I bet chicks always roll Windlings, don't they?

June 7, 2007 3:35 PM

I have been invited to participate in an EarthDawn campaign. I know nothing about "pen and paper" RPGs. What advice can you give me?

So a group of my friends are all experienced, um...face-to-face RPGers. I play WoW. One of the guys mentioned that he's starting an EarthDawn campaign and invited me to participate. I'm excited about joining up and experiencing a different form of gameplay than I'm used to, but I'm a total neophyte, and therefore slightly nervous.

Some of my questions and concerns:

1. I'll be the only chick. I don't expect that to make TOO much of a difference, as none of these guys are the OMG GIRLZ LAWL type... If you've gamed with women before, or if you're a woman gamer, do you have any specific advice?

2. I'm not too worried about rolling a character; I'm sure I can get the GM to help me out with that. But how does actual gameplay work? As I said, I play WoW. I'm used to everything being handled by a game engine.

3. Besides Wikipedia, where can I find information specifically on EarthDawn's storyline, gameplay, and ruleset? I've taken a look at earthdawn.com, but it seems full of information for people who already know what they're doing. Has anyone here played EarthDawn? Can you give me anecdotes?

4. Tell me about roleplaying. We're all silly, fun, actor-types, so it shouldn't be too hard, but what helps?

Any other tips, tricks, or hilarious stories you have to share are much appreciated.

posted by ArsncHeart to sports, hobbies, & recreation (9 comments total)

Don't sweat being the only girl. Been there, done that. Comes with the territory I think. First off, in my experience it takes hours and hours to get a campaign off and running. Rolling up a new character is waaaay time consuming. If you're an actor-type you should be fine. In this case, DON'T be yourself. Pick an off the wall character, maybe even an evil one and just have a blast. Don't be shy. :) The GM will describe the scene, you each get turns and you tell him/her what you're doing, what you're saying, who to, etc. Like I said, the acting thing will help immensely.
posted by CwgrlUp at 3:58 PM on June 7, 2007

The thing that always made or broke roleplaying sessions for me was how seriously the other players took the thing. That is, do not break from character often enough, or play one unreasonable enough as to make story advancement untenable. It's a game for a group, after all.
posted by Netzapper at 4:15 PM on June 7, 2007

yeah, i wouldn't worry about being the only girl (sometimes it's fun!).

i second netzapper's comment--everybody there has to be really into it. think of it like improv: you have to cooperate with the scenario or it's no fun. also, the gamemaster/dungeonmaster/whatever has to be on top of things, do his/her homework, and be interested in keeping the storyline going, not just to coming up with thousands of pointless things to annoy the characters with.
posted by thinkingwoman at 4:31 PM on June 7, 2007

Wikipedia has great info about the game setting and mechanics or Earthdawn.

a few suggestions in no particular order,
It is pretty important that you get to know the gaming style of the group you play with. If they want to spend all day finding out the political situation in a border outpost and you want to do some killing....or vice versa, there could be tension.

Suggest to the GM (Game Master, generic term for the referee in RPGs) that you have concerns and ask who with the group could mentor you in the game. You could even make their character your characters mentor as well.


As another note, when role playing, remember the lesson of John McClain. In an RPG the GM only describes some of all that is in any given room or scene. In the Climactic Scene of Die Hard McClain grabs a firehose and jumps of the roof of the building using it as a rope. If the movie had been an RPG it would have gone like this:

GM: you are on the roof. You just dived for cover from the FBI snipers. The terrorists are about to set off the explosives, What do you do?
JM:Is there a window washers pulley rig?
GM:Thinks...No
JM:Is there a firehose?
GM:I'll give that to you. Where are you going with this?
JM:I wrap it around myself and jump...

RPG's are a cooperative medium. the GM provides a framework and makes final rulings, but you are helping create the world your character travels through. Remember the Gm's rulings hinder you only in as much as the edge of the stage hinders an actor.
posted by Megafly at 4:35 PM on June 7, 2007 [2 favorites]

It's tough, because different groups can have very different ways of playing. Some mostly tell a group story and rarely pick up the dice. Others approach it like a board game, couching everything in terms of the rules. ("I close to Medium Range and use Defensive Crouch and Steely Gaze to gain +2 on my attack roll.") Most groups are somewhere in between.

Because of this, there's more than one answer to "how does actual gameplay work?" The more free-form answer is "the Gamemaster describes what happens, then the players say what their characters do, then the Gamemaster describes what happens, and so on." The more strict answer involves the rules of the game, which I don't know personally, but most RPGs are quite a bit more complicated than Monopoly, to the point where it's rare to find someone who knows every rule without having to look it up.

