"We want to sing the love of danger, the habit of energy and rashness."

[pyat]

Pyat’s Non-Universal Rules of Gaming*
*Note: I believe these behaviours arose out of a sort of grim dynamic that existed between my high-school gaming buddies and a particularly misanthropic GM. For good or ill, the guidelines below have remained with me and largely shape my habits in most games. I make no guarantees about how welcome the application of these rules will be in any given player group.

Rule One: “Shake the Pillars of Heaven”
The goal of your character should not be comfort and security, nor wealth, nor admiration, but rather to have his or her name written in letters of fire across the pages of history. It is not important if you are remembered as a hero or a fool – it is enough to be remembered.

Rule Two: “Chaos is a friend of mine.”
When your party can’t directly take control of a situation, it is sometimes possible to remove control from the opponent via an unexpected action. Smash the Dragon Orb! Jump into a garbage compactor! Initiate the Corbomite Maneuver! And do it NOW. Like the man said, “Better to act quickly and err than to hesitate until the time of action is past.”

Rule Three: “He can never know that he is dead."
Your character, that is. Don’t treat your character as disposable, don’t be suicidal – but also remember that you are in the game to help tell an interesting story. All interesting stories have an end, preferably one involving a tremendous explosion.

Rule Four: “Try not to die like a dog.”
If you think you are going to die, don’t spend your last combat round looking for a healing potion or medpak. Take off your hat and face the Infinite with a sneer, a smile, a leer, a wink, or a snarl – whatever works best for your character.

Comments

[mmsword.livejournal.com]

Rule Four: “Try not to die like a dog.”
If you think you are going to die, don’t spend your last combat round looking for a healing potion or medpak. Take off your hat and face the Infinite with a sneer, a smile, a leer, a wink, or a snarl – whatever works best for your character.

Oh yes. I agree with this full heartedly. This is the thought that went through a Star Wars character of mine's head before. He had gotten on the wrong side of a Rancor. The inside. We learned a lot from that game, the main thing being that Thermal detonators are not for internal use.

(Revised for proper tags and spelling)

[pyat.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry, but Thermal Detonators work BEST from the inside of things. :)

[jordangreywolf.livejournal.com]

I agree with that - and go one step further to suggest that there are some campaigns in which I wish my PC had gone for glory - and died a dramatic (or melodramatic) death, rather than exiting the story in a muddled whimper. There are times when I have clung too tightly to character survival, and was rewarded for my efforts with only technical success. (That is, the "character" lived, technically, but only at the expense of what made him the character he was supposed to be.)

[paka.livejournal.com]

Well, it's certainly a good guide to playing a swashbuckler or a knight. And by sheer chance, guess what I tend to play when I'm not trying to be a sneaky stealthy ranger?

[pyat.livejournal.com]

Hey, it might be fun to run a stealthy ranger this way, too! My friend Daniel certainly does...

[dagoski.livejournal.com]

Besides which, even the most cowardly thief is still a risk taker at heart. That kind of character is always thinking he or she is good enough to beat the odds.

[elzbethoktober.livejournal.com]

1: Yes! I've had the occasional character of whom I had to twist the arm to get them to go on an 'adventure'. I had to stop playing them because all they wanted to do was stay home and be safe.
2: Yes! One of my favorite GM moments was running a campaign in which my partner had a character beloved of the God of Chaos. She brought down mountains, but it was always "an accident".
3: Yes! If I don't have a personal connection with my character on some level, it's no fun to play. But because there is a personal connection, I never want to see them die permanently.
4: Yes! And take as many of them with you as you can.

[pyat.livejournal.com]

Just curious - is #2 from D&D?

Also - congrats on your Maritime decision. I've love to live out there, myself.

[waiwode.livejournal.com]

Rule Two: “Chaos is a friend of mine.”

Quoted for Truth.

In a recent "intense medieval simulation" game, faced with puzzling murders without clues, intrigues we never quite caught wind of, and guilty parties who could hide behind secular, ecclesiatic, or guild offices ... to combat our increasing frustration, and to the rising horror of the GM, we unleashed "Full Force Investigation." Every door exists to be smashed, every tight-lipped bureaucrat exists to be dangled from battlements, and every investigation starts right at the top.

We were stuck wil the well-deserved appelation of "knighted hoodlums" but we got to the bottom of things real quick.

Doug.

[pyat.livejournal.com]

Ah, gamers. :)I'd ask why they aren't running the world, but then I just look southward...

[waiwode.livejournal.com]

Nah, they aren't gamers. Gamers would be worse.

"Hmmm. Finish the new Budget proposal, or join the rest of the Cabinet on the C-SPAN server for a Lvl 60 raid?"

"I'd like to call the Parliamentary Committee on Presidential Misappropriations to Order. First Item. When we left off we were in the Octagonal Room with purple marble pillars, and the Member representing Pierrefonds—Dollard had failed his Sense Traps test while trying to pry the golden statue off the pedestal in the center."

Doug.

[pyat.livejournal.com]

I was thinking more like...

President: "I try to find Osama."
GM: "Gimme a Find Information check."
President: "Crap. A 1. I take 20!"
GM: "Sorry, that negative wisdom modifier makes it impossible. Maybe if you roleplayed out what you were doing...?"
President: "Screw that. Let's just arrest everyone who shoots at us and ask them where Osama is."

[jirris-midvale.livejournal.com]

Rule four is the bane of my existence. Almost every character death I've had was the action move 'so fast he didn't see it coming' thing.

The best was my cleric, who was struggling to remain upright and in the back so the damage dealers could keep doing damage against the slimes and jellies that beset us on all sides. I kept buffing and healing them, not paying attention to what was going on around me. The GM had me take a spot check, and I failed miserably. A jelly fell from the ceiling and onto my poor cleric, crushing her and dissolving her into a pile of dead meat and juice in one round of direct contact. The other characters didn't even notice the spat and sizzle, they noticed when the healing spells stopping coming.

They took her arm, the most recognizable part of her left, and got her raised later. That in itself is a great story.

[pyat.livejournal.com]

Well, that's not so bad, then. She died in action! She wasn't trying to hide from the Jelly.

And if it was Faran, death by jelly is oddly appropriate.

[ladyceleste.livejournal.com]

My worst character death was when the GM decided to make a point that this game was more deadly than our last; my sprite got knocked unconscious and he decided that, before any party members could run over and resuscitate or rescue her, a beastman would pick her up and behead her and taunt the party members with her head. Yeah, real heroic. That was the FIRST WEEK. I'd gone to all of the work putting her together for naught.

It's always sad when a character dies, but that made me angry, first time I've ever walked away from a game.

I've had a few good heroic ones. Like a Star Wars character that flushed herself and some deadly item out into space rather than risk her brother and the rest of the crew getting blown to smithereens. She was one of my faves, too, but I let her go for the right reasons (and she probably would've died anyway in a non-heroic way).

[normanrafferty.livejournal.com]

You are the wind beneath my wings.