So if anyone has read the blog post on Penny-Arcade.com where Gabe ran his weekly DnD game as something inspired by World of Warcraft.
QuoteI try and make sure that each of my games has a "hook". Sometimes the hook might be one encounter where the players are fighting a dragon in free fall, or it might be an entire night of encounters using mirrors and a laser. Even if it's just for one fight, I always want to make sure I have something each night that makes the players put their cell phones down and lean in a little closer to the table. For my game last Monday the hook was "World of Warcraft".
The story of our campaign has been building and building recently and the whole thing has gotten very serious. I think that's great but I also wanted to give them a little break and have some fun. With that in mind I set out to build a night of encounters and quests full of inside jokes for my players, all but one of which are huge WOW fans. My players are currently stuck in the Underdark with a tribe of humans that they are trying to get some information out of. I decided that in order to get in the tribe's good graces the party would need to do some good old fashioned rep grinding. They started off by taking a bunch of little quests from the different tribe members. All of these were pulled right out of WOW and tweaked just a bit to work in D&D. Here is an example:
A small squat man is hunched over a cooking fire. A fat stone kettle sits atop the smoldering blaze. A bubbling roiling broth is releasing a sweet, not altogether unpleasant smell.
-Hello there! My name is Barak, I'm the tribe's one and only chef. As you can imagine, feeding a group our size from what's available here in the caves is no easy task. I'm working on a pot of my famous Underdark Goulash but Sadly I have run out of my key ingredient. If you could bring me 10 helpings of crisp Phaseweb spider meat I could feed the entire tribe for a month.
This got all the WOW players at the table laughing and I wasn't done yet. They also picked up a quest from the tribe's healer, who wanted them to collect Kharolian crystals for her and one of the hunters wanted proof that the spider queen had been killed. I gave them all their quests on little cards and they set out into the Underdark.
It's a cool read, I strongly suggest reading it.
Anyways, you all may remember the WoW d20 books that came out, except that they were horrible. It was like they were completely removed from WoW, it was like it was an adaptation of the WoW novels rather than the actual game. Now, I'd love to play a game that was inspired by MMOs (not a direct adaptation of WoW or anything).
What do you guys think? any thoughts?
Quote from: Gnome NachosAnyways, you all may remember the WoW d20 books that came out, except that they were horrible. It was like they were completely removed from WoW, it was like it was an adaptation of the WoW novels rather than the actual game.
That was the point though... Why play WoW with crummy dry erase walls and D&D minis when you can actually play IN the world of WoW?
Personally, I want a very different experience when I play with other people around a table, something that is wholly more realistic and more engrossing. (But that's me).
*cough*4EisWoW*cough*lolItrollyou*cough*
Oh... sorry about that. I seem to have something caught in my throat. :3
But I do agree with Gabe in that you really want your players involved with the game. After all, if you've spent all your time making up an intricate setting, and players just aren't interested, then it feels like a waste. Getting them truly interested is a perennial problem of the setting designer.
Yeah...I agree with Elemental Elf. If you want to play an MMO, guess what you should do?
a) post a thread to create a tabletop roleplaying game about MMOs, which is pretty much impossible (massively multiplayer online, it is not a massive ammount of people and you are not online)
b) Sit down in front of your computer and play an MMO! Nothing cures that MMO itch like playing an MMO!
If you chose B, you are correct! Congratulations!
Sorry. I couldn't resist a sarcastic answer. Honestly, no offense, I do that to everybody. But the point remains, MMOs are made to be like tabletop RPGs. The only reason you get those collect 10 Slaughterboar Tusk quests is because that MMO has failed to deliver a succsesful roleplaying experience OR it is made for people who find that fun, and I have nothing against that.
Honestly, though, I don't see the point in creating a whole new system for it to be like an MMO. The only differences between MMOs and tabletop RPGs is that 1) you are not sitting around a table with other people 2) you don't have to use your imagination as much and 3) it lacks the depth, realism and adventure elements that a GM could provide in a tabletop game.
So what is it that you want about an MMO? The repetitive fighting? Just kidding. If you like those sort of quests where you collect alot of items, just make more of those. It just comes down to the feel of the quests. For example, for a normal D&D game I might have the following quest:
"Help!" The farmer yells, beckoning you in the small cottage. "My daughters been kidnapped by those nasty goblins! Please help her! I would but I am old, I fear I could not help her much. Please, hurry!" He says, moving quickly over to the window, throwing it open. You see across the wheat feild small grayish humanoids dragging something in a sack.
That was a pretty sloppy example, but still, its what I was going for. This is a pretty basic D&D quest. It could have continued on with the PCs pursuing the goblins, and could result in a combat or roleplaying encounter. All you have to do to change that to MMO style is this...
You see a farmer with a big yellow exclamation point above his head.
Just kidding.
You see the farmer standing by his house, and decide to talk to him. "Hello there! You look like a strong hero. Perhaps you could help me with a problem...."
The PCs then decide whether they want to or not. If they do, he says: "There have been more goblins then usual around here lately. We need someone to take care of them, or they might start causing real trouble. If you bring me back twenty goblin heads I will give you a reward."
That was probably a bad example to. But my point is, all you need to do is change the style of the game. Even though I don't really understand where you're coming from, I hope I could have atleast helped a little throughout my rambling....