I prefer my spy games to feel like spy movies and my fantasy games to feel like fantasy movies, and not vice versa! :-)
And no one would take that away from you, even if some of us -- myself included -- really like Steven Brust's "Taltos" novels (for example), and enjoy getting a lot of spy chocolate in our fantasy peanut butter.
I prefer my spy games to feel like spy movies and my fantasy games to feel like fantasy movies, and not vice versa! :-)And no one would take that away from you, even if some of us -- myself included -- really like Steven Brust's "Taltos" novels (for example), and enjoy getting a lot of spy chocolate in our fantasy peanut butter.
Kirth, would you object to a gentleman's agreement that murdering the PCs in their sleep (or on the toilet or in some similar defenseless situation) should be reserved for special occasions and not on a constant basis? That's all I really want out of a fantasy game. I don't recall anything like that ever happening to the protagonist in a Jack Vance story, and I consider that a good thing.
I think gentleman's agreements are required for any game. The trick is figuring out which ones are needed for your current group. Sometimes you find out by stumbling over them.
The real problem is finding 'gentlemen' to play with.
It does if you want people to abide by the agreement.
I prefer the rolled up +5 Newspaper of Pomposity, or the rolled up +5 Newspaper of Sneakattackyness*.
* This particular newspaper is normally rolled up around a lead pipe that's filled with sand and capped on each end.
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Get a stick and hitta b~@!@!
Mr. Fishy warns PC's that any tactic they use can an will be used againist them. If you pull some cheezey BS tactic then the villian will too.
That usual keeps the foolishness above the board...However Mr. Fishy has had pink uniformed soldiers...alot.
Kirth, would you object to a gentleman's agreement that murdering the PCs in their sleep (or on the toilet or in some similar defenseless situation) should be reserved for special occasions and not on a constant basis? That's all I really want out of a fantasy game. I don't recall anything like that ever happening to the protagonist in a Jack Vance story, and I consider that a good thing.
In most "standard" games, I'd happily concede a lot more than that. As TOZ so rightly pointed out, it's a matter of what your particular groups finds to be "Cricket," so to speak. Just because I'd personally get a big kick out of my PC dying like Travolta in "Pulp Fiction" -- and would be especially impressed if the DM managed to pull it off twice with equal style -- that doesn't mean that anyone else would. A game is a social contract, with all that implies.
So when you say, "that's all I want out of a fantasy game," I'd take that statement with great weight if you were a player in my home game.
As far as Vance, absurd deaths aren't at all lacking -- I especially like my namesake's conversation with the guy he poisoned the day before, in Star King. Granted, the protagonist always has a heavy armor of plot immunity, but that's sort of expected in literature, unless you make a career out of defying it as gratuitously as possible
The real problem is finding 'gentlemen' to play with.
I see none of those here.
Jaak might qualify, though!
I prefer the rolled up +5 Newspaper of Pomposity, or the rolled up +5 Newspaper of Sneakattackyness*.
* This particular newspaper is normally rolled up around a lead pipe that's filled with sand and capped on each end.
PVC is lighter passes thought metal detectors, Also water will shift faster.