Problems narrating again

[Christoffer Lernö]

We already went through this in "Narrated combat results - a problem" but I now feel that ultimately it left me where I started.

Ygg features limited player narration. Basically they can narrate their move as they like, but they can't narrate any effects on GM monsters.

That should be quite clear, right? I had the GM narrating player failures, which wouldn't have been a problem. However, I was writing an example and it struck me how easy it would be to be extremely boring:

I think a frequent scene would be

Player: "I try to stab him"
Roll: a miss
GM: "You miss, he dodges your attack"

Compare that to the player narrating, especially if the player want to protagonize his character:

Player: "I try to stab him"
Roll: a miss
Player: "I lunge with my dagger forward but he steps aside in the last minute"

It's more likely that a player would produce something like that than the GM. The GM has to run the whole game and all the NPCs. The player only needs to play his character.

Anyway, here is where were we run into problems. What if the antagonist wouldn't step to the side? What if he isn't agile or whatever?

I guess my question is this:
"Is it ok if the players' narrations sometimes gets overridden by the GM?" ... or is it too ugly to be allowed.

For example, maybe the example above can't happen for the reason that the monster can't walk but only fly, however this isn't established when the player rolls the dice:

Player: "I try to stab him"
Roll: a miss
Player: "I lunge with my dagger forward but he steps aside in the last minute"
GM: "You lunge with but to your suprise he actually disappears straight up in the air!"

Is this acceptable or simply too ugly?

[Valamir]

Others can probably give you advice in this regard.  But IMO this sort of issue isn't really one that you can be advised on.  This is something that you will have to experience yourself in actual play, either with Ygg or another game that grants this sort of power, so that you can judge for yourself if this sort of issue even comes up.  Playing Donjon I can't say that I've ever had a problem with the result, but Donjon is explicit about the GM shutting up and letting the player narrate what he wants without interference (for as many Facts as he has).  Only you can judge if this would or wouldn't give the feel you're going for in Ygg.

Personally, I think you worry too much.  Try it.  And if it doesn't work the way you like, you'll have a better idea how to fix it because you'll know what went wrong.  Speculating on what might go wrong is hugely counter productive in terms of generating actual testable output.

[Lance D. Allen]

Hey there,

It seems to me that you're trying to codify too much, Pale Fire. This appears to be very much a Social Contract issue, more than a game design issue. Perhaps I'm off-base, as it's been a while since I've participated in these debates, but this is still how it looks to me. Way I figure it, no matter what rules or guidelines you write into the game, players will ignore anything which doesn't jive with their style of play, unless the entire game doesn't, in which case they simply won't play it.

In the specific issue you're discussing, it appears to me to be a matter of narration rights. You can codify this into the game if you wish, and it won't be a detriment, I think. Best way to handle it is to assume respect between players and GM, and specify that the narration of all actions is the right of the player whose character is performing the action. If it's a straight miss, the player should narrate it as a miss, not as the opponent dodging. If the opponent dodges, then the player should narrate the strike attempt, and the GM will narrate the dodge. For example:

"I lunge at him with my dagger, trying to drive the point through his throat and remove that self-satisfied smirk permanently"

Roll the dice, a straight miss.

"In my fury, I misjudge the distance and stumble slightly, putting my dagger into the center of one of the plates of his armor, instead"

-or- Roll the dice, and the GM declares that the opponent is dodging, and rolls the dice as well. The result is a successful dodge.

"As you lunge forward, his grin disappears in surprise, and he scrambles backward, knocking a chair over and blocking your way. He snarls and draws his own dagger, readying to fight."

Never take away a player's right to narrate actions for their own character, and avoid any situation where the GM has to counteract the player's actions, and you should be good.

[Christoffer Lernö]

The trouble comes from that the game isn't really narrativist. The narration is kind of added on to a sim mechanic (it's all over my game really - that approach I mean).

So, there is no way I can do it Donjon style. The GM has absolute rights to override anything in my game. The problem is, I want the players to narrate a little as well. The question is, if I let the GM override the players' narration from time to time, will that seriously impair the enjoyment of the game.

Basically the rule would say: "The player should narrate, but the GM can choose to override any narration"

I don't have any real experience playing with narrative mechanics, so I have no clue how something like this would feel. That's why I'm asking. Just your gut instincts if you will.

Maybe I should add that failure to hit is read from a roll against a static roll, so it is undetermined as to if the opponent dodged well or the attacker attacked clumbsily (on the other hand, if you're not an extreme beginner there is no way you can "miss" unless the opponent actually does something to make you do that)

[Mike Holmes]

OK, first, you're once again confusing director stance empowerment with Narrativism. They are not one and the same. You can have a Sim game with director stance mechanics. In point of fact, they almost all have them. In any game in which the player gets to describe his character's background, there is an opportunity for director stance play. If I create my father or a teacher, by listing him in my background, then that's director stance play.

