We are fastly approaching the mid point of this thing. The time is flying by. I think this years focus definitely so far seems so much more personal. I must catch up on some of the other content creators and see what they are doing.

Let’s see what todays soul searching question is.

“Why did you start RPGing?”

I think it’s been established my teenage years were the 80’s and the UK home computer boom. Living in a fenland market town.

Over in the states they had the whole satanic panic stuff going on. Which never really was a thing over here. So we weren’t really aware of it.

What I was aware of was the “moral majority” in the US and their campaign against heavy metal. After all I was into KISS and other metal groups, reading the then monthly Kerrang! and driving my parents and neighbours crazy with loud rock. So this sort of thing got reported in Kerrang!

In the UK we didn’t escape the moral crusade of others. Here we had Mary Whitehouse and her campaign to censor tv and video. We had the whole video nasty thing. Plus a wanna be Mary Whitehouse called Victoria Gillick who was trying to impose her catholic beliefs on the country and control girls bodies. Fun fact about Victoria Gillick she lives in Wisbech. So we often saw her round town. I went to college with one of her daughters. Plus a few years ago her husband was a UKIP town councillor.

The nearest I got to hearing about the religious fundamentalist campaign against D&D was seeing the Tom Hanks movie Monsters and Mazes (rented and watched on video).

There is a certain picture being painted over these types of posts. I certainly think comparisons could be made between Wisbech and say a mid west American town. It was (and still is) Hicksville.

It certainly feels looking back that it was in its own little bubble. Although it still has the whole “are you local?” thing going on.

I’ve already said previously the home computer boom expanded my world.

Despite owning a copy of the Basic D&D Starter set. I hadn’t actually played it. None of my friends were interested.

I think I could be best described at the time as D&D or RPG curious!

Playing an RPG seemed the natural progression from adventure and RPGs on the home computer.

They were something I wanted to try. I thought I would enjoy them. Although to be truthful, I wasn’t entirely sure what they were, and how you played them.

I think I’d owned the Starter set for a couple of years before going off to Brighton Polytechnic.

I joined the role playing society at Brighton Poly so I could try an RPG for the reasons mentioned above.

Maybe in a future post we will get to explore the Brighton years in more depth. Until then catch you in the next post!

“If you could live in a game setting, where would it be?”

I’d like to say the Forgotten Realms, but let’s face it it’s basically a fancy Middle Ages setting. No flushing toilets, no running water, diseases, working the land, feudal system. Need I go on to why I wouldn’t want to live there?

Middle Earth?

Ixalan?

No for me it’d have to be one of the cyberpunk dystopian futures such as that depicted in FFGs Android setting.

The moment I first played Android Netrunner I fell in love with the theme.

The runners taking on the mega corporations.

Yes it’s still a world of haves and have nots. A world of corruption, run by mega corporations. Mega corporations that are not openly at war with each other, but fight against each other in the shadows.

To be fair apart from the level of technology, no space travel, or space elevator, are we really that far off what is being depicted in these type of settings?

Mega companies like Amazon, Google, Facebook and Apple more or less tell Governments how much tax they will pay. They are almost a law unto themselves. Our politicians no matter their political leaning act in the best interests of the big companies and the rich.

But still in this bladerunneresq future I’d see myself more as one of the runners than say a Street samurai. It’d just love the tech. As I do now, and have done ever since the home computer boom of the 80’s.

Which setting would you choose?

It’s a blistering hot day, I’ve managed to get some gaming in on my day off. Apart from the heat it’s been a pretty good day off. But I’ll cover all this in another post.

You’re here to read todays entry in the 2022 RPGaDAY thingy.

So what is our thunk for the day?

It’s “When did/will you start Gamemastering?”

I started gamemastering way back (and this makes it sound like a long time) in 2019. I want to say April/May time. I’d go back on here and check but in this heat that’s too much effort.

In reality we are talking less than twenty sessions. It’d be more if there hadn’t been a global pandemic.

So I’m a fairly inexperienced DM/GM.

But I do enjoy it. Especially after discovering the way of the lazy DM. Which has made preparing for sessions a delight.

Let’s see what’s behind the round window.

Todays deep dive question is “What is the 2nd RPG you bought?”

To answer this one we need to once more jump in to that Delorean and go back to the life shaping year 1988.

It, (to paraphrase a famous quote) was the best of times and the worst times.

In 1988 I was living down in Brighton, studying at the Polytechnic.

It was the first time in my life that I was living away from home. I was adjusting to living in a hilly place. Brighton with its hills is the complete opposite to the Fenland town I had spent my whole life in. Which is flat as a pancake.

The previous year we had “survived” the great hurricane that had hit the UK. With all the fallen tries around Brighton it seemed to an active imagination like mine at the time like Saruman had been at work here recreating Isengard.

The start of 1988 saw my Grandad passing away. I remember being told he’d gone into hospital, and I was planning to travel back to see him. However my aunt (living in Horseham at the time) asked me to call in on the way back. Which I did. It was then she told me he had died.

Later in the year I got to meet Ace Frehley and get his autograph at a record signing in Kingston Upon Thames. Followed a couple days later seeing his first ever UK solo gig. I was buzzing those few days.

During the Summer my brother and I were at the Castle Donnington Monsters of Rock gig. Where we saw KISS. But acts like Guns and Roses were also playing.

We saw one or two other groups that year. But I can’t remember who.

Then in September Dad decided to take his own life. I was at home when this happened. I tried to resuscitate him. I’ll never forget the taste of his breathe. As you can imagine this hit me pretty hard. The new academic year started weeks later. We had barely said good bye before I was back down in Brighton.

