What are OSR games about?
Joshua Fox is asking about specific OSR games. I've tried looking at some of them, and am hitting a block in my brain.
Maybe that's me; maybe I have a complete misunderstanding of what OSR games are about. I'll put down what I think in the first comment.
Do please tell me what they are about. For this particular 101 lesson, please don't link to games, but feel free to link to explanations.
Given the last few days, my moderation may be pretty ridiculously tight.
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Here's what I think OSR is all about; powerful people using weapons and spells to murder sentients who have treasure. Bringing the treasure home to show off and manipulate others.
ReplyDeleteSo, power fantasies.
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ReplyDeleteWell, I'm not an OSR expert, but I got more of a sense of "Games that let people show off their skills at optimally exploiting systems, as a puzzle-solving skill, in the face of uncertainty."
ReplyDeleteSo, not so much a power fantasy as an actual exercise of an (admittedly narrow) player expertise ... with a healthy dollop of chances to demonstrate fiero and teamwork thrown in for good measure.
I suspect the difference is one of perspective, though.
Yeah, my impression is a lot of OSR is pretty low-powered. But I'm the opposite of an expert so hopefully one will come along.
ReplyDeleteTony Lower-Basch So, more Ocean's 11 than Rambo, where rules complications are intentional such that the player can find things to use against the GM / for the party?
ReplyDeleteJoshua Fox Maybe so!
ReplyDeleteThe central area OSR games cluster around is low-powered, weird fantasy (sometimes space-weird-fantasy) that plays at the edge of sword and sorcery, with an emphasis on the GM resolving situations as needed using classical devices you know well (OD&D), plus maybe a few minimalist additional structures.
ReplyDeleteSituations for play are largely adventures, adventures heavily rely on closed environments (maps, dungeons), and those environments are often deadly as fuck.
I always saw osr about a sense of accomplishment. It's about what you survive and what you defeat. Your character is interesting because it overcame other interesting things.
ReplyDeleteLevi Kornelsen To see if I understand, I hear you saying: OSR is (generally) low powered with swords and sorcery and maybe space magic, with a minimum of "structures" that were not in OD&D. This takes place in pre-built enviroments that will murder the shit out of you.
ReplyDeleteI'm unclear on what is meant by structures and even "classical devices". Does that mean traps, dragons, dungeons?
The DM has a prepared location, which is unfamiliar to the players, who use their characters to explore it. Who those characters are doesn't usually matter much or at all. Any characters could explore this location. What happens in that location can range from vanilla D&D fantasy giant rats and kobold pit traps to incredibly batshit surrealism, and is often the result of random tables. There is no attempt to create a story or an arc or to import the tropes of narrative mediums. Characters do things, discover locations, fight and talk with people and creatures, and shit happens. Characters die and players make new ones.
ReplyDeleteJohnstone Metzger So, some traits I'm there are: immaterial characters, wide variety of locations, potentially intentionally erratic dungeon design, lots of character death. This sounds more like a board game than an RPG. Am I mistaken?
ReplyDeleteSorry, classical rules structures and devices. Roll a d20 with high as good, STR/DEX/CON/INT/WIS/CHA, saving throw, those kinds of things, passed through your threshing machine of choice, but none of this "Roll dice for each trait as you call them and place the dice in a pool" kind of thing. Just, like, roll the dice to see how you did on the thing.
ReplyDeleteThe inclusion of weird space stuff is usually not as magic (although occasionally), but more like "Waaaait. Is this dungeon a crashed spaceship?", and "D&D in Spaaaaaaaace!" as in Buck Rogers and the planetary romance meets Heavy Metal the Movie.
Marking for commenting later (at work right now) :)
ReplyDeleteCameron Mount You're a smart guy. Please tone it down in future comments on this thread. This is not going to be a SG versus OCC thread. Period.
ReplyDeleteThe games I play never feel like a board game, but your list of traits looks okay to me, so perhaps I need to unpack some of them.
ReplyDeleteLevi Kornelsen Its been a while for me. THACO, AC, saves versus dragons breath. Are all of these structures that may be present in OSR?
