In 1994 I saw a need for a change in the role playing industry. It was a golden age and a new style of game was emerging. Live Action Role Playing or LARP, was becoming increasingly popular and the explosion of the internet age was underway. But I felt that the industry was still missing the mark. The market was flooded with small independent game systems from both indie publishers and leading names in the business. There was no shortage of different game mechanics or disparate environments or worlds to play in, but the industry seemed to be chaotic. It was growing more like a cancer than a sustainable enterprise. It was then that I decided to go another way.
Looking over my own experience with role playing and I decided to strip away all of the old conventions, find what worked, what didn’t, and keep only what was need. I reviewed old systems that I had quit playing and why, mechanics and rules that I had rewritten, and core mechanics that I found limiting. In several systems, your actions are reduced to waiting for your turn to swing your +5 weapon of Incredible Badness, rolling some dice and waiting again. In other systems, the dice themselves were a problem, from huge quantities needed or the substitution of other methods of random resolution that had all the variety of rock-paper-scissors.
Also most RPG publishers seemed to have a ‘publish or perish’ mentality. They write a core rulebook, write some more books to fill in the world background with more rules in them, and write some sample adventure books. When they run out of ideas, they revise the core rules and start the process over again. This leaves the player with a stack of antiquated books and a collection that will never be complete for all their effort and years of loyalty. Most of us write reams of our own material anyway, from world background and house rules, to adventures, character backgrounds, and NPC’s. These are also made obsolete by the new editions that the big boys keep cranking out.
I set out to write a system of my own that would unify all of the good things about role playing games. It would be truly universal, able to crossover the boundary from traditional tabletop gaming to LARP with a single set of rules. Experience would not be lost when a new character is built but be assigned to the one who earned it, the Player themselves. This pool of experience would be used to balance the group of players while still providing an advantage to those who have been playing longer.
The need for random resolution would be replaced with a system that let you attempt to outwit your opponent, where the character’s destiny was not only in the hands of the static numbers on a page and a roll of the dice but also the skill of the player. Combat actions would focus on maneuvers that allowed the player tactical control of the situation beyond the ‘I swing again’ phenomenon and allow them real options beyond where to move on the map. Combat would become a thinking man’s game. Action scenes would be as much like real combat as possible; fast, dangerous, and wherever possible simultaneous. No more would the action start and the less combat capable player’s adjourn to hit the snacks, knowing it will be a while until it hits ‘their turn’. Combat would finally be played as it exists in the real world, a fluid experience in barely controlled chaos. Adversaries would move about at the same time jockeying for position. Large scale battles would be just as fast and dangerous as small skirmishes. Quick thinking and superior tactics would stand against bigger numbers and better weaponry to win the day.
Most importantly it would be about the role play. The system would reinforce the ability to take on a persona without grinding down into a mathematical mechanical nightmare. Players would vote anonymously and democratically on who they enjoyed role playing with the most, who developed a Reputation, for good or bad deeds, and for what they would be known. The effort and actions of the players would be rewarded for developing the world, their characters, and the role playing experience for the group. The ‘fun’ factor would be more than it’s own reward, it would be a contest in itself. The experience award would be given by the group to the player who strives to be involved and to involve others, who challenges others to role play at the highest level, and entertains and engages the group the most.
With Qi: Living Energy I believe we have accomplished all of these things and more. We have developed a system where the core mechanics are simple but can be applied in anyway the players want, from dice to playing cards, to hand signals. Qi is designed from the ground up to take advantage of the internet and focuses on developing the role playing community over producing a catalogue. It is designed to grow in an organic way and allow players to share experiences, ideas, and the work that they have put in to their own game worlds and adventure episodes. It allows them to develop powers, abilities, and technologies to fit their own games or to get ideas by looking at the work of others. It provides the tools for players to harness their own talents and make role playing easier and more fun for all of us. Role playing was never about the books or dice, it was about the stories we tell and the fun we have with friends while doing it.