Games within games?

[knifespeaks]

Other than tourney-type events with feats of strength and skill with arms, does anyone have any games played in their campaigns?

Things like chess, checkers spring to mind...chinese checkers too....I also have designed a way to play soccer, should the need to 'win' a game ever be useful.

Just curious to see if anyone has any thoughts or experience with this - I think it adds a good deal of colour myself.

 

[Aristotle]

There is definately precedence for such a thing. In one of the Dragonlance books Raistlin was playing some sort of strategy game. In the "Tribe of One" books for Darksun the main character was involved in a sort of role playing game...

I remember, in one of the boxed sets I think, a game that came in a Darksun product. It was called something "...Gambit". It was a pretty simple dice game used with your standard gaming dice (one of each size from d4 to d20). I used that in a game once, and the players really enjoyed it (although I think it was the gambling they liked most of all).

 

[diaglo]

see if you can find a copy of

http://www.mysticeyegames.com/produ...18&PHPSESSID=d8c4861c1e57e359278b7e0f3858bee3

 

[Richards]

Then there's always "At the Spottle Parlor," an adventure in one of the early issues of Dungeon, that features a gambling game called "spottle," involving some dice and a frog. My players loved playing spottle!

Johnathan

 

[UniversalMonster]

It's come up; I did one adventure where there was a "Goblin Howl"- a sort of convention of goblin tribes, at which there would be sporting events. The players were supposed to form their own team to be 'honorary goblins', and I set up some D20 versions of tug of war, and a team sport kind of like soccer that they had to play.

 

[ScyldSceafing]

Games within games

A month or so before our last AU game, our DM handed me a card game called Mu and told me to get familiar with it, as it was a popular game among giants, and my PC is a giant.

Two sessions later, while aboard a ship full of odd happenings, the PCs joined with a few NPCs to discuss what was happening - but we didn't just sit down an talk. We sat down to talk and play a few hands of Mu.

AMAZING! First of all, this is a great, great card game. At some level it's a simple trick-taking game, but there's also a bidding mechanic which results in shifting alliances. Within two hands we were literally howling at the denouement as the last trick played out.

And here's the cool thing: The whole time we were having a discussion in-character about the goings-on in the ship. The result was a tremendously memorable and satisfying session.

So, to review: Game-within-game - good, if the 'within-game' is good in and of itself. I'd imagine that playing a boring, crappy game within a roleplaying session would be just as boring and crappy as usual, except with funny voices.

 

[Byrons_Ghost]

Then there's always "At the Spottle Parlor," an adventure in one of the early issues of Dungeon, that features a gambling game called "spottle," involving some dice and a frog. My players loved playing spottle!

Johnathan

I remember this module, it was great fun. The best thing about the adventure, IMO, was that it wasn't even really a quest or anything. It was just a description of the game, the tavern, and the people playing. The NPCs had enough personality and quirks that something was bound to happen, although I don't really think anything was scripted.

For other, more traditional games, seems like half the modules out there have some sort of chess puzzle or other (Bloodstone, anyone?). There was also a Master D&D module called "Talons of Night" which featured a version of 9 Men's Morris.

Essentially, the PCs play the game early on with one of the villains, and then later when they confron the Big Bad in the alternate dimension, the only way they can move or attack during combat is by following the rules of the game they played earlier IC. It was sort of neat, but I think it's impact was broken due to my players recognizing the source of the game.

 

[Napftor]

In our 2nd edition game, as DM I always made mention to folks in a bar playing a card game called Gin-n-Rabbits. While the PCs sometimes participated, I never really had any rules, just some calls for die rolls and then arbitrary rulings on "wons" and "losses." Well, I got tired of just talking about the game and decided to write it out for play. So one Sunday afternoon I sat down, wrote out the rules, drew and cut out the cards, and playtested the whole game. Didn't work out to badly, if I do say so myself. We've literally played this game within a game on more than one occasion. You can find at least the mention of the game in Mystic Eye's Tournaments, Fairs, and Taverns.

 

[Mark Plemmons]

Shameless plug time...

Goods and Gear: the Ultimate Adventurer's Guide has five dice games (Barrier, Chariots, Emperor's Luck, Old Lucky's, Three Kings) and two card games (Dwarven Downs, Twenty-One).