October Events to Attend

It is October 2010 and today I found myself thinking about the two upcoming gaming-related events for the month.  As most of you readers know, role playing games have been my favorite past time for many years.  Ever since that fateful day when my elven archer was killed by an erupting volcano, I have promised myself to never let another player experience a horrible game under me.  Thankfully, even with three ongoing chronicles as part of my weekly routine, I have still found the time to participate in other opportunities to give more people a taste of my preferred style of gaming.

I sincerely believe that there is only one wrong way to run a role playing game.  And that is by running a game which is not fun for the player or the game master.

I do however admit that my approach to gaming can seem odd, different, or unique for some people.  Using the techniques and narrative approaches that I have learned from theater, film making, comic creation and writing, I tend to run games which allow players to explore the story freely without losing sight of the unifying tale which all the characters are part of.

Given the opportunity to do so, I also tend to tailor the games to maximize traits which the players prefer, making sure action junkies get a taste of some battle scenes, dramatists find opportunities to unleash emotions and beautifully crafted monologues, and so forth.  I usually only have trouble with rules-lawyers and roll-players in my games.  Rules lawyers get too caught up with the system that they end up becoming disruptive forces against the time spend encouraging the game's mood and narrative flow.  Roll-players, on the other hand, sadly ignore the verbal or contextual cues that make the game more engaging and become too obsessed with determining if their dice roll was cocked or not.

Last September, I was able to run my first ever session of John Wick's Houses of the Blooded.  What began as a typical "banquet" quickly evolved into a tale of political maneuvering, romance and power play.  The game had four players, none of which have ever tried the game system before.  Much to my happiness, all left with fond memories of the game and an interest in finding a copy of the rulebook.

This October, people who are interested in exploring non-computer based gaming or real table top role playing games can attend any of these two upcoming events.  The first is an event called Polyhedral which will be held on the 16th of October.  The event starts at 11a.m. and will be at Last Home restobar in Pioneer.  While most of the games to be held in this location favor the d20 system, I however plan to run either a White Wolf Gaming Studios game such as a World of Darkness mortals session or another game system such as DC Heroes MEGS or maybe even some indie game like the Children of Fire.

Alternately, people who are interested in board games, card games and any other gaming which does not require the use of a computer, can attend this month's Open Gaming Meet.  This monthly event allows attendees to try practically any of the games that are available on the game table for free, once they pay the very affordable Php100 (barely US$ 2.00) entrance fee (which is used to pay for the venue).    Already I have a number of interested people who are hoping for a slot in the Firefly/Serenity rpg I plan to run.  I used this system some months ago for an earlier OGM, and I can still recall how fun the Cortex system can be.

So for those who are interested in playing a game, do come join the fun either at Polyhedral or at the Open Gaming Meet.  Feel free to come up to me and say HI! if you do.  I'm always happy to meet more gamers and make new friends.