{"id":58,"date":"2018-08-10T14:00:00","date_gmt":"2018-08-10T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/briebeau.com\/thoughty\/2018\/08\/10\/five-or-so-questions-on-reign\/"},"modified":"2021-11-16T00:39:19","modified_gmt":"2021-11-16T05:39:19","slug":"five-or-so-questions-on-reign","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/briebeau.com\/thoughty\/2018\/08\/five-or-so-questions-on-reign\/","title":{"rendered":"Five or So Questions on Reign"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hey all! Today I have an interview with Greg Stolze on Reign<\/a><\/i>, which is currently on Kickstarter<\/a>! I asked Greg some challenging questions about the role of a game like Reign in modern day, which I hope you enjoy reading!<\/b><\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a><\/div>\n


<\/b>Tell me a little about Reign<\/i>. What excites you about it?<\/b><\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
REIGN really was kinda my baby. UNKNOWN ARMIES was great, but that was me and Tynes, so REIGN was really the first thing I did that was all Stolze all the time. Also, it\u2019s high fantasy sword \u2019n\u2019 sorcery, which I love, and which I don\u2019t get to do as much \u2014 somehow, between UA and all my WoD work and DELTA GREEN, I sort of got pigeonholed as a horror guy which is\u2026 not inapt. But REIGN is close to my heart.<\/p>\n

On a less squishy emotional level, I liked the idea that REIGN took events that had always been matters of \u201cOh, the GM will hand-wave what\u2019s happening on the wide-scope political scale\u201d and bolted them to dice and stats so that the players can have a new arena in which to go nuts and wreak havoc. I remember in old D&D where, if\u2026 fighters, I think?\u2026 got to a high enough level they got a keep and I really thought that was interesting! But it didn\u2019t give you any options to liberate peasants or go to war against your neighbors or any of the dramatic stuff of governance. I hadn\u2019t played PENDRAGON or BIRTHRIGHT or gotten into the covenant stuff in ARS MAGICA, but maybe that\u2019s just as well. Having not seen the way anyone else handled it, I built it myself from scratch. I just knew I wanted the collective your characters lead to be as important to the game as any individual PC.<\/p>\n

And, well, I had this nifty set of rules I\u2019d built for GODLIKE that seemed like they\u2019d work just as well for castles and crossbows as they did for superheroes in WWI, so I built out from that. I think it worked pretty well.<\/p>\n

What are some ways has Reign<\/i> grown and changed between 2007 and today? What is new, what’s been refined? <\/b><\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
In those intervening years, I released a LOT of supplements online, after getting them collectively crowdfunded. Sixteen of them, in fact. Rather than burn all that to the ground and rebuild on the foundation, I thought what the game needed more than anything else was (1) better art in the supplements \u2014 that\u2019s kind of the dark side of my \u201cone man show\u201d approach, (2) organization so that you can find what you want to use in a tangle fo optional systems and rules tweaks and (3) a nicer print version, since the hardbacks have been unavailable for some time. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s not a big reinvention, and the first two books don\u2019t have a lot of new material, because I honestly didn\u2019t think it needed a ton of work. I\u2019m going through and making the language clearer, finding those decades-old typos and homonym errors, but mostly it\u2019s taking this mess of parts and putting them in an order to be more useful. REIGN was written with the expectation that a lot of people would be using it to toolkit their own settings, and that hasn\u2019t changed.<\/p>\n

One change, though, is my willingness to let other people play with the toys. One reason I didn\u2019t write anything for UNKNOWN ARMIES for a while was, quite simply, I didn\u2019t have an idea I thought was really top notch, and I didn\u2019t want to write something just to dump it on the market. Partly, that\u2019s a matter of pride, but it\u2019s also a matter of greed. I don\u2019t want to serve lukewarm stuff because I don\u2019t think that\u2019s how you keep an audience. But when I got a bunch of new writers working on UA3, their new perspectives and experiences and approaches really pushed me to keep up. So I\u2019ve gotten a bunch of fresh new voices and salty old wordsmiths to give me their takes for stretch goals. <\/p>\n

