Has anyone ever played "themself" in a game of any sort?
- Thread starter Altalazar
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Monte At Home
Explorer
I've done this a few times with groups. I wrote about one such experience here:
http://www.montecook.com/arch_lineos27.html
http://www.montecook.com/arch_lineos27.html
I personally tend to avoid such games. There's usually a little to much ego wrapped up in it for my tastes. YMMV, of course.
Plus - well, very simply, I know very few people who have the stats or skills to survive even a few moments in an action RPG environment.
Plus - well, very simply, I know very few people who have the stats or skills to survive even a few moments in an action RPG environment.
AFGNCAAP
First Post
Interestingly enough (& sadly enough, I should say): yes. Many times. Probably worthy of the other thread about mistakes of young gamers.
D&D Games:
Both myself & a good friend of mine ran our own D&D homebrews where we wound up travelling to. We wound up being races & classes that we liked playing (& not necessarily using stats & races that we would actually have), & did lots of wild stuff. Always the big heroes. He really liked the Guardians of the Flame; I was into the Ultima series of CRPGs (esp. 4+).
Another friend of ours (at the time) had a homebrew where the major "good wizard" came to Earth (actually an avanced version of himself) & recruit our gaming group to save that realm. The game itself didn't last long, but it did bacome a cool backstory--we essentially were revered as "gods" by 1 barbarian tribe (though we actually weren't--we were just high level), and some of our later PCs (natives of the setting) were (non-priest class) worshippers of the deities. (The world had WAY too many elves, though.)
Cyberpunk:
The DM of the elf-heavy world also ran a Cyberpunk game. Basically, our group wound up getting cryogenically frozen by a faulty air conditioner, & we were thawed out in the future. We wound up getting classes, cybernetics--the works. That game lasted a few sessions, though the PCs lived on in other games. My PC was the "mentor" for a vunch of kid PCs when that newer Cyberpunk game came out (the one with nanites that essentially gave superpowers to kids).
Superhero Games:
There has been superhero games where we'd play ourselves with superpowers. I often was some sort of Thor-like character; another was usually Spider-Man or Wolverine-like in powers; etc. The games never really endured, though the legacy has to a degree--in a relatively recent game, our PCs were confronted by the game world's version of ourselves (the players), who happened to be villains--supposedly we were kidnapped, imbued with powers, and either corrupted or mind-controlled into committing evil acts.
TORG:
The most recent incarnation of "players as PCs" is a TORG game where some players play themselves at the start of the Reality Wars (many of us are teenagers at the time, so it's sort of an alternate reality idea, rather than playing ourselves exactly as we are at this point in time). the concept is kinda cool, though I think the game system could be better/different overall.
Other games:
One player kept using himself as a PC incampaigns ran by 1 DM--that DM would run a bunch of different games (TORG, Marvel, D&D, etc.), & that PC of the player wound up world-hopping from 1 game to the next. Character became somewhat formidable (in certasin situations) and a hindrance (in other situations), not to mention that the character had a lot of changes--race changes, gender changes, deaths, clonings, etc. He definitely wasn't the same as he started out as.
The latest use of this concept (other than the TORG game) has been in one of my D&D games (FR, actually). I made up pre-gens based off of the players, but it really wasn't "the players as PCs," per se. I used point-buy for all of the characters, and I made the pre-gens based off of (1) what I saw the players as, personaility-wise, and (2) what the players typically preferred to play. A person who liked to play elves was an elf, but I made the character a barbarian based on the style of play (blunt, direct, jumps into battle, somewhat bad tempered characters). Another player who typically played spellcasters I made a sorcerer, but since the player often goes off the beaten path, I made the character a dwarf sorcerer. Another player always tries to get the best of everything (stat-wise) and be able to do almost anyhting (class/race-wise); I made that character a human bard (diverse, able to do a lot of things, but never better than any PC who focused/devoted on a specific area).
Oddly enough, most of the group enjoyed playing the pre-gens. They easily got into the concepts (wasn't really hard to), and the pre-gens' Alignments pretty much matched up to the characters' styles of play (no Evil ALs, but very few good ALs overall).
I may do the same thing again (with another group), or at least create such character but use them as NPCs only. I think that, in the right context/situation, these games can work out just great. Otherwise, it can easily degenerate into "I can easily do that!/Why isn't X on my character sheet?/I wouldn't do that!/etc."
D&D Games:
Both myself & a good friend of mine ran our own D&D homebrews where we wound up travelling to. We wound up being races & classes that we liked playing (& not necessarily using stats & races that we would actually have), & did lots of wild stuff. Always the big heroes. He really liked the Guardians of the Flame; I was into the Ultima series of CRPGs (esp. 4+).
Another friend of ours (at the time) had a homebrew where the major "good wizard" came to Earth (actually an avanced version of himself) & recruit our gaming group to save that realm. The game itself didn't last long, but it did bacome a cool backstory--we essentially were revered as "gods" by 1 barbarian tribe (though we actually weren't--we were just high level), and some of our later PCs (natives of the setting) were (non-priest class) worshippers of the deities. (The world had WAY too many elves, though.)
Cyberpunk:
The DM of the elf-heavy world also ran a Cyberpunk game. Basically, our group wound up getting cryogenically frozen by a faulty air conditioner, & we were thawed out in the future. We wound up getting classes, cybernetics--the works. That game lasted a few sessions, though the PCs lived on in other games. My PC was the "mentor" for a vunch of kid PCs when that newer Cyberpunk game came out (the one with nanites that essentially gave superpowers to kids).
