THE LIPAKS WAY FRPG By: Lee, aka Dr Pepper Overview For Beginners.       Return to Lipaks main page

    About Fantasy Role Playing In General

When children run around pretending to be cartoon or comic book characters, they are Playacting.

Role Playing is formal playacting, the players agree ahead of time who is going to pretend to be whom, and have a general understanding of what each person can do or is likely to do. The person one pretends to be is called a Character. A story develops as each player describes what their character says and does, which includes interaction with other characters.

A role playing Game adds structure. There is a setting that is independent of the characters. And events can happen that the characters did not plan or expect and which they must react to.

This introduces the idea of a person who controls the setting, generally called the Game Manager or GM here, but could also be called the Referee, Director, or Storyteller. This person tells the players what is going on in general, guides the story along, and takes on the parts of whatever extra characters are needed.

Note that this can also be considered a form of improvisational theater.

Now a Fantasy role playing game is one that includes elements of the supernatural or paranormal such as one finds in fantasy literature. Ever read a fantasy story that you wished you could be in? With a fantasy role playing game you can! In fact, you could say that the purpose of the game (besides having fun, without which it wouldn't be worth playing) is to participate in a fantasy adventure, to create a story through the interaction of the participants.

Fantasy role playing games (FRPGs, FRPs or RPGs) are played through conversation. The GM sets the scene, the players respond in character.
A game can be a one time event, a single gathering of Characters in a single setting. But many GMs run Campaigns, open ended sequences of gaming sessions. In a Campaign the same set of characters experience a series of adventures set in the same environment.

The original method of play, and still the most common is the Live Game. That's where the GM and all the players are together, usually sitting around a table.

The players usually have paper forms that record the characteristics of their characters. There are rule books to explain what sort of things can be done, usually modified by the GM. The GM may make up everything as they go along, or they may have notes they wrote ahead of time. Sometimes there are maps that represent the imaginary setting to help people visualize where they are. Sometimes there are Miniatures, which are little models of characters that are used to represent movement and positioning. The painting and customizing of miniatures has become quite a pastime in its own right.

But the true setting, the playing field, the game board if you like, exists only in the minds and the shared interaction of the participants.

 Also, in live games the scope of conversation tends to stray at times, as in other social activities. Yet this straying sometimes produces unexpected ideas that in turn become part of that game or another at some later date.

There is also Play By Mail (PBM) gaming, in which the GM writes everything down and mails a copy to each of the players, who then mail back their responses. A similar method is Play By Electronic Mail (PBEM), which takes advantage of the speed and ease of computer communication. Both of these have several advantages including allowing people to proceed on their own schedule, giving them time to think, and no arguments over paying for the pizza.

The main disadvantages of these indirect methods of playing are that since they take longer, the chances of personal circumstances forcing a player to drop out are greater. This can disrupt the cohesiveness of the game. And the slower interaction means slower and less varied conversation which in turn reduces the amount of the synthesis of ideas mentioned earlier.
Some online services, bulletin boards and Internet chatrooms offer Online Gaming, which allows live but not face to face play where the players type their actions in real time.

Some people like Live Action gaming, in which the story is physically acted out as much as possible, often in costume.

Normally, the environment (which can be anything from the world in which the game takes place down to the activities of the inhabitants in the immediate locale) is determined by the GM. Some create everything themselves, while others rely on published materials. And of course many start with published materials and put their own stamp on them.

As play proceeds by whatever method, the GM tells the players what's going on. The players tell the GM what their characters are doing, or at least trying to do, which includes discussions with the other characters. The GM determines the results of player actions and the story continues.

When the game ends, the characters continue to exist, assuming they haven't died, of course. They are available to be used in future games. And being living persons, they experience growth and development, hopefully gaining knowledge, skill, effectiveness, wealth, power, fame, fulfillment, or at least something to tell their grandchildren.

    Fantasy Gaming and Wargaming

Fantasy role playing, or just fantasy gaming for short, is often compared to wargaming because fantasy gaming has some developmental roots in the latter. Also, both attempt to create an imaginary "reality".

Wargaming is an attempt to simulate real warfare on a board which represents real terrain with pieces that represent the units of combat forces. Most of the units are groups rather than individuals and encounters in battle are mechanical: the players may yell but the theoretical casualties aren't heard at all. Units rarely get smaller because some of their numbers are killed, instead they are assumed to lose morale until at some point either they are withdrawn to calm down, or else they run away.

Because of the unit orientation, wargaming may seem almost as impersonal as chess. But it remains open ended in a way that chess is not. Chess has very rigid rules. Wargaming may normally proceed as if it did also, but there are always new possibilities that can be devised. Mutiny, for instance, or equipment failure.

Where wargaming and fantasy gaming differ is mainly in their goals and their treatment of individuals.

The goals of wargaming are always, of course, war related. A fantasy game can have a war related goal also, but it need not. Most tend to have some conflict though, as most players like it that way.

The difference in the treatment of individuals is simple: wargames tend to ignore them, fantasy games tend to focus on them. At most a wargame may make provision for the presence of inspirational leaders. For instance in Napoleonics, which is one of the most popular subgenres of wargaming, a beleaguered french unit is less likely to break and run if Napoleon himself is in personal command.

In fantasy gaming, a character may find themselves caught up in the actions of a unit, but the focus still remains on them.

Some gaming systems attempt to cover both ends of the spectrum, having both unit and individual rules, with differing degrees of success.

    Fantasy Gaming And The Literature

The literary background of fantasy gaming is quite varied. It includes ancient mythology, traditional folktales, fairy tales, classic fantasy, and the latest multivolume epics. But there is a standard environment, a common set of expectations that all games are defined relative too.

This environment draws on popular fantasy fiction from the early decades of this century. That's probably because the first game designers either grew up on the writers of that time, or on the next generation of writers who were influenced by them. Hence you are likely to find dragons, elves, wizards, swords, and unicorns, or something equivalent, in most games. And of course, the worlds of fantasy gaming never stand still, there are always opportunities for adventure.

Politics, customs, fashions and ideas tend to be derivative of western Europe in medieval or Renaissance times, again reflecting the background of the designers. Most particularly, the settings of most games lack any sort of modern technology-- no guns, no electricity, no self powered machinery. Even those who set their games in different environments tend to borrow from this standard source. Somehow that seems to help establish the mood.