How often do you include NPCs primarily for roleplaying reasons?

[Treebore]

Nope, not Cormyr.

Consider this - the sea, a submerged castle with a female ghost NPC, strong druid presence (king seeking counsel from the Grand Druid), a horrible monster that can only be slain with a special sword, firbolgs and verbeeg.

Ah, the Moonshae Isles.

 

[Barastrondo]

The definition of roleplaying has most definitely changed from what I understood it to be years ago. Now it seems to include just playing a character, whether you engage on anything more than a mechanical system level or not. To me, roleplaying is a step beyond the mechanical and into the theatrical, where you 'act' as your character by being 'in character'. Rolling dice has nothing to do with it.

I see it as pretty much unchanged from the days of Fred VII. In the earliest days of the hobby, it was a disadvantage to play "in character" in some groups because then you wouldn't be applying all your out-of-character knowledge, and that out-of-character knowledge was part of the measure of "player skill." Different reason (sort of), same symptoms.

I'm just as susceptible to "get off my lawn" syndrome as anyone who's been playing since the 80s (though obviously not as susceptible as those who've been playing since the 70s), but I can't blame a lack of roleplaying on Kids/Games These Days. It's about inspiration, past experiences and group traditions -- same as always.

 

[Mark CMG]

I'm just as susceptible to "get off my lawn" syndrome as anyone who's been playing since the 80s (though obviously not as susceptible as those who've been playing since the 70s), but I can't blame a lack of roleplaying on Kids/Games These Days. It's about inspiration, past experiences and group traditions -- same as always.

Careful there. Someone might think you are characterizing my position as blaming young players or new rules when in fact it is far from the case. I'm not sure there has ever been a game that has really explained RPing very well. It would be hard to blame the earliest incarnations of RPGs since they were in uncharted waters, but certainly major RPGs of all stripes since then (late Seventies onward, perhaps) all have a hand in not helping codify what happens at many, many RPG game tables. In the past, RPing was learned not from the books but from whoever happened to be at the table where you were gaming. I'm not sure that's enough, particularly when so many new players come to RPGs through the major offerings on the market.


Besides, clearly I want more folks on the lawn and often invite them directly.

 

[Barastrondo]

Careful there. Someone might think you are characterizing my position as blaming young players or new rules when in fact it is far from the case.

I don't mean to characterize your position. I'm just challenging the idea that the definition of roleplaying has changed from years ago in Kzach's post. It flourishes where it's nourished and watered, and if the people involved are inclined to the practice. In the last few years, I've watched a new player really take to roleplaying a variety of different personalities while her boyfriend, the longer-term RPG vet, was still generally slower to take on any affectations or attitudes farther from his own.

In my observation, it's same as it always was, with the exception that my personal games have gotten better with experience and my table's self-selected for roleplaying. Of course, if I were recruiting a group of total novices, I might feel differently -- but I doubt they'd be much different than the total novices I played with back then. Just different cultural references they'd bring to the table.

 

[Pentius]

I'm not sure there has ever been a game that has really explained RPing very well. It would be hard to blame the earliest incarnations of RPGs since they were in uncharted waters, but certainly major RPGs of all stripes since then (late Seventies onward, perhaps) all have a hand in not helping codify what happens at many, many RPG game tables. In the past, RPing was learned not from the books but from whoever happened to be at the table where you were gaming. I'm not sure that's enough, particularly when so many new players come to RPGs through the major offerings on the market.


Besides, clearly I want more folks on the lawn and often invite them directly.

Yeah. Learning to RP is a lot of trial by error. I remember getting some of the broad brush stroke ideas from the books, but there's a lot to it that I honestly don't know I'd be able to write down if I tried. Cue someone linking a book that tells how to RP.

Careful there. Someone might think you are characterizing my position as blaming young players or new rules when in fact it is far from the case.

But-but! These kids, with their skill systems and their OGLs, their Bennies, their hipping and their hopping, and the interwebs and their Encounter Powers, man, it's them! I mean, what is an OGL, anyway? It's no wonder kids these days can't roleplay, how is an OGL supposed to make sense in my game world?

