ORCs, Evil or just Opposition?

You may remember this discussion from a while ago, and in an effort to not disrupt things I held back my thoughts, now that its all settled (agree to disagree) The underlying issue with the Orc question seems to be, can evil be normal, or is it something else?

How can Evil Exist?

If Evil is a thing, a force, it is surely destruction. the desire to destroy for no other reason. there can be justified reasons when the need for one thing is greater than the need for a second thing and the first cannot exist without the destruction of the second, yet is that evil?

Laziness, maybe.

If there is a plot of land. 10m x 10m in Soviet Russia known as a sotka. It can cope with a house, a garden enough to grow food for one person for a year, and nothing else. if you need some of that land for a driveway and a carport for your car, you will need to destroy the garden. but do you?

You can move some of the soil needed for the garden into raised beds, ones that use 'vertical space' so the garden 'space' is not destroyed, just moved. 

When You want to replace a very old house that has started to rot, you could take it apart plank by plank, discover all the reusable parts and store them for later use, maybe even in this new house, but the time cost to do that is greater than you can afford, so you employ a demolisher who rips down the house quickly, and throws away all the old wood. Destruction yes.. evil? hmm

If someone has not been trained to understand the cost of both sides, the benefit to store and keep the old wood, and the cost of time to take it apart, they have been trained only to demolish, this is not evil, its just a lack of choice. they know no other.

As a result, often, cultures that understand the choice, and come to other cultures that know no other choices, will likely expect them to learn of the choice, understand that destruction is evil, and creation is good. and so, choose creation.

Yet, if that culture, understanding that loss occurs with destruction, but instead of wanting to grow, wants all others to shrink, through destruction.. is that evil? well surely yes.

Orks are Evil.

This is my world is the evil of the Ork. They may wear armour they have scavenged from their enemies dead, as it afford them more time to destroy more of their enemy, and this is a good idea, but to take the time to create the armour? the cost for them is the time that could have been more destruction, would 10 years of creating armour create more destruction, no, because ultimately, the armour itself must also be destroyed, 

even the destruction of themselves, through scarring, tattoos, piercings is considered a good way to participate in destruction. Old age is not considered good, If the amount of food they consume equates to 100kg of destruction, yet a younger man with the same food produces 200kg of destruction, and there is only one serve of food. the younger will get it, they will use the energy to destroy and the net output of destruction is served. as such, elderly orcs will often sacrifice themselves to the horde. their knowledge will only lead to more creation, 

Humans have both capacities, can be trained in both capacities, and the path of creation leads to more creation, while the path to destruction always ends somewhere. the benefit of destruction is only to an evil god who wants more 'destruction', the 'food' they live on is destruction. So while some humans left with little choice, understanding, or training will resolve to destroy, as they know, no other way, or are too stubborn to change, the orc even when presented with the opportunity to learn it all, will only choose destruction. 

Some scholarly magi, imprisoned some Orks and only gave them the choice to create, with magic, all destroyed items healed and destruction was no a choice, the Orcs slowly grew into what seemed like 'normal' intelligent beings, yet the minute they left the confines of the magical box that always healed everything, and destruction became a choice once more, they reverted almost instantly, and within months were not just savage, but moreso, their knowledge on how to destroy more effectively lead to entire tribes of Orks wiping out civilisations, until such time the chieftains died, their knowledge gone with them, the squabbling tribes after fell into old ways and were soon, destroyed, but not before wiping out continents of humans. 

The Orks are not evil? well, I beg to differ. 

Playing as an Ork, expect your campaign to end violently

If a Player wants to play as an Ork. Sure, it'll be an interesting thought experiment, as long as they, at every choice, can destroy something. it'll be true to the Ork nature.

Arrive at a door, smash it down, enter a house, any furniture? smash it out of the way, fireplace? chuck everything in the fire so the place burns. people? kill them, why not? oh because my friends will block me? can I kill them? so I can kill the others? yes? ok, do it. no? oh, then I need to get more muscle, steal a deadlier weapon, then kill them, anyone who blocks an Ork from being able to destroy something needs to be so obviously stronger else the Ork will try to kill them. the only blocker is 'fear' that the other Ork wants to destroy it first, and by killing them, less destruction will happen.

An Ork player will need to always be 3rd in rank or lower, always seeking a way to survive long enough to eventually overthrow the leader, and make the choices.

A female Ork, giving birth to an Ork will know that their child will destroy more, will raise their little carnage beast with the expectation to destroy others. 

