So, starting next week, we'll be playing one of the oldest RPGs and the first science fiction one ever published. It's also a game I've never refereed before, though I did play in a MA campaign some years ago, so this will be a learning experience for me too. That said, I've thought a lot about the game over the years and have a number of ideas to draw upon. Whether they'll survive contact with the players only time will tell, but I'm keen to see how this unfolds.
Like OD&D and Empire of the Petal Throne, Metamorphosis Alpha is mechanically somewhat sparse, with lots of lacunae and inconsistencies, as we discovered yesterday while trying to generate characters. That's fine. Part of my enjoyment of playing older games is figuring out how to make its unclear and often incomplete rules work in a way that make sense for our campaign. I rather expect that, after a few sessions, our version of MA will develop its own set of house rules and rules interpretations, as all good campaigns do. That's as it should be in my opinion.
Right now, my only worry, if that's the word, about this choice of game is whether Metamorphosis Alpha is capable of sustaining a long campaign. One of the players asked me how long I intended to run MA and I answered, "As long as I can – like all my campaigns." Barrett's Raiders lasted just shy of four years. The Riphaeus Sector Traveller campaign before it lasted slightly less long. And, of course, House of Worms lasted more than a decade. In each case, I didn't expect the campaign would last as long as it did, but I hoped they'd continue indefinitely. That's my preference when it comes to roleplaying, because I feel that, in general, these games are best enjoyed as long form entertainment.
I’ve certainly looked at MA but never played it. Ive heard since the PCs are stone aged cavemen types Gygax would describe things aboard the ship like stairs in vague literal terms without calling them stairs. I’ve always wondered how long that sort of thing could last in a campaign.
ReplyDelete"survive contact with the players..." HA! Who was your first Dungeon Master, Moltke the Elder?
ReplyDeleteI'm so pleased you have such brilliant players to select MA! I can't wait for the reports. And as for longevity of the campaign, yes it it should go as long or short as it dictates, BUT if you are going for distance, I really do think one way to do it is to "Russian Nesting Doll" the double-enclosed setting in another, wildly different enclosed setting. If you've ever seen the Hammer House of Mystery episode Child's Play that would be - vaguely - a very interesting course to have in mind.
MA lends itself to that sort of thing, with unexpected revelations changing teh whole nature of a campaign. The one big campaign I played in ran for about a year more-or-less "standard" with the PCs gradually discovering that their world was a starship and what that hypothetically meant. Then we finally found a secondary bridge and learned that the Warden had actually made a hard landing on a habitable world many generations before the PCs were born, winding up mostly buried, partly under a mountain the crash had collapsed around us and partly beneath a glacier that was just now receding enough to allow access to the outside world. And then that turned into a mix of Underdark crawl and reverse Expedition To the Barrier Peaks while we still dealing with shipboard factional politics. Game fell apart after about three years just as we were getting involved in an impending war between the local D&D-style magocracy and the android warmongers from Deck Five.
DeleteThat sounds awesome - do you have any other details published about the adventure elsewhere?
DeleteAfraid not. Hadn't really thought about it in years, but this dredged it out of memory. Old high school-era game, disintegrated partly because the GM and several players graduated and went off to college. Now that I think about it, I was the baby at the table, just finishing 9th grade when it ended and everyone else was in 11th or graduating. Two or three years felt like such a big gap back then.
DeleteBeing the junior player in a group just doesn't happen for me anymore. Too old.
James, I am very interested in hearing about this campaign - how it goes, and lessons you learn from it. I would love to GM or participate in a Metamorphosis Alpha game sometime in the future, and the next best thing is hearing about game play.
ReplyDeleteLooking forward to reading posts about the game!
ReplyDeleteWhile you stated you are using the original rules, are you planning on using any of the MA 1e compatible materials that Goodman Games has put out for it? Or just the rules themselves?
I will almost certainly use some of the Goodman Games materials. Some of them are quite good.
