The RPG Cliche List

Tolkien Law. All high fantasy games have elves, dwarves, and halflings. Most have orcs/goblins, gnomes, and trolls, too. They also have a lot of other beings and monsters in common - way too many to list here. This is pretty much the oldest cliche of them all - archeologists have even uncovered evidence of prehistoric FRPGs like this. Okay, maybe not.

Trains On Time Rule. Any government overtly or secretly controlled by an evil force no longer has to worry about bureaucracies, internal politicking, citizen oversight laws, logistics, or budgets. (Exception: Dark*Matter)

T-Rex On The Plains. A particularly irritating form of Railroading where the gamemaster uses huge, nasty monsters (or high-level adversaries) to scare players back onto the path. (So named for a peculiar incident in an AD&D game where the players went off task and took a shortcut through a field they had heard about. It was a featureless landscape, but a T-Rex appeared literally out of nowhere and chased the players back onto the main road. Needless to say, the game ended soon after.)

TSR Apostate Rule. Gamers who swear that TSR's games were the worst games imaginable will nevertheless reminisce about them anyway.

Twinkus Rex. Existing in every LARP group, the Twinkus Rex is what horrifically results when munchkins get into LARPing. These players are the undisputed king of rules-abuse and stat-twisting in their local area. They have the awesome power to instantly discern which flaws or disadvantages will have no practical handicapping ability whatsoever and assign them all to their character, using the extra points gained thereby to create a hormonal monstrosity that can easily best Mechagodzilla in hand-to-hand combat. The art of the Twinkus Rex is a subtle one, and must often be witnessed to be believed.

Unfortunate Predecessor Law. All modern-day occult games in the 90's borrow/steal from White Wolf. (Exceptions: Kult, Unknown Armies) See also the Colon Law and Vampire Boy Scout Law.

Vacuum-Packed Dungeon Law. All high fantasy games contain underground complexes that no one built, full of monsters that need no food and never leave their assigned room or corridor.

Vampire Boy Scout Law. Instead of the respectable monsters they once were, vampires in modern-day occult games are now typically brain-dead, hollowly angst-ridden, and almost as menacing (and respectable) as a below-average troop of boy scouts. See also the Unfortunate Predecessor Law. (Exception: Kult)

Vampire Boy Scout Corollary. The above law obviously cannot apply to Vampire campaigns being run under the White Wolf First Generation Law.

Vampire Fanboy Law. Characters in Vampire LARPs are, without exception, less interesting than their players. Even if the players have day jobs as accountants, engineers, or lawyers.

Wallflower. An inescapable but thankfully minor annoyance at virtually every LARP. These players actively avoid conversation, interaction, and conflict with a determination that eclipses mere shyness. Caution must be exercised, as their ranks sometimes conceal the dreaded Avenging Wallflower.

Watcher Group. Stereotypical "neutral" human group in most modern-day occult games that concerns itself with merely observing/studying the supernatural beings.

Webster. A player whose LARP characters invariably spout forth grandiose orations on every topic and confrontation at hand. This behavior can be entertaining or long-winded, depending on the skill of the player. These could also be called Churchills.

Weird Pete Myth. Many gamer groups actually do know a grizzled, thickly-bearded, overweight, irascible old veteran gamer. And this individual usually does (or did) run or own a game store.

"What Does Not Kill You Makes You Stronger." Trite Nietzsche quote that was first used in Conan The Barbarian and has since appeared in no less than 8,000,000 different RPGs, including multiple games in the World of Darkness series. Usually appears in the foreword, the experience point section, or right before the setting details.

White Wolf First Generation Law. Despite all their artistic and storytelling pretensions, many White Wolf campaigns end up being run with much the same mentality as any Dungeons & Dragons campaign. Invariably Werewolf games. In addition, White Wolf cannot realize that the vast majority of gamers have no interest in playing the World of Darkness games the "right" way, or that (by making an issue of this) they're violating their own Golden Rule.

White Wolf Headcase Law. Supernatural characters in White Wolf games are required by the game system to have serious psychological problems. (Exception: Mage, maybe, before paradox goes off the deep end.) This is also true in certain other modern-day occult games, notably Immortal.

White Wolf Line Writer Law. Sourcebooks for modern-day occult games must contradict other sourcebooks for the line.

White Wolf Shadowy Apathy Law. In modern-day occult games, the supernatural beings are always a secret, even if there are so damn many of them that they probably outnumber the humans.

Wick's Rule. Historical, cultural, or linguistic inaccuracies are acceptable as long as you change the country's name first.

World Of Insufficient Light Law. No setting is so complete that the creators can't run it into the ground with four or five more games based in it, especially if they obviously didn't plan to do this in the beginning (and thus have plenty of contradictions).

Zero Law. RPG books are always expensive, even if there's no apparent need for them to be. This is probably because gamers are forever willing to pay this much, so the publishers do not need to change anything. (So named for Zero, an 80-page, $25 game of legendarily sparse content.)

Tedious But Probably Necessary Legal Note: The many, many uses of copyrighted names in this document are not a challenge to the copyright holders. Remember, we got paid zilch for all this. But, just for completeness:

Amber is a trademark of Eric Wujik.

Aria is a trademark of Last Unicorn Games.

Armageddon and Witchcraft are trademarks of Eden Studios.

Champions is a registered trademark of Hero Games.

Continuum is a trademark of Aetherco/Dreamcatcher.

Dark*Matter, Dungeons & Dragons, and Gamma World are registered trademarks of Wizards of the Coast.

Emperor of the Fading Suns is a trademark of Holistic Design, Inc.

Fringeworthy is a trademark of Tri Tac Systems.

FUDGE is a trademark of Steffan O'Sullivan

GURPS is a registered trademark of Steve Jackson Games.

Immortal is a registered trademark of Precedence Publishing.

Multiverser is a registered trademark of Vauldron, Inc.

Nephilim is a trademark of Chaosium.

Obsidian: the Age of Judgment is a trademark of the Apophis Consortium.

Power Kill is a trademark of John Tynes.

Rifts is a registered trademark of Palladium Books.

Rolemaster is a trademark of Iron Crown Enterprises.

SenZar is a trademark of Nova Eth Publishing.

Shadowrun is a registered trademark of FASA Corporation.

Sovereign Stone is a trademark of Corsair Publishing and Sovereign Press.

Unknown Armies is a trademark of Greg Stolze and John Tynes.

Vampire: the Masquerade, Werewolf: the Apocalypse, Mage: the Ascension, and Hunter: the Reckoning are trademarks of White Wolf.

The World of Synnibarr is a trademark of Raven c.s. McCracken.

Zero is a trademark of Steve Stone.

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