Ancestors

Written by 1 tripod in 3 trenchcoats on 2025-01-27 at 16:34

So I had some idle thoughts about Paranoia again lately, which kind of fits into the global zeitgeist.

I mean the roleplaying game of course, although who's to say really?

The game has gone through a few editions over time, and I feel it has risen to thematic relevance again in a way I didn't think possible ten years ago. 1/?

[#]ttrpg

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Written by 1 tripod in 3 trenchcoats on 2025-01-27 at 16:44

Paranoia was a child of the cold war, and it cast the player characters as troubleshooters tasked with working for the good of the Alpha Complex (a domed city/underground base) by the all-mighty Computer.

Troubleshooters find trouble, and they shoot it. What trouble? Communists, traitors, mutants, conspiracies, communists, malfunctioning equipment, communists, commie mutant traitors, etc.

2/?

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Written by 1 tripod in 3 trenchcoats on 2025-01-27 at 16:48

There is a certain conceptual purity in the setting of the first edition that none of the later editions really managed to capture again: you see, the Computer is insane and believes itself and the Alpha Complex to be under constant attack by communists, mutants, or any other menace.

The joke is that every single character in the setting is a member of at least one conspiracy, as well as a mutant, all the while Alpha Complex is the model of a communist society.

3/?

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Written by 1 tripod in 3 trenchcoats on 2025-01-27 at 16:54

Unfortunately, as is often the case with roleplaying games, later editions had some serious conceptual drift set in. 2nd edition was technically close to the original, just a bit cleaned up from the rules side, but already was a bit too "haha look how funny we are" in it's writing.

It didn't help that later books of the edition went with painfully unfunny pop-culture parodies and an unneeded metaplot.

Well, it was the 90s.

4/?

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Written by 1 tripod in 3 trenchcoats on 2025-01-27 at 19:14

Speaking about conceptual drift in roleplaying games: they are kinda prone to it, aren't they?

I think the main reason is because you never know what players and DMs make out of your rules once they are left alone with them.

The big example is of course #dnd, which started as a supplement for a tabletop wargame (the box even having space for the Chainmail rulebook), and ended up... well... gesticulates at the tabletop rpg hobby in general

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Toot

Written by Digital Mark λ ☕️ 🕹 🙄 on 2025-01-27 at 19:27

@kyonshi For Paranoia, it's because wildly incompetent people took over the writing from the original, admittedly flippant and hard to follow, authors who moved on from WEG's ongoing poor pay. There's no reason to use anything but 1st or maybe 2nd, the OG game works fine.

With loose Braunstein D&D, AD&D became so different and strict because Gary was fucking Dave out of credit/shares. 2E because Lorraine was fucking over Gary. 3E because WotC was fucking over indie games.

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Descendants

Written by Digital Mark λ ☕️ 🕹 🙄 on 2025-01-27 at 19:30

@kyonshi There's not a critical mass of Paranoia players for an OSR, but there are indie games like it (and I'm still working on mine, out real soon now).

Letting game companies exist and continue to make hack-work of a game designer's vision is the problem. Make your own thing or GTFO.

[#]ttrpg #dnd #paranoia

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Written by 1 tripod in 3 trenchcoats on 2025-01-27 at 19:31

@mdhughes what indie games do you think are like it? I'd be interested.

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Written by Digital Mark λ ☕️ 🕹 🙄 on 2025-01-27 at 19:41

@kyonshi The serious one is A/State, it's a slightly weird urban horror/fantasy city with treachery and paranoia (lowercase). Cyberpunk 3E & RED feel very openly Paranoia-like; Mike still writes it so it's his vision shifting over time.

I'd have to dig in my Misc games folder, there's a robot RPG which blatantly has misinformation from Humans and central control. Several cyberpunk games have taken up the built-in treachery mechanic, tho I think some now are Among Us-likes.

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