[freeroleplay] Thoughts on system design

[Samuel Penn]

On Wednesday 28 June 2006 19:16, Troy Truchon wrote:
> I have never played Ars but I hear nothing but good things about it.
> I'll probably hunt it down before too long. The idea sounds very
> similar to what I was thinking though.

There's sometimes discussion about this style of gaming on the Ars Magica
mailing list[1]. Archives are available if you're a subscriber.

You can download the 4th Edition rules[2] for free, though it's now in
its 5th Edition.

The main issues are keeping consistency between GMs. One GM may introduce
something that they think is cool but which causes problems for others.

Because Ars has various levels of play, particular GMs can concentrate on
what they like/do best. Maybe someone runs the political Tribunals which
come up once every 7 years.

You could also split it by geographical region, with each person
responsible for things happening in their region. You don't even need
people to run anything - just have them update the doings of major NPCs
and coming up with interesting events in their region, and the main GM
works out how it effects the PCs.

Ars Magica is not for everyone. There tends to be a lot of number
crunching involved in the downtime (learning spells, inventing magical
items, writing books), but it does add a new dimension to playing a
wizard.

btw, I've never actually played in a group which used multiple GMs for
Ars Magica. Those of us running things tend to be either control freaks
or have plot lines so intermeshed with the world that sharing it becomes
difficult. Or possible it's a bit of both :-)


[1] http://lists.csua.berkeley.edu/mailman/listinfo/ars-magica
[2] http://www.atlas-games.com/product_tables/AG0204.php


-- 
Be seeing you,                         http://www.glendale.org.uk
Sam.                        
              IM: samuel.penn at jabber.org or samuel.penn at gmail.com