The Inside Scoop on Gaming

When I first got turned on to RPGnet a little while ago, there were two features that really appealed to me. The first was the Review database. You see, I've been playing Palladium games almost exclusively for some 14 years or so, but before that I had played almost everything else on the shelves. So, after such a long time, I grew curious to see what else was out there (it's been an eventful 14 years, to say the least). Reading the Reviews database was a huge help in bringing myself back up to speed with the rest of the industry. So much so, that I wanted to give something back to it. But, since I am now a fairly regular freelance author for Palladium, I felt that reviewing any commercial products might come off as untrustworthy. What's a poor fanboy to do?

Enter the second thing I really dig about RPGnet: the Free RPG database. If I had a nickel for every minute I've spent downloading, reading and printing out the free RPGs that RPGnet provides links for, I probably wouldn't need to work as hard for a living. More than that, I had found at last a body of work I felt I could publicly critique of without my commercial affiliation working against me. In time, I hope to review a number of those free games, but for now, I'll turn my attention to the one I've been playing most recently: Worlde Arcane.

Worlde Arcane is a freeform fantasy role-playing forum that you access through the Web at http://www.mysteryandmagic.com/. Follow that link, and you arrive at the front page of the game world itself. The game itself is really a kind of PBeM where you make up a character off the top of your head and introduce him or her into one of a few dozen ongoing scenarios of the Knowne Worlde, the game environment. The Knowne Worlde is your basic high fantasy, swords and sorcery setting that will be familiar to just about anyone who's read J.R.R. Tolkien or played fantasy RPGs such as AD&D, Palladium Fantasy, Middle Earth Role-Playing and the like.

To join the game, you fill out a form in which you describe your character and you also write a sample move in the game. Since players are expected to come up with their own plot hooks, dialogue, and descriptive text (hey, this is free-form role-playing, after all), the folks running the game need to know if you're up to the task or not before letting you play. This writing "audition" consists of you describing how your character would respond to a hostile orc in a tavern. Where you take it from there is up to you. In my "audition," I wrote a quick narrative about how my character got into a fistfight with the orc (and its buddies) and emerged bloodied but victorious.

You then submit the form to the Overlord, that shadowy figure (or figures?) who administrates the page. Assuming you get in, you are issued a User ID and a password. You need these to post any messages within the Worlde Arcane.

Actually playing the game is like participating on your garden variety message board. Instead of there being threads like "How come nobody ever runs out of rations?" there are threads like "The Streets of Terajin" or "On Board 'The Medusa' on the Vericul Sea." To join the play, you simply write a response to the thread, either on behalf of your character, or as an anonymous poster (a handy device for entering DM/GM-style prose to offer yourself or other adventure hooks). Since there might be multiple sub-threads going on that have nothing to do with each other, it pays to pay attention to any responses to your character's movements, as well as those of any other characters you might be involved with.

From there, you can take the game wherever you wish. If you intend on introducing your character and then waiting around until somebody throws you an adventure, don't bother. This is much more like sitting around a campfire taking turns at telling an ongoing story that old-school tabletop role-playing, so unless you're prepared to carry an entire storyline or adventure on your own, you're in for a hard time. Me, I really like this aspect of it, but that's because I have no problem until my fingertips get numb.

One of the things I dig most about this forum is the prospect of joining up with other characters and forming a party. Ordinarily, this is no big thing in fantasy RPGs, because you and your buddies are already gathered around the table, dice in hand, ready to play. If you all don't form a party, what the heck are you going to do? You're not all going to adventure solo, because your DM/GM simply won't stand for it. So it becomes a granted part of the beginning of the adventure. Sometimes there's a good reason for the characters coming together, sometimes there isn't. But it's always taken for granted that for whatever impetus, the characters have decided to work, fight and travel together, even if it might not make much sense. In Worlde Arcane, you have to actually go and meet other characters who know as little about you as you do about them, before you form a party. If you simply have your character stride up to a table, order a drink and join up with some others, they might very well laugh you off. ("Away, you drunken sot! We have plans to attend to without your interference!") This is a simple bit of role-playing, to be sure, but one that's often overlooked in tabletop play yet subtly and brilliantly enforced in Worlde Arcane.

