Free Kriegsspiel Roleplaying, part 1 - Here We Go Again

Audio (with extra bullshit - EDIT: someone rightly pointed out to me that the part about death being on the table felt particularly authoritative and would excludes certain approaches. I'm not re-doing the recording, but I edited the text to try and provide a more broad scope statement about FKR which entails diverse practices of play. I'll still highlight that I'm generally describing how I like to run my games and occasionally why I think that's cool, which does not mean you're doing it "wrong" if you like it different. This article was a stream of consciousness discord response to someone asking the sempiternal question "what's FKR anyways". I'm yelling at the void on the internet to lay down my random musings on games, with an edgy streak because it's cathartic. I'm writing for myself mostly, people finding good stuff in it is a bonus. Someone with better communications & marketing skills should write an actual manifesto if we want a clean, practical one.

Free Kriegsspiel Roleplaying is a loose movement with neither centralized authority on the question nor a specific "place to be", although the leftist Free Kriegsspiel Roleplaying server is one place to start, and the NSR server does have "ultralight gaming" as our local FKR gulag.

Historically, it began as my and a pair of even more problematic boomers attempts at disseminating a culture of play that I think is both very widespread and seldom talked about, which can be covered by a bunch of set principles consciously or unintentionally inspired by Free Kriegsspiel precepts and 70s/"Oldest School" roleplaying practices.

Trends that can be observed:

- There is a Referee, who prepares situations in a fictional world, handles entities other than the PCs, focusing on open-ended problems of a materialistic nature (ie: more about physical/sociopolitical situations than psychodramas). They also determine when to invoke rules or procedures, and treat any rules as an optional toolkit to be used only when a judgement call wouldn't work better to produce a sense of fairness, verisimilitude and give meaningful consequences to the players' choices, which are the core experience.

- There is one to ten or more Players, who each handle at least one PC, possibly more (think chorale play, west marches games, OD&D, etc), who likewise focus on cooperative creative problem-solving using elements of the game world rather than extra-diegetic aspects from their character sheets (ie: no character builds, no traditional notion of minmaxing possible within the framework)
 

- Generally, people who use the FKR label for their tables or design spaces tend to rely on minimal rules (ie: very little moving parts to the task resolution system, if there even is one; it is also not necessarily made explicit to the players, to push focus away from mechanical interactions/dicing and towards exploring the fictional world) and minimal to A FUCKING TON of procedures (ie: stuff like wilderness exploration, dungeon crawling procedures, random tables for reaction, weather, morale, etc.)
 

- It is often clarified that "FKR" is not something a system is but rather an approach to have, regardless of ruleset. It is also regularly stated that one can take any book, RPG or fiction or non-fiction, and use it as the "sourcebook" or toolbox to be pilfered from and run a game in that manner. Think "improv" except you're improvising the mechanical framework to keep only whatever fits the needs of play right now rather than internalizing a baroque set of interlocking mechanisms. This is half-true in practice, as I think certain games are better fitted for this toolbox-picking approach: AD&D and older games in general are designed with that approach in mind. OSR games can also be used like that. Some games from the post-Forge era may be pillaged efficiently (Apocalypse World stripped of the moves, for example), although I would wager a lot of the more forgian "high structure, system does matter a LOT to convey a specific feel to the game" would end up with the referee fighting the system to run it FKR-style. Likewise, "modern mainstream" games like 5e or Pathfinder can be pillaged, although what is generally seeked within these frameworks tends to be lost when FKR'd. As I've said: no character builds, no game balance, etc. All of the OSR precepts apply, because FKR is one broad manifesto of the OSR, basically.
 

