Story v RPG Part 4: Potential Pitfalls of using a RPG session for a Story.

Story vs RPG Series

Story: Elements

Story vs RPG Part 2: Main Characters - Protagonist, Antagonist, PC, NPC

Story vs RPG Part 3: Character Information

Story v RPG Part 4: Potential Pitfalls of using a RPG session for a Story.

Story v RPG Part 5: Personality Types

Story v RPG Part 6: Alignment, Morality, and Ethics

Story vs RPG Part 7: Character Needs
Story vs RPG Part 8: Character emotions
Story vs RPG Part 9: Lies - Our characters darkest secrets
Story vs RPG Part 10: Setting - cultures
Story vs RPG Part 11: Pair Dynamics
Story and Game Structure: Storylines
Story vs RPG Part 12: Larger groups - conformity & deviance

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The character personality post isn't finished so I will post this other post that I've been working on for the time being. It shows the three main pitfalls of using a RPG session for a story. My plans were to add more, but if I think up of more I will do a second potential pitfalls continuing the numbering.

Potential Pitfalls of using a RPG session for a story

Great! Your going to use your greatest role-playing game (RPG) story for a novel or story. A number of issues may arise based on that decision. Issues that might have to be considered carefully. You may have to consider the ownership of the world and the characters. You may also have to take your heroic characters and treat them rougher, trust the other character cast less, and test them much more than in the game.

1. Use a World or World Building
First of all, unless you've created your own world by doing some world building or the world is public domain such as Wonderland, Oz, Arthurian Kingdom, Pride and Prejudice, Dracula, or such. Even then, if what you use in the game is someone else interpretation the world, and you decide to use their creation as the basis for your game and story world, then they may have added their own content on to that original content, which may seep into your story.

So using a original built world as the basis for a story is ideal and avoids possible infringement. You may even use the public domain material in your own adopted world, alter, and add more material to that based-on content. Use the original source to modify and make your own version of the world, rather than using a published game source.

2. So who is going to play the main characters in a RPG?
When playing with a group of friends or acquaintances, the other characters are normally controlled by other people. They have rights and ownership to that character's behavior and choices. So if you take what they do, say, and have created, then they are part owner in the story.

You may have to only use the character that you have created, rather than pulling out the legal papers to sign over their character rights - which isn't very beneficial to the gaming sense of fun and friendship.

An author, unless collaborating, create and control their own characters. They have to be able to jump into the minds of their characters throughout the scene. In a sense, mild forced split-personality is helpful.

Therefore take your character(s) and put them in their own story you create.

3. One of the biggest difference is conflict.
Conflict, loss, and failure in stories makes great tension. You want your written characters to struggle, hit obstacles, and experience the pains, setbacks, and emotions of despair and disasters. When things are looking up, a car hits them from the side or their best friend stabs them in the back.

In gaming, that type of game master (GM) or dungeon master (DM) - the person leading the game story - their intrusion, making characters fail, might make it feel like sabotage and that they are against your group of players. In RPGs victories are more important. In gaming you don't want players to die unless they do something wrong in the final battle. So gaming characters aren't normally used in the same way that a story uses the characters.

Own World + Characters you Own + Interesting Conflict

With these first three issues to consider and taken care of, your on your way to avoiding potential pitfalls to using a game session as the basis of a story.

Hopefully I will get further on the character personality type post. I'm not sure if I can finish it yet. I'll post some other small piece maybe if not.

ABS12 system