Chasing the dragon

Whether you're new to gaming or a veteran of many campaigns, it seems to me that many of us are looking to capture or recapture something. Perhaps it was the feeling of your very first campaign with your childhood friends or to bring what's in your imagination to fruition. Maybe you're wanting to emulate a movie you watched. Tabletop roleplaying games give us the freedom to do literally anything. It would seem that we are only limited by what we can imagine, though I find the games themselves limit me as well based on what the rules system allows. We are left with finding the right game for the right feeling we're chasing after.

As many of us know, there are many games out there and it would be fair to argue that each does something different and better than some. I'm curious about this community's thoughts on what games do what better. Perhaps you've been lucky enough to find a game that let's you do everything you've ever wanted.

The "ideal" game I always had in mind and wanted to play in was basically You Don't Meet In An Inn's run of Monsterhearts. Some plot but basically all relationship drama.

I'm too bad of a roleplayer irl to get that experience there but I have found it on GP. First with an amazing Smallville game with Squadfather44, Cosmic_Cube and thetaodaddy, then, after that game had to end due to real life interfering, with a wonderful game of Things from the Flood with Emberskyes that is still ongoing.

There are tons of great game experiences I made or am still hoping to make on here but that is basically the holy grail and I managed to find it twice.

A game that let's you do everything you've ever wanted...nope. And yes. I've always been able to modify or change the way a game is played to suit MY GM style rather than the other way around. I can think of several games over the course of nearly 40 years of gaming (May2002 will be 40 years) that hit the sweet spot. IMHO there are a few factors that make that happen. In a nutshell:

The group you're in (everyone buys in to the game's premises and make the effort to make it a great game)

The GMs ability to be flexible and fair (keep the 4th wall at bay, make calls on the fly that make sense, be firm, be fair)

A great setting (has to be something that keeps your interest no matter the genre)

A modular system (or make it do what you want!) (The rules should embrace the setting.) EVERY game has flaws.

Some folks like a narrow set of rules and some like a broader set of rules. It's a matter of personal taste. Some folks can't see playing games without fumble tables, critical tables, detailed weapon stats and such. Some folks are ok with no dice and just making it all up as you go. Most fall somewhere in the middle.

That's what my experience has lead me to believe - so far. I might change my mind tomorrow or in a few years. Who knows?

For me the dragon is those moments as a GM, when the players take over. I've seen this in IRL games, where my players are so immersed and invested in their characters, they can hammer out interpersonal drama for hours. I've timed it, had instances where as the GM, I've said nothing for an hour. That feeling, of having lead them into creating so much for themselves and each other, is my fantasy with every game.

This has sort of happened on GP a couple times. The first was Savage Rifts, where the players rallied around Melanquolia's mute Burster-who-never-once-Burstered, and RPed endlessly without my prompting. They built their characters and relationships organically around her.

The second was more recently, in a Pathfinder game, where one player asked for a thread to RP his introduction to the city. The others jumped in, and there are now 75 posts in that thread, maybe one from me the GM.

That's my opium dream -- players that I've given enough tools to that they can engage and game without me herding them like cats.

That's excellent! I know that everyone has their own tastes and with different genres and settings being more capable of delivering on those tastes, it's great that you've found that.
"Every game has flaws." That's something to think about. Accepting that statement and being ready to tweak/flex rules to fit what you want does sound like a good plan.

Chasing after and communicating that desire to play your dream game can be challenging. Finding a group that will all buy-in and want the same thing as you is another. I think that many times as we play games we are experimenting with them to see if it's something we like or just to try it on for size, so to speak.

For example, to put my dream game into words, I can only think of vague terms because it's undefined and nebulous. Perhaps there is no "perfect" dream game for me but instead, my dream is to have one that meets certain criteria. That being said, there are certainly players who want to emulate other stories and shows from all types of media where they want to live vicariously through the game to be that character they like such as Aragorn or Han Solo. Making
That does sound wonderful. I haven't personally experienced that as I have generally been in games where players and GM have an almost continual back and forth. Perhaps that's something to say about the unknown of the setting.

