Ultimate Grossmanian warrior as fleshed out PC, let's piss off storygamers again Options Track this topic Email this topic Print this topic Download this topic Subscribe to this forum Display Modes Outline Switch to: Standard Switch to: Linear+

[Wounded Ronin]

So, the classic shtick when we're talking about RPGs including Shadowrun is how there's a primal and eternal conflict between the "storygamers" and the "munchkins" which may never be reconciled. Part of this paradigm includes the fundamental idea that "storygamers" spend all their time talking about their character backgrounds and writing 10 page backstories only they care about whereas "munchkins" all invariably role play the T800 and spend all their time writing 10 page long character sheets where nobody but themselves actually knows all the rules referenced by that character.

Clearly, we have a philosophical imperative to create an ultimate munchkin character AS A FLESHED OUT PC. Thus we can have munchkin in stats, munchkin in tediously fleshed out 10 page backstory, and thus make non-munchkins cry by kicking them in the philosophical jimmy.

Today, no joke, I felt a little bit sick, so I went to a Borders bookstore, sat down with a cup of coffee, and I actually red Grossman's "On Killing" in its entirety in one sitting in a couple of hours. I realize that Grossman has been criticized for an un-scientific method of data collection but I'm not actually writing this post to critique or exonerate Grossman. The point was rather that a person could use Grossmanian ideas about psychology, calling briefly on Freudian concepts (which always make for good storytelling) and write up a character which psychologically would be the ultimate fictional killer.

There are many better men here on Dumpshock who will always write a better statistical character than I. But just in terms of the wishy washy background crap, I've thrown together the following outline you can use to justify your super munchkin terminator in storygaming terms and resume your honest roll-playing.

1.) The character must not have recieved "proper" social conditioning regarding the restraint of lethal behavior in any way, shape, or form. Therefore, the character should have been a small child growing up in a brutal African civil war at the height of its bloodthirsty atrocities and inducted as a child soldier.

2.) The character must have continued the lifestyle of the child soldier, complete with intense quantities of combat experience, successfully for years. According to Grossman, US soldiers in WWII started to come apart mentally after more than 2 months of constant combat without breaks. So we have to frame this character in the sense of being normalized to precisely these sorts of long spells of killing, death, and stress. The concept is that rather than having been forced to shift mental gears and endure stress, the gears never had to be shifted in the first place. As Hyzmarca has pointed out these child soldiers probably have seen more combat than just about anyone on the planet.

3.) Perhaps the character should be female? There's be no questions of pride, ego, or biological behaviors associated with violent conflict (fight, flight, submission, posture, all from Grossman). It'd just be pure, clean reality of violence without social filters or biological pre-programming towards non-lethal outcomes. No surrender, no expectation of mercy, no attempt to mitigate the horror. Zero to surreal nightmare machine in 1 second flat.

4.) The character needs to have a reason to have left or been able to leave the conflict which spawned him/her, and appear in the setting of the game campaign. Perhaps the character, living in a world of completely normalized violence and terror, just doesn't think much of risking life and limb on a whim just to walk somewhere else and see something different leaving a trail of bodies behind if necessary. Perhaps the character is just being very calculating and ends up seeking out places where violence is safer to commit in the long run and has bigger payoffs.

5.) Very importantly, I think the character must be a perfect strategist and tactician. It's one thing that can be used in terms of story or character development to explain why this particular character survived as long as he or she did. You can also argue that an almost superhuman detachment from normal emotions in combat situations has allowed for a nearly contemplative perfect distillation of essential strategies.