Success: The RPG

[xiombarg]

Based on a thread in the Game Design forum at  the Gaming Outpost, I created a numberless, description-based RPG called http://www.io.com/~xiombarg/success.html">Success. Please http://www.io.com/~xiombarg/success.html">check it out and mailto:xiombarg@io.com">let me know what you think either here or mailto:xiombarg@io.com">in email. Hardly original in concept, I know, but I like to think it's a good distillation of the idea. Fnord.

[Jack Spencer Jr]

It actually sounds similar to a game design I have been working on I call The Wheel.

Why The Wheel?  Because naming your system something cool, pithy, or stupid is required.  That's why.

See you in court.

Tennis that is.

[ This Message was edited by: pblock on 2001-09-05 00:54 ]

[xiombarg]

Well, as much as I liked the game, after "The World, The Flesh, and The Devil" a name like "The Wheel" is a relief.

I'd love to see it when you're done with it. In the meantime, any suggestions/comments/rude remarks about http://www.io.com/~xiombarg/success.html">Success is welcome.

[ This Message was edited by: xiombarg on 2001-09-05 01:01 ]

[Jack Spencer Jr]

I'd prefer to take the time to read it thoroughly before commenting, perhaps even playing a session or two but I'll try.

I think that the biggest problem Success has is that it lacks a setting or, more important, premise.  The Wheel also lacks such a thing but I plan to have a chapter called "Reinventing The Wheel" (another reason to name a system.  lame jokes) where I give guidelines for customizing the mechanics for a particular premise/story/what-have-you.

I also have, let's see-- last count about seven or so game concepts brewing which I plan to use my mechanics for.  The various concepts may require such profound changes that the system is all but unrecognizable, but The Wheel is my jumping off point, or will be, anyway.

I suggest you do the same.  Come up with a premise and use Success with it and see if it flies.

[xiombarg]

Well, so far I've playtested it with a wierd anime game (think Metamorphosis Alpha anime-style) and a superhero game, both of which went really well, tho the superhero game (oddly enough) degenerated into a long theological discussion. (I guess that's what happens when one player plays a character that's the personification of the Wrath of God and one of the other players is a minister's daughter.)

Instead of a big, detailed setting, what do you think of a list of different premises for Success games, with small one or two paragraph writeups? Like some of the campaign ideas thrown around in Big Eyes, Small Mouth?

Anyway, if you get a chance to run it, let me know how it goes. Thanks for the feedback!

[Ron Edwards]

Hey,

I am a big fan of finding a Premise for which a system is especially well-suited ... but to do this, it's good to look over several options.

1) Setting - by which I mean that nearly everyone who dares set foot in this setting is going to be washed off his or her feet by the shared, over-riding crisis. Example: Hero Wars, Sun & Storm.

2) Character - by which I mean that the very act of creating a character poses a moral question. Example: Sorcerer, The Code.

3) Situation - by which I mean that the characters are given something specific to do right away. Example: practically any game with "you're hired to get/find Thing X:" as the template for session design.

The casual use of "premise," which is usually referring to situation or setting in a superficial sense, has the same problems as the term "genre" that I outlined a few days ago.  Thus "a western" is not enough for me in answer to the question, "What's the Premise." Neither is "fantasy with sun-powered magic," or "cyberpunk," or "angels and demons are battling openly on Earth."

So in using 1, 2, or 3 above, the key to Premise is that an engaging, NON-in-game question is raised FOR THE PLAYERS to consider and, through the actions of their characters, to answer. Those answers may literally depict the opinions of the players, or deconstruct the question, or demonstrate the outcome of poor choices, or whatever - that's the players' choice.

Now, finally, whichever of 1-3 gets the emphasis for establishing Premise, the other two have to be present anyway - they HAVE to be, there is no role-playing without all three to some extent.

So Paul, what I'm looking for in The World Etc is that minimal bit for all three, as I'm pretty sure that the basis for Premise is #2.

Best,
Ron

[ This Message was edited by: Ron Edwards on 2001-09-05 11:26 ]

[xiombarg]

I dunno if I had a Premise in mind when I designed http://www.io.com/~xiombarg/success.html">Success. I really had only a few goals:

1. Introduce Narrativist gaming to my Gamist/Simulationist-oriented gaming group. This is the reason I maintained strong GM control, despite the large amount of player freedom: I wanted one element "traditional" roleplayers were used to.

2. Eliminate the worry of failure/success in favor of a different question: Given that you're not going to fail, what do you do? What is the correct action to take?

3. Make a game that would be easy and fun for a starting roleplayer, even a very young one, while still having the possibility of being interesting to more "jaded" roleplayers.

I know I succeeded in the first goal, at least, when one of my players said, regarding the possibility that the player can always choose to fail: "I've always wanted to be able to fail at a dramatically appropriate moment without fudging a die roll."

[Epoch]

Okay, since my role here seems to be to ask the tough questions:

Why should I use Success?  What does it get me that a wholly freeform-but-the-GM-has-the-final-word system doesn't?  Well, obviously, it gets me a little more player control.  But not a lot -- the GM can always use the "it's impossible" rule if he seriously doesn't think that something can ever happen, and there's no possibility that the player can veto such a thing.

(I am playing Devil's Advocate, here, by the way -- don't take the tone of the above too seriously).

