Spiral Mutterings 3: A New Role For The Doctor

Ok, I admit it. I am a Role-player, and a Doctor Who fan (yet still have friends). But not everyone is. So I thought I’d ease you non-players into the concept. In a role-playing game (RPG), there are several players, and a referee. The Referee is responsible for the creation of the game’s setting, and controlling the events with in it. The players take on alter egos called characters, to explore that setting. Each character has a particular set of skills, values and background, which all have a bearing on the outcome. There is also a random element, usually provided by dice rolls, to keep pulses racing. Sound familiar?

Well, when properly executed, a RPG session is not dissimilar to an episode of a TV show. The players are the actors & the referee is the director. The difference is that the script is not written; the plot evolves, influenced by the reactions of the characters to the situations they encounter. So with a situation so similar to TV, Doctor Who seems a perfect subject for the medium. Unlike TV, RPG’s are not limited by budget. Imagine The Green Death without the need for condoms!!!

The key to a successful RPG adventure is balance. All those involved need to be like-minded. If the referee takes the game seriously, but the players take a more light-hearted approach, or vice-versa, then tempers will fray and the sessions will descend into bickering and tantrums. Equally important is balance within the game world. Imagine Jo Grant, walking into work on Monday morning to find UNIT HQ over-run with Daleks. As she opens the door, 24 pepper pots open fire. She could hardly be expected to survive! By the same token, a lone Cyberman would find it tricky to overcome a group of half a dozen Time Lords, popping out of a Type 102 TARDIS!

In addition to parity between the characters and their adversaries, there should be some level of equality within the party, too. If one player has a character who is very strong, a scientific genius, and useful at picking locks (sound like anyone you know?), then his colleagues are going to spend a lot of time feeling useless. And this is why the two commercial attempts at Doctor Who role-playing have failed. The player who plays the Doctor has far more skills than his companions. As in the series, the companions become ciphers, to be kidnapped, lost, have ankles twisted or otherwise further the plot. This leads to dissatisfaction for the players controlling these characters, and like any game, an RPG is supposed to be fun.

Another problem with Doctor Who as a subject for an RPG is that there is a LOT of continuity, mythology, and other baggage. I remember my attempts to get a group sorted out for running a Doctor Who game. I only knew 3 Role-players who were interested, and two of those were non-Who fans. Since the Doctor is a complex character, he needs to be played by an experienced role-player. If that player is not a Who fan, then you have more chance of finding the Key to Time than having fun.

It appears, then, that there are only two real approaches to bringing Doctor Who to the tabletop. Firstly, a RPG based on UNIT would work. There is the chance of character development through promotion. Even those without the bloodlust of a military mind could be involved – as a scientific advisor. The Doctor, or similar Time Lord character, should only be introduced as a non-player character, controlled by the referee to give hints and advice, and be handed test tubes.

Secondly, a more obvious idea is to have the characters transported in the TARDIS, with the referee playing the Doctor. The drawback with this approach is that there is a constant battle for the referee to come up with feasible ways of separating them. Still, scores of scriptwriters managed okay.

There have been two attempts at commercial Doctor Who RPG’s. In the mid 1980’s, the FASA Corporation released The Doctor Who Role-playing Game. Based heavily on their hugely successful Star Trek RPG, this game was far more attentive to the rules of the game than with the feel of the series. There was a mine of information about the Doctor and his opponents (mostly wrong), but it was too complex for non-RPGing Who fans to embrace.

The second of these commercial attempts was Time Lord, published by Virgin Books in the early 1990s. A single volume, containing rules and background information, its announcement was met with quite a fanfare. Doctor Who Magazine even published an adventure for the game to tie-in with its launch. This was, to my knowledge, the only published adventure for this game. Time Lord was everything that the earlier attempt wasn’t. Edited by Peter Darvill-Evans, it contained accurate background information. Regeneration was given a chapter of its own. Its rules were simple. Too simple. I tried to get six adventures up and running, but gave up on all of them. It seemed that every time I needed guidance on a particular event, there was no section to cover it.

So, FASA’s Doctor Who RPG was good for experienced RPG players, but poor for Who fans, and Time Lord was great for fans, but of no interest to seasoned adventurers. The series can transfer to RPG. However, I would suggest that the scope of pleasing both RPG fans, and Who devotees (both groups can be difficult at the best of times) is too great for one game. The characters from the series could easily be adapted for existing games, and make a welcome change to the regular fare of elves, goblins and dragons. If you want to try Time Lord, or The Doctor Who Role-playing Game, you’ll have to try the second hand market. Time Lord went out of print when Virgin lost the licence, and FASA’s publication was out of publication when I picked up my copy back in 1988. If anyone is interested in proving me wrong, and has the plans for a DWRPG that is easy to play, accurate, and lots of fun, please let me know.

My first ever article, circa 2000, this is an expanded version of an original web article written f0r the then-fledgling Official Doctor Who Website (www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho). A change of editorial team left it in web-limbo, until Nic Hall's Who Central site kindly gave it a home.

Much to my amazement, the article elicited a response from the author of one of the games covered, and we entered into healthy debate about it for several weeks. A bit of a coup for my first effort, I thought...