I’m sure you’ve heard it before – in the context of writer’s block and not knowing what to do, the advice often given on writer’s blogs and somesuch is to “write what you know”; this idea that you should take things you’ve experienced and put them into your work and that makes the creative process easy… This also applies to tabletop roleplaying games! And no – not just writing modules (though I’ll get to that).
Last year, I ran a campaign in Stars Without Number, a sci-fi Old-School Rennaissance system by Kevin Crawford. I wrote a bit about it, I think – it’s a great system, and I highly recommend it for anyone interested in sci-fi (and OSR) to check it out.
But it wasn’t for me. And it’s not because I didn’t like it – I loved it. Kevin Crawford writes good stuff. Go buy the fancy deluxe version right now. The problem was that I don’t actually know shit about sci-fi or even fantasy-based space operas, as it turns out. Running a campaign in a theme I knew very little about (comparatively) was incredibly difficult. I don’t know the tropes (let alone how to possibly subvert them), and I basically just ended up having to peer into the depths of my fantasy knowledge to pull out a generic quest and strap LED lights and chrome on top. Which… kind of is what a space opera is, right? Either way, it was a pain in the ass to prep for, as a lot of my stuff is improvised at the table, and in between sessions I just had to read short sci-fi stories to steal ideas from and it felt like a lot of unnecessary work. I wasn’t a bad game master by any means, but it felt weak.
Fantasy is much easier – I read hundreds of fantasy novels when I was a kid, and even though I do not feel like I know the genre, it’s amazing the amount of stuff and tropes I can pull when creating adventure hooks and ideas for games – just because of what I’ve been exposed to and what I know. I personally probably won’t ever run sci-fi again unless it’s a premade module. I learned my lesson from that. As for writing…
…I did try and write a serious module. I posted about it last month – published under my company, Bovidae Studios. And it was a great project – I’m really pleased with how it came out! Yet, it was still a lot of work when I had to do the serious bits. I took a lot of jokes out of it in one of the final revisions, if you can believe that. I just struggle with writing truly serious content! So I’m taking a bit of a break from my second serious OSE module and writing a comedy one-shot, for April Fools’ day, which also happens to be my birthday (my whole life was a joke, really). It will be PWYW this time (consider it a birthday gift from me), and I’ll probably discount Cult that day too in celebration (in case anyone put it on any wishlists and is hard up for cash). I am not actually very funny, so we’ll see how that goes.
Circling back to the point: I’ve seen neophyte gamemasters ask for advice on how to run games in genres they aren’t familiar with – like if one of their friends wants to play in a Star Wars or a vampire-themed game so they pick up a copy of a system, but they have no interest in it so beg on public forums for someone to quickly explain the basic premise so they can bash something together… and I won’t tell people not to do that. Do what you want – play what’s fun. And do try new things – don’t be too afraid to get out of your comfort zone! Running SWN made me a better game master, and I’m glad I ran it. I try and run a new system at least once a month. But I will say that being familiar with the media that’s influenced what you’re running does absolute wonders. Run what you know.
Or at least watch the Star Wars films first.
Slice of Beef 