[DitV] BNitH

[cydmab]

It happens whenever players who are used to have tight constraints on their ability to affect the game suddenly have those constraints removed.

Just to make sure this is clear, the players specifically complained about the constraints not being _fully_ removed. They were confused as to why it wasn't 100% freeform on the player side.  As one said, and others agreed: "If you are going to give players so much narrative power, why not just go all the way?" There were no complaints or concerns or expressed discomfort with constraints being removed.

And also to be clear, the setting was chosen before the players knew anything about the rules. The only one who knew the rules was me, and I was opposed to the setting choice. Furthermore, everyone agreed, after the game, that the setting was a poor fit. In fact, the player that most wanted the BN setting prior to the game was also most enthuiastic about the system and trying the normal DitV setting in the future. This was especially unexpected because he is also a strong GURPS supporter - refusing to try other systems. (His pro-GURPS bias is large part why I agreed to the BN setting. We'd try the system I wanted - DitV - with a setting I disliked, with his favorite setting, using a "new fangled" system)

I'm fully happy to accept that you've seen in other games this drift toward comedy because of apprehensive players. Narrative system -> apprehension -> comedy -> mixed game results; But for thuis session, I'm pretty confident the causal chain was Comedic setting and expectations -> system mismatch -> mixed game results.

[Callan S.]

Hi William,

I think I was wrong to be skeptical about what you have done - I really don't know anything I should know about it.

This is an absolute non-issue for our group, and I feel we solved it quite easily by junking alignment and a social contract of GMs being light on use of authorities in game.

However, I have a hypothesis about even light authority use. I think it's true.

Imagine some guys in a boat, one of them at the rudder, the others using their cupped hands to move the boat along. The guy at the rudder has his arms firmly crossed, not touching it for the whole time their in the boat. The other start pushing the boat in various directions with their cupped hands.

Who was in control the whole time?

The guy at the rudder. Yes, even though he never touched it the whole time. Think of it this way - if he didn't want to go in a certain direction, he'd grasp hold of the rudder steer, right?

Well, the converse is also true - if he doesn't grab the rudder, then he must be happy with that direction. It's the direction he wants to go. He's fully in control of it.

Complimentry to this is a feedback loop amongst the other people on the boat - they learn that every time they go in directions that don't satisfy him, he grabs the rudder. Thus it's pointless doing these directions. Thus they start to follow his prefered direction by habit, and the GM rarely has to grab the rudder. This further adds to the impression that since the GM never grabs the rudder, they must be going where they want. It seems that he's light on rudder use, when really he's applying extreme control every single second.

Its a theory about holding off on using GM fiat. It might not be true, but I will say, I think every single game I've ever played has had this in it to some degree. Thanks for listening to my posts :)

[cydmab]

I agree with your theory, sorta. However, the key extra assumption is: "they learn that every time they go in directions that don't satisfy him, he grabs the rudder." No one has ever observed our GMs go to the rudder for 10+, maybe even 20+ years with regard to "bad moral choices." I can't think of a single example under the rubric.

On the other hand, they have observed the GM go for the rudder... well, worse, more like the pistol... when players take risks with their characters. So we've had significant problems recently with players being too cautious with their characters. As GMs (half the players at the table have been GMs one time or another in the last few years, and we all have had problems with killing off PCs too easily) we have noticed the problem, and we've, to one degree or another, promised to cut back on character death. But there's a serious time-lag between that verbal promise and players internalizing it, and so we've still had cautious player problems. I've switched to explicit 100% script-immunity rules when I GM now to try to break the problem, and I have been advocating the other GMs do the same.

So yes, what you describe is a real phenonemon. But not a concern for our particular group with regards to moral choices.

[cydmab]

Oh, and I should of been more clear about this. During the game I was 100% AOK with the restrictions put on me as the GM by the system. Even the restrictions that made me go hmm (e.g. don't prep after the initial town generation). What we were uncomfortable with were the remaining few constraints remaining on the players.

[Mikael]

So, to butt in:

Mandatory alternative DitV setting experimented with: Check.

Group committed to playing another session in the original setting: Check. Excellent.

Discussion about whether freedom breeds silliness: Irrelevant (in the context of this thread).

Discussion about "removing the rest of the player constraints", based on the evidence of this actual play: Even more irrelevant, if you are committed to playing DitV-as-written. Freedom in DitV is not about the "freedom to do anything you want", but "freedom to make interesting personal moral choices", and that's what the rules push for. And that's where you have not been yet, as you explicitly stated in part 2 of your original post - you, as a group, have not escalated within conflicts, and you, as a GM, have not taken a player decision and pushed the issue, escalating to the next conflict.

Thus I am very much looking forward to your next AP post. In regards to the pushing and escalating, I hope you have read Vincent's excellent posts about the matter, here and on his blog.

Cheers,
Mikael

[Web_Weaver]

Hi William,

My overall impression is that you and or your group have an issue with the term freeform, and that you introduced the game by tempting them with its freeform nature.

