Goal, Belief, Instinct

Matt

Goal

This is the easiest for me to figure out. I know what my goal is, in fact I had it demonstrated clearly to me only a few days ago. What I want to do in any role playing game is to create and immerse myself in an emotive environment. What I mean by this is that I want to feel like I am participating, involved in some sort of deeply affecting situation—I want to feel strong emotion, whether those emotions are fear or wonder or revulsion or joy or sadness. The best example of this I have to date is a D&D session I played recently in which we were investigating high magic dwarven ruins. The facts accumulated and the suspense grew until we knew that we were missing 14 bodies in a compound we thought we had completely explored except for one twisted hatch. We were all so twitchy we went as a group to close two doors that had been blowing open in a dark hallway. This ability to create a mood, a feeling is what I aim for and hope to get from playing mouse guard.

Instinct

My instinct is to get things done, to keep things moving with as little hassle and fuss as possible. If that means taking charge I will, if it means that I absolutely must sit back and let the story go, then I very grudgingly will :). I like to be involved, and I like to be doing something but I also like to avoid conflict, avoid complications. I like to take the route of least interference, but not necessarily the route of least resistance for me personally. When I’m at the game table, I seem to be able to take charge of things a little more than I do in the real world, but I still always defer to someone who seems to know more what they’re talking about.

Belief

My belief is that roleplaying games can and should explore deep issues, whether those be personal or societal. This is especially when we get close to my goal, because we have the greatest opportunity to learn when emotions are the highest. Moreover, there are so many opportunities in RPGs to explore things that we couldn’t otherwise—I mean, when am I going to raise a religious mob in real life? By taking us other places, RPGs show us ourselves and our own places better than we see them normally, just like the best sci-fi and fantasy does. It’s a lot easier to look at religious fundamentalism in mice than in humans.