A Half Ork female will likely kill their offspring, as the capacity for any other race to destroy is less than an Ork, instinctively, so the child will not live. Only human females, having been forced, by an Ork that satiates its lust, and failed to kill the mother, will be born. Human females, unable to destroy that which they have themselves created, even if it is less than it should/could be, will raise the child as best they can. 

Players should determine how much 'destruction' they have in them based on their wisdom, charisma and Peity.

The Ork Gods won't like half Orks running around, and the more Pious the half breed is, the god will get their 'claws' into them. The GM can just 'influence' all Ork related encounters to be a little harder, deadlier or more often when a Half Ork becomes Pious.

Playing as an ORC on the other hand...

Remember that DD12 allows for races of other worlds to bleed through, so Orcs (note the spelling) might come through from another dimension. As I am to understand, these Orcs might have some form of hair growing from their skulls, they might communicate rather than decimate. They might not even BE Evil?! 

Players be warned

A non-evil Orc is not easy to play, while your in game friends may not communicate outright hatred or distrust, the GM should always be feeding your lines about how people will glance in your direction nervously, your comrades should accidentally make racist remarks, or concepts the might hurt your feelings are actually meant to, Orks are not Orcs.

But, this is ROLEPLAY, you're meant to be dealing with other worldly situations that put you in discomfort, so you as a player can expand your mind and abilities in the real world.

Have at it. Smash, Bash, Crunch and Grind, an Ork Life is full of FUN!   

{Old Drafts} Why Buy a Game?

{Old Drafts August 2015, as part of my "drafts Cleanup"}

I look at the Mobile Games market, they're evolving faster than other markets, because of the ease of entry, the numbers of people entering the market, the consumers and their attitudes, So its a micro cosmos market to study.

The Whole Freemium model, Get in for free, play the game for free, and either hit a brick pay-wall, pay or quit, or quicksand of skill, and you need to either master the game or pay to get back to the ease of playing, or the game is still free, but you can buy a cool hat for your character, or asking the player, Hey you've been playing for over 20 hours, you obviously like it, why don't you give something back to the creators.. 

So I look at myself, and ask: Why don't I pay for these games? I'm a games developer, I went to Uni for 3 years to study games design, and yet I can't bring myself to pay a cent for a single game so far? How am I going to understand how to get someone in the market to pay for my game, if I won't buy someone elses.. Am I such an outlier?

Back up a step, I played computer games for years, but only paid for a handful of them, in the beginning c64 games were easy to copy, then later, learning to hack a game was a skill in itself, which got me into computing, then later I found it more interesting to make games than to play them.. I actually only like to play games that in themselves are problem solving games.

In Roleplay, I couldn't afford games as a kid, so I played my own, I borrowed books from friends, read them, took notes, and returned them, didn't ever run them, let along buy them.. So how can I expect someone to fork out money for my RPG if I won't for someone elses?

Well, I have to be an outlier I guess.. I'm not a consumer, I'm a creator. So I can't use my own thoughts and feelings on being a consumer to judge the market with..

So Back to Mobile, What would it take for me to buy into a game.. and then it hit me.. Minecraft, the last game I bought, in 2009, I bought in for two reasons, A) because I thought it was going somewhere that no other game had gone, and B) because I could create something that lasted.. 

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The General Thought was: If people don't want to pay for a mobile game, why don't they, and when they do.. why do they?

The Mobile market is a micro-cosmos-market that we can study, because its a persons free time, they usually have to 'connect' to the net (or connect to people) to play, people wont just pay for anything, but after they get interested enough.. they pay for something in game.

I don't know if I'd pay for GM up front, I'd need to see the "product" and see that indeed it is better than average.. because average is free. Maybe once I'm in the game, I might consider paying, but once I'm in for free, I sorta feel like I'm in already..


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Giving it for free vs Paying for it.. I'll come back the crude version at the end..

Players aren't just the consumers, they are contributors too, so Its actually harder to ask them to pay, You don't have a one way situation, sure the GM runs 80% of whats going on, but without the players 20%, its hot air.

I compare it to teaching a language, as a tutor, often. I need the student to want to be there, want to learn, do their homework and participate. I'll prepare the lesson, which can take as much time as the lesson itself, and which sux if they don't turn up, but at the end of the day, my skills are needed for the student to learn, because they want the skills in the language.

