Tue Jun 24, 2014 12:27 am by 
So I was telling Corey about an idea I had: A freeform roleplay where the players pick up roles as countries or nations instead of playing individuals.
It got us to talking about how it would work, and what kind of ideas it’d pull inspiration from. We came up with the idea that it could take place in space, and various galactic governments could be vieing in an inter-planetary drama, but it could just as easily take place on a steam-punk inspired victorian fantasy world, or a more traditional sword and sorcery high fantasy one, or even just a not-earth in any place or time that we can imagine.
Depending on how many players we have I think it would be cool for players to operate in loosely bound “teams” where they work together to find the most interesting path for a country to walk. This could make the game quite interesting in that one player on this team could end up being slated against the other, one representing the government and the other representing a rebellion, other players could play off of this by launching full-scale invasions, or supplying one side or the other to ensure victory.
The ability for every player to shift perspective at any time would be important and make the game more interesting. One minute you may be collaboratively describing a battle in a war with another player in the style of a retrospective documentary interview, and the next you’d be in first person as the soldier who was the lynchpin in that battle’s victory. Since you’re playing an entire country there’s no telling what limits you have. You could play as individuals, or groups, or tell stories in grand sweeping statements that involve the entire nation, you could shift from first to third person at the drop of a hat. But the whole point would be to have the whole thing result in a good story that everyone worked hard to tell their part of.
So what are your guys’ thoughts on this? Does it sound super boring? Whether or not it does, what would you do to make it more interesting?
It got us to talking about how it would work, and what kind of ideas it’d pull inspiration from. We came up with the idea that it could take place in space, and various galactic governments could be vieing in an inter-planetary drama, but it could just as easily take place on a steam-punk inspired victorian fantasy world, or a more traditional sword and sorcery high fantasy one, or even just a not-earth in any place or time that we can imagine.
Depending on how many players we have I think it would be cool for players to operate in loosely bound “teams” where they work together to find the most interesting path for a country to walk. This could make the game quite interesting in that one player on this team could end up being slated against the other, one representing the government and the other representing a rebellion, other players could play off of this by launching full-scale invasions, or supplying one side or the other to ensure victory.
The ability for every player to shift perspective at any time would be important and make the game more interesting. One minute you may be collaboratively describing a battle in a war with another player in the style of a retrospective documentary interview, and the next you’d be in first person as the soldier who was the lynchpin in that battle’s victory. Since you’re playing an entire country there’s no telling what limits you have. You could play as individuals, or groups, or tell stories in grand sweeping statements that involve the entire nation, you could shift from first to third person at the drop of a hat. But the whole point would be to have the whole thing result in a good story that everyone worked hard to tell their part of.
So what are your guys’ thoughts on this? Does it sound super boring? Whether or not it does, what would you do to make it more interesting?
