How far do you take your game?

[Illrein]

Violence: In my games, I use different types of violence for different moods. Usually, if I want a 'heartless' view towards the thought of violence, I'd have it happen "off-camera", so to speak. When I describe violence, it usually means that the players are in big trouble, and they've caught onto this tactic. I go as far as I need to, which isn't too far as it seems to draw a lot of out of game discussion.
Sex: The only time I've dealt with this was in a mercenary game. One of the players pursued a female stage performer. I let him make a couple of checks and I told him, "That's it. You scored." In my personal theory, everything revolves around sex. Therefore, I try to avoid sex in my campaigns as much as possible. One of my fellow role-players tends to bring sex into every game, usually in the form of rape. This brings out a revenge motive for adventure hooks, much like Charles Bronson movies.
Language: Out of game, we cuss quite a bit, maybe about as much as South Park. In game, however, there is little profanity. Language in my games is about the same amount of language used in Final Fantasy VII.
Religion: My role-playing group is primarily atheist, with me being the only agnostic one there. We don't run into religious conflicts. We often share the same point of view of religions: anything organized is bound to fail.
Politics: A hot topic in our group is political theory. In our group, we have a republican, a democrat, and various libertarians. Mainly, though, discussion arise about political actions against euthanasia, communicable diseases, totalitarianism, and the development of technology. Leave it to D&D players to debate matters like that. Nerds: You can't live with them, you can't live without them.

 

[Chrisling]

I go as far as the players will let me, actually. And depending on their responses to some things, I guide the game appropriately.

For instance, one of the players was making noise about her C turning eeeeeeevil as soon as possible. So, I wanted to make a point about the sort of things that evil people do not only to good poeple, but to each other. So I created a scenario where her character <i>could</i> be gang-raped. I just had a back-up plan in case the <i>player</i> didn't want to go in that direction. So, y'know, the bugbears broke down the door to her room and grappled her and held her down and I went into the other room with the player and told her what I wanted to do -- have her character viciously, violently and repeatedly raped. She blanched. She told me she didn't want to go there. I told her I had an alternative plan for just this reason, but then I told her that she doesn't want to play evil in my game if she's not willing to deal with the consequences of evil.

I'd be more than happy to graphically describe sex if there was some reason for it. There usually isn't, however -- the players aren't interested in that sort of thing, at least not from me at a game table, heh, which I understand. It's sorta creepy when you think about one guy describing graphic sex with another guy with three or four other guys watching. *shivers* That half of my players are female doesn't help; I figure lots of female players would take it badly if I described the details of their characters getting boinked. But I'd do it if it was necessary to the plot.

I routinely describe graphic violence. If you don't want to hear me describe a sword going in your foe's mouth and sticking out the back of their neck with the crunching of teeth . . . well, you probably shouldn't be in my game.

Oh, with langauge, I say whatever I feel NPCs would say, and basically expect my players to reciprocate. I have no trouble having my NPCs swear like sailors, if appropriate to the character.

 

[belegost]

In general I run a PG-13 type game. Our youngest player is 28 and I don't think anyone has a problem differentiating between fantasy and reality. I also run a pure G rated game for my son and his friends.

I'm a firm believer that what you don't see (or have described to you) but have to imagine can be twice as disturbing. I rarely go into vivid descriptions or details of violence acts. Usually, I will describe what happens just enough and let the players fill in the gaps.

We have had some pretty nasty things occur in the game without going gross. The sister of one of the players was dismembered and displayed in a grotesque manner when she was captured on a diplomatic trip. The scene could have been completely vile, but again I thought by describing just enough to get their imagination going we could have better results. It turned out that each player developed their own worst picture of what could have happened and I've never seen a group so united in their efforts of revenge. I don't think anything I described could have had the same effect.

We are not remotely interested in roleplaying sexual encounters once they heat up. Several of the PCs developed relationships but none of the sexual activity was covered in any detail nor do we have any interest in doing so.

While it is a matter of taste, I'm definitely a Signs/Blair Witch (or better yet Hitchcock) style of horror as opposed to the hack and slash Friday the 13th/etc. where we see all the gore and details. All the over the top visualization of horror doesn't affect me like a scene where I fill in a lot of the details.

 

[Fenrir]

My games tend to rate in the "R" range. A general theme of moral ambiguity hangs over my games: the characters are generally positively inclined, but they've used tactics like exortion, theft, and execution to achieve their ends. Moreover, my antagonist is not evil. Just another man with other goals.

I'm pretty graphic when it comes to the violence. I'll describe blood sprays and all the effects of a wound. It makes combat seem more dangerous than it actually is.

Sex has only occured in the game twice, and each time I've faded to black. I have no real interest to act out sex with a bunch of guys my own age. But it is present.