- Because a lot of the FKR relies on sometimes implicit culture of play, we over here in the FKR cult try and make as many social and game processes transparent and explicit, although because in my case it is all I've ever played and all I play or run, it can be tricky to see things from another perspective without seeming preachy or dismissive. Nonetheless, here are a few additional tidbits that I think are essential for FKR-type play:
 

- I've said the Referee is meant to be a fair arbiter of the world right? That means they're only "a fan of the characters" insofar as they try to make an interesting world for them to explore. Beyond that, there is no pre-written plot in mind or expectations of where the game will go. "Play to find out what happens" certainly applies. Some people take issue or seem befuddled, confused, or aggravated by the idea that the GM is the final authority on the world without rules to protect the players from abuse. This is a non-issue that is perceived as one because of adversial GMing play culture which I believe is toxic regardless of the game or school of gaming you're coming from.
 

- The role of the GM is to provide information to the players to allow them to make informed choices, and maximize their agency. For this to be meaningful, the neutrality must extend to (narratively) bad outcomes. Depending on your table, that may mean that PC death is on the table, or other permanent outcomes like maiming, losing important NPCs or simply failing at major goals, should be considered not as engineered dramatic moments, but as possible outcomes should the fiction dictate it. It should all come from the actions or inactions of the players, and not from any assumption of GM and PCs working against each others.
 

- Some players may feel uneasy about not having a complex set of mechanics to use as the levers they can push and pull to interact with the fiction. Instead of these, they should trust the GM to provide generous and trustworthy information about their environment, and give a certain leeway as to the abilities of their characters. That is, most often these are adventure games, in which cases it can be assumed that an Adventurer is adept at any activities that would be required to progress in the game: from climbing to swimming to fighting etc. NPC experts and other alternative routes or solutions may be required for more specialized information, which in turns makes seeking these information another part of the adventure, rather than buffering it behind a skill check or lore check or whatnot.
 

- Essentially, the key is trust. The table should convene and discuss these principles and make sure everyone involved buys into it and finds the prospect enjoyable. This will lead to excellent gaming moments. If it's not for you, that's fair and fine. Move along and go play other games, there's plenty around. These are the ones I like.
 

- Sociopolitically, FKR has had an interesting context. It started out as a breakaway from the OSR and, in part because of my being a dumb idiot back then, was tied up with some bigoted peeps who did not help make the environment very healthy. Old grognard BS may have played a part. Thankfully that situation changed - the old server is pretty much dead, with neither me nor the Other Guy on it or as owners, and more importantly the current FKR server is explicitly a leftist space, which has greatly contributed to another aspect of the FKR that I love.
 

- Inclusivity and accessibility. For all my talk of "this isn't your boyfriend's D&D", I generally am looking for converts. I'm just not interested in debating theory. Come play a game at my table with an open mind, see if you're having fun, then spread the good word and run your own games that way too if you wanna. It's not like it's a mind disease and you won't be able to get back to crunchier / lower trust gaming experiences after getting a taste, hahahaha, ha. Anyways yeah I like that the systems are minimalist and the games themselves tend to be frame as fairly accessible experiences welcoming a diverse crowd of weirdoes, queers, POC, neurodiverse people. I make that easier and make running games easier by having very simple and elegant mechanics and teaching by showing. Which is, every time I've run games for complete novices (ie : nothing to unlearn from other cultures of play) they've generally felt pretty confident that running a game is EASY and that anybody (ie: they) could do it too, and then they proceeded to run GOOD GAMES that didn't feature shitty railroading or adversarial/bossy GMing and I think that's the best testament to the value of FKR in the broader RPG hobby.
 

- I don't write the most hand-holding games, paradoxically. I like to think that people can just interpret shit and not worry too much about "getting it right". Certainly it tends to be the case with complete noobs, or people already invested in FKR philosophy. In the case of peeps who come from different cultures of play, there's a lot of articles out there explaining stuff with more theory behind it. I've answered a LOT of questions and strawmen myself, so now I mostly focus on talking about the stuff I like, running games, and sharing procedures or stuff I make for my games. I also find that FKR tends to make the out-of-game-talks more about worlds and adventure design or procedure design, rather than about Stuff I Find Boring (ie: builds, balance, theories-that-are-mostly-there-cause-people-like-to-talk-about-games-more-than-play-them, etc.)

Any offense, any takes above you think are shit, well, hmm, don't caaaaare, love ya byeee.