Monday, February 25, 2013

What's an Adventurer?

One of my players, RF, shared this comic frame from Order of the Stick --

I don't know where I first heard the term "murder hobos," but we've been jokingly referring to the PCs in my CotMA game as murder hobos for some time.

I think that this picture captures the essence of play in my current game.  

The PCs are out for themselves, they're out for the team, and they're out to grab some loot and kill some monsters.  Generally they are not opposed to helping out the city of Ravenport or the general populace, as long as there's something in it for them.  I think a few of the PCs are definitely heroic and they are motivated by altruism from time to time, but the party as a whole is a bit mercenary.  In a nice way.

I think this frame also sums up how the imagined society deals with adventurers.  As long as X > Y where X is number of problems solved and Y is number of problems caused; society will tolerate the adventurers.  There's something in it for them.

If the inequality becomes tipped the other way, the peasants appear with pitchforks, the militia is called, and the city guard is mobilized.

So, here's to the Red Ravens!  Adventurers in the truest sense!  May X always be greater than Y.

Original Art by DB, player of Oryx

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