What you specifically want is a limited form of director stance applied to the description of combat results. Limited in that the GM can override any statement.

But you are absolutely correct to note that this might be problematic. In point of fact, what will happen is that the players will cease to use the mechanic the moment that the GM overrides their description. Why? Because that's the point at which they realize that they are not actually empowered to create, but only to create a description which is then being either accepted or rejected by the GM. Which means that you are essentially doing the GMs work for him, and not getting a reward for it. Why would anyone want to do that?

We've all discussed this before. It seems to me that your problem with giving players carte blanche to just describe at will these results, with no GM overriding possible, stems from the idea that there is some objective reality that is being created by the other mechanics, or that exists in the GMs mind that the player, may destroyed by a player who unwittingly stomps on that reality with his description.

Well, this is just not an issue. All you have to do is say that the player must stick to the "realities" created by the mechanics in his description. That is, modify the rule to say that the GM can only step in when the description somehow voids the mechanics. Then the GM is just a referee, and not a judge of the quality of the description. He's just adjudicating an already written specific limitation (that of the description matching the mechanics).

And if the player's description does smack into the game's "objective reality" we've given you all sorts of solutions to that "problem". Such that it'll never be a problem in play.  See some of the old threads that you started where we covered this in detail.

Does actually allowing such mechanics conflict with your "Illusionist" design goals? Well, yes, sorta. That is, if you allow players to control certain aspects of the game, then the GM is no longer completely in control. OTOH, saying that players can control descriptions, but then giving the GM the ability to cancel these descriptions is hardly illusionism. The player will know who's hands the power lies in (and as I said, the bubble will burst the first time the GM uses his authority).

So, what I suggest is that you allow this one little exception in to the Illusionist goal, and give the players true power. There are a lot of good reasons. Simply put, the threat of problems occuring is just not that high. You have limited the player's control to such a small area of effect, and given it enough strictures that the player is just not likely at all to be able to affect anything detrimental. And in the rare case that they do, there are plenty of Illusionist tactics to take to rectify the situation. It will work just fine. Take it from a group of people who have seen such mechanics work a zillion times in play.

The other option I see is to remove the mechanic altogether.

Mike

[Christoffer Lernö]

But you are absolutely correct to note that this might be problematic. In point of fact, what will happen is that the players will cease to use the mechanic the moment that the GM overrides their description.

That is exactly what I'm afraid of. On one side it would be very practical if the players where totally free to describe actions, even those that involve other participants. Like Donjon... seems to work fine.

On one hand I could say "You're only allowed to describe your own moves and not effects of any moves"

Only that would exclude telling stories like: "I lunge but the monster avoids my stab" because that might override some of the GM's ideas for the monster. If players fight it also becomes a problem: should one player be allowed to direct another player's character? That seem to work a lot against the types of sim play I'm thinking about.

And yet, how can we otherwise prevent certain descriptions from ever happening? There is one result on the die which makes you fumble. That result would give the opponent a free attack on you. Here you could make up a lot of cool reasons WHY that fumble gives a free attack, but it requires control over both participants.

It strikes me that one could have cooperative narration, meaning that if both participants agree they can work out the details of the event together. Cooperative directorial control if you will.

In this case one could enforce the principle that you can only narrate a character which is under your "ownership", however you can cooperate with the owner of other characters to form joint narration. Of course, if the other doesn't want to, you are stuck with narrating only your own character.

Isn't that important as well as this:

Well, this is just not an issue. All you have to do is say that the player must stick to the "realities" created by the mechanics in his description. That is, modify the rule to say that the GM can only step in when the description somehow voids the mechanics.

Am I on the right track here or am I playing on the wrong football field?

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Christoffer,

My call is that the procedure you're describing already happens in tons of role-playing. The practitioners simply don't realize that they do it (but miss it if it's disallowed, say by a GM in another game), and the practice isn't openly endorsed by most RPGs that people learn their standards from.

It has nothing to do with Narrativism; what you're considering is narration. Narration, or saying what happens, is central to any role-playing, and who-says-it-when is also central.

So your best bet, frankly, is to describe it in the text and say, "This is OK." The people who are doing it already with say, "Oh! Cool, we do that," and who knows, others might be pleased enough with the idea to try it.

The point, however, is that every group will have its own standards for where the buck stops - i.e., when narration is going over the acceptable line. This is the scary point: groups of this Sim/Situation, fantasy sort you're going for probably already has these standards in place regarding the GM.