There's nothing quite like sitting back and watching the players roll with whatever situation you've put them in. Those times where my intervention wasn't needed are some of the most fond memories I have of games that I've run IRL.

One example was a game where the characters had found an ancient scroll written in some long lost script; which I had come up with the night before. They spent one entire session, in character, trying to work it out based on clues that had found in previous meetings (there were some words that had been translated previously via various means). When they hadn't cracked it by the end of the session they took to our Slack channel and worked on it as a team daily, and still hadn't worked it out, spent most of the next session doing the same until they finally got it. I barely spoke a word the whole time. It was awesome.

For me, the dragon is elusive. I have greatly enjoyed many, many games on here but the dragon is seldom glimpsed, and only fleetingly. It wasn't even until recently that I was able to name the dragon: I want to feel like I'm 12 again. I can't even begin to explain what that means exactly, but I know it when I see it.

Maybe I should look into OSR?

I know what you mean. Some things have gone missing. One example - I like character death, but most 5e DMs seem to be allergic to it or they'll only allow it if it's meaningful or poignant. Psshh! Even what I play purposely reckless characters they just don't die.

Maybe I should look into OSR?

Well hello thread that's been dead for months.
I think I know what you mean, Jabes, about being 12 again. It's part the new excitement and part innocent naivety for me, I think. There's more, but it's difficult to put into words.
Have you found any games that bring you closer to that "12 yr old you" feeling? Or does it depend on the people you game with?
As for character death, that is a growing trend. I have given players the option of letting me roll in secret or rolling publicly so that if they're ok with how the dice roll, they know they're accepting the possibility of death. Many players don't want their characters to die, but many GMs don't want it because it can chase players away. At least, that's how I feel. It's another one of those things to talk about in Session 0.

Something isn't right here...

... as if a million Waterdhavians cried out in anguish and then were silenced.

Some games here and there, yes.

@Len once ran an Isle of Dread game converted to 5e that gave me that vibe.

@Naatkinson is currently running some of the classic D&D modules, also converted to 5e (link to public game) and that's been great too!

The group does matter, along with many other factors others have mentioned. Ironically, the dragon no longer visits when I play with the guys I actually played with when I was 12.

Sad, isn't it?

I think I get what you mean. I remember when I discovered The Dark Eye and D&d Basic. Seems we played endless hours at those games, and the fun we had interpreting the rules, coming up with rulings, and discovering new games... Heck, I remember the "wow" factor I felt the first time I played West End Game's Star Wars... that is until a crappy GM completely ruined that game for me...

Now, I'm older and have more obligations. I not only have less time to put into gaming, but it seems I also have less energy. That dragon feels like it may be truly gone now, though I swear I can catch glimpses of it every once in a while, and I may have even succeeded in actually touching it once or twice...

The short answer is yes, you should both look into the OSR. =]

And not to be obnoxious about recommending a system -- the "magic" being described is a little different for everyone, of course, and might have nothing to do with the system -- but Beyond the Wall and Other Adventures is really aimed squarely at recreating that majesty. It's about young characters coming into contact with amazing things for the first time, and provides some specific tools to support the GM facilitating this kind of game.

It's tricky talking about the dragons we're chasing, as it's kinda disrespectful to the people we're in games with - like they're not dragons.

Why look for dragons, and ignore the dragons I already have?

* DoIP is the old-school-adventures-near-Phandalin dragon (as well as a, y'know, dragon dragon), and proper classic fantasy tropes.

* FH has the dragon of players who turn up for a slow-burning adventure (players who turn up... mmm.... dragony).

* UR is a comedy gold dragon. Hapless bonkers heroes without any real clue how to save the world.

* The new IDRotF and SKT look to have some really interesting characters developing. Early days, but I think I've found baby dragons here.

* CM is my lightweight and relaxed dragon.

Perhaps I need to stop chasing dragons and take better care of the dragons I already have.

