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Fantasy Roleplaying has its basis in the old "Let's Pretend" games of
childhood. Players in the game pretend to be characters (called Player
Characters or PCs) in an imaginary world, reacting to scenarios as
their characters would realistically act. Imagine two characters; one
cowardly, one brave and self assured. In certain situations each character
will act in a different manner. For example, entering a crowded room
of an inn. The brave individual might stride directly over to
the bar and order a drink. The cowardly soul might nervously look around
the room and after hesitating, slink over to the far corner of the bar.
The choice of action is determined by the player for their particular
character. In childhood "Let's Pretend" games, any actions are possible,
including events that could evolve to impossible outcomes for multiple
players, e.g. "I shot you", "No, I dodged it.", "But I'm a crack shot
and don't miss", "But I still dodged anyway", etc.
Roleplaying games avoid these circumstances by providing a structured
environment (rules and gameworld backgrounds) where the outcomes of
conflicting actions can be determined in a somewhat logical manner.
Often this is done by a special player within the game called the
Game Master (GM) who constructs the scenarios the players find
themselves in and adjudicates any conflicts that might arise. This
person also acts as a controller for all nonplayer characters (NPCs) that
the player characters may encounter during the game session.
Game characters consist of several parts, including descriptions of their
physical and mental characteristics, a background history and game statistics.
These combine to form the basis of what is known as a Character Sheet.
The game statistics are numbers that represent the character's abilities
within the game system, e.g. Dexterity determines the agility of the
character. This number is used in the game to assist in resolving
conflicts that might arise involving dexterous actions, e.g. attempting
to avoid a thrown object.
In many roleplaying games, dice are used to assist in the resolution of
conflicts. This rolling of dice is often referred to as a test. In some
situations, the game master might ask a player to roll dice as a test for
a certain action. The result of the dice roll can be used to determine
the success level of a character's action.
Before the gaming session, the game master thinks of an interesting plot
and develops a number of "encounters" that relate to the plot. This provides
a number of scenarios for the player characters to interact within. The
results of these interactions form the basis of the overall story of the
group of player characters. The game master usually constructs a campaign,
which is a series of interlinking stories played over a number of gaming
sessions.
This web site contains information about our campaign, including
Character Sheets and journals of the roleplaying sessions.
 Earthdawn is a Fantasy Roleplaying Game released by the FASA Corporation in 1993. With the closure of FASA Corporation in 2001, Living Room Games took up the publishing of Earthdawn material and released Earthdawn 2nd Edtion. More details about the game can be can be found at the Living Room Games (http://www.lrgames.com/) web site. The game is set in a mythical past where magic is a part of everyday life. It is set on Earth and uses an alternate history in which there are periods of time called Ages. Earthdawn is set in the Fourth Age (about 10,000 years ago). Present time is termed to be Fifth Age, while Shadowrun (another FASA roleplaying game) is the Sixth Age (circa 2050s). Different Ages have different levels of magic or mana. The present Age has little or no mana, therefore magic is all but nonexistant. In the time of Earthdawn, the magic level is high, whilst in Shadowrun, the magic level is lower but slowly increasing. When magic levels reach a certain point, creatures from other planes of existance can cross over to our realm. Some of these creatures are known as Horrors - really nasty critters! Some are mindless destroyers, others feed off the pain and suffering of other creatures. In the time when Earthdawn is set, the peoples of the world have just endured a mass influx of Horrors that lasted about 500 years. This period was known as the Scourge. During the time of the Scourge, people survived in kaers, magically and physically protected citadels, most often situated underground. These kaers were sometimes breached by the Horrors, causing great havoc to those within. In the time of the Storm Wolves, about 100 years after the Scourge ended, some Horrors are still roaming the lands... |
