For the last 15yrs or more, this is the only game I like to run. As a DM I get to create compelling stories where the NPCs are like real people and the players get the opportunity to get involved in epic high fantasy with a gritty underbelly for lack of a better term. My players love this and because their characters seem more real to them. Because they are all at least 28yrs old they are mature enough to handle any themes I throw at them without getting weird of uncomfortable.
For example:
- IMC a paladin may be immune to the effects of fear but she still feels it and may ask her god for help dealing with it when alone while putting on a brave face to inspire her comrades.
- A noble priest may fall for a festhall girl and be torn between the duties of his station and class and love for this "inappropriate" lady.
- Warriors sometimes start with a true relish for battle but after a decent number of levels may start becoming haunted by all the lived they've taken even in a just cause.
- When the PCs are involved in a war they may have to deal harshly with men under their command who participated in rape or the killing of prisoners.
- Fiends are fiendish and wholly evil to the point where most mortal minds cannot comprhend their depravity.
- Raiders enslave and rape and pillage the way they did and do in our own world.
- When a city falls to orcs....you really don't want to be a woman, child or male non-combatant. Sometimes defenders will kill their own wives and children before letting them fall into the hands of orcs and other humanoids because there are no illusions as to their fate.
- War, violence and evil are vividly real and have real consequences. There is no rollicking slaughter in my games. Evil isn't sexy even though it pretends to be.
Now as heavy as all of the above is, there are great rewards. The PCs, if heroic will be loved by those they help and can find love amongst their admirers. For example when I was running a FR campaign I had Storm (The Chosen of Mystra) fall in love with a PC because he was a hell of a guy. The PCs can get recognition and lands and power and become the true movers and shakers of the world. The PCs will have earned what they have not only in battle but in achievements of all kinds.
Character development is rewarded by increased XP and because I don't usually run more than one heavy combat encounter per session I give liberal experience points for role-playing (at least if you try your best) and penalize metagaming. Some sessions there is no combat and intrigues and other sorts of adventure come to the forefront.
Mature games value atmosphere, depth and moral complexity. Heroes are heroes but they are still mortals with doubts, fears, regrets, loves, losses, etc. They are 3-dimensional characters.
I have had a player get teary eyed at the loss of his character's wife (a longstanding adventuring NPC in the group who had retired when she found herself pregnant) and child at the hands of a major villian that he failed to kill when he had the opportunity. He consigned himself to wreak bloody handed vengeance upon the villain and did so even though it cost him his life. The player was happy with that end for him because he knew that the character couldn't go on after that loss.
Mature games have mature themes but they are rewarding because they engage the player's emotions in a way that light and fluffy games cannot.
Don't get me wrong I don't mind playing in an irregularly scheduled beer and pretzels game from time to time where its more a chance to laugh, socialize and play around in a way I usually cannot in my normal game because it would be too disruptive. Mature DMing can be taxing because I find that like an author, I can really get into the NPCs and situations. Sometimes those situations can be very serious and sobering. Sometimes a lighthearted game of D&D or a video game is a great prescripton to counted the heaviness of mature, dramatic gaming.
Hanging out with my son and playing with his wrestling guys is probably the best antidote to the heaviness, at least for me.
Chris
