[Caper] A Game in Search of a Premise

[LordSmerf]

So i started this project intending to enter it as a 24 Hour RPG.

Basically i'm trying to capture the feel of Caper fiction.  Examples include: The Italian Job, Ocean's Eleven, The Great Escape, The Jackal, and Mission: Impossible.  Pretty much anything that has a Planning and Execution phase (regardless of how much or little attention a given phase gets).  I think i've got a solid system that should be fun to play and easy to learn.

In order to follow, as closely as possible, the fiction which inspired the game i have a mechanic that attempts to foster a sense of constantly rising Tension.  In order to do this i have a Tension value that is tracked for the game as a whole (like Fear in MLwM).  I'm quite pleased with the way the numbers interact with the system's resolution mechanics.  Unfortunately there is a problem:

I don't know what makes Tension increase.  Essentially, i've got a game that has a great slot for a Premise to be addressed, but i can't seem to figure out what Premise would fit into this genre.  I have absolutely no idea.  Needless to say the project is unfinished, but i think that if i had a Premise i could get a first draft up and running in a day or two...

What i'm asking for is: Suggestions.  What Premise do you think this style of game would be well suited to addressing?

Thomas

[MikeSands]

One thing that these sort of films often seem to rely on for increasing tension is the secrets in the different characters' pasts. Perhaps flashback scenes that reveal elements that endanger the mission could crank up tension?

The other thing to use would probably be the unexpected. Maybe flash-forwards could be used after a part of the plan is nailed down to show (for instance) the guards changing their patrol pattern or something like that.

And it sounds like a great idea for a game, by the way.

[TonyLB]

Oooh, ooh, ooh.  I love Caper movies.  I'll try to help!

How about "Cleverness:  The cause of and solution to all of life's problems."

[LordSmerf]

Good points on time shifts ratcheting up tension, but that's not really what i'm trying to get at here.  Those are great ways to indicate an increase in Tension, but what i'm looking for is actually a reason to increase the Tension.

Example: In My Life with Master you have a Love stat.  Love rises as you exhibit your humanity.  You also have a Self Loathing stat which increases as you exhibit your inhumanity.  So the Premise can be stated as: Are you truly a monster or can you overcome your inhuman qualities?

For Caper i need to define that moral question.  Tension should go up whenever that question is addressed (whether a definative answer is provided or not).

Thomas

EDITED NOTE: Crossposted with Tony.

[Sydney Freedberg]

Are you sure that it's necessarily a moral premise? Seems caper films are less about morality than mastery -- about keeping your cool (self-control) and keeping on top of the situation (control of others). Tension would therefore rise whenever it becomes harder to keeps under control (either internal or external), or perhaps whenever something actually goes out of control on either front.

E.g. an internal loss of control could be the gang's alcoholic driver having a few drinks too many before the heist; an external loss of control could be the guards changing the patrol route as you mentioned.

Ocean's 11 SPOILER Follows!

Or a complex example: in Ocean's 11 (the new version -- haven't seen the original), the Matt Damon character and the Two Bickering Brothers [names forgotten] are told "wait in the van" (attempt at control by Clooney's character, Ocean, the boss). But the Brothers Bicker endlessly (minor failure of self-control) which causes Matt Damon's character to lose patience and get out of the van (major failure of self-control), which ends up the guards chasing him (loss of control of situation) and the Asian acrobat guy [yes, I suck at remembering names] getting his hand crunched (all told, a significant but not catastrophic defeat).

EDIT for afterthought: Come to think of it (as I was folding baby laundry), Ocean's 11 is all about these themes of control: Think how much self-control Ocean (Clooney) has to exercise in his final scam-within-a-scam to control others, including ultimately the archvillain Benedict (Andy Garcia, right?), in a situation where he appears to have totally lost control.

[MikeSands]

Sydney, I think you have just explained what I was getting at.

Control is certainly a major theme of caper films, and I think it comes out in the two ways you described.

[Blankshield]

A good reason to increase tension, riffing off of the last suggestion, would be to tie the tension to the payoff.  If the tension never rises, the payoff is never big.  Give a scale in the rules system that runs from "you end up worse off than you started" and goes all the way up to "You are better off than you expected" and require the players to generate some number X of internal points of tension to get there.

To keep things unpredictable have a random number of external points of tension.