How do you replicate leadership in Reign? What do players do when they’re leading? What is leading?<\/b><\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
OK, these are three very different questions. <\/p>\n

Leadership in REIGN is replicated with die rolls, the same way that mighty sorcery and deeds of martial renown are. One of the big pleasures of playing a game (as distinct from running one) is the opportunity to imagine myself as someone with very different skills and behaviors. Someone who\u2019s not shy, for example, or someone who doesn\u2019t get embarrased and uncomfortable with confrontation. Or, y\u2019know, a ninja. <\/p>\n

To take the third question second, leading seems, to me, to be a lot of listening to people and understanding them. Good leaders \u2014 and I\u2019m thinking certain editors and developers here \u2014 inspire a sort of loyalty. You want to give them your best. It\u2019s not just a paycheck. Good leaders draw the best out of you. They see you, not just as the role into which you\u2019ve been thrust, but as the individual adapting to that roll. Good leaders know the strengths and weaknesses of their people, and put them where the strengths are leveraged, and where their weaknesses do the least damage. In real life, I\u2019m a terrible leader. Not the world\u2019s greatest listener, surprisingly dense about people\u2019s feelings sometimes, something of a hermit. But the idea of playing someone who\u2019s listened to and who can organize people into a greater whole\u2026 yeah, that\u2019s my fantasy. One of \u2018em. <\/p>\n

What players do when they\u2019re leading is that sort of organization, understanding and inspiration. Only instead of having to really get through to people with charisma, you can create a character who has that sort of compelling presentation. Your characters can be the kinds of people who make the St. Crispin\u2019s Day speech, even if you yourself are plagued by podium paralysis. <\/p>\n

I mean who hasn\u2019t, at some point, fantasized about being listened to and obeyed? That\u2019s the wish-fulfillment REIGN offers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"a<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
The special edition covers are really beautiful!<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

I asked Greg two sets of questions and then I got a collective response:<\/i><\/b>

Sixteen supplements is a lot! How do you keep all of these things connected and consistent – the fictional themes, the mechanical structures – when there is so much information? Does that amount of stuff end up paralleling to bookkeeping in game?<\/p>\n

AND<\/p>\n

You discuss modularity on the Kickstarter page, basically explaining options for different ways of playing. Tell me more about this! How does it work? <\/b><\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Hah, the answer to these questions is really the same thing\u2026 the modularity from the KS is the solution to having the giant pile of supplemental rules and setting material. It\u2019s like when you have a bunch of different LEGO sets, and you build them, and that\u2019s fine, but eventually (if you\u2019re like me) you take them apart and wind up with a giant bin of undifferentiated components. So then you sort them so you can make something new.<\/div>\n
In this metaphor, the original supplements are like individual LEGO sets. You can get the sort of\u2026 pre-planned experience. The chaotic pile is where the material, as a whole, is now. The organization is what we\u2019re going after with the KS, cross-referencing different stuff so that you can find the thing you were thinking of. Just as importantly, perhaps, we can also help you figure out what to exclude. Not every group needs every rule, so getting that clarified is a pretty high priority.<\/p>\n

Why do you think a game about leadership and strategy like Reign<\/i> has an important place in play in the modern era, during a time that’s so tumultuous for so many people?<\/b><\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Hoooo boy\u2026<\/p>\n

OK, I\u2019ll start with something from Lynda Barry \u2014 I read her book WHAT IT IS, although it feels more like I should say I \u201cwitnessed\u201d or \u201cexperienced\u201d it? It\u2019s this deep-dive art book about creativity and her intense personal history with it, and it\u2019s very strong medicine. One thing she touched on was the idea of art as \u201cescapism,\u201d and she said she doesn\u2019t think we create or engage with art in order to escape from reality, but to change our experience of it. She didn\u2019t draw to get away from the sharp edges of her childhood, but to survive them. <\/p>\n

