The cheese disagrees, sir!

Because of suavo's long reply to the cheese' snippy comment, he has been forced to reply with a completely new post...


"My major problem...is that the universe in question is very large and very complex. That may sound like a copout..."

And indeed, it is a copout. Let us see why.

"With Robotech...the story I told about you guys had little, if anything, to do with the events of the Robotech universe. The setting was there, as a background, but that was enough...the story is fairly discrete, and quite straightforward when you come down to it."

Well, yes the cheese' supposes that the case can be made that the overall story of the first Robotech series is pretty straightforward. If you are willing to say that a galaxy spanning war between humans and aliens is "discrete and straightforward." However, the fact that the universe only played a background to that campaign has more to do with the fact that as characters, the players had no desire to get involved with the "Robotech" story. Had the group created characters in the RDF, then the going's on of the human/zentradi war would have been a little more important to the game.

Also remember that all of the discworld novels are about characters (just like any good rpg session) and not necessarily on the universe as a whole. Adding another story into the discworld is just as easy as it is to do in, say, the Star Wars, Warhammer, or Shadowrun universes. With the discworld, you just have a lot of stories coming from one source.

"...the story we did fit well with the rest of the universe, without needing to intertwine with it excessively, or constantly worry about treading on anything that was otherwise canon..."

This, in relation to the discworld, is completely a non-issue. Pratchett himself has given a number of books over to one off stories and characters that in no significant way interact with other, more established characters.

The discworld has no cannon. Pratchett himself has said on a number of occasions that the universe evolved through his writing with no conscious effort on his part. There exists a map of Ankh-Morpork, but only because someone took six months to pour over every detail Pratchett had ever written about the city. But he in no way sat down and mapped the city out himself (he didn't even believe such a thing could adequately be done).

By setting a campaign in the discworld we would be doing exactly what you do in any rpg. You start with a "setting" and evolve it to your group's specific needs/desires.

"Discworld is a big, complex universe. There's a lot going on there, even without taking in to account the universe's prepensity for not making sense in the least. "

Every universe is, by definition, big and complex. That's usually what makes people want to set rpg's in them. The difference here, is that rather having 30 odd source books dedicated to the universe, there are that many novels.

And the universe does make sense, but in an evolutionary sort of way. Magic, in the beginning of the series, was a classic "fantasy" type, with spells, rituals, etc. It has gone on to become (for some) something closer to quantum physics, but it was not an overnight change (remember, these books started out nearly 20 years ago).

In fact, the rpg manual states the three most important rules about the universe. Everything else is pretty much up for grabs.

"It is a universe which denies understanding, and intentionally so."

This is completely wrong, and is an assumption made based on only passing knowledge of the universe. In some ways, it is a universe easier to understand than most. For instance, everyone on the disc knows that every "one in a million" chance at something will succeed. The important thing to remember, though is that if the odds are "one in 999,999" then you're probably fucked.

"The story is too vague/complex."

Yes, and my shit is too brown/smelly. The cheese isn't sure how something is both vague and complex at the same time, but every universe is vague by definition. Universes tend to be big. And, it's not really that complex. We don't know every story of every person on the disc, we just know the few that Pratchett has told. We (those who would be playing the campaign) would be creating our own.

"As a GM, that accordingly leaves me with two options.
1) Create a story that doesn't really have much to do with anything.This is the easier of the two, but it fails in a key way: it doesn't do the universe justice. It defeats the purpose of playing the Discworld RPG at all... it could be anything."

Not really because the important thing about the universe is the SETTING ITSELF. Because there aren't a whole lot of rpg's that can say metaphor, narrative, and whimsy are an integral part of the place. It comes down to adjusting how you as a GM, and we as players, approach the game. Clearly, the campaigns wouldn't be straight up swords and sourcery ala D&D, but that's what makes the place special.

"2) Create a story that intertwines heavily with one particular story from the books...That means the game becomes a seesaw swinging back and forth between inside jokes that are funny for the sake of being there at all, and a constant effort of explaining small details that would otherwise be missed/ignored."

First off, anything set on the disc should have some inside jokes baked in. But, and this the important thing, they can OUR inside jokes. They don't have to be ones from the novels.

You already said that in Robotech we didn't have a strong connection to the known storyline, and there's no reason to be forced into doing that here.

"The universe is simply too diverse/indiscrete to lend itself well to an RPG in my opinion."

The cheese wonders, then, why so many people play Forgotten Realms or Star Wars. Those are two settings that are way more defined than discworld, yet are two highly popular games. If you're reluctance to GM comes from the fact that you don't know the universe, then that is a valid argument. But don't make the excuse that it's a problem with the setting itself.

In many way, in fact, it would probably be a bonus to you as the GM to be less familiar with the books. That way you're not constrained by what Pratchett has previously written. The source book does a very good job of giving an overview of the universe, which is all you should really need.

As for D20 modern...well, the cheese would rather just play Shadowrun. The whole point of playing an rpg (from the cheese' point of veiw, anyway) is to play a character in a cool setting that he knows and enjoys. The cheese likes Shadowrun, Warhammer, and Star Wars, and likes playing characters in them. Same goes for the discworld.