Rape hasn't really been touched on much, but one of the early NPC's had been raped by a group of orcs.

I bring FR's religions to bear completely, in order to increase the verisimilitude of the game and the environs.

 

[Ace]

My game is PG13 and oriented to scroundrels and rogues not Evil Psycopath wannabees

No graphic sex

No graphic violence

minimal hard core swearing



Someday though I will run my all Cambions game and then the rules will be different....

 

[mmadsen]

The goriest thing that happened in the last session was probably when one of the PCs shot an NPC in the eye with a crossbow bolt, and the bolt emerged from the back of the skull - with a twitching insectoid brain parasite still attached.

Now that's vivid imagery! Love it!

 

[Crothian]

Mine is PG-13 ro R, but most of the violence and other vile stuff is implied instead of fully detailed. I've found that hinting at things works better then full detail. A less is more type of thing.

 

[jgbrowning]

with crothian on this one.

i've found my players imagination much better than anything i can say.

i guess the worst ive done is had the female cleric of pelor get impregnated by a blood deamon and then give birth by vomiting.

joe b.

 

[Deadguy]

I think that ultimately you have to be guided by your players, moderated by what you, yourself, feel comfortable with as DM.

Most of the people that I game with are in their late 20s or early 30s, so for me it's not a question of having to worry about dealing with minors. Even so, two groups play quite differently. One group is definitely more 'sanitised' than the other - we gloss over much of the sexual activity and even the violence. But that's because the game focusses mostly on the interplay between the PCs and the key NPCs. Swearing can be very 'graphic' with them, though, since that's the way some of the characters speak!

On the other hand, the other group I DM for prefers a more graphic style. There combat is grisly and I include a great deal of background stuff, pointing out the incidence of disease, deformity and spiritual degradation that some people suffer. Likewise sexual encounters can be descriptive - not to the degree of 'what goes where' so much as how the encounter plays out. In that sense, it's like any other intense role-play encounter with an NPC. I don't feel embarrassed by this interaction and nor do the players. I hope it's because we aren't approaching the matter in a puerile fashion, but rather recognising character drives.

I enjoy DMing for both groups, and it is they, not I, who have dictated the style. I guess I am saying that no-one should tell you that it's 'wrong' to approach the game more graphically - that doesn't necessarily make it sensationalist and pornographic as some might imply.

 

[Xarlen]

Yep, I go far, but not without reason. One player is 24, the other two are in their thirties, so they can handle it.

Violence? You betcha. Generally I am pretty descriptive of what happens, because I like cinematics. A monk rolls a perfect reflex save vs. multiple traps, I'm going to describe him dodging. Just like I'm going to say what happens when that Magic Missile hits for 25 damage and splatters the guy, as well as that arrow.

However, the only times that I seriously click the Gore button is when it's going to leave a bad taste in their mouth. The party was battling a sect of worshipers to the Goddess of Pain, Poison, Disease and Suffering, who were trying to take over a city, by prophecy of their god.

Two situations that come to mind: They needed a final sacrifice, to complete the Seven Sided Star, and thus the Talonites broke into their enemy clergy's Cathedral. The PCs come in, and find some acolytes brutalized; one's hanging from the ceiling, another's been nailed to the wall, after shallowly stabbed, and bled out. Another situation being, they were fighting the Talonites who had poisoned the water supply under the city. Well, the priestess dived under the water, and excaped. The Pyschic warrior that was on the water then lowered his sword, was giving up (because he was looking for healing), and the party agreed to his surrender. And about that time, the fiendish sharks she summoned from beneath the water got to him.

The description I gave to that really set the tone.

As for Sex, well, yeah. The party cleric is in a romantic relationship with the party's tank, my NPC. We don't describe sex, but we do do the 'fade to black' after leading up to it. And, there's enough innuendo flying around (especially from the cleric's player), and another character is a female Half-dragon elf, who plays the flirt. She has been into some situations (posing as a prostitute to get into a ganglander's hideout, and accidently mistaking an actual client for the ganglord; she went home with him). As said, we don't describe it, but it's certainly there.

Language: Yep. We play online, so no youngin's. Now, no gratitust spouting of profanity, but when they've delt with thugs, street thieves, and the like, it comes much more then normal. And I'm going to drop a foul-mouthed undead doorman to a wizard's tomb (Ala skeleton from The Last Unicorn).

Other: Religion? Yep. I give the party cleric a lot of stuff to do, because he's a Cleric, and thus, should have some RP stuff attached to him. Like a wizard who wants to do arcane stuff, he should get to stroke his Divine fancy. I've had him perform a secret marriage for two nobles (Ala Romeo and Juliet), and last session, he concecrated a 'haunted' inn and the graves of three unfortunate victims to a fire; the party had happened upon an Inn that had a fire, long ago, and the 'memories' were still around.