Some more thoughts on Ars Magica

My last post on Ars Magica had 187 views, and only one comment about someone who had actually played the game. I think it's kind of telling that they basically ripped the themes from the game and ditched the rest.

It seems like AM is a game many people have read, been very impressed by and then not played as written! I guess that those who kept the covenant management system are the same kind of people who play merchant campaigns in Traveller, keeping tabs on earnings, losses and mortgage payment. I have enough of that in real life.

The really detailed magic system is another matter. It seems like everyone loves the idea of being able to craft spells on the fly and using some kind of and system, just like spell points and all those ideas. But, even though I'm not a fan of the classic system of D&D it's easy and it works, even though it lacks flavour. Maybe this is the part of AM which actually change how people play.

Then there's that part which I find kind of funny, namely the "troupe style play", which is actually just they old way to play, reinvented. Having multiple characters per player is not new, and that I've even tried myself with great success.

"it is recommended that the GM keep the number of players in his party small - two or three players with up to four characters apiece is ideal."

That's T&T 5th ed. from 1979.  Something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue. Maybe I'll get to run Ars Magica one day, and then it will be nothing like written, I bet.

The Entourage Approach

I was reading Fight On! issue #2 today, and came across an article with the same title as this post, by David Bowman. This is not the first time I've encountered the idea, but I at once got to think about something I'd read in my T&T 5th ed rulebook.

This is what Ken writes about how many players you need:

two or three players with up to four characters a piece is ideal. When it is necessary for a GM to try to cope with more than three players, it may be necessary to limit the number of characters they can use at one time

From my perspective it's kind of amusing that the idea to start with one character per player and add characters if you're short of players, seem to be far from Ken's experience. Apparently the norm was to have more than one character!

David writes a very interesting article about how to have one PC as your main guy, and then a Loyal Follower to take over when the big guy dies. It's a neat and workable way to have a bigger choice of what to play, but also to keep continuity when some calamity strikes the party.

I have been talking about troupe style play before, and it struck me as kind of amusing that when that idea was introduced with Ars Magica, that style of play was already way old. The new way was the old way. Nobody knew Ars Magica was that "old school", right?

When I ran my Dungeon of Voorand campaign, I used the "stable" approach with three characters per player. That was my attempt to play it like I'd read they did in Phoenix when the game was invented.

So, if you want to play your game the way they did it "back then". Break out Ars Magica, or read that article in Fight On! Or roll up a stable and play T&T. The more the merrier. I guess they knew it already during the seventies.

How to nurture Game Masters - troupe style playing?

After writing the report from our play of How We Came to Live Here, I kept thinking of that play experience. We all help setting scenes, and we all help by playing NPCs and develop different antagonists for the heroes. It's a lot like sharing game mastering duties, actually.

Sometimes people think about the hobby, and talk about the need for new blood. One way that have been mentioned across the blogosphere a lot is for having a simpler boxed set of rules in physical stores that stock games. While the idea have merits, I also think that nurturing what we have is also very important. Most of all gamers are players, not Game Masters/Storytellers/Referee/Judge/Dungeon Masters or whatever you want to call it. The late Keith Herber noticed the fact that Chaosium sold most of their books to Keepers, and that it limited their audience. While the idea of splatbooks alleviate this business conundrum somewhat, the idea is still that most sales are not to the persons who just show up for someone else to run a game. This is not just a problem for people who try so eke out a living selling game books, but it also threatens burn out for game masters world wide.

Have you ever heard of Ars Magica? It's a game filled with a lot of wonder and cool ideas. Personally I have not found it very fun, since it is so often more focused on the management of the covenant (the magicians "tower" with it's servants, hangers on and the politics and logistics of running a small town) than anything I consider fun. But, a few of the ideas in that game are worth taking a closer look at. Since everyone have at least two player characters in that game, a magician and a companion, you take turn playing the magicians! They are the most powerful character and everyone thus share the spotlight, sometimes playing their other character. Add to this, which is called troupe style roleplaying, the idea that you also share the GM duties (which is kind of natural when you share spotlight like that) and you have a nice way to train new game masters!

Running a game for your friends takes a lot of time and effort, and it make sense to try to share the burden. Not only that, but it makes it easier to avoid one person burn out because of the work load. I think it could be a nice way to phase new people into the chair behind the screen, and would also be of economic benefit for the hobby at large. More Game Masters means more potential buyers, more possibilities of being creative with your friends, less burn out and overworked game masters. Add to that the possibility of training good skills which might serve you at e.g. work. I think it would be an all win.

It is also very fun.