Core Activities in Role Playing Games

[ScottCarter]

Trying to come up with a list of the main activities that PCs in role playing games perform. Basically ways to finish this sentence: "In this game Characters do X."  If it was a typical Fantasy RPG it might be "In this game Characters kill things and take their stuff"  or in a Gumshoe game "In this game Characters solve mysteries." 

Other than killing, exploring, or solving mysteries what do PCs do in games?

[Jace911]

Role play?

:V

[clockworkjoe]

In Red Markets, players have to look for work and negotiate for their wages. That's a major part of the game.

[balhaza]

In Legend of Five Rings, player sit around, drink green tea and besmirch each other/NPC. Then thy are force to commit seppuku. Usually doesn't happen but some do.


Chris

[trinite]

For most games, I prefer the formula, "Players use X to do Y," because the capabilities of the characters are usually closely related to their goals.

In Unknown Armies, players try to harness bizarre supernatural powers to to achieve insanely ambitious goals.

In Eclipse Phase, players use the strange technology of transhuman space society to defeat horrifying existential threats.

In Call of Cthulhu, players try to overcome their realistic human frailty to resist horrifyingly powerful supernatural threats.

In Vampire: the Masquerade, players use monstrous superpowers to perform elaborate clandestine social schemes.

In Base Raiders, players use do-it-yourself superpowers to extract wealth and more superpowers from abandoned superhero bases.

[sinanju]

In Champions, players use math to define common tools and weapons in excruciating detail, then use them on bad guys. (I kid, I kid. I've played Champions since the first edition, and I enjoy it but it's not for everyone. Some people get a law degree. I learned Champions.)