As a GM, I need the players to want to be there, want to play, do their own form of homework (character backstory, thoughts on what they want from the game) and participate.. I'll prepare the world, the background plot, the simulated environment, sometimes twice as much time as playing.. and while yes it sucks if they don't turn up.. we just continue the next week (worst is enough players to make it work, but the critical player isn't there) My skills are needed for the the players to have the enjoyment... but and this is the crux.. but, what do they want from the RPG session, that they can't get elsewhere, or for free? There is no clear understanding in skills or experience that will help them in the future.. so they don't compare it to a lesson, instead its considered just a fun activity.. 

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I can only compare it to the mobile games environment.. hundreds of thousands of games, for free. Hundreds of hours of artists and programmers to make these games, and one in ten will earn any money, one in a hundred will break even on costs, and one in a few thousand will make some money.. Studios come, make 2-5 games, if they hit the right audience with the right ideas with the right timing, they make 1 game which pays for all their costs for the time it took to make the 2-5 games, then they are broke and out. Many Studios don't get past the 2nd game, they don't make a cent from either their first or second and they struggle to make a third and they can't afford to make it any better, because artists want money and costs and costs and down the drain they go..

Rarely a game gets audience, ideas, timing and market penetration all together, jackpot, and they either go on to make more games, 100,000 companies and one gets to survive a few more years. Its all about economics.

An Indie game, by a westerner needs 10,000 players to pay $1 (profit) to the developer to cover costs/minimal life expenses. It takes 6 months full time artist & programmer (or split between more people) to make an average mobile game. 

Indie Games, and Indie Mobile Games have more developers coming to market than consumers are picking up smart phones and joining the market. Each Indie Dev needs 10,000 new consumers to discover his product, to allow the market to break even. 

Then add in, that a Romanian Developer can survive on $250 a month, he only needs 1,500 players to cover his costs, he can make a slightly crappier game, maybe even spend 4 months making it, and he's set.. but the smart ones, spend 6 months, grab their artist and programmer friends and make a slightly better game, and takes 20,000 players from the market, so there goes 2 indie developers in the western market.

The Market shrinks, so prices shrink, 

Is the Indie RPG Market headed the same direction? will a few thousand writers make games, some getting a few hundred sales? some getting none? one in a 100,000 actually breaking into the 'big leagues'?

Is part of the problem, that more indie writers are coming to market faster than people interesting in mobile games?

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2018 Review: How does this relate to RPGs, Are more RPGs hitting the market than people willing to buy them? I know some GMs who buy everything that interests them, even if they don't have the time.

I think I read that 1400 new RPGs were released since 2015. Even if 1/12th of that match the genre you're interested in, that still means you'd need to playtest every weekend a new group, with new rules for 2 years to find out which of the 116 published games work best for the scenario you are making..

Maybe I should review all the RPGs, and provide the results as a paid product? "Comprehensive list of all RPGs til 2018.. 2020, since It'd take me two years to research and include them all.

While I never included a title, nor conclusion to this wall of text.. I think I could say that maybe people go to D&D because there is too much choice, not enough clarity.. maybe the market needs some clarity.. 

Game Dev: Upgrade Games

Improvement or Upgrade Games involve the player starting on a stage, a problem, a way to solve the problem, which cannot be done first attempt, but each attempt give you some kind of currency (information, cash, whathaveyou) which allows you to improve the stage/solution to be better at each attempt. Usually within 5-15 minutes, you've played it enough rounds to win. Your Meta Goal is to play again and beat your previous score. 

The Interesting thing about such games, is that the Upgrade is a component of bigger games, but has been simplified to just that one aspect, upgrading. Usually though, upgrade games involve an actual game task, as simple as it can be, from just clicking (Must-a-mine) steering (Hedgehog Launcher) Timing (Berzerk Ball) or 

How to Monetize?

Upgrade games are time wasters, which typically means a player is very unlikely to waste money on it as well. That said...

Upfront cost would require the user really wanting to play the game (word of mouth or competitive challenge) or the game having some further reaching goals.

Theoretically, a pay to win formula might be to have some far reaching trophy goal, one that you could achieve by playing a million times, or by paying $5 worth of upgrades, which unlocks the trophy.. you get to see the content which you paid for with your $5.. or someone without the means, with their million plays (maybe they should have different endings)

Microtransactions, Potentially the game could be far more fun if you use special upgrades that don't change the game play, but add a different style for the paid gamer.. again, if they know they are paying for the different graphic content, they might be more likely to buy into it.

This line to be edited, when I post the "Pay to..." topic in the future.