Lucifer as a Player
September 4, 2002

          First off, my gaming career has been littered with a marked lack of playing...I GM all the time, but rarely do I get a chance to play. Recently, I've been playing in CC's Star Wars game, so that's cool...but to understand where I'm coming from, you gotta understand I've got plenty of experience GMing...not so much playing.
          For example, I'm running a D&D3E game right now. Have I ever played in one? Nope. Now running my 3rd D&D3 game, but never played it as a PC. Mythus (no, you've likely never heard of it) is one of my favorite RPs of all time. Have I ever played in a game? Nope. Ran three or four long-term campaigns, but never as an HP (PCs in that game). Crap, I'm bitchin', not talking about how I work as a player.
          So, how do I work? I'm into deep immersion role playing. If my character is going to do something dumb, he does something dumb. I don't tend to get competitive with other players (you got a +5 sword? Great...less bad guys for me) or try to take over, despite the fact that I GM more than I play (did I mention that?). If the GM makes a ruling, I'll only offer up advice/whatever if asked. Rules lawyers bug me as a GM and I'll be damned if I'll do it as a player. Now, the deep emersion rping I'm into has gotten me into trouble in the past...I won't intentionally create a character that is contrary to what the GM wants in a game, but if it happens out of ignorance (or misinformation), I won't change the character's personality just to fit the game...I'd rather quit the character (which I hate). To me, story, action, etc. is secondary to portraying the character...that's where the fun is for me.
          What turns me off? Railroading is the biggest thing. I'm not following your carefully manipulated plot? To damned bad...if I wanted to sit around and listen to someone else tell me a story I'd watch the tube or read a book. I'm into RPing for the interactivity of it as well and it's a GM's job to ensure and provide that kind of atmosphere (more on that whenever I get around to doing the GMing question). Now that ain't to say a GM shouldn't plan...they certainly should, but they should be fine with it when things take a left turn at Albe-turkey and go places he'd never dreamed of. I also prefer GMs who will ham it up with the NPCs...if you go for the monotone sort of RPing, chance are I'll fall asleep, and fast.
          So I guess that's it for now...oh, I'm not much into comedic games...comedy is well and good every once in a while, but if you're running a silly game, chances are I'll find the door fast, if I've been tricked into showing up at all. Toon, etc are pretty boring to me...likely goes back to that full emersion thing...