The Dresden Files > DFRPG

[Gauging Interest] Text-based online Dresden RPG game

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Bosh:
I know we won't get our hands on our pre-order PDFs until at least April, but I have too many ideas bouncing around my head that want to get out. Due to my one year-old son and my bizarre work schedule it’s going to be hard for me to schedule many games with my regular playgroup so I’m going to try running a forum-based (or possibly play by e-mail) game. My schedule is too unpredictable (especially when summer hits) to have regularly scheduled voice chat games but I have a good bit of random free time in between my various jobs, so I'd be able to run a forum or email game at a good fast pace.

The sorts of games I’d be interested in running:

A. Dresden in Asia: Asia would be a great place to run a Dresden Files game since there’s so much fodder for supernatural plots and being set well away from Chicago lets the players keep out of Harry’s shadow. The Dresden Files calls out to be set in a big city and I know Seoul very well and it’s really a great setting for an RPG.

Seoul was chosen as the site for the capital because it is supposedly a nexus of geomantic forces (in Dresden Files term: ley line central). Korea has a long history of being caught in the middle between great powers so there’ll be all kinds of Russian, Chinese and Japanese influence as well as the local Korean stuff as well as there being an American army base smack in the middle of the city. For plot fodder there’s a Stalinist dictatorship just north of the suburbs, Buddhism, very strong Christianity, Taoism, Shamanism, strange cults by the fistful (Moonies!), incredibly powerful corporate conglomerates run by secretive families that mostly marry each other, wacky internet culture, plenty of awesome movies (Korean cinema is incredible) to steal plot ideas from and a thousand urban legends. Also I can go out and take pictures of some adventure locations.

The general tone of this campaign would be pretty similar to that of the Dresden Files (Noir-ish investigation). The party could either be a miscellaneous group united mostly by their desire to keep people from being hurt by the supernatural (like Dresden & friends), mortals in over their heads or members of a supernatural faction of some sort.

B. Viking Age Historical Campaign: Vikings are a lot of fun to play since stereotypical Viking hero behavior often sounds a whole lot like stereotypical PC behavior. More than any other book I’ve ever read when, when I read the Saga of Egil Skallagrimsson, I hear a GM in my head yelling at the main character, “you’re doing WHAT now?” and reaching for something strong. Viking magic is also a good fit for Dresden magic since a lot of it would carry over without any work at all (just tone down the flashy stuff, focus a lot on Thaumaturgy and swap out potions for runes while keeping the rules basically the same).

For this campaign I’d run something long on the Icelandic Sagas and short on the Eddas, i.e. lots of bloody local conflicts, telling people who killed your father to prepare to die, Viking raids, runes, berserkers, shape-shifters, witchery and the undead but keeping the large-scale mythical stuff in the background. The overall feel would be low-powered, gritty and relatively historically accurate.

C. The 17th Century Turned up to 11: take the 17th Century and then throw out historical accuracy and base things on the Rule of Cool and Dresdenisms instead. That means Jesuits with secret kung-fu brought back by Matteo Ricci, The Pirates of the Caribbean, The Three Musketeers, Solomon Kane, the Thirty Years War, witching burnings, Red Court conquistadores vs. Mayan human sacrifice, etc. etc. The PCs would be globetrotting adventurers of some sort.

D. Sword and Sorcery: from what I’ve seen so far the Dresden RPG magic system would work well for more traditional fantasy and the stunt rules seem flexible enough to cover all kinds of critters and powers. Trying this would with some Sword and Sorcery (inspired by Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser especially) could be fun. We could use the Dresden city rules to create a Lankhmar/Ankh-Morpork-style fantasy city state to start in and the rest of the world would be full of corrupt tyrants, wild tribes, degenerate semi-humans, the remnants of lots civilizations, cults of demon gods and all of that fun stuff. The map would mostly be left blank except for various cool locations that the players would think up (most world creation would be done by the players, not me) and would be slowly filled in through play.