Superhero Games:
There has been superhero games where we'd play ourselves with superpowers. I often was some sort of Thor-like character; another was usually Spider-Man or Wolverine-like in powers; etc. The games never really endured, though the legacy has to a degree--in a relatively recent game, our PCs were confronted by the game world's version of ourselves (the players), who happened to be villains--supposedly we were kidnapped, imbued with powers, and either corrupted or mind-controlled into committing evil acts.
TORG:
The most recent incarnation of "players as PCs" is a TORG game where some players play themselves at the start of the Reality Wars (many of us are teenagers at the time, so it's sort of an alternate reality idea, rather than playing ourselves exactly as we are at this point in time). the concept is kinda cool, though I think the game system could be better/different overall.
Other games:
One player kept using himself as a PC incampaigns ran by 1 DM--that DM would run a bunch of different games (TORG, Marvel, D&D, etc.), & that PC of the player wound up world-hopping from 1 game to the next. Character became somewhat formidable (in certasin situations) and a hindrance (in other situations), not to mention that the character had a lot of changes--race changes, gender changes, deaths, clonings, etc. He definitely wasn't the same as he started out as.
The latest use of this concept (other than the TORG game) has been in one of my D&D games (FR, actually). I made up pre-gens based off of the players, but it really wasn't "the players as PCs," per se. I used point-buy for all of the characters, and I made the pre-gens based off of (1) what I saw the players as, personaility-wise, and (2) what the players typically preferred to play. A person who liked to play elves was an elf, but I made the character a barbarian based on the style of play (blunt, direct, jumps into battle, somewhat bad tempered characters). Another player who typically played spellcasters I made a sorcerer, but since the player often goes off the beaten path, I made the character a dwarf sorcerer. Another player always tries to get the best of everything (stat-wise) and be able to do almost anyhting (class/race-wise); I made that character a human bard (diverse, able to do a lot of things, but never better than any PC who focused/devoted on a specific area).
Oddly enough, most of the group enjoyed playing the pre-gens. They easily got into the concepts (wasn't really hard to), and the pre-gens' Alignments pretty much matched up to the characters' styles of play (no Evil ALs, but very few good ALs overall).
I may do the same thing again (with another group), or at least create such character but use them as NPCs only. I think that, in the right context/situation, these games can work out just great. Otherwise, it can easily degenerate into "I can easily do that!/Why isn't X on my character sheet?/I wouldn't do that!/etc."
Hardhead
Explorer
Monte At Home said:
About four years ago, I ran an Alternity game roughly based off a combination of the TV show Sliders and the book Timeline (before it was a movie). Anyway, the characters were from an "Alternate Earth" so that gave us some leeway about making our chacters. Players had the option of making wholey new characters or alternate versions of themselves. All but one of them made alternate selves. It worked out really well.
One, who was in his second year at college made an Archaeologist (a real one, not Indiana Jones. He was useful since so many worlds were based on scenerios like "what if the Roman Empire had never fallen" or somesuch. He had also trained in middle-age weaponry, which was useful on technologically backwards worlds). Incidently, he now *is* an archaeologist, sot that worked out pretty well. One of the older members of the group made a version of himself that had stayed in the military, become special ops, and was a sniper. One made a detective/psi version of himself (we used a light touch of psionics, about Star Trek level). The other made a wholey new character.
(Psi)SeveredHead
Adventurer
I did, for two sessions of Dark*Matter (Alternity), which is basically Shadow Chasers with a different ruleset.
WayneLigon
Adventurer
I've done it a couple times. Both times were as close to the absolute nadir of gaming pleasure I've ever had, period.
One was: You [the player] gain super powers in this, our real world. What happens next? A fascinating campaign start, and I've used it with great success a couple times. It could very well have been because we were using GURPS rules and I was given 'Super Strength', which in GURPS terms meant all my points were blown to give me a 20 ST to start. Basically that means I can lift a considerable but not 'super' amount of weight. Maybe about 400 pounds. Really useful, that, when people have laser beam eyes, can fly, etc.
The other was where we were transported to some fantasy world. One guy poked something with a stick to see if it was hostile and it killed us all in a couple rounds.
One was: You [the player] gain super powers in this, our real world. What happens next? A fascinating campaign start, and I've used it with great success a couple times. It could very well have been because we were using GURPS rules and I was given 'Super Strength', which in GURPS terms meant all my points were blown to give me a 20 ST to start. Basically that means I can lift a considerable but not 'super' amount of weight. Maybe about 400 pounds. Really useful, that, when people have laser beam eyes, can fly, etc.
The other was where we were transported to some fantasy world. One guy poked something with a stick to see if it was hostile and it killed us all in a couple rounds.
In highschool we did this several times after an early game magazine printed an actual set of tests that could be correlated to the old Aftermath game. It was fun because it took out much of the subjective ego issues that tend to result otherwise. A similar set of comparative tests popped up when the 1st ed. Twilight 2000 came out. Fun at the time, the attraction has somewhat paled as I age.
MerakSpielman
First Post
An interesting way to do this might be to have the other players anonymously vote on your attributes. You get the average of their votes. Everybody votes for all attributes for all players except their own.
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