Let me start off with a disclaimer: I have never played an RPG, at least not in the traditional style. The closest I’ve come is something called the “mind games” that a friend introduced our small group to. There were no stats, no dice. It was pretty much a Death Battle style one-on-one turn-based combat where we created a character, listed his or her abilities, powers, and weapons on the page (we drew our characters–naturally mine were mostly superhero based though my second team were a sort of Star Wars/Masters Of The Universe hybrid concept), and did battle until someone had properly defeated the other. Naturally it was honor based but we were all honorable people, and while I didn’t have a perfect record I am proud to say I won the majority of my fights. Death wasn’t required to win, which is to my non-lethal benefit (though I think one of my characters were among the ex-living) but as I’ll get into that was the limit of my RPG experience outside of video games. And even those I don’t play a lot of. I mostly chose this topic because it bookends nicely with the BattleTech novel review for Chapter By Chapter.
So don’t look at this as advice from a critic/creator so much as observations of someone who enjoys listening or reading stories about other people’s RPG campaign. Not watching them play; I tried watching Power Rangers Hyperforce and just couldn’t get into it though I know broadcasting gaming sessions is pretty popular on the web. I do enjoy the stories of people who played, where I don’t have to sit there as they roll their extra-sided dice and try to decide what to do next. I have picked up on a few things about the RPG as storyteller and this is one situation where everyone involved is the storyteller.
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