Find the right color for humanist game

[Tobias]

All,

You may or may not be aware of a game I'm designing, Your Gods are Dead. Related to that game are a bunch of questions I've been having in my mind for a long time, sort of a recurring interest/theme of my life: humanity and humanism.

(YGAD is, at the same time, a conglomeration of all my gaming experiences. So it may just be my mandatory Fantasy Heartbreaker.)

Since the issues are not limited to YGAD, I thought I would put both a sense of the general questions and a question on how they can be reflected in a game (so as to make exploration of the concepts also possible by the group). See, I'm exploring what my human nature means to me. Values, ethics, etc., beliefs, and I wind up with a 'rational humanism' as a belief structure. An expansion of my personal human nature to humankind in general.

This specific post is concerned with color. The mechanics of YGAD and the setting (the Gods are gone, what do you do?) try to take into account the importance of a character's presence and interaction with the environment already. (Whether they are succeeding I don't know at all, but that's another subject. For instance, I'm not sure I'm getting the balance between gamism and simulationism right - or am even aware of it enough.)

But getting color right - that's got me stumped. I'm aware of some posts that say that a game does not neccesarily need strong color - and I'm probably already injecting color by my own natural style of writing. But specifically trying to set color might help, if it can be done.

I don't want some pedantic game, with YGAD. I want a fantasy game that touches upon some questions of humanity/humanism. I don't want the horror-angst-what-have-I-become mood of the World of Darkness.

So basically, the question boils down to: what color would/could YOU put on games exploring these issues? In YGAD, that color would be mixed with your 'normal' fantasy elements, but in other games, the fantasy element might be gone completely and the focus more on these issues.

My apologies if this is rambling. I generally find it difficult to explain my personal philosophy succinctly, but I hope that isn't too essential to this post - I'm looking for descriptions that would entice you to play in a game that explores these issues, not settle a debate.

I'm also willing to entertain the thought that I don't need to try to get these concepts into the game - that any game that has characters that are compelling enough that make players go "my character would never do that, because it's against his ethics" is automatically going/getting there.

Anyways, responses (or questions to clarify things) welcome.

[Jasper]

Hi Tobias,

...what color would/could YOU put on games exploring these issues?

I don't know how useful a question this really is.  There are a million different ways you could do it, and I doubt any two people would choose exactly the same color -- which is why survey-type posts are discouraged in general around here.  The real question is what color would help convey the message you have, or facilitate the kind of gameplay you want...or just your personal preference.  You seem to have some strong ideas of what you don't want, is there any direction you find yourself favoring?  We need to consider what diffierent kinds of color are possible canditates, and then see what effect they might have on the game.  Assuming you can find a color that satisfies you, I would advise going with one rather than bland neaturality -- given your topic.  


PS. If it's a Greek game, you might want to use a Greek phrase, instead of the Latin "Deus Ex Machina."

[Tobias]

Point(s) taken, and thanks for it. Allow me to re-phrase:

'What would be (the most) effective colors for this exploring this theme?'

I understand that there still are a million possibilities, but color, as a design tool, is new for me. So some ideas might also just be good to get me jumpstarted.

For instance, one option would be to have parts of text told from the viewpoint of a disillusioned priest to one of the old gods - in YGAD's specific case. In a more general case, anything that juxtaposes humanism as a value system against something else.

I'm leaning towards something confrontational, a challenge to get the job done, myself.

And I'm not sure I get your P.S. Could you elaborate?

[JamesSterrett]

Consider, then, tweaking some of the text you already have.

For example:

Society also has to adapt, which is like saying a patient has to learn to live without a major organ.

into

Society also has to adapt, which is like saying a patient has to learn to live without a crutch.


Among the questions I think you're trying to riase:

- Is religion necessary?

- Is religion the same as faith?

- Are god(s) necessary?  Can people stand on their own without real/mythological assistance?

- Does good behaviour depend on feared retribution ("be good or god will punish you")?

- Welfare (divine favor) vs workfare (doing it for yourself)

For the same reason, I'd drop the text claiming that the god's power flowed into people.  Players are special not because of a divine taint, but because they have decided to stand on their own feet and act.  Their extra tiles represent accumulated expertise - gained by doing things for themselves.  I do realize this idea really mucks with much of the color in your system-as-written (Forming/Flowing/Dreaming would need to be reconceptualized under new terms, for example).

You've got a system, and I've tried to read back at you the premise that jumps out at me - the next trick to to identify the premise you're really on about, and make sure the color lines up solidly to ensure that it communicates that premise.

[And I'm not saying that's easy.  :)  ]

[Tobias]

Good stuff here, thanks. I'll definately use the organ -> crutch thing.

You've nailed some of the questions I'm raising, for sure. One of the things I'm really looking for is - what do people strive for when they're out there 'all alone'. They remember a certain ethic that used to be reinforced, do they keep striving for it? Does 'basic human nature' mess them up?

