Post by captaincrumbcake on Jan 7, 2016 14:07:36 GMT -5
Been thinking on this for some time, now. Morgan's thread on High Level play certainly urged me to push on with this. As does the forum subscript: Running the campaign, our collected wisdom and campaigning tips.
I'm going to declare, at the outset, that this is all a supposition. There is no smoking gun, nothing written stating, or any of that stuff (that I'm aware of), implied as to support these points. And any anecdotal rebuttal or confirmation of anything supposed is, just that.
1. The Time of it All
I'm looking back at 1972-73-74, and trying to imagine the little world of LG and the miniature war-games/players there, and all that. I'm trying to get into my head Dave Arneson reading the Fantasy Supplement and Chain Mail, and extracting from that, the idea of one man/one player concept, and how to make that work. How his notes ended up with EGG, and the idea of individual play suddenly seemed, to them, the logical step (away) from miniature battle reenactments; how the guidelines had to evolve, etc. Several things (most of all) glare out of this at me, but I don't want to sideline the purpose of the thread; so, just as a side point, 2 things to consider: 1. the appearance of magic/magic-use in the Fantasy Supplement, and its mushrooming into the OD&D rules as the (IMO) dominant component of the game (as opposed to miniature war games.) 2. I assume that most players assumed as well, that a Hero or Superhero (in Chain Mail) rose to the position from participating in numerous wars and campaigns; that he/she, didn't get to be a FM 4 or FM 8 by going out and raiding dungeons in between territorial disputes. Which is a stark contrast in difference between the concepts of miniature war games and, OD&D.
Moving on.
There are several references in the LBBs (OD&D) advising the reader/user to consult Chain Mail for either purposes of clarification, or to use a component therein when conducting OD&D adventures. This, of course, eventually gets ironed out, edited, removed from future editions as the evolving nature of the game began to support itself with its own defined components. But back then, back there, such was not the case. And it is within this sphere of: back then, there, at that time, given what there was to work with, that is the point of my suppositions.
2. What is a Lord to do?
"There is no theoretical limit to how high a character may progress,". Where does this concept come from? What is it based on? Is it even possible? When considering the idea of games, how many are you aware of, where there is no limit to the X that the character can gain/achieve in it before the game ends? Or better still, where in the hell does/did all that treasure (and those monsters) come from that continue to generate the XP necessary for such a concept to not become a joke? Or this, did EGG and DA really embrace this idea? If so, then what in the hell is the point of a character "retiring" in order to clear out some hexes, build a castle, and then manage the populace and economy of his fief? Why bother with all that crap anyway, spending all that loot, when one can just keep going forever, raiding dungeons and becoming richer than Sir Paul or the Donald, able to bathe in piles of coins and....ugh, I am venting now. There is no point in "Name level" and all that includes, in a limitless world.
But suppose...just suppose, that the purpose of the Name level (and all that entails) was to re-direct the players back to where they began--miniature war games?
Putting aside all the "limitless" stuff for the moment (which is an OD&D component anyway, and not CM as I understand it), suppose a character is destined to do those things that we associate with war games? Suppose that the Name level character, is now--you--again, controlling your regiments, and dealing with the problems and complexities of living in the feudal world which spawned you to begin with? All the end game stuff hinted at in the OD&D books would, then, make sense. In this regard, the GM's greater campaign world is filled with players whose characters have reached the level to which they have been striving, in order to become part of the greater cause/purpose of the campaign-world; rather than remain small, individual parasites existing merely to run about and eat as much as they can and hoard as much as they can. Multiple players, can you imagine 3, 4, 9, 12, spread all across the GM's world, all striving to control what they can via their own expertise (Fighting Man/Lord, Cleric/High Priest, Magic-user/Wizard, etc.)
So, I'm supposing, what if the End game of the campaign is to revert back to, CM--in a sense?
Argh! my brain is sore, and I probably didn't articulate myself very well.
Oh, well. I hope everyone at least gets a chuckle out of this.
I'm going to declare, at the outset, that this is all a supposition. There is no smoking gun, nothing written stating, or any of that stuff (that I'm aware of), implied as to support these points. And any anecdotal rebuttal or confirmation of anything supposed is, just that.
1. The Time of it All
I'm looking back at 1972-73-74, and trying to imagine the little world of LG and the miniature war-games/players there, and all that. I'm trying to get into my head Dave Arneson reading the Fantasy Supplement and Chain Mail, and extracting from that, the idea of one man/one player concept, and how to make that work. How his notes ended up with EGG, and the idea of individual play suddenly seemed, to them, the logical step (away) from miniature battle reenactments; how the guidelines had to evolve, etc. Several things (most of all) glare out of this at me, but I don't want to sideline the purpose of the thread; so, just as a side point, 2 things to consider: 1. the appearance of magic/magic-use in the Fantasy Supplement, and its mushrooming into the OD&D rules as the (IMO) dominant component of the game (as opposed to miniature war games.) 2. I assume that most players assumed as well, that a Hero or Superhero (in Chain Mail) rose to the position from participating in numerous wars and campaigns; that he/she, didn't get to be a FM 4 or FM 8 by going out and raiding dungeons in between territorial disputes. Which is a stark contrast in difference between the concepts of miniature war games and, OD&D.
Moving on.
There are several references in the LBBs (OD&D) advising the reader/user to consult Chain Mail for either purposes of clarification, or to use a component therein when conducting OD&D adventures. This, of course, eventually gets ironed out, edited, removed from future editions as the evolving nature of the game began to support itself with its own defined components. But back then, back there, such was not the case. And it is within this sphere of: back then, there, at that time, given what there was to work with, that is the point of my suppositions.
2. What is a Lord to do?
"There is no theoretical limit to how high a character may progress,". Where does this concept come from? What is it based on? Is it even possible? When considering the idea of games, how many are you aware of, where there is no limit to the X that the character can gain/achieve in it before the game ends? Or better still, where in the hell does/did all that treasure (and those monsters) come from that continue to generate the XP necessary for such a concept to not become a joke? Or this, did EGG and DA really embrace this idea? If so, then what in the hell is the point of a character "retiring" in order to clear out some hexes, build a castle, and then manage the populace and economy of his fief? Why bother with all that crap anyway, spending all that loot, when one can just keep going forever, raiding dungeons and becoming richer than Sir Paul or the Donald, able to bathe in piles of coins and....ugh, I am venting now. There is no point in "Name level" and all that includes, in a limitless world.
But suppose...just suppose, that the purpose of the Name level (and all that entails) was to re-direct the players back to where they began--miniature war games?
Putting aside all the "limitless" stuff for the moment (which is an OD&D component anyway, and not CM as I understand it), suppose a character is destined to do those things that we associate with war games? Suppose that the Name level character, is now--you--again, controlling your regiments, and dealing with the problems and complexities of living in the feudal world which spawned you to begin with? All the end game stuff hinted at in the OD&D books would, then, make sense. In this regard, the GM's greater campaign world is filled with players whose characters have reached the level to which they have been striving, in order to become part of the greater cause/purpose of the campaign-world; rather than remain small, individual parasites existing merely to run about and eat as much as they can and hoard as much as they can. Multiple players, can you imagine 3, 4, 9, 12, spread all across the GM's world, all striving to control what they can via their own expertise (Fighting Man/Lord, Cleric/High Priest, Magic-user/Wizard, etc.)
So, I'm supposing, what if the End game of the campaign is to revert back to, CM--in a sense?
Argh! my brain is sore, and I probably didn't articulate myself very well.
Oh, well. I hope everyone at least gets a chuckle out of this.
