It may just be my luck, but in all my time on RPoL I have never participated in a Firefly game that didn't fizzle and die before it could leave the atmosphere.

Is this a common experience, or am I just cursed?

Are there any games that you've been yearning to play only to have them fall out from under you every time you join a game?

Perhaps it is the fate of all Firefly games to get cancelled in their prime...

Poor Whedon.

There is definitely a trend that certain types of games just die - I get the *feeling* (not trying to state a fact here) that some game-types that have too-close of a following or nearly cult-classic feel don't necessarily feel right to everyone that joins them and I bet GMs feel burn-out when people question "their version/vision" of things.  Just a guess.

I find that the more intense and devoted the following of a work, and the more narrow the set of options for how that work is supposed to feel, the harder it is for a GM and group of players to maintain "the magic."

In reply to TheWarriorPoet519 (msg # 3):

Yes.

That's why I shy away from games that bill themselves with the title of a well-known property. It's also why I would never attempt such a thing myself.

I think it's more a problem with fandoms where the following seems out of place with how much there actually was.

For example, games like Star Wars, Star Trek don't have this issue; because there is a -lot- specifying how the universe works. Firefly though, has an intensely... fanatical following, for what comes down to one short series, a movie, and some comics (and not all fans follow the comics).

Well, one of the Firefly games I played in was actually clicking along very nicely...until Real Life decided that it needed our Game Master more than we did.  That kinda brought things to a screeching halt.

I've tried my hand at two others...one, I was rejected from because my suggested character concept was too similar to someone else's, according to the GM, and I was not given the option of either modifying that character or coming up with something else.  The other I joined, too forever to get moving in because of health issues for the GM...and then, once it started running, I found myself railroaded into a no-win situation and my character was killed off when I didn't post often enough (because of a Real Life situation that I'd mentioned to the GM.)

So, my experience with Firefly/Serenity games is very different.  The one I was in that died, while I was in it, didn't 'fizzle and die'.  It was still very active, as I recall, when the GM announced, "Sorry, I won't have time to continue this game, so we're done."  I have no idea of the fates of the other two games, but my treatment from the respective GMs left me thankful that I wasn't involved in them, after all.

I think any game with a closed cast is more at risk than a more sandbox/revolving door game. You're on a space ship; it's not easy to deal with player drop-outs or absences.

I also agree with all the thoughts on fandom. I imagine it would be easier to run a Firefly game if you kept Serenity canon at bay with a ten-foot pole and concentrated on the adventures of an OC crew.

It also gets a bit exclusive. If you sell something as "cowboys in space" you'll get more applicants than if you advertise it as "a Firefly game" because anyone who is not intimately familiar with the series will shy away.

In my experience (as a player and GM), the real problem with Firefly games is the sort of default structure built into the concept. Each player has a clearly defined role (pilot, mechanic, gunhand, medic) and the game revolves around flying in a spaceship and taking jobs.

On a tv show, this works just fine. Something breaks, and Kaylee goes and fixes it. And when stuff isn't broken, the show can focus on other people. And when the 'job' is happening, the tough people go and get it done, and the noncombatants stay on the ship. The show just checks in with them now and again, watch River and Book discuss the nature of God or Simon miss yet another change and relations with Kaylee.

And it all works.

But in a communal storytelling game this doesn't work. The mechanic and pilot have nothing to do unless the ship is in the air or broken. And even when they ARE useful, their contribution boils down to a dice roll and then nothing. And splitting the party is really hard to do properly on Rpol. Either the GM runs themselves ragged trying to run two or three different threads and keep them synchronized, or a couple of players are bored out of their minds waiting for everyone to get back.

And you can compensate for this somewhat by always giving everyone something to do, but there are only so many times that the ship can break during a maneuver, injuring someone, so that the gunhand has to carry them to the medical bay. And even then, when that happens, again, it's often just a flurry of dice rolls and then it's done.

And that's before you get into problems inherent in the job-betrayal-revenge-payment-another job structure that the game tends to fall into. Shadowrun has the same problem.

I've never made it work. And it's not for lack of good, interested players.

I had a good game running for a short while before I needed to leave RPoL due to real life issues (took me 4 years to get back here, but look Ma - I made it!). I had some awesome concepts from the players and it was all working out well. We had nods to the TV show and film, but overall it was a new crew, new ship, telling a story that hadn't been told yet. Concentrating on the characters and building around what they did worked best to tell a story about a bunch of people together, instead of trying to do a 'Firefly' story.

I think you need to break from the established stories with a game where published content is at a minimum, and need a set of players who accept and are happy with that. It takes work, but when it succeeds it's very much worth it. Ideas can involve anything from a universe where the Browncoats won and now as Alliance supporters you are swimming against the tide, to the Reavers conquering most of the known planets so that the only safe havens are space stations where hundreds of ships cluster together for protection. Never be scared to branch out on a story past where the established material leads you - you never know, it could just be the experience of a lifetime.

I'll be attempting to do another game soon, so let's hope there isn't a curse on Firefly!

I've played in one here that ran through in its entirity. In fact, it's the only game I've played in I think that ever did. I can't remember who the GM was either, but it was 4 or 5 years back.

I've run and played in other Firefly games but they do seem to fizzle after a while.

I will confess, I'm actually not a fan.  (Don't stone me!)  However, I was once invited by someone who's work I really admire to join such a game.   It had already been running for, I think, two years real time when I joined.   And went on for at least another seven or eight months while I was there, and was still thriving after I left.   With no apparent end in sight.

Hopefully, this may be some encouragement for you.    I think in general, from what I've seen, fans are overly fanatical about the whole thing, and have very exacting standards about how the game is supposed to go. Especially as regards their own character.  And such standards pave the road for big disappointments, and melodramatic departures.

Well, Firefly games don't have any monopoly on that.  But I think they tend to be even worse in it than many others.