So we\u2019re in a tumultuous time and I\u2019m writing a tumultuous elfgame. Am I just a little white ball on a golf tee, waiting for a driver labeled \u201caccusations of frivolity\u201d to come slamming down on me for a power drive? Eh, well maybe. Maybe for some people, playing a game where they\u2019re the powerful bosses can be a distraction from doing the gloomy, necessary, unmeasurable work in the real world. But maybe, for some people, playing that game could let them (or help them) believe that change is possible, that individuals do influence these looming power gangs. <\/p>\n

Or, maybe it\u2019s OK to just have fun playing the game. <\/p>\n

But our creations are always mirrors of our concerns. If roleplaying isn\u2019t INEXTRICABLY creative, you have to work really hard to do it without any aspect of acting, or authorship, or imaginitive innovation. So your feelings about the villainies of modern politics are just about certain to make their way into REIGN, whether you do it deliberately or not. Maybe that\u2019s also OK. Maybe the satisfaction of decapitating an imaginary evil king is just the catharsis you need to avoid screaming at a co-worker about politics until both of you cry. <\/p>\n

I\u2019ve thought a lot about why we engage unpleasant themes, intense stories, fictions of tragedy\u2026 After all, now more than any time in history, we can access genuine tragedy all the time. Why horror stories? Why make up more of it? Maybe it\u2019s the relief of knowing that THIS awful thing isn\u2019t real. Or maybe when an issue is painful to handle, putting a layer of fiction around it allows the mind to contemplate it more coolly. Consider the game RED MARKETS \u2014 it\u2019s about zombies, but it\u2019s REALLY about poverty. John Carpenter\u2019s movie THE THING is about a gnarly space alien, but it\u2019s REALLY about the dangers of trust and mistrust in a cold and uncaring universe. A lot of media that\u2019s about X is REALLY about Y, and REIGN can certainly do that. This clash between the trade guilds of Uldholm while the Dindavarans sharpen their swords can be about how liberals persecute radicals while white-power revanchists snicker up their sleeves. <\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know. Maybe creativity shouldn\u2019t teach lessons, but I think it almost always does. Maybe in an intensely political reality, an intensely political game can offer a framework for disentangling complicated feelings. Or, maybe it just promises some kind of paradoxical relief.<\/p>\n

\"the<\/a><\/div>\n

—<\/p>\n

Thanks so much Greg for the interview! I hope you all enjoyed the interview and that you’ll check out Reign<\/i> on Kickstarter today<\/a>!<\/b><\/p>\n

\n

Thoughty is supported by the community on patreon.com\/briecs<\/a>. Tell your friends! <\/p>\n

To leave some cash in the tip jar, go to http:\/\/paypal.me\/thoughty<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If you’d like to be interviewed for Thoughty, or have a project featured, follow the instructions on the Contact page<\/a>.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hey all! Today I have an interview with Greg Stolze on Reign, which is currently on Kickstarter! I asked Greg some challenging questions about the role of a game like Reign in modern day, which I hope you enjoy reading! — Tell me a little about Reign. What excites you about it? REIGN really was … Continue reading “Five or So Questions on Reign”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[390],"tags":[20,10,4,17,57,25,39,73,8,15,12,23,18],"class_list":["post-58","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive","tag-five-or-so","tag-game-design","tag-games","tag-gaming","tag-history","tag-interviews","tag-leadership","tag-politics","tag-roleplaying-games","tag-rpg","tag-rpgs","tag-tabletop-games","tag-tabletop-rpgs"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paHOcG-W","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":80,"url":"https:\/\/briebeau.com\/thoughty\/2018\/06\/five-or-so-questions-on-champions-now\/","url_meta":{"origin":58,"position":0},"title":"Five or So Questions on Champions Now","author":"Beau J\u00e1gr Sheldon","date":"June 2, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Hi all!I did an interview with Ron Edwards on his Kickstarter project, Champions Now! 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