As with so many endeavors, it'll probably work best to go along with the group while you get your bearings. If their approach is to look around for something to fight, it might not work too well if you decide your character wants to get involved in local politics, or vice versa.

On the other hand, one of the fun things about having a newbie in the group is that they have a fresh perspective and aren't as absorbed in the rule books and traditions, so they come up with neat ideas. If you come up with an interesting idea, like climbing up into a tree and trying to drop onto someone's horse, and the Gamemaster smiles and goes along with it, you've got a good group. If instead he says "Well, you need to have fifteen more skill points and the Aboreal Ambush knack to do that" well, some people like that sort of game but it's not much fun if you don't know the rules.

Being a good player mostly entails not being a bad player. Don't hog the limelight, don't choose to play a character that's just going to screw things up for everyone else (the classic roleplaying example of this is someone who plays a thief who immediately starts trying to steal from the other characters), and don't take anything too personally. I'd also suggest eventually learning at least the basics of the rules so you don't have to keep asking "How many dice do I roll? Am I trying to roll high or low?"

Beyond that, have fun, try to think and act as your character, and adopting a voice or mannerism can be entertaining as long as it's not grating.
posted by L. Fitzgerald Sjoberg at 4:40 PM on June 7, 2007 [1 favorite]

Forgot an aside. It's not that a good Gamemaster will automatically let you succeed at your ambush, but he'll let you try instead of lecturing rules at you. Unless it's going to get you killed, in which case gently discouraging you may be appropriate.
posted by L. Fitzgerald Sjoberg at 4:42 PM on June 7, 2007 [1 favorite]

I concur that it'll be important for you to observe the style of fellow players and try to conform to that, at least initially. It would be a buzz-kill if they're all about lengthy bloviating and speechifying and amateur acting, for instance, and you're about throwin' down the dice and blandly announcing "I hit and do 12 points of damage. Next."

Another thing--to the extent that you can, just roll with everything. There's a fine line between "I don't understand your ruling, GM" and "Your ruling BLOWS, GM, and let me tell you why". In my experience, if you have faith in your GM and your point of contention is really about a judgment call or some rules interpetation that could go either way, just go with what the GM has said to keep the game moving.

When the GM gets around to you for your statement of action, try to be ready. Don't be That Person who's shuffling through 67 loose sheets of paper to figure out if you have a +2 on your attack or a +3. Try to have all your modifiers ready and have some plan of action. Your default can always be "I attack", but in a pinch there's nothing wrong with saying "I stand there gobsmacked in amazement" to buy yourself another round to figure out your tactics.

Figure out some distinguishing behavioral tics for your character (just don't go overboard with them). You might have pet names for your guns, or you might hate dogs, or you could have a nerdish interest in a band or TV show, or maybe you always talk about "Back in my hometown, we always do things like thus and so". Just dropping in stuff like this from time to time goes a long way to establishing your character, and it gives the GM something to work with as well. If you demonstrate that your character always does an hour of martial arts exercises every evening, it won't be long before you find yourself in a fight at a dojo, or encountering some judo master, or being invited to study t'ai chi with the elders.
posted by Midnight Creeper at 6:41 PM on June 7, 2007 [1 favorite]

General RPG advice:

Make sure that the needs and wants of your character are clear to you. I've found that knowing what your character wants out of any given situation makes the roleplaying much smoother. Keep that in mind for the non-combat parts of the session.

As for combat, a warning: don't go for gimmicks or narrow specializations. Try to have a mix of skills (ask for common ones and get a few extra that interest you). This will give you much more flexibility so that you're always useful and not too depended on for one certain thing.

I had friends who loved complicated combat specializations, and it would slow down gameplay with complicated mechanics, leave the character useless when the gimmick wasn't viable, and imbalance the party. Keep it simple.
posted by cowbellemoo at 8:23 PM on June 7, 2007

Try to get an overview of how the game works (I am only directly familiar with the D20 games, but this one looks similar on a broad level to DnD). and try to pick a role that compliments your party. For example, in my game (again the caveat is that its a different system), my party had grown disproportionately ranged magic heavy, so when my first character got killed, the new one I rolled was focused on being able to do a great deal of damage close in, and have a variety of ways of accomplishing that, so I was happy that I could be creative in my killing, and my group was happy because I was preventing the big bad monsters from getting to our squishier members. Also try to get out of combat skills that will make you unique and useful for your group, you dont want to be bored out of combat (this could work very differently in Earthdawn though). Finally, dont go overboard with the roleplaying, enjoy it, but remember its just a game not a renaissance fair.
posted by BobbyDigital at 9:37 AM on June 8, 2007