[Capes] What Do I Take Pride In?

[James_Nostack]

You've just been playing Capes with your friends, and the session has wrapped up.  Let's say it was a blast, and you had a good time.  What do you take pride in?

I'm trying to figure out what this game is about.  I can't quite take pride in creating cool plot developments, because other people can undo them effortlessly.  I can't take pride in portraying my character, because other people can narrate him or her for me.  I can't take pride in overcoming an obstacle, because it sounds like most Capes conflicts work out about the same anyway.  (Note - that's all based on 60 minutes of on-line play, though I hope to get some more experience in soon.)

It sounds like the main things are:

(1) my imagination was in tune with the others enough that they didn't undo my narration.  (Note - I haven't read the rules, but it sounds like there's not much to enforce this outcome.)  

(2) because I can narrate the use of my powers or abilities, I can savor going over the top with all kinds of crazy, crazy stuff.  If it would be an out of control scene in an action blockbuster, I can do it.  (or, a funny scene in a comedy, or whatever.)  In short--I can turn the volume up to 11 for whatever I enjoy, with the understanding that none of it makes a lasting difference in terms of game mechanics or SIS.

Note that my personal enjoyment of (2) may cause problems for my fellow players.  During our brief actual play example, I narrated knocking over skyscrapers like dominoes, which I thought was cool and comic book-y.  My fellow player was annoyed or upset by this.  

Anyway - it looks like the main source of pleasure from the use of these particular rules, are to work out a Social Contract of aesthetics, and then enjoy the Color of superhero trappings.  

These are good things, but am I missing anything?

[Sydney Freedberg]

(1) my imagination was in tune with the others enough that they didn't undo my narration.  (Note - I haven't read the rules, but it sounds like there's not much to enforce this outcome.)

Aha. What you've got here is a very mild negative of what could be a strong positive. Let me rephrase:

the others thought my narration was so cool they not only didn't undo or ignore it, they picked up things I introduced and ran with them

Sign you've successfully created a good spotlight character (PC) in Capes? Other people pile onto the conflicts where that character's fate is at stake -- giving you Inspirations when you win and Story Tokens when you lose. (Hey! A tangible way to measure my success!)

Sign you've successfully created a good non-spotlight character (NPC)? As above, plus in later scenes other people play him/her.

Sign you've created an interesting plot? Other people take it away from you and advance it further.

And of course there's just doing cool narration.

This is the stuff I take pride in after a session.

[TonyLB]

Sign you've created an interesting plot? Other people take it away from you and advance it further.

Yeah.  I'm right with Sydney on that one.

I think the thread GM-Task:  Test to Extremity has good thoughts on this as well.  It's more focussed on how you target a specific person, but the principle is the same:  Sometimes you aren't acting in order to figure out how cool your character can be, you're acting because you see how cool someone elses character could be... cooler than they ever imagined.  And you're the one who can make it happen.

[James_Nostack]

Sydney, I'll take you at your word--but, like I said in the monstrous [Actual Play] thread--is there any reason I should be using Capes for that?  In any RPG having a cool PC or NPC is nice, though in most RPG's people can't "jam" on "your instrument."  So, how does Capes foster the creation of a cool PC, or NPC?  What is it in the rules that makes you say, "Damn I have to see what happens to this guy next?"

I don't know if you've ever played Clinton R. Nixon's Paladin.  Some people have said it's no fun in Actual Play, and since I've never played it, I can't comment.  But character creation in that game is awesome.  You come away with a noble hero with terrible inner anguish, because that is what the chargen rules do.  The character concept is on a hair-trigger, and if it's not to start with, it will be by the time you're done.

[James_Nostack]

you're acting because you see how cool someone elses character could be... cooler than they ever imagined.  And you're the one who can make it happen.

Tony, I'll grant you that this is possible; I haven't played enough Capes to tell one way or another.

But I have to tell you -- when I have a freaking awesome character in my mind, I would go absolutely bananas to have some other player get their grubby mitts on them.  To use the band metaphor, that is my signed Jimi Hendrix guitar--stay the hell away from it.

This isn't an abstract concern; Vax and I are going through a Capes setting generation thing right now, and it will impact on Actual Play shortly.  I am the type of guy who, when bored on the train, invents superhero concepts which are (to me, at least) extremely entertaining.  Until I know that Vax and I are 100% on the same wavelength, I don't want to introduce them, because there's the risk that I won't like what he does to "my babies."  So, in this case the rules discourage me from emotional investment, because I can't enjoy "safe" self-expression on the character level.  (Even with the single spotlight character, the others aren't safe.)

This isn't an issue in more traditional super rpg's.  I wouldn't think twice about using them in a Mutants & Masterminds game, for instance.  The plot the GM comes up with might bore me to tears, but at least I get to control who my character is on the most basic level.

