One thing that occurs however is that there might be a chance that all the modern day examples might put some people off since they might not actually know anything about the examples you are citing. Certainly I have no clue about Aum Shinrikyo other than releasing Sarin gas on the underground.

That said I just turn up and try to be as downtrodden as possible.

Anyways, it makes interesting reading. Cheers!!

As for Aum Shinrikyo, they're on the list for being religious maniacs prepared to kill folks in a horrible way for "what's right."  That's pretty crucial, thematically-speaking, for the Dawning Light.

Glad it was of interest, though!

*: rather than people who would like it if they only tried it

---
Joe Rooney - Battle Vegan

Insurrection LRP: high fantasy in a dystopian setting. Event Four is October 15th-17th 2010, at Consall Scout Camp Site, Staffs. Book now for a £10 discount!

Bladelands: Raoul Twice-Dead - all-round bad guy
EOS: staff - NPCing and fighting a specialty
Maelstrom: Carlito Rossini, Sol Igneus Co. - Flembic Weaverite explorer/adventurer/bailiff for hire
Odyssey: Mirrikh, Favoured Immortal of Shah Jalila of the Eyes of Darius. Died spilling Greek blood!

Persian email list for Odyssey

Dan Osbaldeston

PD -Ricardo Verdi, Lower City Steward

Insurrection - Hendrik Houthakker, Wayfarers Survivor...?

www.tempus-fugitive.co.uk

My point was more when people are looking for other games they might look at that document and decide against playing because they don't know what point is trying to be made.

Sh*te? Maybe, but if an example can be given from a book or film etc then i figure more roleplayers will get a grasp of the ideas more than trying to understand what perspective the refs have when they view the real world groups and individuals that are being referenced.

Best example I can give is that Free Thought Radicals. One of the influences cited is the National Union of Students. Now, to someone who works with a trade union (and in fact I think Joe works for the NUS) these individuals might well be heroic figures who struggle under a mire of beauracracyto allow education for all.To someone else they might be a group of work shy fops who operate to allow other work shy drug taking alcoholics to keep sponging off the state and coast through life being a set of miserable slackers... *

* - NOT MY OWN VIEW I hasten to add.

The point here is not to have a debate/arguement about students/nus/ whatever but rather to say that if an example can be given from a written text or cimematic source then I think this is less open for interpretation than using a realworld political example where I suddenly need to understand the politics of not only the source being cited but the attitudes of the person citing it.

Silly? Maybe. And I have to confess that while I have read the details I have in no way absorbed (and will not in future absorb) it since I don't think it really changes the way that I approach the game now or in future.

I've never worked for the NUS, but I was an elected official for them in the West Midlands in 2005/06 and nationally 2006/07.  I work for a trade union nowadays (the University & College Union, for the record).

The point with the Radicals, for example, is that there's no reason they can't be both heroes and layabouts, depending on where you're standing.  They might be brave academics standing up for the rights of students, or they might be freeloading whingers with nothing to contribute to society.  It's all a matter of perspective - but crucially, not the game designers' perspective, or at least not entirely.

I think the clearest way I have of summing stuff up here is that there aren't any good guys.  All the factions are written to have both admirable and abominable philosophies and approaches.  There is quite a dose of parody/satire in our writing at times; the NUS reference in the Radicals, for example, has a lot to do with arguments I witnessed over and over again between people complaining that the NUS should focus only on student issues versus doing society & citizenship stuff.

My politics aren't the same as Oli's or Nat's or Ross', and the point of Insurrection isn't to make anyone adhere to my beliefs or anyone else's -- although it would be awesome if part of what we achieved was making a player or crew member re-evaluate something in the real world because of something they experienced in our fictional one.  Some of the non-fiction references are certainly more ambiguous than literary ones, or roleplaying ones, or movie ones, for sure, but ultimately I guess a lot of it comes down to a fascination with the things people will fight for, and the ways in which they'll fight for them.  The point is that there isn't black-and-white, good-versus-evil, simple explanations.