DeleteThe Epsilon City module is very good, I was heartbroken when my own game fell apart before the party actually got there.
DeleteM:A is a unique choice, with a lot of potential for spinning off into various genres. Star Trek had a Boot Hill episode and a Gangbusters episode, so you can too!
ReplyDeleteThe news is that there is more support available for it now from Goodman Games.
ReplyDeleteBonus points if he gets any mileage at all from TSR's Metamorphosis Alpha to Omega book. You know, from the Amazing Engine range? There must be something in there to use as an idea mine - the alien ship/parasite stuck to the Warden, maybe? That wasn't in the original, was it?
DeleteAs I recall, the big foldout map was fairly nice. Probably the best thing in the whole book.
What makes you wonder whether it can support a long campaign?
ReplyDeleteI don't know, just a feeling, I guess – that and I've never heard of anyone running a years-long campaign using MA before.
DeleteWe managed three years worth back when I was in (mostly junior) high school, and it might have gone longer if the GM and half the players (all older than I was) hadn't graduated. Admittedly, after the first years or so the tone of the game changed. We went from exploring the Warden to discovering the ship had made a rough landing many generations before our PCs were born and the glacier and rockslides that had covered the ship were just now allowing access to the world outside. Things transitioned to a mix of factional politics onboard ship, Underdark exploration, and eventually a sort of reverse Expedition to the Barrier Peaks where the D&D-style locals were clashing with explorers from the Warden, with incursions going in both directions.
DeleteSo, maybe MA as pure MA doesn't have legs, but it's real easy to mutate in strange ways. Another obvious route is to get some control over the ship and start dealing with other interstellar traffic. Generation ship stories are ripe for using the "surprise, while you were en route we developed better drives back home and overjumped you to your destination" trope.
I'm looking forward to this. Gamma World was hugely influential on me, and I'd like to see what your Met Alpha game turns out to be.
ReplyDeleteI have a couple of MA adventures posted as files for Metamorphosis Alpha on RPG Geek.
ReplyDeletehttps://rpggeek.com/rpg/769/metamorphosis-alpha-1st-edition#files
Looking forward to reading about this more. I never played MA BITD, couldnt even find it- TSR games of the mid to late 70s were very hard to find- just GW and BH started to show up around 79. I only ever saw MA on the products for sale page in the back of my Holmes book and LBBs.
ReplyDeleteI bought into the Goodman KS, still have the enormous thing- always wanted to run it for my Kids Group, but they didnt have any interest in sci fi/sci fantasy outside Star Wars.
There are definite tweaks that could be made to make lasting play more interesting. The one I liked the most was changing the wristbands, which, using RAW, worked perfectly every time and nullified any challenge that might be posed by the ship's doors. I solved this by changing the rules for wristbands so that they were all needed to be powered; ones found buried in rubble or on the bodies of dead crew all had 3d6 charges, rolled secretly by me. Players put a lot more thought into exploring ancient structures and the ship's hull when the possibility that their magic keys would stop working became apparent. I stole all of this from the Eyes from Tekumel, obviously.
ReplyDeleteWhat beginning sequence do you plan on using? The standard "barbarians too ignorant to know that they are on a spaceship"? Or perhaps "An Alternate Beginning Sequence for Metamorphosis: Alpha" by Guy W. McLimore, Jr. (The Dragon #6, April 1977), which was reprinted in Best of The Dragon? Or perhaps something else?
ReplyDeleteI'm going with the standard set-up. Much as I like the alternate sequence, I feel like that's the kind of thing that works better after the players are already familiar with the setting.
DeleteIs this going to be a GW/M:A mashup? If it is, I can't wait to hear the details.
ReplyDeleteNo, the plan at present is simply to use MA straight, possibly augmented by material from Goodman Games.
DeleteCount me in as interested in hearing about this campaign as it unfolds. Been collecting notes for a BRP-based campaign based on MA. And yes, the "Alpha to Omega" does have some cool ideas.
ReplyDelete