Back when I played in the beta and early release of Ultima Online almost a decade ago, I almost couldn’t believe my luck. This would really be the game I’d longed for. I could meet people online in a fantasy world, and together we’d have emergent, collaborative stories unfold of derring-do, chivalry, and virtue.
And vice, of course! Mustn’t forget the vice. I eagerly looked forward to the duels that would take place when one character took in-character offense at another’s words. I contemplated a Robin Hood–style character who would help himself to the contents of rich player’s purses and earn fame handing out my ill-gotten gains to newer players.
I relished the thought of being a homesteaded in an isometric world, carving out a place for myself in Britannia through the work of my own two virtual hands.
I had a horrible time. My big mistake? Assuming that other players wanted pretty much what I did from such a game—or at least something compatible.
I tried to have fun. I didn’t worry about whether other players roleplayed the way I thought they should. Instead, I wrote a guide on how to speak “Britannian.” (Oddly enough, it’s still floating around out there. I wrote it as “Josephus the Scholar.” It even got mentioned in a book! I had no idea. Too funny.)
And when my young and idealistic animal tamer got killed seven or eight times in a row, I shrugged and started to gather feathers so I could make some more arrows. Mind you, I’m not complaining about UO being too “difficult,” even though a post at Tobold’s blog on that topic inspired this little ramble. (Oh, and I see it’s actually to the new Hardcore Casual’s first post. Good post, Syncaine!) In fact, I argued passionately for three freedom to stab my fellow players in their backs and rifle through their goodies.
I just didn’t count on people who played the game simply to dominate other players.
The PKers did ruin the game for me. The in-game law enforcement meant I could create my wicked characters, and the PKers themselves meant I couldn’t really function as a good guy. My hard-won equipment would be stripped from my corpse, and I couldn’t even get to the interesting places I wanted to explore.
And, of course, the “gamist” players cared mostly about advancing their characters, a more-subtle incompatibility to my own preferred style of play. (I wanted to level, but I wanted to do it while roleplaying.)
The PKers were a malicious minority who really did ruin the game for a vast number of others. But I was in a small minority, too, dreaming of a game that just couldn’t exist.
I wouldn’t be surprised, though, if a visit to Britannia today would show me a game much closer to what I hoped for back in the day. Can anyone still playing tell me?
Great gaming minds tried to make UO work, and basically they failed. (The game hasn’t failed. It’s still going! But for a while at least, it was nothing like what the creators—and I for that matter—envisioned)
Could a massively multiplayer fantasy simulation be made to work, one where talk of PVE and PVP were irrelevant, because the world functioned and you functioned in it? I now know the audience would be small. Most people don’t want a game where vendors go to bed at night or where the goodies on their corpses can be taken. And in fact I can fully understand why. But if someone set out to do it and make it genuinely enjoyable, could it be done?
June 29th, 2007
This is a write-up of an NPC from a pirate-themed GURPS campaign I’m currently running. Based largely on the Seas of Daring, Seas of Dread setting presented in Ken Hite’s amazing excellent GURPS Horror, 3rd edition . The setting does somewhat resemble that of a popular movie trilogy, but this is purely coincidental. I’ve had to leave out some details because my wife, a player in the campaign, does read this blog. |
Captain of the sloop Fata del Mundo, Ernesto Medina y Soto has managed to keep a low enough profile that he and his prate crew travel the Spanish Main with impunity. They take just enough to live large and have even earned a reputation as employable for extra-legal activities that require a ship. They’ll honor any paid commission to the letter, even having gone so far as to hand over to one employer a fortune in plundered doubloons they took from a captured ship when no one would have been the wiser.
Having worked the Caribbean for better than twenty years, Captain Medina y Soto is no stranger to the supernatural happenings that abound just beyond the edges of civilized society. He keeps rock-salt–loaded pistols at all times for the occasional zombie, meticulously observes those “superstitions” that have kept the dark forces of uncreation away from his ship, and damn well what the Inquisition is really after. He’s a damn good shot, too.
Medina y Soto is a lech. Any woman who spends more than half a minute with him will have to fend off his advances. Fortunately his advances—though ardent, passionate, and sincere—are also easy to rebuff. He takes rejection in good grace, seeing it as part of the challenge to overcome all demurs.
Medina y Soto is astonishngly ugly. He is not just fat, but profoundly so. His skin is marred by acne scars, and a generous wen lies to the side of his nose. And his conviction that any form of personal hygiene will make him vulnerable to duppies and darker things means that he reeks most foully. No amount of elaborate and colorful dress—which he does affect—cancels out his smell.
This makes it all the more astonishing that his personal charm is often enough to win over the good graces of even cautious maids.
He talks loud, lives large, and acts at all times with unshakable confidence. His considerable bulk only adds to the sense he projects that he belongs in any space he occupies. And the cruel jabs and demeaning bluster he hurls at his crew is backed up by not one whit of real threat. He loves his comrades, and they know it.
Captain Medina y Soto generally shows up as an employable entity with a ship for parties of PCs who don’t otherwise have access to one. Early in a campaign set in the magical secret history of Seas of Daring, Seas of Dread, he can also be an invaluable mentor, initiating gormless PCs into the terrible realities that await them on the high seas and giving them a few tools to help them survive just one more day.
GURPS stats
Ernesto Medina y Soto
Attributes [165]
ST 15 [50], DX 12 [40], IQ 14 [80], HT 11 [10]
HP 15, Will 14, Per 14, FP 11
Basic Lift 45, Damage 1d+1/2d+1, Basic Speed 5.75
Advantages [87]
Ally (Crew) (50% of starting points) (Group Size (6-10); Constantly) [48], Charisma (3) [15], Fearlessness (2) [4], Signature Gear (Fata del Mundo (a sloop)) (20) [20]
Perks [1]
Alcohol Tolerance [1]
Disadvantages [-46]
Appearance (Ugly) [-8], Fat [-3], Lecherousness (12 or less) [-15], Odious Personal Habit (Doesn’t bathe . . . ever) (-2) [-10], Social Stigma (Outlaw) (-2) [-10]
Quirks [-3]
Almond-sized wen on the side of his nose [-1], Keeps a skin of sack with him at all times [-1], Keeps two pistols loaded with rock-salt shot at all times [-1]
Skills [57]
Area Knowledge (Carribbean) IQ/E - IQ+0 14 [1], Boating/TL4 (Sailboat) DX/A - DX-1 11 [1], Brawling DX/E - DX+2 14 [4], Gunner/TL4 (Beams) DX/E - DX+0 12 [1], Guns/TL4 (Pistol) DX/E - DX+7 19 [24], Intimidation Will/A - Will-1 13 [1], Knife DX/E - DX+1 13 [2], Leadership IQ/A - IQ+2 16 includes: +3 from ‘Charisma’, [1], Merchant IQ/A - IQ-1 13 [1], Navigation/TL4 (Sea) IQ/A - IQ+0 14 [2], Occultism IQ/A - IQ+3 17 [12], Ritual Magic (All) IQ/VH - IQ-3 11 [1], Seamanship/TL4 IQ/E - IQ+0 14 [1], Shiphandling/TL4 (Ship) IQ/H - IQ-2 12 [1], Shortsword DX/A - DX-1 11 [1], Strategy (Naval) IQ/H - IQ-2 12 [1], Tactics IQ/H - IQ-1 13 [2]
June 28th, 2007