What have you done with incoherent games?

[sirogit]

Its a fairly common claim to say that incoherent games are popular because of their incoherency, that it allows the game to be whatever the players of it desire.

I have never seen this in action. I would like for people to substantiate this claim by talking about an incoherent game that they have taken and made what everyone at the table desired in the first place, if they feel that they would not have been able to accomplish this in a coherent game.

[Mark D. Eddy]

Shadowrun is my poison of choice for this. Mixed with a completely random assortment of players (WotC's Seattle game center) in the mid '90's. We had people who were there for the premise, people who were there for the combat du jour, people who were there to see how the rock concert would turn out tonight, and people who were there for the running gags. I used an optional rule (Impact from ShadowBeat!, for the Shadowrun fans out there) as a narrativist tool -- there was romance, intrigue, and a rock band with the Yakuza after them. The wierd karma/fortune hybrid in the resolution system meant, under my style of refereeing, that people never had to guess why things went bad.

The best example of just how wierdly hybrid this game was: One night the (I now suspect Gamist) Troll Bodyguard's player got bored. So the (Simulationist, I suspect -- If you read this, Justin [jdagna], tell me where you think Reynaud is) Rocker was kidnapped by his own bodyguard for a game of Trollball -- with the Rocker as the ball. And the (Narrativist) Street Shaman had to decide what level of force was appropriate to stop the troll without hurting the Rocker, because there was a concert that night. So everyone had a great time: the Troll's player proved how tough his character really was, the Rocker got into his character's head trying to talk his way out of the situation, and the Shaman was able to emphasize just how difficult a decision it was to forego lethal force as each progressive attempt to slow down or stop the troll failed.

It was a great game because Shadowrun allows people to choose their own Agenda and I (he said modestly) was able to balance the needs of the players so that no one felt left out of the spotlight (if they wanted the spotlight).

[Frank T]

We played Vampire: the Masquerade very intensely for over a year and were contantly drifting between Sim and Nar play, with occasional ventures into Gam. Looking back I cannot see a pattern in when we drifted or why. It didn't seem to matter. Of course we didn't think about Creative Agendas (it was 1997, after all). But we sure as hell had a great time, probably the best I ever had roleplaying.

Today, as I know about GNS and the Big Model, I really haven't changed my style of play very much. In my current round we use the Unisystem Lite, and we still drift a lot with no obvious pattern to be distinguished. It's due to this, actually, that I'm still very sceptical about GNS.

[Marco]

First let me say two things:
1. I don't think coherence and incoherence are especially meaningful terms. Your question is hard for me to answer--what determines a coherent or incoherent rules-set is, IMO, a factor of who reads it and how they interpert it.

2. I don't believe there's anything you can do with an "incoherent game" that you can't do with a "coherent game." I would be hard-pressed to use Top Secret to play a WH40K game where everyone played Psionic adept space-marines. But that has nothing to do with coherence.

I think the whole question is badly articulated--not by you, per-se, but because I think you're drawing a distinction that is better described in terms of rules-abstraction and focus than coherence. There are reasons that less focused games may appeal more broadly than more focused ones and it's clear that some people find certain combinations or rules and settings or certain methodologies of game design to be problematic.

But the idea that these are absolutes? I don't agree with that. I'm not saying that one can't analyze a game's mechanics and "intent" in some way--but I think the idea of calling Game X Incoherent and Game Y Coherent is one of the ideas around here that needs a lot more examination.

EXPERIENCE 1
I played GURPS Vampire for two years (approx.) of great roleplaying.

We made a very strong attempt to play by the book (including using mechanics I didn't like, like the way they did aggravated damage) and there was nothing I would count as real drifting of the rules.

The play mode is pretty much exactly what I describe for (presumably Narrativist play) under JAGS (there are several threads here and in the GNS forum).

Where we got some milage out of GURPS + V:tM setting was that over the course of the game the themes extant during play changed greatly. In the begining there were strong themes of "family," alienation, and betrayal (the first scenario was the groups betrayal by their "father").

Later in the game the questions revolved around responsibiliy of power. If a hypothetical "coherent" game had focused on one or the other then it would've been hard to move as easily as we did from one to the other.

But that's just a hypothetical coherent game. A really good, felxible coherent game wouldn't necessiarily have that problem at all.

EXPERIENCE 2
I think that in some sense every game I've posted here has been using what some people would consider (and what I know some posters have considered) incoherent rule-sets.

This is because I'm using what is described as a coherent Sim game to do something that at least approximates Narrativist play. As Ron says, there's nothing in the theory that says that shouldn't work great--and, hey, I can attest that, AFAIC it does work great--but ...

These are Narrativist color/Narrativist situations/Narrativist backgrounds--and pretty-Sim-y mechanics.

So--incoherent? I wouldn't say so--but I'm not sure what "Incoherent" really is outside of Vampire ... which worked pretty well for me.

Now, it's true, we used the GURPS engine--but ... does that really make a difference? I don't know.

-Marco

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

I sense a terrifying potential for this thread to devolve into a "what is incoherence" quagmire.

Sirogit, please define for this thread's purposes what you consider to be incoherent design.

Everyone else, instead of bringing up frustrations or assertions about this, let's just accept what Sirogit says for this thread and discuss that here.

Best,
Ron

[contracycle]

I have a sort qualified response.  Having played both Mage and Vamp for considerable periods, I think both games exhibited non-fatal incoherence.

a good example is of a GM who always wanted the hunting in Vamp to be a roleplayed out experience, whereas I wanted to top up and go.  This meant the GM was constantly trying to make a big deal out of stuff I wanted to treat trivially.  We had some discussions about that and once I expressed a view of the character that explained this I think he was happy to work around the fact that I wouldn't bite that bait.  OTOH, I was not the only player, and the GM had a fellow Narratavist (I think) to work with, and they kinda worked around me as the odd man out - in fact one might say the other character and I became foils for each other.

Now the mage game had as GM the person who had been the Narr player in the vamp game.  We got along well enough in a sprawling game with many players that was held together by raw continuity.  There were occasionall moments in which I would do stuff and the GM would get all excited about, but they were the exceptions rather than the rule.  From my perspective they mostly arose from exploration of character.