I am not sure I can see what you are actually referring to, DitV is in no way a freeform game, and it does not set out to "lift restrictions". Sure, as Mikael also alludes to, the core of the game is allowing the players to make moral choices and judgements, without reference to a pre-defined setting constraint. But the central theme of the game involves confronting the PCs and indeed the players with the implications of their choices, by testing these judgements by saying "really, what about when...?".

If you focus on "freeform issues" whatever they are to your group, you may miss the central issues. Indeed, the actual conflict resolution system is very system heavy, and will always frustrate those seeking total freedom of narration.

[cydmab]

Discussion about "removing the rest of the player constraints", based on the evidence of this actual play: Even more irrelevant, if you are committed to playing DitV-as-written.

Well... it's "issues that came up in play." The sortof thing that, I dunno, should be mentioned in actual-play report. That is, what players said to the open ended question "What did you like and not like about the game?" One player complained and others agreed that the system wasn't freeform enough. You can take that anyway you like. I'm just reporting what they said. But yes, we remain committed to trying it at least one more time "by the book" in the default setting because we aren't sure whether the system is fundamentally bad for our group, or whether the system was just bad for the setting (combined with errors made considering it was first time we played it). However, if on the second play this is still a problem, that will have implications on how or whether we play it a third time.

Well... actually there is one more implication. I also want to run PTA. I chose to run DitV instead of PTA first, because I felt DitV would be a little more tactical, strategic, "gamey" than PTA, and there was one player at the table that I thought liked that sort of stuff. Turns out, that player complained, entirely against my expectations, that there was too much dice-rolling in this session. So maybe the next time I get a chance to run a game I'll do PTA first. Although I still eventually want to try DitV one more time.

that you introduced the game by tempting them with its freeform nature.

NOOOOO. I said next to nothing about the system. I got them to play because a) the GM for the main campaign was taking the week off and b) I agreed to use their silly setting. Furthermore, as said above, the concern about it not being freeform enough was brought up by the players.

Now it is worth noting that we as players have two styles of game to refer to: "traditional" games like DnD, GURPS, and freeform, like childhood make-believe/pretend and modifications to such games. We don't have alot of experience with games that lie somewhere in between that scale, or off that scale entirely. Total speculation: So perhaps they were trying to figure out which category DitV fell into, decided it clearly wasn't traditional, so they maybe (falsely) associated it with trying to be freeform. But that's just speculation. I think its more likely that they were just comparing the experience (DitV in mismatched setting) to freeform, and felt freeform might be better. I suspect something like this might be true, for our group, although we won't know for sure without additional play:

DitV in normal DitV setting > freeform bong nazi > DitV in bong nazi > GURPS bong nazi

Although phrased this way, Mikael does have a good point. My group does not really care whether (freeform bong nazi > DitV in bong nazi > GURPS bong nazi) is true. We care whether for all setting X, (DitV in normal DitV setting > freeform in X). And the only way to begin to answer that is to play DitV in normal setting.

That all said, I still think this thread might be of interest to someone thinking of adapting DitV to other settings in general, and comedic settings in particular. The particular example that comes to my mind is DitV in the Paranoia setting. If one were thinking of doing this conversion, but preserve the silly-crazy-dark humor aspect of Paranoia, I'd recommend one think twice before going forward with such a project. Obviously this is only one actual play report, and so can't make sweeping generalizations like "DitV can't do humor." But... our experience is something to keep in mind at least.

[cydmab]

And that's where you have not been yet, as you explicitly stated in part 2 of your original post - you, as a group, have not escalated within conflicts, and you, as a GM, have not taken a player decision and pushed the issue, escalating to the next conflict.

To be clear, I agree with this statement.  This is what I believe we did wrong, and why we have to try DitV again, "for real" next time.

[Web_Weaver]

NOOOOO....

OK, well at least you have clarified that. I would suggest that the whole 'traditional <-> freeform' categorization isn't a very useful one, but I get the feeling that you agree. Traditional Roleplaying language is very limited, such that conversations like that get side-tracked easily.

The particular example that comes to my mind is DitV in the Paranoia setting. If one were thinking of doing this conversion, but preserve the silly-crazy-dark humor aspect of Paranoia, I'd recommend one think twice before going forward with such a project.

I think the best advice here is play the basic game first, and keep playing until you have given the overall reward cycle a chance to kick in, and then look how other settings can be modeled. Troubleshooters in the Alpha Complex has been considered before. Not sure if it was a success or not, but it sounds compatible as long as the Escalation System and the Town Creation System are adapted clearly, as has been suggested above in this thread.

In standard play, I think the reward cycle starts to kick in when player judgments are seen to be feeding back and confronting the players and or PCs moral viewpoint. For some players this jumps out at them straight away, after they first apply fallout, but for others this may take a couple of towns.

Of course, the players may see the system working and say, "oh I get it, but this isn't that interesting to me".

[Callan S.]

And that's where you have not been yet, as you explicitly stated in part 2 of your original post - you, as a group, have not escalated within conflicts, and you, as a GM, have not taken a player decision and pushed the issue, escalating to the next conflict.

To be clear, I agree with this statement.  This is what I believe we did wrong, and why we have to try DitV again, "for real" next time.

Hmm, I think Mikael makes a stronger point than mine as well. Can't wait for you to play again with escalation and hopefully give us an account! :)