{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/52", "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it. Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.", "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'" }, "archive": "urth", "thread": { "id": 52, "subject": "Wolfe RPGs", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "1997-05-28T14:18:41+00:00", "last": "1997-05-28T19:43:00+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Joel Priddy", "address": "jpriddy at saturn.vcu.edu" }, "date": "1997-05-28T14:18:41+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wolfe RPGs", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "So I was looking at the web page for the New Sun GURPS game,\nand am very curious as to how it's going. I admit that my first\nreaction was horror that anyone would even make the attempt. Then\nI saw that our very own mantis was at the wheel.\n\n Back in the old days, when the internet didn't have visuals and I\nwas in school, a friend of mine and I were given a big chunk of\nserver in order to run a virtual-community project. We were\nlooking at MUSHes at one point, and briefly (very, very briefly)\nconsidered a New Sun themed MUSH. One reason we decided against\nit was that (and this may sound tired to any one who has read\nenough reviews of Wolfe over the years) the aspect that makes\nthose\nbooks mesmerizing has more to do with the style and the\natmosphere than the specific attributes of, say, an alzebo or a\ndestrier. And since you can't quantify style, you won't be able to\nmaintain it with all (or perhaps any) of the participants. And\nwithout the style to lay over New Sun, a MUSH based on it would\nlook a lot like a MUSH based on Gamma World, or even Thundar the\nBarbarian.\n Of course, we didn't have nearly the understanding of the New\nSun's environs that mantis has. A major part of that \"atmosphere\"\nwe appreciated so much was a sense of wonder at all the\nopaque phrases and names. This is the level on which we (or at\nleast I) was reading the New Sun on: given evocative but largely\nuncommunicative language, one's own imagination filled in all the\ndetails, creating a fantastic landscape that is also highly\npersonal for each reader.\n (I was neck deep in communication theory at the time, so this\nidea of noncommunication in order to spark the audience's\nimagination really appealed to me, and perhaps I leapt too quickly \nto ascribe everything Wolfe\nwas doing to the single explanation of \"closure.\" Just as I now\nhave to resist explaining everything away as Catholicism)\n\n Later, as I read more about the New Sun books, I learned that\nin fact the language did represent specific ideas, that there was\nan idea behind each bizarrely-named creature or weapon or\ncharacter. The term \"destrier\" isn't supposed to merely conjure\nup an exotic or alien war horse, but is a\ngenetically-engineered animal with very detailed attributes. So\nmaybe my reservations regarding the ability to diagram the Urth\nfor RPG purposes were misplaced.\n\nSo, What I'm trying to get around to is: how's it going? Is the\ntranslation from novel to RPG working? Is the style, spirit and\nphilosophy surving the process? How many character points does it\ncost to wax melancholy any given moment?\n\n\n-cephalothorax-\n\nPS Now, while I considered New Sun an impossible task, the entire\ntime I was reading Long Sun, almost from page one, I was\ntranslating it into GURPS format in my the back of my head. This\nis an old habit that I'm sure lots of people here can relate to." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "m.driussi", "address": "m.driussi at genie.com" }, "date": "1997-05-28T19:43:00+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wolfe RPGs", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Reply: Item #5008537 from URTH at LISTS.BEST.COM@INET#\n\ncephalothorax,\n\nThank you for your interest in \"GURPS Book of the New Sun\"! As for\nhow it is going as a project, the two easy answers are \"slowly\" and\n\"please tell us: download the (second) draft, look over it, and send\ncomments to SJGames and/or me.\"\n\nRe: capturing the mood as key to the experience, I agree with you.\n(Urth as a \"Gamma World\" variant is an especially astute call--bonus\npoints for \"Thundar the Barbarian.\" It is as if you are reading my\nmind!) If we look at how \"Original D&D\" was actually played (nevermind\nfor the moment the issue of what was published and how it was presented,\netc.), it is hard to believe that Jack Vance's THE DYING EARTH or\nTolkien's TLOTR had any sort of influence. Or that =any= \"classics\"\nof fantasy fiction did. In fact, the chaotic ooze had no real\nparentage and, imho, is primarily responsible for computer arcade\ngames like Pac-Man, Donkey Kong, and all their more \"serious/blood\nthirsty\" descendants .\n\nHowever, the RPG industry has been moving ever closer to issues of\nstyle =and= substance. \"Recent\" vampire-mania LARPs, where your\nlocal goths get out and literally \"do it\" out on the streets after\ndusk, show that \"mood\" and \"context\" are both valued commodities.\nAlso the rise, however feeble, of \"storytelling\" games leads away\nfrom the elements appropriated by the computer arcade games.\n\nAnd there has been a tradition of author-sanctioned\ngames-based-on-fiction, too (as opposed to the r/i/p/o/f/f/ \"homage\"\nscenario first pioneered by the first edition of \"Gods, Demigods, &\nHeroes\" which \"borrowed\" material from the works of Moorcock and\nLovecraft).\n\nHaving writ that, still--given the improbability of a \"perfect\" game,\none cannot ensure that the players will play it in the perfect way.\nAnd likewise one can imagine people playing a quintissentially\nVancean adventure from such an obviously flawed game as \"Original\nD&D.\"\n\nChaosium's \"Call of Cthulhu,\" an excellent rpg based upon fiction, is\na good reference point: how can the referee create the suspense and\nchills of a Lovecraft story when the players have knowingly signed up\nfor a Lovecraftian adventure? (How to keep the usual gaming clowning\naround from turning it into \"Ghostbusters\"?) With this kind of\nself-knowing, can a true \"Lovecraft\" story take place as an\nadventure, or will it be more like \"Prohibition Era: X-Files\"? (Granted,\nthe characters =all= must die or go insane, preferably both.)\n\nRe: \"how many character points does it cost to wax melancholy?\" LOL.\nIn truth I've added a Fugue State mental disadvantage for those who\nhave Severian-brand Eidetic Memory (tm), for those unpleasant times\nwhen you'd secretly rather be lost in memory (roll for hours) instead\nof dealing with the muck of the moment.\n\nFinally, this annecdote: when Neil Gaiman heard about the project he\nsaid (words to this effect), \"How neat--a game where everybody tries to\nfigure out who his own mother is.\" \n\n=mantis=" } ] } ] }