Modern-day game settings and 9/11

[Maraxle]

Maybe I'm wrong but I feel you may have misread my initial post. I sincerly hope you or anyone else felt that I was praising the d20 Afghanistan product. I was merely using it as an example. I've never laid eyes on the product. And others keep using the word "entertainment" which should never go hand-and-hand with the phrase 9/11. I guess even prefacing my starting thread posting didn't help.

Once again I was asking how to deal with 9/11 in modern-day game settings. In the spycraft campaign I referred to I now remember that my group never really asked if 9/11 plays a part. The subject only came up when I was planning the campaign (still ongoing process) and that's when I thought to post something here and see what others have done. Thanks to those who answered the question.

Oh no. I didn't misread you. I understand that you weren't promoting Afghanistan d20. I just meant that I wouldn't touch on 9/11 in any game, regardless. Then, I got off on a tangent about Afghanistan d20.

 

[Maraxle]

It may be a little soon for Afghanistan d20, if only because Afghanistan was just the first step in a much broader and ongoing conflict. That may have contributed to the impression that the authors were somehow 'profiteering' from a war while it's still being fought.

I totally believe that they were profiteering. They are no better than the people who were selling rubble form the world trade center on ebay, or the people who jack up the prices on generators whenever the northeast has an ice storm.

 

[Eternalknight]

What would be interesting to know is how well the thing has sold.I think it is still too soon, and still too sensitive. Sure, we have games based around World War II. But World War II is long over, and the War on Terror is still (more than likely) in its infancy. There are still troops in Afghanistan, and with Iraq a likely target, I certainly hope we don't see an Iraq d20 game any tim in the near future.

 

[Henry]

It all comes down to really knowing your players. If you all feel that you can "handle" it, then by all means do so. But there's nothing wrong with NOT handling it, either. It's still too close. Still too VERY close.

 

[Torx]

As was said by Crothian:

9/11 affected a lot of people in different ways.

And as was said by Henry:

It all comes down to really knowing your players.

Both of these statements accurately illustrate my beliefs regarding 9/11. However, it also comes down to what role you'd like 9/11 to play in your game. If utter realism is the goal of the game, right down to using accurate names, places, and history, 9/11 would be essential at least as a background story.

If, on the other hand, the game does not rely so heavily on realism - 9/11's placement in a game rests more on your players.

Put yourself in your players shoes with 9/11 events either happening or have happened. You are forced to make difficult emotional decisions based on your character's background, alignment, and loads of other mitigating factors. Some players feed off this kind of opportunity, others shy away from it, still others would loathe to be placed in such a difficult position.

Then you have the added problem of playing a superhero or Spycraft game with 9/11 about to happen. Can the characters stop it? Or are the events predetermined? These are difficult choices to make as a GM, and difficult to deal with as a player - at least from my perspective. Is all of that really worthwhile?

Again - refer to Crothian and Henry

 

[barsoomcore]

It's always tough to draw the line between exploiting and honouring -- a strange concept I know but bear with me.

On the one hand, it's not ridiculous to say that using tragic events in a game trivializes such events and exploits them for entertainment purposes. Whether you actually agree with that point of view or not, I don't think many people would dismiss it out of hand as nonsense. It's got some merit, at least.

On the other hand, it's also not ridiculous to say that pretending tragic events didn't happen also trivializes them and exploits our own desire to avoid painful truths. Again, you don't have to agree completely, but I think that most people would agree that's not a completely insane notion.

So what do you do? Is not making use of such events a way of honouring the losses suffered, or is using them the better way to indicate that respect? Now that issue is going to have a different answer for each of us, I suspect. Is Afghanistan d20 a shallow grab for cash? Or, perhaps, was it motivated from a desire to present as truthful a picture as could be provided of that country's terrible suffering for the past decades? Both are possible, and which one you pick may not depend on the stated aims of the publishers. Is including 9/11 in your own game appropriate? Again, different answer for everyone.

What I do think is true (and I'm Canadian, so I'm all thoughtful and cooperative and stuff) is that everyone agrees that tragedy should always be remembered, that we should learn lessons from the past and that we have to keep our hope and our faith alive if we are to go forward at all. Whatever our response may be, the only truly abhorrent one is indifference.

 

[Kilmore]

Personally, after 9-11, I was all for blowing up the Taliban and Al-Qaeda. Gaming it would have been a fine outlet of steam for me if I would have had access to a modern game to do it with. I'm willing to say that the Afghanistan D20 game was a game designer's way of blowing off steam as well. I don't see anything wrong with it.

If St. Louis would have been attacked, and I would have been a witness or worse, involved with the carnage, then I think my attitude would be different. This is not to say I wasn't affected, but there's no way I could ever say 9-11 affected me the same way it did those in New York or those who had loved ones involved. I think it would be insulting if I ever insinuated that. NY went through hell this last year, and I have tons of respect for how you got through it.

But anyways, from the time I started gaming in the early 80's to the turn of the millenium, I thought that the modern era was the WORST and most boring era to game in. All the great adventures were done and over with (or far to the future). But now, looking at the news and all the events going on overseas (not just the Middle East), I am quite interested in getting D20 modern.

Still, I plan on creating an alternate "Modern" world, putting in a lot of the real world and mixing in appropriate cinematic elements. Anyone else got this plan?

 

[kenjib]

One potential pitfall is the fact that 9/11 has yet to be contextualized and understood. We don't even really know all that many hard facts about what happened and the media where we get our information from on all ends of the spectrum is highly politicized. There are many different interpretations of and reactions to this tragedy, and if some of the players have widely divergent views then there could be a problem.

For example, do you get into the issue of the tension between civil liberties and security, and the consolidation of power into the executive branch of gov't? If not, how can you possibly avoid it? That is a highly charged topic that is likely to stir up some very polarized opinions from different people at the table and create a problem for a DM trying to define a fluid game narrative amidst a conflict of interpretation. I think it's possible to handle the topic delicately, but at the same time it's kind of like walking through a mine field. Now if everyone in the game group has similar political leanings, that's a different story.

 

[Ranger REG]

For example, do you get into the issue of the tension between civil liberties and security, and the consolidation of power into the executive branch of gov't? If not, how can you possibly avoid it?

That depends. Most of the characters we play are soldiers and/or agents. To them, they think of security first and foremost. It's the DM's job to give what is considered a normal reaction who don't have that kind of mindset (i.e., civilians), although it can vary between individual NPCs.

 

[frankthedm]

Or maybe the attacks were to prevent something more horrible.

An Idea I have had as well. Some may find the subject not for them, but my gaming group' players are pretty inhuman morality wise