Also, what's the point of having any kind of formal chargen mechanics, even ones as loose as Success's?  Is there some mindset you're trying to encourage with it?

[xiombarg]

Why should I use Success?  What does it get me that a wholly freeform-but-the-GM-has-the-final-word system doesn't?  Well, obviously, it gets me a little more player control.  But not a lot -- the GM can always use the "it's impossible" rule if he seriously doesn't think that something can ever happen, and there's no possibility that the player can veto such a thing.

Safety net. Many players balk at going totally freeform, because they don't trust the GM, or view him as a sort of Gamist "opponent". And on the flipside, many GMs balk at giving up their veto power. The idea here is to keep that balance of power in place, to keep players and GM comfortable, while simultanously encouraging exploration of the boundaries, without throwing those boundaries to the wind like some indie RPGs do. (Not that there's anything wrong with that; it's just that it turns some people off.) Yes, the GM can use that veto, but the text encourages him to use it rarely, if at all, at worst using the rule of "No", which the players can counter-veto. In return, the players are encouraged to use their powers to enhance everyone's game, rather than to simply "win".

Also, one of the reasons a certain percentage of players tried Amber Diceless when it first came out was because they always had horrible luck with dice. But the karma system of Amber takes some getting used to, and those new to the system sometimes do not create characters as effective as they would like. I have a player who consistently rolls terrible in every game he plays in. For this reason, I think his character development suffers -- no matter how effective his character is on paper, in practice it doesn't matter, so he's never felt what it's like to have a character that could accomplish anything. I wanted to see what he would do if he was freed from worrying about the die roll, what sort of character he would play. That's the other reason to use Success: To free the players from the tyranny of dice but still leaving a system (however minimal) to fall back on, without the complexity of other diceless systems. I wanted the thrill of diceless success without the bother.

And speaking of complexity, I wanted a system that was so simple that it was easy to come up with variations on the fly. That's why there are so many optional rules -- I wanted something that was easy for people to tinker with and make suit their style of play. Originally the "Chance" rule was going to be part of the core mechanic but then I stripped it out to make it simpler.

However, given that, perhaps I should add an optional rule to allow more player override -- perhaps if all the players spend a token, they can overrule an "impossible" ruling.

Another reason to use Success to have vastly different "power levels" for the characters and still have all players feel like they have effective characters, without worrying about points or broad or narrow traits. I honestly wanted a game where one person could play a CIA assassin and another plays a four-year-old street urchin, and one doesn't eclipse the other unless the players themselves allow that to happen.

(I am playing Devil's Advocate, here, by the way -- don't take the tone of the above too seriously).

Also, what's the point of having any kind of formal chargen mechanics, even ones as loose as Success's?  Is there some mindset you're trying to encourage with it?

Don't worry, I like constructive criticism. Don't pull any punches. I know there isn't much there. ;-)

As I said above, yes, there's a certain mindset I'm trying to encourage. I'm encouraging GMs to give the players a lot more power, to allow them more input into the game, while keeping the "traditional" dynamic in place. And I'm encouraging players to think less in terms of what their character can do (since, in theory, any character can do anything that's not impossible), and more in terms of who they are, or in terms of *what* the character does and *why*. It's like the age-old question: "If you had a million dollars, what would you do?" I'm also trying to encourage players to think in terms of the enjoyment of the whole group, which they should be doing anyway, but I'd like them to be doing it more conciously than most groups do.

The fact of the matter is that as much as one discusses Directorial stance and G/N/S and so on here on the Forge, most roleplayers aren't even used to discussing what they want, let alone engaging in theorhetical discussions about it, just like a lot of people have more trouble talking to their spouse than would ideally be the case. To use the band metaphore: Well-intentioned and talented band members sometimes get their own ideas and bands break up because people won't talk to each other, or they can't articulate their thoughts well enough. In my experience people who might like to try some of the more independant game designs are often daunted by the attitude and the extreme change from what they're used to, so I wanted something somewhat familiar and highly customizable that could be used to test a group's boundaries. I like to think figuring out what optional rules a group prefers to use with something like Success tells you a lot about what sort of gamers they are in practice, even more so than discussing theory.

Does that make any sense? And, one last thing: I find it's easier to find players to "try out a new system" than to get players to join a completely freeform game. YMMV.

[Epoch]

Xiombarg,

Yeah, all that sounds pretty reasonable to me.

Y'know what Success got me thinking about?  Obviously, one of the perennial problems with a fairly light/freeform game system is that people argue about what should or shouldn't be possible.

What if aruments were systematized, too?  Like, you're allowed to print out three references that relate to something you think you're likely to do in the upcoming game session.  If you present one of these "arguments from authority," during the game and it relates to the activity you're trying to do, you automatically win the argument and succeed in your IC action.

Kind of silly, but it might make for a kind of cool educational RPG.

[xiombarg]

Epoch, did you ever do cross-examination debate in high school? Basically, there are all sorts of standards for evidence that one could use for that sort of thing (the easiest being "more recent is better") that one could steal from that culture. Tho I'm not sure you'd want to. ;-)

[Epoch]

I was never on any kind of debate team, no.  But what you're suggesting sounds like it could be cool for this kind of thing.

But, then, I don't run educational RPG's.  Any teachers in the house?