My final year (I was doing a two year HND) was more me trying to deal with Dad’s death than studying. It was a very rough time. But I some how passed.

So there you have some context around my purchase of my second RPG. Some of this will be very new information to some of my friends.

From previous posts in this years #RPGaDAY we know that D&D was my first purchased RPG, and that MERP was the first one that I had played.

However my second RPG purchase was not the rules for MERP but the core rulebook for the Elfquest RPG.

At the time I was developing a serious comic book habit, with the Brighton Forbidden Planet being my main dealer of choice.

I had already bought a complete set of the Howard the Duck comic book in the search of the first ever KISS comic book appearance. I really got into Howard the Duck through this search. A love of the character I still have to this day, despite the movie.

I was buying Batman and Punisher comics, Nausiccaa plus some other manga. But more importantly I had stumbled upon the Pini Elfquest comic.

There was something about these wolf riding elves and their search for a new home and other elves that just grabbed me.

So when I found out that there was an RPG (basically by seeing the rule book on the shelves at the Brighton FP) I had to buy it.

Sadly I’ve never gotten to play the RPG. I don’t think I’ve ever sat down and read the rules completely. Only ever skimming through them.

I know there are some criticism of the rules and the bonding of elves with there being little or no control over who bonds to who. In these more enlightened times I’m sure that if this was to be updated that that problematic bit would be dropped or handled more sensitively. Let alone the mechanics simplified and made more accessible.

Maybe one day I’ll get to play it, or use it with a system like Genesys.

What was the second RPG you bought?

“Hello! Hurray! Let the show begin I’m ready.” Alice Cooper.

So what is todays soul searching question about RPGs?

“Who introduced you to RPGs?”

I’ve mentioned before in a previous post how I was first introduced to RPGs.

To save you clicking the link and getting bored even more. It can be summarised succinctly as I stumbled into them.

There wasn’t a particular person that introduced me to them.

I had no friends into them. They were more interested in video games. After all this was at the height of the UK home computer boom. Heck it consumed my life too. Not just playing video games. But coding as well. Where as the majority of my friends stopped there not expanding their horizons. Computers for me helped me grow. Exposing me to new things that a teenager in a fenland market town wouldn’t normally get exposed to.

If I had to name a particular person. I couldn’t. For the reasons above.

But you could argue, and I wouldn’t disagree. That a good case could be made that the staff writers of those early video game magazines that wrote about RPGs were the ones that introduced me to RPGs.

I think I owe them a big big thank you for doing so.

So who introduced you to RPGs?

My day of the week clock is going to be so messed up this week. Mainly because I’m working both days of the weekend.

However I have a transfer date to my new store. Which means this time next week I’m based at a new location. Doing a new role. Very exciting times.

But that’s enough about me. We are here for that day seven goodness of the #RPGaDAY2022 thing.

So todays thought for the day is “System Sunday: Describe a cool part of a system that you love.”

Before I actually share my brief poorly written thoughts on this subject. I just want to say I love the idea of doing a regular Sunday thing looking at a cool part of a RPG that I own. Maybe it’s something I’ll come back to once this death march has finished.

In todays answer I’m going to look at the cool part of the Alien RPG that attracted me to the game.

I’ll admit right here and now I’ve not played the Alien RPG. I have everything for it. But not played. There are plans to run a session or two starting to take place. But nothing solid at the moment.

When I first heard about the Alien RPG obviously the theme of having a RPG set in the Alien universe really attracted me to the game. I love the Alien movies. Love the books, graphic novels, video games set in that universe.

However what really sold me on the game and made it a “I must own this and play it” was when the YouTube channel (sorry can’t remember which) I was watching started talking about the stress mechanic the game used.

“… mounting tension is represented by your STRESS LEVEL. It usually starts at zero, and can increase by pushing dice rolls (see page 60) and by experiencing frightening or stressful situations…“ page 30, Alien RPG Core Rulebook

This is how the core rulebook describes how the stress mechanic works.

“When you push a roll, your STRESS LEVEL immediately increases by one point… When making skill rolls—including the immediate re-roll when pushing—add a number of Stress Dice to your dice pool equal to your current STRESS LEVEL. This means the stress actually increases your chances to succeed at skill rolls—it makes you more sharp and alert. However, if you roll a face hugger symbol on one or more Stress Dice during a skill roll, you risk panic.” page 61

The stress dice should be a different colour to the other dice used in a skill roll. Obviously Free League sell their Alien specific dice (pictured above). However any six side dice can be used.

That push your luck element to represent stress really did impress me. It sounded so cool and simple. And yet effective.

Rolling those dice and seeing the face hugger appear surely must cause the tension to rise not just for the player rolling but also round the table. What’s going to happen on that panic roll? “A Panic Roll can cause your skill roll to fail no matter how many you rolled.” page 61.

A panic roll has you “Roll a D6, add your current STRESS LEVEL, and check the table…” page 104.

As long as your total is less than six, nothing bad happens. But seven upwards bad things start to happen. The severity of that bad thing gets worse the higher your total. It starts off minor but soon gets to “oh shit”.

The more you push your dice rolls the more likely something bad happens when you get the face hugger symbol. So you have to manage that stress level. All of a sudden that skill test you have to pass becomes a difficult decision about whether you push the roll and increase your stress level risking bad things. I can only imagine (at the moment) the tension.

All this just resonated with me. I just needed to play/own this game.

I hope you also found this mechanic cool. What would your answer be.