Solo Roleplay
Sole Role-play
At the end of 2021 I got a big urge to play my role-playing games I had collected before to read while playing the supposed “most popular game”. I had all of these book and I only ever got to read them, day dream, and then go roll a d20 and accept mediocre. So, I had the idea to search YouTube for how to play role-playing games by yourself, and then I searched DriveThruRPG. I found a few YouTube channels at the time that had a running story and some people talking about game master emulators, but I thought I could do it better! I had heard about Ironsworn, but Powered by the Apocalypse games never really groked with me then, and I wanted to play something else. I had this stack of Genesys and Star Wars books and dice so I made a starting scene. Long story short, the story “finished”, but it ultimiately fizzled out because I didn’t know how to drive the “what’s next?” aspect. I bought a ton of supplements and most of them never really clicked for me. That was until I bought this little red book called Mythic Role Playing.
Mythic Role Playing, MRPG, is a role-playing game first published in 2003 by a little company called Word Mill Games. I say little, but it was really one person. The author, Tana Pigeon, wrote MRPG because she felt that role-playing games didn’t fulfill what she wanted. The Game Master Emulator section of MRPG became popular and then Mythic Game Master Emulator, MGME, was published. For nearly 20 years the MGME was the standard for solo role-playing for many people. This supplement helped me learn how to design a scene, test the expectations, and then alter or interrupt what I wanted. This allowed me to let go, trust the tables, and exercise my interpretation of what was going on and then lean into expectations again. However, I explored still. I then purchased the Game Master’s Apprentice decks, ALONe, DM Yourself, and GEMulator, but nothing resounded as much as Mythic.
Mythic has enlightened me and helped me master on-the-fly Game Mastering, and also idea generation that is within the context and fiction of the universe; even if I made it up all impromptu. I’ve been able to pick up games I have and test them out, play and learn the rules and mechanics before bringing it to the table. Then I’ve also found my energy for reading, studying, and mastering those rules. MGME has helped me figure out which games I actually enjoy playing rather than conceptually from reading.
As of early 2023, Word Mill Games, Tana Pigeon, released Mythic Game Master Emulator Second Edition with content and systems from 20 years, supplements, and magazine articles written for the system. I look forward to Mythic Role Playing Second Edition as well! Join the Discord group too!