An Anecdote

Few things are duller than gamers talking about old games, but I will risk it here, because this anecdote so neatly encapsulates the problem of games with overpowered, or even superpowered characters.

Once upon a time, I fell in with a group of role players who worked for West End Games, the company that brings us both PARANOIA and STAR WARS RPG’s. They were a fine bunch of fellows, and we found we had an evening to kill, so I suggested that I moderate a roleplaying game of my own devising: a pick-up game, so to speak.

Over the years, I have adduced a relatively simple method to start a game at the drop of a hat without the cumbersome process of rolling up characters.

Typically, I tell players, “You can play any character from any book or story I have read or seen. Anyone. If you are from a movie I’ve seen or a comic I’ve read, I will know your background, powers, and limitations.”

The reason for my generous indifference to how strong your characters are, or what powers they have, is that I like to put players in a background where they are faced with a moral quandary, or a threat that can only be solved by tact or cunning or creative thinking.

For background, I have a multiverse setting which is a combination of Norse Myths, Zelazny’s Amber, Zelazny’s Roadmarks, Michael Moorcock’s Eternal Champion, miscegenated with LeGuin’s Earthsea, Frank Herbert’s Dune, Tolkien’s Middle-Earth, Gene Wolfe’s Urth, Highlander, Dr Who, HP Lovecraft.

Over the years, I have developed fairly sound guidelines as to how to handle crossovers (Kal-El of Krypton, for example, when in Amber is only as strong as Gerard) or how different ideas or systems of magic tend to work when outside their home element.

There were four players, three boys and one girl.

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Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.