One thing you will discover when you try playing a Classic RPG is that character creation is fast. It’s also an important part of a game session as Classic RPG gamers roll their characters together during the game session. This is how we come together as a team because we need to work together in order to assemble an effective party of adventurers. We also have limits to what we can carry with us, and discussions arise about what equipment is being purchased in order for each PC to contribute toward the team's well being. i.e. Does the party really need twelve ten foot poles? Maybe, we can decide who will carry that useful dungeoneering tool and just bring one, or maybe two. The other thing that soon becomes apparent is the utter lack of Nerf and Buff in these games. The threat of death is palpable. The dice are fickle and fall how they may. Quite often several characters end up dying. Playing in the classic style is a high stakes game of life and death. I did a statistical analysis on my sessions and I find that a 10-20% casualty rate is the norm on any adventure. Thus questions arise from new gamers. How do you cope with losing all those PCs? Don’t old schoolers care about their creations? Learning to cope with PC loss is something you learn early on in the classic games. Many tears are shed over favorite PCs, and we do hate to cross out a favorite character, but we love the tension of our grip it and rip it games where merely surviving is a form of winning. Classic RPGs are different from modern games. Playing is where PCs are created in classic games. It’s through our adventures and accomplishments that our PCs emerge as fully fleshed out personas. Consider that 1st level PCs are very weak and a 17 year old warrior really has very little back story worth bringing up during a game session because there are things in the game session that want to eat his or her face. Those same face eating monsters do not really care if you are an orphan, or have a long lost uncle you wish to be reconnected with - face eating is job number one! Our attachment to our characters comes out of having dared to plumb the depths of a famous dungeon with our comrades and also having managed to survive. We become invested through playing. Our PCs must earn their accolades through actually doing heroic deeds. This makes them even more special to us, because you can’t fake a real back story that comes from having slain powerful monsters - all your friends were there to witness the event. Chris’s gifted warrior earned his title in my campaign as the Lord of the Gate by jumping down into the hoard of invading orcs and vanquishing his foes. And some may again be asking, what happens when your favorite character dies? First off, there is no Plot Armor in a Classic RPG. PC death happens a lot. We are experienced with losing our PCs and we just suck it up. I admit it, losing PCs is no fun, but it is necessary to the style of dangerous play. The game has to be deadly in order for it to be rewarding. Another thing we do is to take an old character, say you had a favorite dwarf charatcer who bought the farm, well the next dwarf we play we use the dead dwarf’s persona as a template for creating a new dwarf character. There is no shame in recycling these pretend people. Quite often they are archetypes anyway, so they are based on some other concept for a character, perhaps out of literature, or a favorite movie. Recycling in this way allows individual players to evolve a character type without having to start from scratch. Thus our PC personas become eternal and are sometimes reincarnated into existence. Sure, the name, stats, and abilities are different, but we can keep playing the same kind of character that interests us. With Classic RPGs it is not uncommon to end up with several DMs in a group as well. For some reason, the newer games have trouble with how many DMs there are. I base this on comments I see all over the internet. The simpler low rules games seem to be more relaxed thus more players want to learn to DM. Why am I talking about DMs here? Well, it isn’t uncommon for a player who is also a DM to use their old characters, whether they got killed or not, as NPCs in their own campaign. I do this a lot myself. Creating detailed NPCs for my own campaign takes time. So when I play in a one off session I will take the PC I used and convert it to an NPC I can use in my own campaign. This is because I have lived in this persona for long enough to really know what this character is like and what their motives are. My players have met many interesting people in my world that are actually my own charaacters, some of whom date back to 1977. Berlini the Great, a prankster Elf Wizard who likes to do things like paint ‘Kick Me’ on the balrog’s hind quarters. He doesn’t always appear, but my players have encountered a balrog who is looking for Berlini. Dark Star, the beautiful Magic User from Cidri. G’nad the Barbarian, a testosterone laden warrior who was Dark Star's companion. Argyle, the gargoyle with his sidekick, Punxsutawney Phil, the overtly greedy hobbit thief. Livyanu, the Healer from Tekumel. Piume, the Scholar from Timnath. And many others. I love my old characters and it feels good have them back. By reviving your characters and replaying them as 1st level one’s, or using them as NPCs when you are the DM, you can keep playing your favorites forever. The Fellowship of the Thing is proud to promote Classic RPG play.
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