How To Begin Your Game

The Topic today is how to start your own Paper Game. Lets begin by covering the kind of materials you'll need. The essentials of course will always be:

• Paper (a spiral notebook will do)
• Writing utensil (I usually create the character sheet with Pen and fill in the player's information with Pencil so i can erase it later)
• And an Imagination (I cannot stress how seriously valuable this is to paper gaming. If you cant imagine whats going on, you'll always be lost or confused, and it probably wont be fun)

Other things you might want to include could be: dice, or counters (calculators work for this), a playing board, maybe even figurines. But all these materials depend on the kind of game you want to run. For instance: if you're the sort of weirdo that likes handing out experience Frilly-Willy at absolutely inconvenient times so that the players have trouble keeping track, you might need some counters.

The next step is getting some players. Not everyone has players lined up, and most people find it embarrassing to look for them. Finding players is about as hard as finding someone who will share your peanut-butter and pickle sandwich with you. Mostly they look like normal people, sometimes they even are normal people. But I have a method of finding potentials that will help you avoid making a fool out of yourself. The people you're looking for all have one very simple thing in common: they are either a pirate, or a ninja. All you have to do is ask them which one. If they respond with a real answer then they're a candidate for your game. This is a proven flawless method. I promise.

When looking for players keep in mind the size of the game your interested in. One player games are by far the easiest to run, and the story always comes out great. Two players is kind of a toss-up. If they travel and work together its not much harder than any one player games. However, if they fight and bicker then you could have two separate games on your hand. Anything with three or more players and now you're looking at the standard backstabbing, bloody mess of a role playing game. This isn't a problem by any means, its just different from single player games. Personally, I stop enjoying the game if I have to run it for any more than nine players. So there is definitely a personal limit to how much you can remember and make up within a short period of time.

Now that you've found a player or two, you can get your game on. I usually start by drawing up the map. Here's a tip for that: Draw a small map like a city, ship, or island. The players will roam around this small area for awhile getting themselves used to the game play. Once they're ready all you have to do is zoom out, and draw a bigger map for them to roam around in and discover new things. You can keep doing this over and over tacking on map wherever you need it, and eventually you'll have a whole world laying out in front of you.

The map doesn't have to be first, you could start with the character sheets if you'd like. Ill warn you though, this is a process! Allow for roughly 5 minutes per player per sheet, even if everyone's filling theirs out at the same time. Also, you'll want to catch some little facts about their character. Things like if they have a big nose, white hair, extraordinary sense of smell, or if they're really tall. Not too many, just one or two. These little tidbits will come in handy when you're describing things.
(ie. "The man at the table across the room gives your white hair a look of interest. Its possible he recognizes you from somewhere."

Ok. Lets go over what you need:

• A place to play
• The materials (Paper, Pen, & Imagination)
• Players
• A Spot to start (like a map, and/or some sort of story prepared ahead of time)

Now go out there and make a nerd out of a close friend (so you two can play embarrassing games together in semi-secret)!

Why Should I Even Bother Playing?

Welcome Back Blogger,

That is the question isn't it- why would one even want to play a Paper Game? Paper Games have been around as long as paper itself and the act of pretending to be someone else has been a common trait in everyone since the dawn of man's time on earth. Even these days you can see it plain as day in children; they bark like dogs and meow like cats, wear their parents clothing, or pretend to be their favorite super hero. Whoosh! They fly by and in their world the sheet is a cape and the box is a fantastic futuristic helmet with the power to shoot laser beams. You tell them to sit down and eat dinner, but they don’t have time for dinner yet, they still have to save the world!

Playing a paper game is one way to release your inner creativity. You’re simply giving that inner creativity a subtle form, a molded shape you feel free to use however suits you. Playing a game is a lot simpler in many ways than creating one because the boundaries are already set up, but those boundaries can be SO very different from the boundaries you know in your everyday life that you, as a player, can feel so free. Free to ignore annoying people, drink too much, spend all your money, travel the world, belch, sing, dance, and narrowly escape death time and time again.

