KnThrak said:
Therumancer said:
Hmmm, well to be honest I've given it a couple of shots here and there, I guess the thing is that it's just not all that exciting to watch other people play an RPG, even if I haven't gamed in person for quite a while (I do however do a few PBP RPGs).
It depends. I gamemaster, and I sometimes feel I can see Zak pull a grimace outside the camera view.
I can relate to a lot of things in it, because I usually have groups of people who tumble forward rolling whatever dice they can to smash through things (or stabby-stabby them), and who consider negotiations something only done while eating pizza and being unable to roll dice.
And watching semi-newbie players play alongside experiences people is always fun as a gamemaster. That being said, did you specifically make the character Justine plays? Since she's probably temporary, you gave her a relatively strong character to use her for the story, right?
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I'm not involved with this at all, I just mentioned that I've given it a couple of watches here and there and found it rather dull (in response to other things). I didn't make any of the characters involved, for obvious reasons.
That said when I do GM, I find that taking new players, either new to the game or ones I've just met, through character generation gives me a decent chance to get to know them, and also explain the rules to an extent.
As far as giving brand new players a meatier character, well typically I don't do that because newbies do not remain newbies forever, and assuming the person stays in the game as intended they are going to figure things out. If I'm gaming for the long run that could cause some problems because booting someone's beloved character from the game because *I* twinked it and they no longer need that isn't right.
That said, I'm fairly into heroic fantasy (which is a matter of taste) as such when I GM the PCs are usually somewhat weighted towards the higher end of things. Unlike some other GMs I kind of take the approach that "it wouldn't be there, if it wasn't intended to be used", which means that I tend to cut the characters loose quite a bit and occasionally put the kind of magical items into treasure hordes that most GMs consider to be "Munchkin". On the other hand I also tend to cut loose with a lot of the nastier and more exotic monster types that you also don't see very often in D&D games.
This isn't to say that I don't do low powered campaigns, but simply that I game for escapism, and see the point is to get away from being humble and realistic. As trite and stereotypical as it might be, while it might not be your first adventure or two, you typically wind up saving the kingdom/world/multiverse in my games at some point.