The other thing I dig about this game is fighting. With no combat rules, you simply decide how combat turns out and write it that way. This grants you lots of legroom to write up cool and dramatic fight scenes without having to worry about the confines of a particular game engine. If you want to have your daring swashbuckler swing from the ropes while fencing, there's no need to check his "Swing" skill, or his weapon proficiency, or whatever. You just do it. For a hardcore power gamer, running combat this way might offer a huge opening for abuse, but the Overlord reserves the right to delete your postings if you go too far over the edge. That, and the general feeling I have so far is the folks in Worlde Arcane are mature, serious role-players who aren't likely to post something like, "With his Blade of the Gods, Gorum the Grim ran through the town and killed everybody! Hah, hah, hah!"

Magick works the same way. If your character can cast spells, you simply write out what happens, with a gentle reminder from the Overlord that magick has its limits and takes its toll on spellcasters.

As for the Overlord, before anybody gets the wrong idea, my dealings with whoever this person is have been positive thus far. The big O seems friendly and really doesn't want to get involved in your adventures any more than you want him too. He, she or them is just there to ensure that the world doesn't get turned on its ear and that everybody has a good time.

The only hard and fast rules of Worlde Arcane are those of fair and honorable play, largely enforced by the players themselves. This makes the game something of an online community, as well, sort of like Ultima Online without the anarchy, I suppose. When you get right down to it, the only way to break "the rules" is to evoke some effect on another character without giving him or her a chance to counter it, or by making a move that strains everybody's willingness to suspend disbelief. In the first case, if you feel like picking some other character's pocket, you simply write how you make the attempt and let the other character respond, rather than offering something like "I pick Zedremere's pockets clean and leave him penniless. And I stole his sword, too!" Likewise, the site itself gives a fine example of how you're likely to get blown off by other players if you strain their disbelief.

Which brings me to another point, both good and bad. There is an impressive amount of source material, background data, tips on playing, and FAQs about Worlde Arcane available for you to read and download. The upside of this is it gives you as much opportunity as you like to get your feet wet before playing. The downside is it takes a while to slog through it all. I'm also not sure how familiar the Overlord expects you to be with the Knowne Worlde before you begin playing, so to be on the safe side, I'd give the background stuff a look before you petition to join the game.

The other up/downside is that you are expected to post at least every 5 days. The Overlord makes it very clear that failure to abide by that may result in your character being removed from the game. On one hand, this is a nice way to make sure that the only folks who participate are those willing to spend to time to keep the adventures going. Anybody who's played a PBeM knows how they can get off to a rocketing start only to lose momentum and atrophy into complete stasis within a few weeks. The way Worlde Arcane is structured, if the adventure you're in spins down for some reason but you're still raring to play, you can try to write yourself into one the many other adventures going on. Or, you can simply write your own adventure and continue with nary a skipped beat. On the downside, this makes playing in Worlde Arcane time-intensive. If you like finding inventive ways of goofing off at work, like I do, then this is a great thing. But if you only intend on playing now and again in your spare time, you might find the Overlord and its Worlde moving on without you if you're unwilling or unable to keep up. That said, if you are going to be away for a while on vacation or something similar, sending advance notice to the Overlord and your fellow players should prevent any problems. And, from what I can tell, folks have experienced computer problems where they can't get online for a few days, and the Overlord never booted them for it. Apparently, the "five days" rule isn't enforced with a mailed fist.

In closing, let me say that Worlde Arcane is an ambitious project that offers lots of role-playing opportunity. According to the background info in this, it's been around for a few years already, so one can expect it to continue for the forseeable future. Hopefully, this kind of play will catch on, and we'll see other web sites devoted to similar styles of playing, but in different genres. I know a sci-fi, wild west, pirates of the Spanish Main or just about any other genre version of Worlde Arcane would be just as much fun as the current version I am playing. Worlde Arcane might not be the best forum for the beginning role-player because it places most of the storytelling responsibility on yourself. But for veterans who don't mind playing in a time-honored (or cliched, if you're cynical) setting (or for skilled writers unfamiliar with traditional role-playing who might use this as a way to get their feet wet), it's a great place to be.

Although I have only begun my adventures in Worlde Arcane, I expect they shall happily continue for quite some time. So stop by and give it a look. Heck, you're on the Web already, and it won't cost you a dime. >8^)

Style: 4 (Classy and well done)
Substance: 5 (Excellent!)