You can borrow my guitar... just not my best one.

[Sydney Freedberg]

Sydney, I'll take you at your word--but, like I said in the monstrous [Actual Play] thread--is there any reason I should be using Capes for that?

(a) Everyone's got full authority to make a story (distributed GM powers)
(b) The Debt/Story Token/Inspiration economy provides clear feedback on just what's getting people's attention and what isn't

when I have a freaking awesome character in my mind, I would go absolutely bananas to have some other player get their grubby mitts on them.

I've had that instinct too. I mostly got over it. I have one character I introduced last session whom I think the other players' don't quite get yet ("M-41")... so I'm just going to make sure to play her again before anyone else has a chance to, so I can make it clear to everyone what kind of person she is; and then I'll be able to let her go.

And you can always amend your group's Comic Code to let each person take on additional spotlight characters, or even have veto power over anyone else using a character you created.

[Sydney Freedberg]

Oh, and James? You do lose the purity of your original vision when you let someone else play a character you created, yes. But as long as you and only you play that character, it'll never surprise you. Maybe someone else can bring your character a new dimension, a new life.

Lend someone else that Jimi Hendrix guitar. You might be pleasantly surprised.

[Vaxalon]

Everyone's got full authority to make a story (distributed GM powers)...

What?  No they don't... NOONE has full authority... or the GROUP does, in all its insane schizoid glory....

And yes, a good comics code, as I have said many, many times before, is critical.

[TonyLB]

Y'know what I'm thinking about?  All those freakin' awesome characters that I created through the years.  They were so cool in my head.  Nine times out of ten they sucked in actual play.  And then, as I tried to reconcile how awesome they were in my mind with how horribly they turned out in play, I'd blame the other players, or the GM, or myself, or somebody, rather than facing the simple truth:

They had evolved to thrive in the landscape of my own mind, and that's just not the same conditions as the shared imaginary space.

These days I create characters who are cool, but whose main draw is that they have huge blinking neon signs saying "MESS WITH ME!"  They are explicitly built with an eye toward the landscape where they will actually be used:  shared imaginary spaces.  I want people to take a hand in shaping them.

Nine times out of ten the characters turn out absolutely awesome, because of contributions from other players that I would never have expected.  Other players will leap to give you cruel, insightful, glorious ideas for how to challenge your character.  All you have to do is ask properly.

This character's father supposedly died when an unexplained piece of space-debris collided with his space-shuttle, but the body has never been found.  Mess with me, father-shaped alien critters!

That character's sister is an overbearing, domineering super-heroine who can do everything right and who always shows up her younger brother.  Mess with me, guilt-ladling little-miss-perfect sibling!

[Vaxalon]

That makes sense, except that the hooks you build will only work if the other players like them.

If they have OTHER hooks they want to use... out they go.

In fact

If you hav such great hooks in mind, why not do a service and attach them to the OTHER player characters?  Why does it have to be YOUR character that has the domineering superheroine older sister?  Why not PLAY the domineering superheroine older sister, and give someone else some spotlight?

The reason I ask, is because telling the group that your character has this older sister requires their buy-in, but just jumping in with it doesn't.

[TonyLB]

Doesn't it?

If I jump in with a domineering older sister to your character, I need your buy-in before she matters to you.  Otherwise she just languishes there, an idea that sounded really cool in my mind but died in actual play.  I see it happen all the time.  Don't you?

Whatever direction you make the connection, it takes two to tango:  Player A to offer something and Player B to think its cool enough to take it and run with it.

[Vaxalon]

The difference, is that you're offering something cool about the OTHER PERSON's character, instead of your own.

[TonyLB]

And that's important because it's an incentive for them to be interested in it, yes?

I think we're agreeing.  For what it's worth, I don't think that you should only create such details about your own character.  I was just giving examples to show the principle in that context.  Both the things I think up about my characters and the things I think up about other characters are tailored to find something that is interesting both to me and to somebody else.  

I cannot do that unilaterally:  I have to get buy-in from another player.  I can, however, give them various incentives to be interested:  Character development, character involvement, meta-game resources, threats to their character, Game-world importance, etc., etc., etc.... The list goes on and on.  If we're in agreement that those things (and many more) serve the purpose of enticing another player to be interested (but can never force their interest) then I think we're on exactly the same page.

[Vaxalon]

Perhaps.

It would be nice to agree about something.

There is a certain amount of satisfaction in seeing someone take a seed you planted and take it and make something more out of it.

Why do I get the impression, then, that you don't like it, that I feel that Capes is a great start, but needs a little work to be perfect?

[TonyLB]

Wow, this is such a neat real-world example of my ideas on Reciprocity of Interest that it prompted me to write them up in a whole different thread.