It's also a good call about dropping or modifying the 'power flowed into them' thing - at least the presentation of it. I'll tell you the reasons I'm not dropping them without pause:

1 - I do want to back up the 'specialness' of the characters (and individuals in general) with some sort of power that stems from their Values. I'm also wondering if I could actually rewrite Forming/Flowing/Dreaming in a meaningful way without it being thematically shoehorned in. And I like a little fantasy in my setting, a little magic, and this seemed an obvious way.

2 - I'm also interested in 'the next generation' - would the children of the currently empowered generation still have the same power? I'm shooting for a scenario where they don't - and the current character generation are the last remnants of the old ways. Maybe I can expand on this thought a little, and make it clear that the characters are an in-between phase - which might give them additional worries as they try to plan for their children. In that case, the attention for kids might be played up as part of humanity.

I'm keeping my gun ready in case any of these are Sacred Cows, though. Thanks again for the suggestions.

[JamesSterrett]

I do want to back up the 'specialness' of the characters (and individuals in general) with some sort of power that stems from their Values. I'm also wondering if I could actually rewrite Forming/Flowing/Dreaming in a meaningful way without it being thematically shoehorned in.

Have you considered something similar to Riddle of Steel's Spiritual Attributes?  This lets the power flow from the values/destinies/people the characters care about, instead of from the gods (perhaps referred to in the text as divine toxic waste?  ;-)  )

A radical thought that might let your fantasy fit in better - perhaps all the divine powers came from us all along, and the gods acted as parasites soaking them up.  Thus the power now reverts to humans to use.  This doesn't allow for the "second generation", though.  Perhaps the parasitism was benign, and served the bring out the powers as well as consuming them, so this is the last generation in whom these powers will be brought forth, and for a brief time they can weild those powers as they see fit to shape the coming world?

[Tobias]

I like that radical thought. I've played White Wolf's Mage before, and thus am familiar with 'world-mind' empowered concepts/paradigms. I generally prefer to have all fantasy (in whatever game I play) 'powers' derive from such human mind-energy anyway - without stating it out loud.

Yes, that could work. Some hints at the 'true' explanation could be given in the storykeeper's section. I initially decided to keep away from the idea that the gods were empowered by humans in the first place since I thought it might be a bit much for the players - but maybe I should give them more credit.

'Parasites', 'Toxic waste' etc. does set mood quite nicely, so I'll have to ponder those. And the benign parasitism idea could certainly work.

TROS' Spiritual Attributes - well, I don't own TROS, just the playtest. I have read about them, but don't know the details. In one version of YGAD, the Value and Goals thing were actually numbered stats, but I found it ugly to put a number on something like 'kindness'.

[Eero Tuovinen]

A short suggestion before going back to work:

Recognize your favourite literary works for the kind of themes you want to evoke as color. Read them again. This helps in four ways:
1) you can copy what makes the works in question evocative of the color.
2) you can use intertext to evoke the memory of the works in question in readers who are already familiar with your sources.
3) you can just ask your reader to familiarize themselves with the seminal works that tell it better than you ever could.
4) Ultimately the only way to learn writing is to experience it. Learn from the best, so you may yourself become their peer.

For liberal humanism I'd probably go with some genre authors (Asimov springs to mind for some reason, although there are stronger options) from the '60s. Ultimately it's up to you to choose based on what impresses you.

[JamesSterrett]

It's true that one of the big hurdles with TROS's SAs is the notion that the actual number assigned to an SA does not indicate the strength of the SA - the usual example is that you don't love your wife more or less at "Love Wife 1" or "Love Wife 5".

I suggest http://www.theriddleofsteel.net/whatis/SA.htm as the best explanation of the potential power of SAs - they serve as a means to empower the players & characters in situations where something that matters is on the line.

None of which means that SAs are the perfect solution for you, or that a mutated version of them is what you need, either.  Something to chew on, though, since one of the themes I think I'm seeing is the question of what really matters to people, why it matters, and what they'll do/suffer to get to outcomes they want.  SAs can mesh well with that.

Glad to have been of some assistance - I'm looking forward to the next version; it's an interesting background to me.  :)   (On the other hand, my base reaction to the bag-of-chips concept is "urk", on a handling level, though I *do* recognize it lets you do some nifty things that a percentile dice system cannot.)

[Paul Czege]

Recognize your favourite literary works for the kind of themes you want to evoke as color. Read them again.

I'm with Eero on this. Were it my game, I'd probably re-read Camus (definitely The Plague, but likely The Stranger as well).

Paul

[simon_hibbs]

I suggest http://www.theriddleofsteel.net/whatis/SA.htm as the best explanation of the potential power of SAs - they serve as a means to empower the players & characters in situations where something that matters is on the line.