Worlde Arcane
Author: Everybody who plays it, really Category: game Company/Publisher: The Mystery & Magic Co. Line: n/a Cost: Free, baby! Page count: n/a ISBN: n/a SKU: n/a Playtest Review by Bill Coffin on 06/30/99. Genre tags: Fantasy Diceless	When I first got turned on to RPGnet a little while ago, there were two features that really appealed to me. The first was the Review database. You see, I've been playing Palladium games almost exclusively for some 14 years or so, but before that I had played almost everything else on the shelves. So, after such a long time, I grew curious to see what else was out there (it's been an eventful 14 years, to say the least). Reading the Reviews database was a huge help in bringing myself back up to speed with the rest of the industry. So much so, that I wanted to give something back to it. But, since I am now a fairly regular freelance author for Palladium, I felt that reviewing any commercial products might come off as untrustworthy. What's a poor fanboy to do? Enter the second thing I really dig about RPGnet: the Free RPG database. If I had a nickel for every minute I've spent downloading, reading and printing out the free RPGs that RPGnet provides links for, I probably wouldn't need to work as hard for a living. More than that, I had found at last a body of work I felt I could publicly critique of without my commercial affiliation working against me. In time, I hope to review a number of those free games, but for now, I'll turn my attention to the one I've been playing most recently: Worlde Arcane. Worlde Arcane is a freeform fantasy role-playing forum that you access through the Web at http://www.mysteryandmagic.com/. Follow that link, and you arrive at the front page of the game world itself. The game itself is really a kind of PBeM where you make up a character off the top of your head and introduce him or her into one of a few dozen ongoing scenarios of the Knowne Worlde, the game environment. The Knowne Worlde is your basic high fantasy, swords and sorcery setting that will be familiar to just about anyone who's read J.R.R. Tolkien or played fantasy RPGs such as AD&D, Palladium Fantasy, Middle Earth Role-Playing and the like. To join the game, you fill out a form in which you describe your character and you also write a sample move in the game. Since players are expected to come up with their own plot hooks, dialogue, and descriptive text (hey, this is free-form role-playing, after all), the folks running the game need to know if you're up to the task or not before letting you play. This writing "audition" consists of you describing how your character would respond to a hostile orc in a tavern. Where you take it from there is up to you. In my "audition," I wrote a quick narrative about how my character got into a fistfight with the orc (and its buddies) and emerged bloodied but victorious. You then submit the form to the Overlord, that shadowy figure (or figures?) who administrates the page. Assuming you get in, you are issued a User ID and a password. You need these to post any messages within the Worlde Arcane. Actually playing the game is like participating on your garden variety message board. Instead of there being threads like "How come nobody ever runs out of rations?" there are threads like "The Streets of Terajin" or "On Board 'The Medusa' on the Vericul Sea." To join the play, you simply write a response to the thread, either on behalf of your character, or as an anonymous poster (a handy device for entering DM/GM-style prose to offer yourself or other adventure hooks). Since there might be multiple sub-threads going on that have nothing to do with each other, it pays to pay attention to any responses to your character's movements, as well as those of any other characters you might be involved with. From there, you can take the game wherever you wish. If you intend on introducing your character and then waiting around until somebody throws you an adventure, don't bother. This is much more like sitting around a campfire taking turns at telling an ongoing story that old-school tabletop role-playing, so unless you're prepared to carry an entire storyline or adventure on your own, you're in for a hard time. Me, I really like this aspect of it, but that's because I have no problem until my fingertips get numb. One of the things I dig most about this forum is the prospect of joining up with other characters and forming a party. Ordinarily, this is no big thing in fantasy RPGs, because you and your buddies are already gathered around the table, dice in hand, ready to play. If you all don't form a party, what the heck are you going to do? You're not all going to adventure solo, because your DM/GM simply won't stand for it. So it becomes a granted part of the beginning of the adventure. Sometimes there's a good reason for the characters coming together, sometimes there isn't. But it's always taken for granted that for whatever impetus, the characters have decided to work, fight and travel together, even if it might not make much sense. In Worlde Arcane, you have to actually go and meet other characters who know as little about you as you do about them, before you form a party. If you simply have your character stride up to a table, order a drink and join up with some others, they might very well laugh you off. ("Away, you drunken sot! We have plans to attend to without your interference!") This is a simple bit of role-playing, to be sure, but one that's often overlooked in tabletop play yet subtly and brilliantly enforced in Worlde Arcane. The other thing I dig about this game is