or another be forced to play an iconic character who is VERY different from what they normally play. It's a treat. ^^
Yup!
Re: beware!
Anyway, I try to keep my characters different, but many times I end up applying for something really similar to what I already have. oops @_X
I'm not very good at backstabbers either, so if my character's going to be bad, they're gonna be clearly bad :D