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Like I said, pen and paper doesn’t mean tabletop. It could be Play by e-mail, Play by post, using a virtual tabletop or whatever. 🙂
So the main issue is about finding the right people.
The usual all-encompassing real life question. 😉
Ah I see. 😀
Ironically I actually have Tabletop Simulator. I know it’s not what you mean but I had forgotten about it. 😀 Forgot I had it. I think people have used it some for that sort of thing. but again, like you say, not needed really.
Would take a mighty long time to play something like that by email.
By e-mail, I’m used to using something like a yahoo or google group. It’s not faster or slower than playing by post. Players’ involvement is what makes it fast or slow. 😉
Whereas for direct online roleplaying via a VTT, I’m usually using Roll20.
Interesting.
Reminds me of something my exhusband used to do…. They called it the ‘pin game’. A bunch of guys were playing it together. We would go over to the GM’s house, he would take my then husband down to the basement where he kept an enormous table with a map laid out and all these little metal men and buildings and such. And they would talk about their moves and my exhusband would take his colored pins and move them on the maps where he wanted his troops to go and over the week the guy running it would talk to each of the other players and the next week, when they each went back, the big table would show the troop movement and what resulted.
Sounds like something I’ve seen several decades ago but I’m just not able to translate that correctly, sorry. 😛 Never been much of a fan of miniatures though. I prefer things to stay in the mind, that’s where they can be the most correct. A picture can arguably be a nice support, sometimes, and that’s how I’m using them, but miniatures are way too estranged from what they depict to actually support the storytelling and the ambiance. So I’m not using them.
Miniature wargaming (I believe that’s the actual correct word) is something I’ve never been into and it’s not related to RPGs. Fact is it’s related to war, the real thing, for obvious reasons. 😉
Yeah… I agree. Was never anything I was interested in. He couldn’t keep a job and spent all his time painting those little metal guys, spending all our money on them and then hiding them. *shaking her head* 😛 But talk about PAINFULLY slow game play…. 😛 Yuck.
(And yeah…. it was a couple of decades ago. 😀 Married him at 21… Divorced him at 28. Been exactly 20 years.) 😀
Wouldn’t know. I’ve watched these stuff going on for years since roleplayers and miniatures wargamers were meeting side by side when I was muuuuch younger but it never piqued my interest. Felt way too tedious and too repetitive. I am looking for the panache, the flair, the grandiose in things, and just tactical mathematical thinking isn’t my thing. 🙂
Note that this applies to many computer games. I get quickly bored if it’s just about bashing. 😉
What about solo play? I just went on my solo character and played for about an hour in GW2. Had a ton of fun. Helped out some beginning players, jumped in on a bunch of events, did about half of a map, resurrected a few who were struggling and got an amazing random drop…. A level 80 piece of jewelry that goes toward earning an end game piece. You can’t really play like, when you only have a little time and you’re in the mood, right?
If I read you correctly, you helped beginning players, resurrected a few and so on, so it’s not exactly solo. 😉
Now for this kind of quick games, if I wanted to do something like that in PnP, I’d pick one GM, just one player for a quick fast paced game where there won’t be any interruption because players are not going to chitchat about their old aunt Mary since there’s only one player so he/she can be full time in the game and do whatever he/she pleases. If she’s a healer, what you’e describing would work fine, of course you’d be relating to NPCs played by the GM but as long as it’s fun… 🙂
I seem to remember some trends about roleplaying without GM but tbh I’ve little to no faith in that one. I believe a GM is compulsory, because sometimes, the rules have to be bent, and that requires a human brain behind the steering will 😛 .
When I say I helped out players, there were no words said. I mean i got a few thank yous, but no one asked for anything. I just ran in, saw a problem and helped. A unique and amazing thing about GW2 is the dynamic way the world works. You see a player is low on health and you can just run in and heal or kill whatever is attacking them and keep going. Everyone who hits the thing gets equal credit so no one is out anything, no grouping or partying is required, but it feels more akin to helping out an NPC in a solo game. So in that respect, yeah… it’s still very solo. I do the same thing with NPCs. I see a guard is low on health I jump in. I can heal and help kill whatever is attacking him.
But in any case, so really, you’d still need a GM to play your PnP game. What if someone designed a solo GM software? You could use it as a group or just for yourself… Probably, something like that already exists, but I was just thinking about it while waiting for my router/modem to restart…. Internet issues tonight.
You don’t need a specific soft. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. 🙂
A standard VTT soft works perfectly fine for just one player and one GM.
Now, if you’re thinking about a virtual GM, then it’s not gonna work, because I’ve known flesh and blood GMs who threw in aliens in a hill street blues-like campaign and I’m quite doubtful about the ability of a computer to surprise us with stuff like that… and I am expecting stuff like that, not bashing mobs, otherwise, I’d be looking for it in mmorpgs, if you get my drift. ;P
There’s a modern trend of GM-less “RPGs”. Guess they could be soloed.
These look like boardgames on steroids to me, not exactly RPGs but let’s just say I’m too old for that stuff. 😉 ^_^
You can absolutely play traditional RPGs without a GM.
It requires an open mind and logical interpretation.
Here’s a blog I started documenting my solo adventure:
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