If the potential payoff goes up as points of tension are resolved instead of as they are added, then you can begin a bit to duplicate the flip from "hell in a handbasket" to "coming up roses" that is characteristic of caper fiction - things are never looking worse than right before the resolution, when the tension is cranked to the roof - but then those points of tension get resolved or worked around or revealed as part of a greater plan (cf: Ocean's 11) and suddenly the whole picture changes.

James

[Stephen]

The key to Caper films is that they always involve a Plan with a whole host of tiny little Steps that have to be accomplished in order and on time to deliver the Payoff.

The tension in Caper stories comes either (a) when a necessary Step of the Plan is botched, thus cranking up the difficulty of subsequent Steps, or (b) when a Surprise is injected into the mix -- somebody does something the Caperers don't expect, or a key piece of information turns out to be wrong or incomplete.

I would say that Tension increases in one of two ways:

1)  At the players' request, the GM has to introduce an Unexpected Complication - requiring the players to think on their feet.  (Potentially, one player can introduce them against another?)  This cranks up the Tension, but increases the Payoff -- it's the equivalent of raising the stakes in a poker game.

2)  If a PC botches any of the Steps, the Tension should go up in direct proportion to how badly he/she botched.

[Stephen]

As for the Premise: well, most Capers get undertaken not just for the money (there are usually easier/simpler ways to make money, even in the amounts most Capers go for), but to make some kind of point -- they're about humiliating the victim, or proving the Caperer's cleverness, or accomplishing a Mission from God (hey, The Blues Brothers is its own kind of caper film).

So how about:  Playing the game well is more important than winning it.  Or:  A victory won without style is no victory at all.  The whole point of the game is not just to pull off the Caper but to pull it off as dashingly and skilfully as possible -- it's better to fail at a complex plan than succeed with a simple, brute-force plan any moron could have thought up.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

Thomas, you must run and not walk to run a search here at the Forge for all discussion of Criminal Element, the only role-playing game design I've seen that really nails the caper film.

As far as GNS goes, it mainly supports High Concept Sim, and does so very very well through every single feature of its design. Although it's not in final form yet to my knowledge, it could be a standout game.

Best,
Ron

[Sydney Freedberg]

A good reason to increase tension, riffing off of the last suggestion, would be to tie the tension to the payoff.  If the tension never rises, the payoff is never big.  Give a scale in the rules system that runs from "you end up worse off than you started" and goes all the way up to "You are better off than you expected" and require the players to generate some number X of internal points of tension to get there.

Perhaps the best way to implement this is simply raise the stakes in a gambling mechanic -- i.e. Tension 0 is you stay home and do nothing, so no risk, no reward; as Tension rises, both risk and reward rise.

[Jere]

In http://www.innocence.com/games/age-of-paranoia/index.php/Main/HomePage">Age of Paranoia we addressed this style of events through our http://www.innocence.com/games/age-of-paranoia/index.php/Main/MissionPlay">Mission Play. While there are som,e bugs (see further down) I think so far its working quite well.

Jeremiah

[LordSmerf]

Are you sure that it's necessarily a moral premise? Seems caper films are less about morality than mastery -- about keeping your cool (self-control) and keeping on top of the situation (control of others). Tension would therefore rise whenever it becomes harder to keeps under control (either internal or external), or perhaps whenever something actually goes out of control on either front.

After some thought, i'm really beginning to warm to this idea...  It's an excellent point as stated (Mike, i guess i just couldn't see what you were getting at).

So if we go with the idea that the game is all about "maintaining conrtrol" then we will want to implement a system in which control loss spirals: the more you lose, the faster you lose.  I really like that.

I guess that means that we want to implement two levels of control: a Personal Control for each character, basically how well are they holding up under the pressure, and a Caper Control, basically how much control does the team have over the situation.

I'm going to have to spend some more time thinking (and reading), but i think that this is a great direction to take the game...

Thanks for all the input so far, and if anyone has any suggestions regarding how to implement this mechanically i'd love to hear them.

Thomas

[TonyLB]

The other thing I'll point out (though it's been highlighted by some of the Ocean's 11 references) is that characters do not (and should not) immediately know when things are spiralling out of control.  

Much of the really fun stuff (particularly early in a story) happens during the gap between the audience realizing that the plan's gone wrong and the characters realizing it.

[LordSmerf]

That's a really good point.  The quesion arises: Is there a way to allow the players as audience to know that things are spiraling out of control while still keeping the players as characters in the dark?

I don't know if that is even possible, and i do not really see a good way to approximate it either.

Thomas