I'm chaotic neutral

The first time I saw this video was a long time ago in internet terms -- maybe a year? Back in the days when Google Video was still new and exciting. But apparently juineve missed it the first time around, because a couple of days ago she sent me a link along with some snide comment. And if someone as savvy as her didn't catch it, then maybe it passed some of you by as well. So as my gift to all of you, here is an internet classic: Fear of Girls.

and if it helps I'd say I feel a little worse than I did when we met

I've been thinking a lot about game blogs lately. I don't mean blogs about game theory or games in general. Nor do I mean games run via blog, although I've seen many fine examples of that, synthesizing the best elements of play-by-email and play-on-message-board. It seems like most of the blogs on GreatestJournal are created for the purpose of roleplaying, although my perception of that is likely skewed.

But what I'm talking about is blogs of a particular game. Bluebooking. Character profiles. Game session synopses. Memorable quotes both in and out of character. They form a record of particular details that will otherwise fade (although a scrupulous GM learns to take copious notes.) They provide rich feedback for the GM on just how his players perceive the events taking place in game; a window into their suppositions about the nature of the plot and the assumptions they may not even know they're making. More than just a good sense of what's working and what isn't, they provide a perspective from the other side of the table. Players, after all, are notorious for seizing upon seemingly insignificant throwaway details while ignoring the sledgehammer hints the GM is dropping (yes, I am being sardonic here.) They're also famous for inventing explanations for a turn of events that are often better than what the GM originally had in mind.

I am a total geek for all that stuff.

And the thing is I've never, ever had it in my own life, not really. I attempted to do it once in college and it was an umitigated disaster. I was running the game in question, and was unable to resist the temptation to limit my synopses to things the player actually knew. So they read the stuff I posted (because really, the people involved in a game are the primary audience for the game blog) and through it became aware of secrets they were not yet meant to know, in character, and had to struggle with the impulse to metagame. That's a bad state of affairs, and so I abandoned the attempt and have never tried it again since.

Incidentally Legends, the boffer LARP I've been playing for the past half year, has an interesting take on the metagaming question. They make absolutely no distinction between in-game and out-of-game knowledge. If you know something out-of-character then you know it in-character, period, end of discussion. The policy has its strength and weaknesses like any other, but it definitely got me thinking. As with all meta-rules its more or less impossible to enforce, but then most LARPs are built around the honor system. I certainly know some things that I am continuing to act as though my character does not, because its more fun for me. But overall that can be very difficult to do, and so Legends helpfully removes the temptation. It keeps people from chattering away out of game the way they tend to do; you're forced to either be tight-lipped or not have any secrets. And for a goober like me, who otherwise has a problem not gushing about every cool and secret thing he's discovered, it just provides another boost to the willing suspension of disbelief, another way in which the illusion of the game world is reinforced.

Anyway, I digress. The point is that I think game blogs are nifty, but am basically pathologically incapable of doing one justice as the GM of a game. And ever since college I've been the GM more often than not. I've come to the conclusion that these things have to be done player-side in order to be good. And while I might wish that my players would take it upon themselves to write synopses of each game's events from their perspective, its not something I'm interested in actually asking them to do. When you're running a game there's a fine line between asking someone to do something and making them feel obligated, and that's not a path I'm interested in walking down. Its just a game, people should only be doing it for the fun of it.

Barring unforseen catastrophe I'm going to play the second session of the Mountain Witch game tonight. And a while back I made a promise to myself that, were I ever a player in a long-running game ever again, I would blog it. I lament not having a blog of pax_malificus's Mage game so hard. As it stands all I have are a handful of notes, many of which no longer make much sense to me. Now Mountain Witch isn't exactly a long-running campaign. Its designed as a three-shot. But I'm still sorely tempted to write up what has come to pass so far anyway, and then blog about tonight's session, and be able to blog about the third when and if it happens. I dunno if I will, but its a definite possibility.