ReplyDeleteCameron Mount "People" isn't helpful. People are giving their perspective of their lived experiences. You can give us yours, but you may not deny the experiences of others.
ReplyDeleteJohnstone Metzger I'd love to see that! I'd love to know what I'm missing, and how this thing that sounds one way plays a totally different way. Or even how if it is phrased a bit different, it may come across totally different.
ReplyDeleteI have often wondered if some OSR games and those in a similar space might be board game-like, but don't forget they still have the fiction, and a GM whose job is to mediate between the fiction and the rules.
ReplyDeleteAre we trying to answer what makes a game OSR or what is the point of an OSR game? I don't pretend to know much about the first point mostly because what I see for the 2nd just is not as interesting to me. An example, sci-fi horror as a genre is usually about the hubris of man and the resulting fallout. The story of the Odessy is about the same thing, but that doesn't make it sci-fi horror, but if you don't like that kind of story you probably won't know much about why the Odessy doesn't fit this genre.
ReplyDeleteJoshua Fox If I'm hearing you right, the existence of the GM is an important and substantial distinction between RPG and boardgames, such that the presence of a GM means it is not a board game.
ReplyDeleteThat sounds potentially very true! I'll have to give it some thought.
From what I understand "power fantasy" is almost 180 degrees wrong, you're more likely to encounter gritty grounded "realism". OSR games, as I understand it, are about making the moment-to-moment exploration of the physical environment meaningful (in an analogous way to how a generic "Forgie" game makes interpersonal moral issues meaningful in a moment-to-moment way). So both a fully-mapped dungeon (wherever you go, you encounter what's there) and a fully random-table sandbox (wherever you go, the GM does the appropriate randomization for the place you went) fit the bill. And exploration doesn't just mean walking around and looking at stuff, it can also be poking at traps with poles, using a players "dungeoneering knowhow" to figure out ways to get past obstacles, having weird conversations with surrealistic monsters, etc. They're very unlike board games in that the shared-imagined-space is very important for figuring out how novel ideas interact with the imagined environment ("what happens when we pour acid on it?"). The GM, though practice and expertise, is trying to "play it straight" and tell people what they think the realistic consequences of their actions would be, they're not trying to put any thumbs on scales to deliver "story" or "excitement" or things like that. In general there's a dislike of written, codified rules -- they tend to prefer internalizing expertise through practice and cultural transmission (i.e. talking to people, reading and writing blogs about techniques, etc.). At least that's my impression of what it's about.
ReplyDeleteCameron Mount This is intentionally a 101 thread for me, because I don't know things. That means I have wrong beliefs, and helpful people are explaining how I'm wrong. You just seem mad, maybe at me maybe at nebulous "people". I'm going to ask you to step out of the thread, as this particular departure is not one I wish to invest energy in.
ReplyDeleteWilliam Nichols no, I don't think so - the old Hero Quest board game had a GM but it was definitely still a board game. I'm saying, stuff happens in the game which is only represented in the players' heads, which is not defined in a strictly quantitative way, and which can only be mediated through the rules through a process of explicit or implicit negotiation (in the case of the OSR, usually via a GM). That is what I mean when I say a game depends on "the fiction" and I think it's more-or-less synonymous with roleplaying (but that is another subject). OSR games are not board games because they have "the fiction"; I don't think any board game can cope with such a construct.
ReplyDeleteI now eagerly await a flood of counterexamples ;)
(seriously, don't bother with the counterexamples)
Dan Maruschak If I'm hearing you right:
ReplyDelete-- I am totally wrong in my initial understanding. (Cool!)
-- OSR is to physical space as, say, monster hearts is to emotional space. If story games could be described as "writing sad things on index cards" (which, while untrue, gets to a lot of the heart), OSR could be described as "pouring acid on traps".
-- Rely on player and GM capability, with a dislike of rules
-- GMs don't try to deliver "story" or "excitement".
Is that true?
Cameron Mount - "Closed" environment may be misleading - Defined environment may be closer. With the degree of definition shifting, sure, but a dungeon map, hex map, whatever, are all location-heavy, allowing for there to be exploration of the environment rather than the environment being primarily an ad-hoc invention that's not really important.
