Or, Adventures in Systemless Gaming
When I found gaming, I fell into it wholeheartly, and wanted to be gaming any time that I could. The problem was that I started Gaming with Rifts from Palladium Books and Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, 2nd Edition, two systems that were heavy on books and needed charts and tables to create characters and adjudicate rolls. Neither were condusive to bringing new players online in an improvised location or play while on the go. I'd often run into friends and acquaintaces who'd be interested in gaming but the setup or infrastruture prevented getting started.
So I began freestyling. I'd start with a prompt, usually shamelessly stolen ieead from TV or movies, and get the perosn or people I was with to role-play. If I had some dice we'd roll those, but often i'd be using coin flips, Odd/Even calls or Rock-Paper-Sissors for random resolutions. This works pretty well for killing time in waiting rooms or on a walk or sitting in a car while someone runs an errand.
Eventually this lead to the may iterations of RPG: On The Go, the never finalized rules systems that I'd like to boil down to a single sheet of paper and character sheets that can be made on a 4x6 index card.
The downside to this is that it's really hard to keep a story going, and easy to have a story end up in a dead end. You and the your players have to be OK with stories without resolutions, of characters played and abandoned. Addtionally, this requires a GM that is good with go-with the flow improvisational play. GMs that are at their best with modules and maps will have a hard time with this system.
Similarly, it's easy for playsers to work themselves into a corner or lose the plot. It's up to the GM to try and bring it back around. It's also important to communicate and make sure the game stays fun and be ready to drop or refocus at any time.
These prompts are standard scenarios that I've used and abused. But any half-remembered adventure module, neat dungeon idea, anime episode, movie plot or other idea can turn into a fun game. It's OK that it's not perfect, the point is to have something to do and practice flexiblity and thinking on your feet. All of these games should be cooperative. Often Freestyle Gaming will be one-on-one with a GM and a single player, and it's important to remember athat a game is a conversation, mot a lecture. Practice "Yes, and..." and ocasionally "No, but..." back and forth, and only use the dice when it's fun or needed.
This idea has always been improvised and bespoke to the individual session. What if someone wanted actual rules? We're working on that here at Freestyle Gamingwith dice recommendations and some more design philosophy. Eventually we're looking to create a simple 1 pager (double-sided?) document for a set of rules to make Freestyle gaming in austere enviroments easier and simpler.
The original one page Crackroll document is linked here for posterity.
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