I like that you use a lot of abbreviations that I don't understand 😄

---

I also don't think it's disrespectful to people in current games if you say what you wish for in your ideal game. It's not necessarily a reflection on your fellow players but might just be an expression of interest in themes or genres that just don't mesh with everyone.

I'll repeat what I've alresdy said, that I immensely enjoy most of my games here. As has been noted elsewhere, there are many kinds of fun, and a variety of experiences to be had. I'm not saying what I'm chasing is any better than the other experiences. All I'm saying is that while I'm able to satisfy the craving for some kinds of experiences, there's one that I long for and remains out of reach.

That is your fault for not being steeped in the mass of products by Wizards of the Coast. I, for one, have no problem recognising those as references to Wizards' product names... yep, pretty sure those are Wizard's products.

The biggest issue I see is that most never actually saw a dragon. They think they saw a dragon when they were 12, but what looked like a dragon at 12 turns out was just a theme-park animatronic. Now that you're 30, you see how crappy it looks.

I started playing in 2005 and for a few years couldn't believe how fun it was pouring over 3.Pathfinder character sheets, thousands of spells, fights lasting 4 hours. Nowadays I would not play in such a game if they paid me.

What looks like a dragon to me changes as I get older. The trick to finding the dragon is, I guess, being open to the idea that maybe you don't know how it looks anymore and you should check out that weird lizard thing, it may just turn out to be a dragon.

Not All of them Just Abreviations of his game names Which happen to be mostly Wotc Product.

Sorry. I spilt my scrabble pieces on that last post.

Honestly, the dragon that I find myself chasing with rpgs can't really be captured by pbp.

Which is, similar to Jabes' "like I was 12 again", the feel I really want is just sitting around a table, for hours on end, with no sense of needing to "get something done", just languidly exploring the world and the characters and the gameplay in whatever way naturally arises, and preferably with terrain and miniatures on the table.

Pbp doesn't really do any of that for me. (and my IRL can't facilitate it either)

I always feel like the game needs to be moving forward, with pbp. Lest people lose interest.

Any "languidly exploring the world and characters" game I've been in hasn't lasted on those merits.

And of course, no terrain or minis.

What I chase in pbp is stories and writing.

And I can pretty honestly say that certainly every game I run is a dragon for me - a specific "story"/aspect of a game or world that I've always wanted to look at and explore more, I don't run games that I'm not passionate about - too many other things to do for that! And any more I don't play in games that aren't dragons for me either.

If you want to do some OSR, I plan on spinning up a game of Basic Fantasy (same system we did for our Al-Qadim game) sometime soon. Once I get my feet back under me from the holidays!

Very insightful. Part of the attraction of the OSR for me (I'm, ahem, not 30) is that many of those games are like I imagine I wanted them to be -- they are, or can be, like an idealized form of that old school play. I don't want to go back to that style of play, that's for sure, when (at least in the game I ran) the players ran three characters each, there was a trail of discarded magic items, and PC death was nigh meaningless. But those early feelings of wonder and amazement, like what is this?! Those are hard to beat.

What's your modern day analog to that feeling, do you think?

Modern Day? You know, when I think about it, I've been lucky enough to kind of catch lightning in a bottle a few times -- but it's not about re-capturing anything, it's more like everything coming together. There have been a number of those over the years, but the most recent experiences were playing Blades in the Dark for the first time at a con, and a live Iron Edda Accelerated short campaign I ran in 2020 that was just one of those games where it all came together in a way no one could see coming. The most satisfying TPK imaginable. And if you know Fate, that's a hugely unlikely outcome.

What about you?

You know, you're right. As much as many of those old games gave me this wow factor when I first discovered and played them, I must admit many of those were really clunky and poorly optimized. Yeah, we had plenty of time to play those clunky games when we were kids, but now? I might be very reluctant to touch many of those with a 10-foot pole... Yeah, give me a simple and streamlined system any time!

I've been following along with this discussion and enjoying it a lot. Thanks to everyone for sharing their insights.

