RPGs or Role-Playing Games 101, and Shield Maidens to come from Mongoose

by Screenmancer Gamer

Since the first RPG (Dungeons & Dragons) was unleashed upon the world in the mid-seventies, most tabletop roleplaying games have shared many common elements. Each player creates a character and writes down their stats on a piece of paper or some sort of digital sheet.

Ask any tabletop role player what their favorite aspect is, and you’d get a lot of different answers; but many of them will report that roleplaying games capture the imagination better than even the best epic fantasy or science fiction films can.

Once it kind of taxed the imagination to suspend disbelief based on a list on paper. But RPGs have truly come of age now, and can span a wide variety of different genres and licenses. Some of them are based on existing films, novels, games, TV series, comic books or even historical settings and others are completely without any previously developed backstory.

Why Do We Dig RPGs?

RPGs allow gamers to tap into their own creativity and bond with each other in ways impossible to accomplish through any other means. In most RPGs, player characters are developed as fully-fledged real personas, with their own life histories, personal experiences, friendships, families, skills, passions and flaws. Some statistics are usually given numbers to denote how adapt they are in certain natural abilities or acquired competences.

One person usually adopts the role of game master, acting as the player characters’ eyes, ears, sense of touch, smell and taste, describing the world around them and assuming the part of everyone they meet, usually drawing on an already-developed adventure, general outline or idea. Written adventures don’t act as static storylines, but rather as guidelines, introducing the story, hooks, locations, possible events and non-player characters, but almost all RPGs allow the players characters to say and do whatever makes sense within the logic of the setting.

For example, Mongoose Publishing in the UK is launching a new game called “Shield Maidens.” The genre is both familiar and entirely new: it’s Vikings meets cyberpunk, borrowing elements from both to present a refreshing take on a future that would be possible if the Norse myths got it right. It’s ripe for high-octane action as well as more solemn moments, thrilling interactions and funny situations. Plus killer costuming and wild weaponry with style. As for the storyline?

­The scenario, or backstory, goes something like this: the people of Midgard have been under the powerful hold of the cruel Fenrir Empire, which has been tightening its grasp throughout the nine realms, squeezing the life essence from each world it is able to reach. The branches of the cosmic tree Yggdrasil are dying and the land is shrouded in what seems to be an endless winter. High up in the skies, the gods are waging war on each other as the twilight of their days looms near.

Still, ancient dragons sitting on other-worldy branches are predicting the dawn of a new age once the wheel of eternity starts turning again. The duty to usher in this season full of promises falls to the Shield Maidens, the great heroes who carry the awe-inspiring Guardian Shields.

Tasked by the goddess Freya to prevent Ragnarok, their very presence presents the most palpable threat Fenrir is facing, making them both feared and hatred across the entire empire. As the agents of Fenrir try to stifle free thought and social justice, crush individuality and deny diversity, the Shield Maidens stand tall, a beacon of light to all living beings within the nine realms.

Shield Maidens is Big on Inclusion & Multiversity

Even though the gamer community is well-known for being one of the most open-minded out there, there have only been a few indie tabletop roleplaying games that openly embrace LGBTQIA+ people. Shield Maidens allows everyone to play brave futuristic Viking women, battling injustice, prejudice and fear, without being too much “in your face.” The best way to love one another is, after all, not to discriminate, and heterosexual gamers will find just as much to enjoy within the vibrant pages of this game as anyone else. The focus of the game remains the obstacles presented by the Fenrir Empire, but the scope is epic, with deities battling each other and a single organization holding entire worlds in its crippling grasp.

To frame inclusivity in a real-world historical context, in 1945 the scientist/philosopher Karl Popper (1902-1994) coined the term “the paradox of tolerance.” Popper posited that as long as we stay tolerant towards intolerance, we allow intolerance to exist and thrive. Somewhat paradoxically, the term “tolerance” has become a pejorative noun, infused with the sense that we have to be permissive of things or people we don’t like, just because that’s the right attitude. Instead of being tolerant towards all sexual orientations, genders, cultures and ideologies, as long as they don’t aim to hurt others, the writers of Shield Maidens want to embrace gender gradation and emerging ideas with open arms.

British company Mongoose Publishing created the RGP background content for this 101 on role playing, and has been on the forefront of the tabletop roleplaying game scene for the past 21 years. The publisher originally focused on content for the most popular RPG ever, Dungeons & Dragons, but has since been responsible for hugely popular miniatures and roleplaying games incarnating equally recognized properties like Babylon 5, Judge Dredd, Conan, Starship Troopers and many others. Currently, Mongoose Publishing is still making a splash with Traveller (probably the most iconic SF RPG ever), 2300 AD, Sea of Thieves, Paranoia (still standing tall as the funniest role playing game out there) and Legend. In March or April, the publisher is set to achieve another milestone with its high-profile Kickstarter for Shield Maidens, a Viking cyberpunk tabletop roleplaying game.

Screenmancer will keep you updated on the Kickstarter launch, progress and resolution with Mongoose Publishing, as they head into a 2022 that will (hopefully) end up amazing all us RGP fans.

Until then? Stay safe. Game on.

# # #