Or look at passions and relationships in HeroQuest, which are intended to be used in the same way.

I think a big difference is in the way these abilities are increased. I don't have a copy of TROS, but it appears that increasing SAs is a seperate thing from increasing combat abilities, while in HQ all abilities are increased by spending points from a single pool. Therefore in TROS you can augment your combat abilities by nurturing your SAs, while in HQ you'd be better off just dumping all your points directly into your combat and magic abilities, all other things being equal (which of course they usualy aren't).


Simon Hibbs

[JamesSterrett]

In TROS, you get "XP" in the form of increases to your SA pools.  You can then cash in dice from your SA pools to increase your skills & stats.

Thus SAs reward you for using them, twice - you get to survive better, and you get to improve your character, since SA dice get awarded for SA use....

Your comment on dumping all the points into combat does raise the question - are there skills worth using other than combat skills?  I'm presuming that in YGAD the answer is "yes".  (I haven't played HQ, and thus don't know the answer for HQ, though I confess I hope the answer is also "yes".  :)  )

And, of course, none of this means SAs are necessarily the right thing for YGAD.

[Tobias]

Eero - good point. If anyone wants to chip in more titles, that'd be appreciated. Right now I'm leaning towards staying in a casual writing style, and to having a disillusioned proponent of the old ways (a former priest) and a gung-ho roustabout as proponent of the news ways as In-Character voices that could talk to the character. Kinda the angel-devil-on-shoulder-routine. Much of their opinions could come from some of the works I'll (re)read.

James - I'll have a look. Whether they work for me or not, chewing on SAs can't hurt. As to the handling problems of a bag of chips - it's not too bad, I assure you, as long as you don't make them the 'potato' kind. The answer to your question of whether it's worth to "[dump] points in non-combat skills" would be a resounding yes - depending on the campaign. In a very social campaign, with lots of courtly intrigue, you'll need those social skills. To survive in the forest, you better have some wilderness skills. Etc. If the GM and players agree it's going to be a campaign that's mostly about the Wars, sure, combat skills are probably a smart thing.

Simon and Paul - thanks for your suggestions - will look into it.

[Tobias]

Had a look at both Riddle of Steel and HeroQuest.

Riddle of Steel is a bit (too) crunchy to me (personal taste), which is why I'll not play it, but SA's look cool. The concept of having them be intermediate stages of XP that are then used again is cool, but as a mechanic doesn't really excite me for YGAD. Adhering to your value does not make you a better swordfighter, in my book (if this is me interpreting the TROS rules wrong, apologies).

Hero quest looks really cool, especially also having relationships as well as personal values. I read in another thread the GM giving 'bonuses' to his players if they took family ties to each other or to the village they were in at the start of the campaign, and thought it was quite nice to stimulate 'caring'. Since I'm looking at generational stuff in YGAD, maybe I can get such a tie-in without needing number for it.

Reading both at least has me convinced I need more clarity in gaining, regaining, and using both Karma and Push. This was neccesary anyway. I'll tell you what I'm leaning towards now:

Push is regained by getting to relax after having worked at your goal. If you've promoted your goal since the last break, you get 1 to three push (back).

Karma is regained by accomplishing things that mirror your value. If stuff has happened in the surrounding due to your (in)direct influence, you gain 1 to three Karma.

Now, both statistics have a 'half-life'. If you just loaf around an inn for 2 year, they'll sure be zero. This will, hopefully, keep the players driven somewhat.

Now, Push and Karma cannot pass 5. If they would (say: drawing a + karma tile, or having accomplished much towards your goal without spending push, or gaining Karma through value) go over 5, all excess drains off, you fall back to 3, and the player gets to describe a long-term setting-altering event through their contact in the same manner their contact would activate in the short-term way when drawing an environment tile.

Some examples and extra lines of text would have to make the rules more clear to the reader/player.

On a whole other note: this thread is drifting all over the place. I don't mind, since I'm getting good stuff out of it, but I am aware and willing to split or anything else if people want.

Tobias

[simon_hibbs]

Your comment on dumping all the points into combat does raise the question - are there skills worth using other than combat skills?  I'm presuming that in YGAD the answer is "yes".  (I haven't played HQ, and thus don't know the answer for HQ, though I confess I hope the answer is also "yes".  :)  )

It's most certainly yes.

I was just talking in the context of the discussion. In TROS you can only become really good at combat if you improve your SAs, and doing so doesn't detract from your combat abilities at all. In HQ if all you want to do is improve your combat prowess, you're better off just spending Hero Points on combat abilities.

However HeroQuest isn't just about fighting, and doesn't actualy have to be about fighting at all. I'm just making the point that it isn't just the contest resolution mechanics that count - TROS and HQ both allow passions and relationships to augment combat abilities, but the way the experience system is structured also has a huge influence in the way it rewards and thus directs player/character behaviour.


Simon Hibbs