 

[Treebore]

Its always been my experience that most players do very minimal "role" play, if any at all. Very few have been into any greater degree of RP than that. One of the reasons I think I have fallen in love with L5R is because "role" play has always been such a big part of the game ever since I was introduced. Like during our last game session Saturday before last, we played for 6 hours and NEVER rolled any dice! ALL role play, and I loved it!

I think it helps that L5R encourages role play. Your honor is very important, so is your social status, so how you present yourself is actually more important than how well you fight, and I have been very fortunate in that every GM I have had focused on these aspects rather than the combat. I'm not saying we don't fight, but combat in the games I have participated in has been less than 1/3 of the game.

 

[The Shaman]

"Primarily" for roleplaying? Well, arguably all of them - I don't know who will become the adventurers' allies and who will become their rivals until after the game starts, and that's determined through roleplay.

Everyone gets stats, even if they're just generic stats (farmer, guard, bravo, et cetera); I may need to make an opposed attribute check during roleplaying, so I like to have the numbers in front of me.

 

[Kzach]

In the past, RPing was learned not from the books but from whoever happened to be at the table where you were gaming.

Speak for yourself.

When I first started gaming the concept of the game (Robotech) was explained to me as nothing more than a mechanical construct. My friend who introduced me to RPG's had no concept of roleplaying.

I chased down the AD&D volumes, read them and figured out roleplaying from what I read. It was the books that taught us these things and from what I recall, it was as clear as a bright sunny day from the writings in those books what the whole concept of roleplaying was all about.

And I do think it's a different era with different generational attitudes. Kids ARE different. Saying kids are growing up in the same ways with the same influences today as they did twenty or thirty years ago is beyond ridiculous. The world has changed and kids have access to unprecedented amounts of information and on-demand entertainment.

Also, pick a random article from an issue of Dragon in the 80's or even 90's, and compare it to one from today. I recall a lot of emphasis and constant reinforcement of the values of roleplaying that I simply don't see in articles these days.

 

[Barastrondo]

When I first started gaming the concept of the game (Robotech) was explained to me as nothing more than a mechanical construct. My friend who introduced me to RPG's had no concept of roleplaying.

Why not?

I'm not trying to be dismissive, here. But if your friend didn't really develop a concept of roleplaying from the books -- and he wasn't the only one back then -- is there a traceable critical difference? I mean, I learned largely from the books myself. But I also played with plenty of people who didn't learn to delve into a character from the books, or from anywhere for that matter.

And I do think it's a different era with different generational attitudes. Kids ARE different. Saying kids are growing up in the same ways with the same influences today as they did twenty or thirty years ago is beyond ridiculous. The world has changed and kids have access to unprecedented amounts of information and on-demand entertainment.

This is true, and yet I find no evidence in this that the definition of roleplaying has changed, particularly when it's flourishing in chat rooms and fanfiction threads and all kinds of places that have nothing to do with books and dice.

Also, pick a random article from an issue of Dragon in the 80's or even 90's, and compare it to one from today. I recall a lot of emphasis and constant reinforcement of the values of roleplaying that I simply don't see in articles these days.

What we need is charts to do just that. Sadly, my physical Dragons are in storage, but I'm pretty sure that there are a lot of articles in there that aren't all that dedicated to the values of roleplaying (whatever those may be). Articles about the physics of falling damage, early explorations of two-weapon fighting, NPC classes, bestiaries for the purpose of making sure we had orange and purple and brown dragons. Stuff that was all mechanics, no characterization. I naturally remember the articles that were really good and made an impact, and forget a lot of the stuff that was more about the game and less about the roleplay -- but that's true today as well. There are articles that are basically flavor text + mechanics, but there's also some RP gold. I'd put Schwalb's "Masquerades" article from a couple of months right up there with the best of 'em.

Okay, maybe there's nothing quite like Tucker's Kobolds. But that wasn't even an article.

 

[Ycore Rixle]

I can't imagine running D&D or any rpg without creating far more NPCs for roleplay than for combat.