The dragon? With all the years that have passed and the systems I've seen and read, and all the jadedness that real life brings that colours my current gaming experiences, the dragon is now for me simply the chance to play. I've kinda given up the chance to ever sit at a table again for rpging, given the social circle I find myself in and the fact that even hanging around game stores have lost their appeal. So yeah, I'm just happy to play anything.

For me, right now, one dragon is when the GM and their story disappear into the background and it is the players riffing on each other, character conflict, and story moved forward by players action that the GM did not anticipate.

I GMed a game where one of the players, a newbye who diid not quite know rpg etiquette of not engaging in pvp unless previously agreed, basically became the villain of the story. The campaign was a bit shorter but defeating him in the end was so muchmore satisfying for everyone then any npc, and he was happy as well because he played a memorable role.

If he did not play with us "veterans", we would have never thought of going in that direction with the story, because we had ingrained in us "pvp is disruptive and uncool and you should really talk it out beforehand".

That to me was an unexpcted dragon

For me, I enjoy having a creative outlet that gives me an excuse to socialize as well. I can't just sit down and write a book. I love to improv stuff, so I can't bring myself to prepare more than a bare bones of a story and let what's going to happen happen. I need to get these ideas out and I suppose my "dragon" is when a plot twist or baddie reveal, etc lands well with the table.

In my home game, the table exploded when I revealed that the jewelry they pulled off a dead enemy was a conduit for mind control. I like to think the way it was revealed is what made it so amazing. My original idea was that they would have an issue next time they touched it and would feel the effects themselves.
They used it to bribe a guard, who then after a non-hostile encounter with the bribing, the guard stabbed them in the back unexpectedly while the jewelry glowed. They put it together and went nuts (good way, not bad way).

This definitely rings true to me as well! I love being surprised as a GM, and watching players get lost and immersed in the story and taking the reins themselves. It probably varies by group but think a PbP game needs to operate at a certain pace in order for that to kind of play to flourish...

Hmm, I'm finding myself thinking about how to engineer these "dragon chasing" games from the GM perspective. I wonder what the answer would look like if I think about it from the player perspective? As a player, how can I help create this style of game?

I think one thing is making bold posts. Sometimes I find myself slowing down my posting to match a group. I think "I don't want to hog the spotlight" or "I don't want to force the game down a path that goes against the will or goals of other players." Those aren't bad things to consider, but when players operate to much in that mode, things grind down, even with a streamlined system. Using the Harrigan Transactions concept, It's like that kind of play generates extra transactions that are entirely social, not based on game mechanics. But it's still friction, a drag force slowing down the game. It helps a lot when people in the group know each other.

I was just talking with @Knifesedgegames (a true PbP veteran if ever there was one) about this topic and he hit me with a great tip. I was asking him how as a DM I can support this bold kind of posting. I was unsure if, when a game is stuck in an awkward phase and somebody tries something and it turns out to have a negative consequence, is that gonna lead to worse humming and hawing? His response: "You shouldn't worry about players feeling punished for doing that, just make sure it's cool and dramatic." Words to live by.

Anyway, there's some half-baked thoughts!

Happy to report that my particular dragon is alive and well!

Thanks to @Adam's "Hellrider" game, which I play alongside @runekyndig, @cowleyc, and @RAAMtentacles, I'm able to experience a piece of TTRPG art I've loved since I was a kid.


A Paladin in Hell by David Sutherland (Players Handbook, 1978)

That's very kind, mate. I guess David Sutherland didn't draw a paladin running away from a BBEG murdering a tiny flying elephant.

My two "dragons" in the past few years:

- The players in an Ancient Greece game really started to get things together to revive their local village kingdom and make life better for their neighbors. There was a lot of good characterization in that game.

- One of my players ate a god.

Tasted like chicken?

Probably more like really good beef. A divine bovine

I'm embarrassed that I don't remember the details of the rules I ran with for that game, but it was basically "push your luck unto disaster" and then see what happens next ...

Both the player characters were ridiculously potent magic users