fighting. With no combat rules, you simply decide how combat turns out and write it that way. This grants you lots of legroom to write up cool and dramatic fight scenes without having to worry about the confines of a particular game engine. If you want to have your daring swashbuckler swing from the ropes while fencing, there's no need to check his "Swing" skill, or his weapon proficiency, or whatever. You just do it. For a hardcore power gamer, running combat this way might offer a huge opening for abuse, but the Overlord reserves the right to delete your postings if you go too far over the edge. That, and the general feeling I have so far is the folks in Worlde Arcane are mature, serious role-players who aren't likely to post something like, "With his Blade of the Gods, Gorum the Grim ran through the town and killed everybody! Hah, hah, hah!" Magick works the same way. If your character can cast spells, you simply write out what happens, with a gentle reminder from the Overlord that magick has its limits and takes its toll on spellcasters. As for the Overlord, before anybody gets the wrong idea, my dealings with whoever this person is have been positive thus far. The big O seems friendly and really doesn't want to get involved in your adventures any more than you want him too. He, she or them is just there to ensure that the world doesn't get turned on its ear and that everybody has a good time. The only hard and fast rules of Worlde Arcane are those of fair and honorable play, largely enforced by the players themselves. This makes the game something of an online community, as well, sort of like Ultima Online without the anarchy, I suppose. When you get right down to it, the only way to break "the rules" is to evoke some effect on another character without giving him or her a chance to counter it, or by making a move that strains everybody's willingness to suspend disbelief. In the first case, if you feel like picking some other character's pocket, you simply write how you make the attempt and let the other character respond, rather than offering something like "I pick Zedremere's pockets clean and leave him penniless. And I stole his sword, too!" Likewise, the site itself gives a fine example of how you're likely to get blown off by other players if you strain their disbelief. Which brings me to another point, both good and bad. There is an impressive amount of source material, background data, tips on playing, and FAQs about Worlde Arcane available for you to read and download. The upside of this is it gives you as much opportunity as you like to get your feet wet before playing. The downside is it takes a while to slog through it all. I'm also not sure how familiar the Overlord expects you to be with the Knowne Worlde before you begin playing, so to be on the safe side, I'd give the background stuff a look before you petition to join the game. The other up/downside is that you are expected to post at least every 5 days. The Overlord makes it very clear that failure to abide by that may result in your character being removed from the game. On one hand, this is a nice way to make sure that the only folks who participate are those willing to spend to time to keep the adventures going. Anybody who's played a PBeM knows how they can get off to a rocketing start only to lose momentum and atrophy into complete stasis within a few weeks. The way Worlde Arcane is structured, if the adventure you're in spins down for some reason but you're still raring to play, you can try to write yourself into one the many other adventures going on. Or, you can simply write your own adventure and continue with nary a skipped beat. On the downside, this makes playing in Worlde Arcane time-intensive. If you like finding inventive ways of goofing off at work, like I do, then this is a great thing. But if you only intend on playing now and again in your spare time, you might find the Overlord and its Worlde moving on without you if you're unwilling or unable to keep up. That said, if you are going to be away for a while on vacation or something similar, sending advance notice to the Overlord and your fellow players should prevent any problems. And, from what I can tell, folks have experienced computer problems where they can't get online for a few days, and the Overlord never booted them for it. Apparently, the "five days" rule isn't enforced with a mailed fist. In closing, let me say that Worlde Arcane is an ambitious project that offers lots of role-playing opportunity. According to the background info in this, it's been around for a few years already, so one can expect it to continue for the forseeable future. Hopefully, this kind of play will catch on, and we'll see other web sites devoted to similar styles of playing, but in different genres. I know a sci-fi, wild west, pirates of the Spanish Main or just about any other genre version of Worlde Arcane would be just as much fun as the current version I am playing. Worlde Arcane might not be the best forum for the beginning role-player because it places most of the storytelling responsibility on yourself. But for veterans who don't mind playing in a time-honored (or cliched, if you're cynical) setting (or for skilled writers unfamiliar with traditional role-playing who might use this as a way to get their feet wet), it's a great place to be. Although I have only begun my adventures in Worlde Arcane, I expect they shall happily continue for quite some time. So stop by and give it a look. Heck, you're on the Web already, and it won't cost you a dime. >8^) Style: 4 (Classy and well done) Substance: 5 (Excellent!)