What are people interested in?

SoulCatcher78:
I'd be interestede in the Asia option.  I have little to no information about Korea so you'd have to put up with a lot of "how do you pronouce that?" type of questions (thankfully there is google (and google maps)) when it comes down to needing more information.  From your descriptions of your Seoul ideas in other threads I'd be excited to see them in action.  Forum based works well for me also because of work (54-60 hours a week).

Chung-Hee Smith:

Born in the United States (2nd generation immigrants) Chung-Hee listened to stories of his family's homeland growning up from his Grandmother (Soon-yi) while his parents worked.  Both parents were killed when he was still young (15) and he was raised by his Grandmother until her recent death.  Chung-Hee has become disillusioned with the US and he wants to immerse himself in the culture described by his Grandmother.  Chung-Hee has used his remaining money from his parents/grandmother's life insurance policies and the proceeds from selling his parents business to finance his move.  What he doesn't realize is that Korea has changed radically in the last 50 years.  He has no relatives (that he is aware of) living in the south but has decided to begin his new life in Seoul.
More thoughts on concepts later.

Blaze:
In our on line RPG:  We've done Old West Dresden.  Pirates Dresden (Cap'n was known as Shirtless Tom.) Roaring Twenties Dresden... (Well, Roaring Twenties Thomas and Murphy.)

Ancalagon:
C would be *awesome* 

I just read Les Trois Mousquetaires (in French) from Dumas, so I think that would be all sort of cool.  There are a lot of hermetic mages and alchemists active at the time,  the beast of the Gévaudan isn't that far off, there are all sorts of cool stuff from overseas being imported, Richelieu, Oliver Cromwell, the man in the iron mask... it just reeks with possibilities. 

Unfortunately, I personally wouldn't able to commit to such a game (well... maybe depending) but I just wanted to speak out on how cool such a game would be.

Ancalagon

Bosh:

--- Quote ---I'd be interestede in the Asia option.  I have little to no information about Korea so you'd have to put up with a lot of "how do you pronouce that?" type of questions (thankfully there is google (and google maps)) when it comes down to needing more information.
--- End quote ---

Well, one of the benefits of a text-based game is you don't have to pronounce anything :) Seriously though, the broad outlines of Seoul are pretty easy to get, it's the closest thing there is to a generic Asian megapolis, since in a lot of ways if you take China and Japan and split the difference you get Korea. If this game starts up, I'll make some posts like "Learning everything you really need to know about Seoul in 5 minutes" and stuff like that :)


--- Quote ---Chung-Hee Smith:
--- End quote ---
With that last name I'm assuming his father isn't Korean-American. Being ethnically half-Korean opens up a whole bunch of complications. Although things are getting better these days, for a long time there's been a tendency to not treat half-Koreans very well unless they're very successful, in which they get embraced on a national level. See for examples the good work (ethnically half Korean football star) Hines Ward is doing here: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/09/sports/football/09ward.html?_r=1&ref=sports


--- Quote ---What he doesn't realize is that Korea has changed radically in the last 50 years.  He has no relatives (that he is aware of) living in the south but has decided to begin his new life in Seoul.
More thoughts on concepts later.
--- End quote ---
Sounds like a solid concept. I've met some people like that at work :)
One possibility, if you want him be trying to throw his money around, is that's he's invested his money in some kind of business partnership (import/export, software design, etc.) in which his partner will hire the local work and he'll cover the international business aspects (talking to non-Korean clients, etc.). That could give some good hooks to pull him into the Korean business world and a lot of plots that come with that (Korean corporate culture often seems like something out of a CyberPunk novel).


--- Quote ---C would be *awesome* 
--- End quote ---
Indeed. I think that C would be the hardest to pull of but the most awesome if it actually worked.

Just reading about some aspects of the Spanish Empire in the Americas at this time period is just a bit mind blowing with its immense size, wealth, how little outsiders know about it, etc.

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