When we wrote the factions, we made a point of being sure that we find all of them more or less pretty repugnant, morally-speaking.  They're just structures made by people, after all.  I feel like I'm rambling a bit but the idea is that there isn't really an objective truth.  There's no unifying religion that cuts across racial and cultural boundaries and gives you external rules to live by.  Each race has a radically different creation belief and cultural setup that is obviously superior to everyone else's (OK, except humans) and which can't easily co-exist with the others when brought into close proximity.

In short: it doesn't matter what my view is of Spanish anti-fascists (love'em) or the Red Army Faction (hate'em - I'm a pacifist IRL), or any other real-world example.  We're dystopian high fantasy, so nothing is perfect and even though the Radicals might (for example) be closest to my own real-world politics, there's a lot of distance between me and the SWP and even more between me and insurrectionary anarchism.  We wanted to avoid there being a "right" way to play the game (e.g. in one system I've played, being a devout worshipper of the mainstream gods is the only real way to gain significant IC advantage without massive amounts of extra work and risk).  I suppose our real hope is that one day, towards the end of the campaign, you will all somehow come up with some outcome to the problem of the Commonwealth* that none of us saw coming. 

I think you can play Insurrection very well without needing to read anything other than the stuff we directly produce as PDFs (and not all of that is really necessary, I suppose).  But if someone was looking for inspiration for a new character or group, or even if they were just a bit bored in the winter and wanted to get a bit further inside the setting, then these influences are a good place to start.  And although they might be a bit vague, things like the Battle of Seattle and the Stop The War Coalition are definitely things that shaped this game.  Hell, the whole idea of the factions having both co-operative and competitive goals** comes from the weirdness of the coalitions of the global justice movement and the anti-EU constitution protests in France.  Campaigners from the green movement marching alongside hardcore Marxists and right-wing Christians?  WTF?

Hmm, perhaps it's worth me paraphrasing this (quite significantly, as it's currently a bit of an essay) into an FAQ.  I described (rather inaccurately and hugely pretentiously) Insurrection as Brechtian LRP yesterday.  The point is that any creative work is saying something.  I think in LRP we often fail to acknowledge that - it's "just a game."  Insurrection has stuff to say, for sure, and we're absolutely not afraid to say it, but there is a lot to say.  And saying some of it here and now would ruin some of the point of exploring the gameworld.

Mind you, I hope last game demonstrated that we're not solely, or even mostly, about encouraging players to "adopt a critical perspective in order to recognise social injustice and exploitation and to be moved to go forth from the (field) and effect change in the world outside."  We also like high fantasy, hence undead plot.  Once again, it can be both.  As long as folk are having fun and getting something out of the game, we're happy.

*: hell, even the Commonwealth aren't entirely bad, objectively-speaking.  But they are certainly bad for the PC factions, just in radically different ways.
**: some XP-bearing goals you'll only get if you all work together.  For other goals, success for one faction necessitates failure for another.  For still other goals, your success (and XP win) might inconvenience or damage another faction (or it might not) but it won't directly affect their XP award.

---
Joe Rooney - Battle Vegan

Insurrection LRP: high fantasy in a dystopian setting. Event Four is October 15th-17th 2010, at Consall Scout Camp Site, Staffs. Book now for a £10 discount!

Bladelands: Raoul Twice-Dead - all-round bad guy
EOS: staff - NPCing and fighting a specialty
Maelstrom: Carlito Rossini, Sol Igneus Co. - Flembic Weaverite explorer/adventurer/bailiff for hire
Odyssey: Mirrikh, Favoured Immortal of Shah Jalila of the Eyes of Darius. Died spilling Greek blood!

Persian email list for Odyssey

Dan Osbaldeston

PD -Ricardo Verdi, Lower City Steward

Insurrection - Hendrik Houthakker, Wayfarers Survivor...?

www.tempus-fugitive.co.uk

Dan Osbaldeston

PD -Ricardo Verdi, Lower City Steward

Insurrection - Hendrik Houthakker, Wayfarers Survivor...?

www.tempus-fugitive.co.uk

nathanael@insurrectionlrp.co.uk

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