Matching Mixed Media: How Form Informs Function in TTRPGs
Around the same time I started working on paraluman, I also felt in me a great urge to do good. Or specifically, *put out good energy into the world. And part of that mission was figuring out a way to apply the increasingly scattered skill set and interests I have and fashion them into something practical.
And that in part became the Not Just One TTRPG series.
It’s not quite a monthly series as it didn’t start until March and there were some breaks here and there, but the point of the series was teach people how to play games that weren’t d20 based.
My first system was d20 Modern.
The neat thing about the d20 family of systems (which includes D&D and Pathfinder, two staples of my tabletop resume) is that it’s an comprehensive system. It is very cool and very expressive between how your stats feed into skills and all of the rules for all sorts of social interactions and combat. It’s great for telling epic stories that naturally lead to conflict that can only be resolved in some sort of battle. This makes sense given its history and its origin, and it’s great if you’re willing to work through the crunch of the system, because there is indeed a lot of crunch.
And between some quarter play throughs of Baldur’s Gate 3 and getting a chance to dabble more with other systems, I like the d20 system insofar if I am with a group of players and game masters willing to engage in the same level of crunch consistently. While some things exist in the theater of the mind, a good chunk of d20 systems are played in a grid and there’s a level of focus required at any given time from everyone involved.
The d20s are not a pick up and play system. They are a “we are committing to this system.” And I have discovered that as a 30 something year old with a mercurial schedule that it’s hard to find people to commit to the type of long lasting campaign that you need for a d20.
Conversely, this year, I’ve finally gotten to play Kids on Bikes.
Kids on Bikes is the foundation for several Dimension 20 series and my god, it’s my favorite thing to run. At some point I may actually get to play, but here are the things that I appreciate about the system:
Character creation is super streamlined.
Skill checks are super streamlined.
The arithimatic is easier.
It is naturally hackable in a way that D&D isn’t.
D&D is great for tactics, but often time the most exciting part of TTRPGs is not the number crunching (although don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing quite like the high of critting and rolling all of that nice compounded by several levels of abilities carefully curated over several years), but the collaborative story telling aspect. And Kids on Bikes is ultimately focused on the story. And as someone who is very much good with making sandboxes and less good managing NPCs, Kids on Bikes lets us play make believe with just enough rules.
The other board archetypes of systems I’ve taught this year were the Storytelling system and various Powered by the Apocalypse. On the spectrum of Kids on Bikes to D&D, the Storytelling system is slightly closer to Kids (a more free form approach to core mechanics) and PbtA (having a very rigid ruleset) is closer to D&D.
As is the case with writing, form informs function. It’s not surprising that when a non-significant portion of your architecture/house/rulebook is dedicated to the flow of combat, combat becomes not just a pivotal part of it, but integral to the way the story is told.
When combat gets abstracted, it lends itself more to different stories.
And perhaps this would be the proper time to do a proper cross comparison between the actual plays that utilize the system, but I think today, I just wanted to share this little piece of good I’ve made and will continue to cultivate.
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