Freeform and Fortune?

[komradebob]

I've used similar systems in the past mayself, especially when there wasn't a particular game handy that covered the situation (creating a unique setting on the fly), or when playing with folks that were casual gamers and didn't have a familiarity with a given setting or ruleset.

IME, a simple "how-likely-is-it-to-happen" worked very well, regardless of the particulars of the die type rolled.

I think this points to a general direction possibilty in design trends. Instead of focussing design on the micro-level of character to world interaction, it simplifies it greatly and shifts design focus to player to player interaction. Doing so leads to some interesting questions, like:

Why do characters get xps, rather than players?
Why do character players get xps, and GMs don't?
If GMs got xps, how would they use them?
What does it mean when you bring initiative/turn order up to the player level, rather than keeping it down on the character level?
...and about a hundred others.

I suspect that mainstream commercial sim designs continue to focus on complex resolution systems from the fear that simple systems are not commercially viable, and those producers may well be correct. I personally feel that that design mentality is one of the biggest barriers seperating mainstream rpg design from a broader audience of the general populace.

[Rob Carriere]

The question, to me, is why not simply take that last step to complete freeform? At the point that the abstraction is at the level of roll one die vs roll another die, why not just select the outcome instead of the dice? What are the dice providing at this point?

A way of saying "maybe".

The big issue with these kind of games as well as true freeform is assumption clash. The dice give you a way to say, "OK, I think it should be left, you think it should be right, we'll roll for it." This can save an awful lot of discussion. And at least in the group I played this style with, we all felt such discussions were an interruption of what we wanted to be doing.

I would imagine that among a group that enjoys such discussions your conclusion holds in full force.
SR
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[Mike Holmes]

First, Rob, I think people don't approach it like this. If they did it might be a bit more functional. But the problem even with your notion is that there are still going to be those moments where the players disagree even that a roll is called for. There's a three foot gap over a chasm. Possibly short enough to step over. Do we roll? Even at long odds to fail?

It's the problem of when the tension of the roll should be introduced that's the problem. Sans a system telling you that it's the GM's prerogative and duty to set these things up, it can still be problematic.

Really the point of all of this is that these "systems" are ususally extremely incomplete, because what's not agreed upon is what the die rolls are for, and how they get established. IOW, the IIEE isn't worked out at all. Often because the system gets created by some guy saying, "Hey, let's just roll some dice for combat and stuff, and high rolls mean good, and low rolls mean bad." Well, that tells you what the outcomes are, but not how we're agreeing to establish when to roll in the first place or why we're rolling.

Again, put this in the context of some text that explains it (perhaps as you have, Rob) and to which the players agree, and you might get a functional system. Or if you have a GM who really understands this all, and perhaps uses examples of play to make people understand the issue. The point is simply that the minimum requirement to make a game functional over time, barring getting very lucky, is to not only have the resolution system set out, but the IIEE, too.

Mike

[Frank T]

Hey, a lot of replies! :D I don't have the time to address everything as I ought to right now, so I'll stick with the point raised by Mike for the moment:

What are the dice providing at this point?

I disagree that they are just a remnant of old gaming roots. But I also disagree that it's a way of solving assumption clashes or in any other way settling differences between players. Here's what I think it provides: thrill. As plain as that. The thrill of success and failure hanging in the ballance. The exitement of having something beyond your control influence the outcomes of situations.

I think by playing the way I outlined, you can have that thrill without

a) bothering about stats and

b) risking the outcome going against your vision of character and setting.

That is assuming, of course, that there is no assumption clash. Plus, I absolutely agree with Mike on this one:

Really the point of all of this is that these "systems" are ususally extremely incomplete, because what's not agreed upon is what the die rolls are for, and how they get established.

That was one of the big problems also with the two guys I mentionened.

I'll be back for more.

- Frank

[Rob Carriere]

Mike,
I wouldn't presume to speak for `people' over such a thing, just for myself and even that limited by all the caveats of introspection.

I sincerely believe that I was using the dice as I described. Because of that, I find myself in full agreement with your remaining points. A die mechanic is not enough for a functional system. Today I know enough to toss IEEE in there as well, but back then I didn't, and I didn't.