ReplyDeleteIn Old School play, at least in my experience, the specified environment at whatever scale is a serious player, one you generally stay in the specified bounds of, and one that there are definitively known things about upon which a great deal of play is hung.
OSR can be many things but it is mostly built off a foundation of classic TSR D&D and the idea that the players take control of adventures within a fantasy world.
ReplyDeleteAdventurer's motivations are up to the players; fame, money, power, questing for the forces of good.
The setting can be anything from a single cave complex to an entire continent. The players should be free to act as they choose, sandbox style. The GM should not have a specific story pre-planned.
Rules-wise the GM is free to bend or ignore them as required to best represent events they unfold. If the players are particularly cunning the GM should bend the rules in their favour, or skip them altogether should the players have found a way to diffuse a threat. This decisions all rest with the GM.
The games are dangerous. There is no garantee of survival for PCs. Exactly how dangerous varies from game to game.
Random tables for encounters and events are a good thing. Especially when they surprise the GM as much as the players.
I think that about covers it. I'm sure many other OSR fans would disagree with some of what I've said.
You should go post your question in the OSR community too.
Joshua Fox I'm sorry if I came across as looking for counter examples! I wasn't meaning to! I've been rewriting what people say into my own words to help me understand it. Have I come across as a badwrong unfun jerk?
ReplyDeleteThen the difference isn't the GM but "the fiction". That is, a game is an RPG if it has "the fiction". Do I hear you right?
Levi Kornelsen Please don't ping in Cameron. I've asked him to step out, and its not fair to ping him back in.
ReplyDeleteWhoop; missed that. Apologies.
ReplyDeleteCameron Mount, I hear that you are saying that you feel that OSR is being misrepresented in this thread and that you are concerned about bias. Those are valid thoughts to have and I was hoping you can share your opinion. What is the purpose of an OSR game? To you, what defines the experience and make it unique to other types of games?
ReplyDeleteDavid Rothfeder Please don't ping in Cameron. I've had to ask him to step out of the thread, and it is unfair to him and me to ping him back in. If you'd like to talk to him about this, please find another space.
ReplyDeleteMy apologies too (I did not see your post to Levi in time). I was hoping rather than turn this into an accusatory situation we could listen to his concerns. I have not seen his behavior as crossing a line into inappropriate yet.
ReplyDeleteBrian Ashford
ReplyDeleteIf I hear you right:
-- OSR uses classic TSR D&D, both rules and fantasy tropes
-- PCs can have a variety of motivations, not needing to be motivated by "good"
-- Sandbox is a necessity; the GM should not preplan overmuch.
-- Rules can be ignored depending on player cunning. This is GM dependent.
-- PCs die.
-- Surprises -- even for the GM! -- are a good thing!
-- I should ask this somewhere else.
Just to be clear: I am describing the games I play on a regular basis, the games played by people I play games with when I am not there, and the products that I read and use for these games that are created by other people. Of course I am naturally more biased toward the parts of the OSR and old school play that support the kind of murderhobo D&D that I play. But I only talk about games I love, I don't waste this many words on stuff I think is bad, or lesser.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I would be happy to hear about parts of the OSR, and old school games, that differ from this style.
William Nichols I'm not an expert so I'd hesitate to say that I'd be able to definitely characterize things. And given how touchy some people are about outsiders characterizing the things they care about, I'd hesitate to endorse an analogy that has so many levels of indirection ("is this warped view of X analogous to this warped view of Y?"). But I agree about the parts with GM and player capability being important, the physical space (which could be a weird magical place, populated by weird magical things) being important, and the GM not intentionally trying to inject "story" or "excitemet".
ReplyDeleteOK, folk. I'm about to go do other things, so I'm going to shut down comments. Thank you all for the 101 course! I've learned:
ReplyDelete-- OSR is about player cunning
-- OSR is about minimal rules
-- OSR is about not being preplanned
-- the fiction and the GM ensure this is not a boardgame
-- weird space fantasy is a thing that happens
-- the adventures will kill the shit out of you.
I'm sure I've missed some things. This is what I got this instant; I will review tomorrow and see what else I missed.
Thanks everyone. Even you, Cameron! No hard feelings, we just weren't being productive together.