Pan-reward-ism

[Jason Lee]

Now, arguably you could come up with different Gamist and Narrativist representations of the same character, say.  However, that still seems suspect to me.  If I am playing a highly violent character, then I will probably end up using a lot of combat traits.  That doesn't mean that I'm not illuminating the question of what drives people to violence.

That was my thinking with the half-baked Wacky Little System.
We could take Gary (let's say he's an ex Navy SEAL, why don't we):

Gary the Gamist (Kills things because he can):
Training (Soldier)
Talent (Strong)
Most effective when fighting.
Rewarded by using and practicing his Traits

Gary the Narrativist (kills things better when threatened, more violent when backed into a corner):
Virtue (Survivor)
Vice (Fear)
Most effective when his life is threatened and he's been backed into a corner.
Rewarded when threatened (the emotion of Fear would kick in when he lost a Complication and that loss put him into a threatening situation) and when he survives a threat to his life.

The system is half-baked and tiny, but it's my interpretation of what Chris was suggesting.

[clehrich]

Hey Jason,

That's cute.  I like it.  Stripped so bare as this, you can really see how little is actually going on in it.

So what do you think would happen if everyone designed characters of different types?  Would the group tend to Drift into coherence, building up and changing descriptors, or would there just be general play incoherence?

Anyone else want to comment on this?

[Jason Lee]

That's cute.  I like it.  Stripped so bare as this, you can really see how little is actually going on in it.

So what do you think would happen if everyone designed characters of different types?  Would the group tend to Drift into coherence, building up and changing descriptors, or would there just be general play incoherence?

Why thank you, sir.

Honesty, I don't know exactly what would happen.  I've never tried to intentionally play a game like this (and I don't have a pure Ned in my group).  My theory was that if Gary, Ned and Sam could get passed the taste issues* the system would allow each player to focus on what they wanted without collision.  With each player kind of pocketted away in their own little world as far as GNS priorities are concerned (basically what MJ described).  Why I think collision would be avoided is because character effectiveness isn't penalized for any priority and rewards are personalized.
_____
* Nothing Gary and Ned does makes sense to Sam, Ned gets irriated Sam won't focus on the story, etc.

[C. Edwards]

A game I've been piecing together, working title is 'Doppelganger', seems to be somewhat relevant to the discussion. The basic idea is that there is one character amongst the group and each player has control of a different 'persona' of that core character. Each 'persona' is linked to different color elements (one 'persona' might be anchored to a 'medieval fantasy' world and another to a 'cyberpunk' world, etc.). The players spend currency to gain control of 'the ball' and have their 'persona' take over. When a 'persona' shift takes place the new 'persona' starts where the previous one left off. The color elements change but the situation stays essentially the same (example: what is an ancient stone crypt for one persona may be a cryogenic storage facility for another).

One element I'm going to incorporate is a ranking system for each player to communicate the importance of a particular type of play organized along GNS guidelines. Rewards for each player will be based partly along those guidelines. A player who ranks Gamist concerns highest will recieve a greater reward for Gamist challenges, and so on. There will be a method in place for shifting those rankings should a player wish to do so.

I'm going to use a basically Sim design (my current thoughts are to use something similar to the careers system in Simon Washbourne's Barbarians of Lemuria) and let each player concentrate on what elements of play they enjoy most and be rewarded for it.

As M. J. pointed out the result will be the penalization of the lower ranked modes (in the form of lesser rewards) but I want the players to be aware of the different modes to some degree. Hey, it beats sticking rats in a maze. :)

I just might reconsider some of what I had in mind due to Jason's Wacky Little System posts.

-Chris

[M. J. Young]

I'm going to chime in with John here. I think that GNS has a lot less to do with character design and a lot more to do with progress of play. I've seen players' gamist tendencies push against the narrativist concepts of Legends of Alyria (and it seems to contain them pretty well); the design of the character may facilitate one sort of play or another, but it certainly doesn't dictate it. Far more springs from the mechanics of play, and more yet from the attitudes of the players.

This is why so many games drift: the greatest influence to GNS is what the players (corporately) want to do. Play mechanics then step in and guide that one direction or another, but players with strongly gamist preferences who are in agreement are going to wind up turning Sorcerer into a contest. A game plays to one agenda only to the degree that the players allow themselves to be guided that direction. Character creation is an important part of that guidance, but as John observes it's not the only part, and it's quite possible to use any particular character generation method as the starting point for any form of play. A player could see it as a great challenge to win the game despite taking a character geared for telling stories. You don't get there that way.

That doesn't mean having such a flexible character creation system isn't a good start; but you've got to build from there into how the game responds to that. Jason did some of that; but then, what's still missing is how the game prevents players from forcing each other into their mold.

Let's suppose we're creating a group using that system which is going to be set as an American infantry squad in Viet Nam. This is a wonderful setting for sim, gamist, and narrativist play--there's all kinds of stuff you can get out of it. Explore what it's like to be a soldier in such a difficult environment. Beat the enemy. Feel the conflicts of having been drafted to fight in a war you don't know is right with the knowledge that there's a tremendous backlash around it back home (as your protestor friend sends you letters talking about their efforts to force an end to the war).

Now, as a group, what are we going to do?

That's where the conflict arises.

The reason it doesn't arrive in Multiverser is because there is no "group". "As a group" we are each free to say, have fun stormin' the castle, and do whatever it is we want to do. Sure, maybe if the gamist player asks the narrativist player to help him capture Phnom Pen (that's probably not spelled correctly--it's been too many years) he'll go along and play the gamist's game for a while; and maybe the simulationist will help, too. But if the game requires the players to work on the same tasks, it inherently requires them to agree on GNS goals or accept that the other members of the group may be working against that which they're hoping to achieve.

What you need to find is a way to make three modes of play cooperative. That's the rub.

--M. J. Young