Revenant, RPGs, and Heroism

A beautiful movie. When it comes to RPGs, especially high-magic and high-fantasy, it leaves me wondering. I like realism. I like the grim and gritty. I dislike the entitlement and empowerment of the current crop of pen-and-paper RPGs, where characters feel like they are some superhero in the middle of an overused CG Matrix-style 360 slow-motion shot where everyone is fighting and using cool powers like of out of some 2010's era Avengers movie.

It makes me want to go back to Mongoose's Legend, frankly.

While I like my escapism and fantasy tropes, it all feels so mixed up. World of Warcraft meets MMOs meets D&D meets Pathfinder and it all becomes some high-magic joke where mages walk all over the story with infinite cast fire-blast magic, solve everything divination spells, character builds, max-ing DPS, and nothing feels like it is taken seriously any more. That essential quality of a hero sacrificing is lost to min-maxing and magic so prevalent and powerful you could never do a Revenant style story. Not in a million years with a high-fantasy game.

"Let's level to the point where we get the spells to solve this," is what I hear from players.

Granted, low-magic survival and gritty roleplay isn't high-fantasy fare. It doesn't even fall into the genre. "Play another game," is what I feel, because I don't feel I can recreate that experience for players, not in a high-fantasy game. Not with MMO-inspired classes and rules. Not with the constant focus being on wealth and power accumulation, levels and experience points.

Maybe I will get over this feeling, but then again, something primal calls to me. Something that feels real, in the silly way pen-and-paper games try to model reality. Something where survival is the real measure of heroism and achievement, where facing incredible odds and living to tell the tale is the stuff of legends.

It's just one of those movies that makes you think, and it puts a lot of fantasy gaming assumptions under the harsh spotlight of "why is this fun?" Or more importantly "what do I feel is fun for me?"