Looking for Trouble

D&D involves a lot of killing. Bouts of combat can last for days (IRL, but sometimes in-game too). It is graphic, it is detailed, and it's very fun if you're in the mood for that kind of thing. But what about outside of battle? There, the rules fall thin. The speech check is just a role (like I mentioned in Bite-Sized Thoughts 2), and working a mechanism is just two rolls for detection and disarmament. This seems very unbalanced, and it is- by design.

The spirit of D&D is not high fantasy, like Tolkien's works. Rather, it's a pulp fantasy simulator. Just run a search on the internet, or talk to someone who reads comics- they'll get this. Particularly, D&D started in the '80s- a little bit after the height of mass-produced booklets and magazines of this nature.

It was supposed to be ridiculous. It was pure fantasy, literally! Later editions gradually watered it down, but it still kept the core idea, even if very few people caught on. It was about mighty, powerful heroes doing great deeds of heroic scope, not a few schlubs trying to survive in the world.

So, stepping into the shoes of my own Engine, I have to ask myself: If it's not going to be about slaying dragons (and surviving dungeons), what's the conflict going to be? I've been thinking about this for a little while, and I've come up with a loose list of conflicts the game mechanics will focus on.

• Physical conflict
• Games of persuasion
• Environmenal survival
• Mechanical and electronic manipulation
• Gathering wealth, and spending it wisely

Obviously, some most of these need to be more fleshed out. The rules of the game only explicitly allow for the first to be defined clearly. But, it's still a diverse range of possible challenges. If I wanted, I could simulate a hot-dog eating contest. I probably won't, but you never know.

The combat-centric game has long been under criticism. It's even more visible in games than in RPGs, because it's cheap thrills. Psychologically, we are hardwired to be very alert and aware of violence around us- that's what makes it so easy to make a shooting game. But, obviously, it gets a little tedious after a while.

The Escapade Engine is not D&D, and I want to keep it that way. The openness to have a non-violent campaign is very refreshing, and I intend to exploit it as a possibility at some point.

Now, the obligatory Fallout reference. The first entry in the series- made in 1997- could be finished without firing a single shot. Imagine that.