Sure, the GM will loudly describe himself as having "ultimate power," but in practice, one or more players often act as a brake or regulator for his narrations. Consider yourself in play, narrating what happens after the miss or the crit or whatever. When do you realize that what you're doing isn't going over? What do the players say or do?

You don't have to micro-manage this regulatory process, whether it's players-to-GM or GM-and-other-players-to-player (once the player is permitted to narrate). You should provide guidelines, (a) permitting the player to narrate, perhaps on certain rolls; (b) providing standards for what they must accord with, e.g. you missed, so you missed, get over it, you can't change that; and (c) providing standards for what they get to narrate about, which in your case is mainly Color.

I want to emphasize (c) because many GMs react to these suggestions with shock. I believe it was Jesse, quite a while ago, who was horrified even by having a player say, "He swung wide, so I ducked," because the player was "controlling," however briefly, the NPC's action. This kind of control is what you're trying to relax a little, so you need to reassure these GMs that it's only a little.

I do agree with you that such practices are the only really effective way to get the right Color into play. Otherwise the GM becomes Color-man as well as Plot-man, as well as System-man, etc, etc ... and for all but the most dedicated Me-My-Game GMs, that's an exhausting and ultimately impossible task.

Best,
Ron

[Valamir]

Do you have Sorcerer PF?  If not you can find some good threads on the topic down in the Adept forum.  I'd link to them, but I don't remember a good key word to search on...perhaps someone who remembers them better can help.

At any rate, Sorcerer doesn't muck around with the player narration stuff like Donjon does (even though the actual dice rolling is the same).  Yet there can be all of the player driven flamboyant descriptive stuff that you're going for too.

It does it by having all of that happen BEFORE the roll, rather than as a result of the roll.  Using a very non traditional initiative type system players state, restate their actions riffing off each other (including the GM) until everyone is satisfied with the way the action is set.  Bonus dice are handed out as applicable then Action is called, dice are rolled and the GM then controls the actual narration, accounting for all of the cool stuff that was gone over before.

I kind of like where you're going with the player empowerment.  But if the problems you see prove to be too great for your tastes...you might want to consider that method as a way of having both.

[Christoffer Lernö]

and the practice isn't openly endorsed by most RPGs that people learn their standards from.

Yes. I want to endorse it, and furthermore I want to use it to avoid making up rules for everything.

(For example, say I had rules for when you could do sweeps and throws. Maybe you required x stuff to set it up, with y modifiers and so on. Maybe I'd have to modify things for clothing and so on. This is the "standard" way of doing it. More stuff? More detail. As we've discussed before it's ultimately counter productive. I was into doing a loose version of the above myself before I got here. However, I was already into abstracting some parts of the action into the roll, so I was kinda open for pushes in this direction. So Ygg wants sweeps? Well let the roll decide what the general outcome and most of modifiers and requirements gets baked into the description of what happens rather than the system. All that without messing up the balance. However, it's kinda new to me so I'm still having difficulties realizing the full extent of it yet)

Consider yourself in play, narrating what happens after the miss or the crit or whatever. When do you realize that what you're doing isn't going over? What do the players say or do?

My experience? They'll start complaining if you describe their characters doing something they wouldn't want to do. So yeah, you're right.

I want to emphasize (c) because many GMs react to these suggestions with shock.

Uh huh. Even though I played this way with people, the RULES were always traditional, so seeing it written in the rules feels... well weird. I believe it's reassuring if there is some mechanism in place that regulates the extent of the narration on a graded scale. So if succeed by x (or somehing like that) you get 1 unit of narration on whatever scale it is rated. If you succeed by y you get 2 units and so on. Somehow quantifying the narrative extent and grading it would keep the illusion to the GM that the GM is in control. (What's that, an illusionist game design technique? Hehe)

Otherwise the GM becomes Color-man as well as Plot-man, as well as System-man, etc, etc ...

Which is the main reasons why combat tend to be dull (the other is slowness)... The GM simply can't keep making cool and varied descriptions for everyone day out and day in. Besides, that makes the players more of observers of their actions than participants. If you let them participate in making colour... well everyone likes their character to do interesting and cool stuff so they have a lot of interest invested in creating colour.

I haven't really played like that to any real extent. So, is my guess (the above) correct?

Do you have Sorcerer PF?

No, but I'm gonna buy it as soon as I get my new password from PayPal :) However, I'm familiar with Sorcerer's combat. I can't really use it straight off, it wouldn't fit with other stuff. But it solves a lot of stuff besides the description thing. IIEE is much better, for example. However, like I say I don't think it fits so I can only let myself keep it in mind and be a little inspired by it even if my mechanic won't look anything like it.