The result was a system that worked well enough to sustain the game among a group of friends who trusted each other, but it was a lot like the proverbial dancing bear. It was meant as an experiment, and it is one that I'm happy to have done, but wouldn't repeat.

Nevertheless, short-cut of argument through the use of dice is the reason I didn't drift to complete freeform and the absence of such a short cut is one of the major reasons I still don't play freeform today. I realize, then and now, that all I'm doing is pushing the argumentation back one notch, from `does it happen' to `how likely is it', but I found that that one notch made a big difference in the amount of time spent discussing outcomes.

Frank,
Definitely thrill can be a big factor depending who is playing.

SR
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[Mike Holmes]

Rob,

Thing is, theoretically the Freeformers have their agenda set out from the first, and don't have any arguments. That is, the assumption that there will be arguments that dice can be used to resolve in short order, sound like an assumption that freeform games all start with a dysfunctional level of lack of agreement on the creative agenda of play. I think that for these arguments you have to assume a functional freeform game with a coherent Creative Agenda (including IIEE, etc).

Now, if you want to claim that there is no such thing as a freeform game with a coherent CA, that would be a different argument - one that my biases would like me to accept. But without studying the form a lot more than I have, at least, I couldn't say that there are no coherent freeform games with any certaintly.

Though the one's I've seen have all had problems... :-)

I'm betting the freeformers are there on the other side of the fence saying right now that we tabletoppers never have had a coherent game, either. :-)

Mike

[Lee Short]

Mike,

I think that many of the arguments in freeform games come from differing views of what's plausible in a given context, rather than differing agendas.  So freeformers can still have plenty of arguments, even if agenda isn't involved (but of course, many times agenda is involved).

[Mike Holmes]

Well, I think those arguments about genre expectations stem from Creative Agenda problems. Sim/Gam incoherence, for instance, causes one player to question another's addition because it's not "fair." I think that you'll find that once the CA stuff is nailed down, that when a person comes up with something implausible, it's at most amusing. You never get the sort of "argument" that needs dice to resolve.

"Uh, it's Vulcan's, not Klingons that have the pointy ears."

"Oh, damn, you're right. Forget I mentioned em."

Mike

[Lee Short]

Yeah, but CA differences aren't the only source of different expectations.  Different assumptions about how the real world works are another rich vein, IME -- fundamentally, most genres are defined as "just like the real world, except . . ."

So I guess that's really where we disagree -- I think that differing assumptions about the real world contribute significantly to this problem; you don't seem to.

[Rob Carriere]

Mike,
"No such thing as a freeform game with a coherent CA"...yeah, I'll buy that for about the same reason that I'll buy "no such thing as a tt game with a coherent CA". I don't believe in perfect agreement (about anything) among any group of more than one.

Point is, in a system that includes formalized rules people can avoid direct confrontation by going through the authority of the rules. This is elementary "smoothing" behavior. In a freeform system everything moves by open negotiation. So, I think that, for a given group, the amount of incoherence that can be tolerated will be significantly higher when using a well-designed and appropriate set of rules.

Also, while I agree with you that many apparent content-of-the-SIS arguments are really CA arguments in disguise, I don't think that all SIS arguments are such. I have witnessed (the moral equivalent of) a 5 minute discussion about whether it was the Vulcans or Klingons who had funny ears, with both players annoyed at the time spent on the argument and neither standing to gain from either outcome, but both unable to continue until they had the "right" picture in their heads.

SR
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[Mike Holmes]

Lee, oh, no, I agree with you that such disagreements are problematic and come up frequently. It's just that this is no different in tabletop than it is in freeform. If freeform is more problematic, that can't be the problem. Rather is has to be a lack of way to deal with the problems when they come up. That's CA.

In a freeform system everything moves by open negotiation.

Ron has said something like this saying that freeform has the most Points of Contact of any form of RPG. And I can see that, I guess. It also has the lowest handling time/effort, however, when people do manage to negotiate these POC. This is the essential TT/Freeform tradeoff, I believe.

Mike

[Rob Carriere]

[...] that freeform has the most Points of Contact of any form of RPG. [...] It also has the lowest handling time/effort, however, when people do manage to negotiate these POC. This is the essential TT/Freeform tradeoff, I believe.

Now that's a beautiful summary!
SR
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