The simple things in life suddenly become the little treasures of your Paper Game experience. For instance, when you're a pirate on the high seas, all you're thinking about is crew politics and the next port of harbor where you might be stealing, pillaging, and plundering.Or, you might rest and get your wits before spending your earnings on useful items for the next big adventure. What you're not thinking about is the wind on your face, or the taste of salt in your mouth, or that apple you'll eat before falling asleep in your swaying hammock below deck. So you see, it’s the mundane things that make the game the most interesting, and that make for some great life lessons.

Truly though, I've always found that being the Game Master is just as thrilling as being a player. Sure, there's more work involved, and you don't get a break as often as the players do, but that's kinda the fun part. Sometimes my players end up just sitting around listening to each other’s turns (if they aren't in one big group), but I'm always playing. Always imagining and describing, always setting up those boundaries for them to play in, and describing the mundane things they might otherwise not notice about the world we're creating together. A Paper Game is comparable to a work of art, and the Game Master isn't the only artist. The Game master paints the background and molds the base of the sculpture, but the players fill in the action packed foreground. Together they write a story worth remembering and in doing so create bonds between everyone in the room. A great game isn’t just a story that can be recounted days later, but years later. The kind of story you never completely forget. And that is why you might want to play: for the freedom of imagination, the fun of the social activity, and the memories you'll be able to look back on with a smile.

Or if all that memoir crap isn't your cup of tea, maybe you just want to play to break down boundaries. There are a surprising number of players in the world that love to destroy, ruin, disrupt, and generally antagonize my games. I don't mind so much because it strengthens me as a Game Master. I mean, just as long as all their disruption goes on "in game", then I could hardly care less. It creates a challenge for my ability to adapt to the player’s wants and makes for a fun session for everyone in the room to see just how far they might be able to make it before getting locked up or killed. But even then the story doesn't have to end with them being chained in a dungeon or beaten in battle. I have witnessed players escape the most inescapable situations and overcome the most impossible challenges. Some people are just downright unstoppable, and if that's what feeds you, what inspires you to play; then do it. It’s totally worth the extra effort on the Game Masters part, and after all, it’s all just fun and games.

What A Paper Game Is

Hello Bloggers!

This is my fist blog, and I intend on using it to get one thing across:

What's a Paper Game you ask?

Solid question, I retort, and since I make and run them in my free time, I will be happy to tell you. But the answer is not quite as simple as one would expect. First I must also explain what a Role Playing Game is. A Role Playing Game is any game where the player takes on the role of a character, most often fictitious, and usually human. That was actually pretty simple, eh?

Role Playing Games (or RPG's) could be anything from the Dress up & Doctor games our children play together behind the shed, to the Halo and Final Fantasy games we play on our game counsels. Paper Games (or Pen & Paper Games as some would call them) are another form of Role Playing Games. They require only a few things: Paper, Some sort of writing utensil, and an Imagination. Most Paper Games also incorporate dice or maybe even little figurines if the players are SUPER-Nerdy.

The most famous of these Paper Games is probably Dungeons & Dragons. Ah yes, D&D… the game that makes us all look so bad. You’ve got that visual of acne faced cloaked figures hiding in the darkest shadows that are the back of your high school cafeteria. They’re speaking in non-sense language and screaming at the dice on the table! All of a sudden two of them stand up and pull wooden swords out of apparently thin air! The other players root them on until the tall one with braces slays the short one with big ears. Blood, no. Ketchup everywhere, they return to their seats and the fat one starts singing for no reason at all. “Freaks.” You say to yourself >.<

NO! Bad judgmental blogger person, jumping to stereotypical conclusions like that! Live Action Role Playing (LARPing) is a whole other monster! LARPers, as they're called, dress up as their characters and act out what their character is doing in the game, but they act it out in reality. Some RPG's exist entirely based on the LARPing way. Not mine though. Maybe someday I’ll give it a try, maybe. But until then I remain a Nerd with my dignity and I play games wearing my hoody on my back and my converse on my feet.

Ok, so let’s recap what we’ve just learned:
I make Paper Games in my free time.
Paper Games require only Pen, Paper, and an Imagination to play.
I don’t wear ridiculous outfits and learn fake languages to get better at my hobby.

Well done Blogger. You’re one entry closer to filling out your own character sheet and joining in the phenomenon sweeping the nerds of the nation.