More Can Go Wrong

The other day I happened to be sitting in a hotel restaurant listening in on the conversation (as one does) of a youngish couple sitting nearby. It was evidently at an early stage in their relationship and presumably their first time away together (hubba hubba, honk honk, nudge nudge, wink wink, phwoar, suits you sir, etc.) and they were in that nice, warm, gushy phase of wanting to share their thoughts and opinions about life, the universe and everything. 

I found myself nodding along in quiet agreement when they started to discuss the type of books they liked to read. The man was explaining why it was that he tends to read non-fiction, specifically history books, and why he tends to eschew fiction and, even more so, poetry. This was because, when it comes to fiction, and especially poetry, 'more can go wrong'. One can forgive flaws in the prose, structure, and composition of a non-fiction book more readily than in fiction, because often the substance is intrinsically interesting. A not very well written book about a period of history one is interested in is far more likely to get finished than a not very well written novel. 

'More can go wrong' in a novel because one can dislike the pacing, the plot itself, the prose, the dialogue, the characters, and so on. And so while a great novel is great, and more enjoyable than a great non-fiction book, the bar for passable non-fiction is lower. 

And I think this anonymous individual was even more correct about poetry. I love great poetry but great poems are not at all common, and most poetry is tripe. An awful lot can go wrong.

This spurred me to reflect on the life of a designer or writer of RPG materials, and a putative ranking on the basis of 'go wrongness'. 

At the top of the pyramid, in terms of the likelihood of things going wrong, is I would say at the level of the rules. The hardest task is writing very good rules that will satisfy most players, which achieve a purpose, and which people will not quibble over. This is, I suppose, in large part because rules are not intrinsically interesting or fun to read about. Making an accessible, workable, understandable and enjoyable ruleset is tough. Most rulesets fail. 

On the next wrong, in terms of the number of things that can go wrong, is the adventure module. It is extremely easy to write bad adventures. It is only slightly less difficult to write mediocre ones. But the art of writing an adventure module that works, 'out of the box', is exceedingly difficult. It can be pitched at the wrong level; it can have too much or too little treasure; it can strike the wrong tone; it can have too many illogical elements; it can be too one-paced or too varied; etc., etc. There are not many good ones. Most are dross.

The next step down comes campaign settings. Here, it is easier to get things at least tolerably right. Even a fairly unimaginative warmed-over version of Middle Earth will do, as long as it has nice art - and there are enough examples out there to make this abundantly evident. Most campaign settings are not very good, in the grand scheme of things, but they do well enough out of it and are at least readable.

Below campaign settings are bestiaries. It is hard I think to write very, very bad bestiaries. At worst, the contents will be boring but functional. Even a little bit of imagination will go a long way. And this is because in the end even monsters which are merely aesthetically distinct have a value - they break up the monotony. A seagull-man who wields Aztec-style weapons is in itself worth having, as a concept, even if mechanically it is the same thing as an orc. It is something a bit different. And this is often enough in itself, again if accompanied by nice art.

At the bottom of the pile are splatbooks. People will purchase by-the-numbers splatbooks. Indeed, there are entire publishing companies which make a cottage industry of churning out fairly low quality fluff for people to relatively unthinkingly consume. I do not understand this but I don't really have the FOMO gene when it comes to RPG materials; many do, and I don't judge them for it (I do have it in relation to whisky, stationery, and secondhand books). 

It follows that when it comes to the designers/writers of RPG materials, God-Emperors are those who write good rulesets, Kings are those who write good adventure modules, Princes are those who write good campaign settings, Barons are those who write good bestiaries, and Peasants are those who write splatbooks. 

And it follows from this that one should only call an RPG designer great when he has written at least one good ruleset. The rest of us are also-rans.