Any RPG potential in the wilderness?

[Tomas HVM]

In the thread about the "survival-game" we started discussing wilderness and survival in roleplaying games, in more general terms. I'd like to go on with that discussion in this thread. I've taken the liberty of citing part of the discussion made by me and "Contracycle" here:

I find that there is lots of elements in this type of game to make more than gamist challenges. In fact the gamist challenge is far from central in my writings on it. I choose to keep the hunt very abstract. I find that the Wilderness and the hunter has more to do with presenting a field of expertice, empowering the hunter over other types of characters, making him into some kind of negotiatior of danger. In addition it is about atmosphere; creating an emotional content of the game that matches the strong fear for the unknown underlying the "Here be dragons!"-note on old maps.

Erm, that sounds highly gamist to me.  A negotiator of danger?  Surely thats about as pure a form of step on up as is available, especially when framed by "the fate of the tribe rests on your shoulders".

I make the wilderness a place filled with strong symbols of chaos and beastliness, and as such it may be that my take on this, is so far from your ideas that our two views don't communicate at all.

Its true that I don't think of the wilderness primarily in allegorical terms, no.  But that is the kind of failing I was trying to highlight - reducing the wilderness to some Issue like this robs it of its externality, its impassivity in the face of human suffering.  And the result is that despite the the fact that game is nominally about survival, its in fact really just another save-the-world-before-sundown-by-killing-the-badguy-and-taking-their-stuff game.  It could have been any where, and in any setting, and thus as a game about survival it fails.

You may be right in observing that some gamesmiths only use the tribe/wilderness/survival-theme as a thin coating for the real theme of all their games; high adventure and gritty combat.

I do not feel that I'm falling into this trap when writing my Wilderness-module for Fabula. I'm trying to catch the "feel" of the wilderness, and at the same time investigate how the wilderness may influence the game in more substantial ways. to find new conflicts, or to do wellknown conflicts in new ways, is part of this amibition.

However; I expect some conflicts to be recognizable from games with totally different themes. It may be because my roleplaying scenarios focus on humans, and human conflicts, or it may be because I'm blind to alternative ways of exploiting the potential of roleplaying games.

Anyway I believe it possible to create roleplaying games with a true wilderness theme. I believe it is possible to treat this theme in a way that would satisfy even such harsh critics as "Contracycle". That is certainly my intention!

Questions:
--> How may this be done?
--> What is the true potential of such a theme?

Is it possible to do it within the frames of a traditional fantasy game, or will the theme demand a special methodic take, to blossom in the right way?

What can be revealed of human nature trough the focus on wilderness? The beast within us all is one obvious focal point. The harsh reality of nature is another one, surviving it, or succumbing to the forces that paly with a human life. Fear of the unknown is a third. A forth may be man and beast in conflict. What more is there to investigate in such a game?

[Vaxalon]

If you look at the great "survival in the wilderness" movies, they're almost always about more than one person, and the focus is mostly on the relationship between those people against the background of the wilderness.

[ErrathofKosh]

There are books that focus on one person's survival, but they delve deep into their thoughts, emotions, and reactions.  Of course, a RPG is usually focused on more than one character...

[ErrathofKosh]

As far as themes go, one of my favorite involves the "white" boy raised by the Indian tribe, who must fight the prejudice of others growing up, and who may return to the white man's world one day to face more prejudice.  Of course, the larger theme is the conflict between a hunter race and a more industrial one and can be expressed in many other ways.

Another type of play on this "civilized" versus "savage" idea is found directly in Jack London's books.  Either the character is coming more aware of his primal, savage state or becoming more "civilized" why still retaining some of the most important survival skills.

I think the Gold Rush in Alaska game could address some of the same issues that the hunter-gather game could.

[Tomas HVM]

If you look at the great "survival in the wilderness" movies, they're almost always about more than one person, and the focus is mostly on the relationship between those people against the background of the wilderness.

Yes, you're right, and that fact makes me more confident than ever that it is possible to make a great roleplaying game out of it. But how can it translate into a roleplaying game, and what kind of conflicts will the survival-theme fascilitate?

[contracycle]

If you look at the great "survival in the wilderness" movies, they're almost always about more than one person, and the focus is mostly on the relationship between those people against the background of the wilderness.

Sure.  But thats becuase they are a produced artifact, the sotry commodity, which must be sold and consumed.  In that regard they are compelled to go down the story route in pursuit of commercial success.  We are not hampered by that limitation in our own games and can feel free to discard that additional obligation.

[contracycle]

What can be revealed of human nature trough the focus on wilderness?

Who cares?

The beast within us all is one obvious focal point. The harsh reality of nature is another one, surviving it, or succumbing to the forces that paly with a human life. Fear of the unknown is a third. A forth may be man and beast in conflict. What more is there to investigate in such a game?

How to make a stone hand-axe.  The proper technique for baiting a mastodon into a pit.  The importance of fire in neolithic lives.  The neolothic "task-scape".  How life is lived when your entire range of containers is limited to skin bags and clay pots.  Which plants are edible and which poisonous in a given bit of terrain.  How you construct a proper cleft-stick trap with twigs and twine.  Hunting with dogs, the care and feeding of a pack of hounds, and the sheep-worrying habits of the wily fox.

All of the topics you have proposed are highly anthropocentric and emotive; as a result, they have very little to do withg the wilderness or with survival; they have to do with human appreciations of the wilderness at best.  A player of such a game might learn some things about human understandings of nature, but nothing about nature itself.  I find this highly annoying not least because it is so repetitive.

the point I'm raising is something like this: anyone who's played a FRPG has probably spent a fair amount of game time on horseback.  And yet I have learned next to nothing about horses from RPG's despite this; I find it furstrating that this important (to me) aspect of the envirobnment has been so comprehensivley ommitted.  Its likely its due in part precisely becuase few of us have much real experience with horses, or indeed with the wilderness.  For my money, the balance should be redressed by focus on the wilderness in its own right, not merely as some backdrop for a cheesy, heard-it-a-thousand-times "human drama".

[ErrathofKosh]

Whoa!

Take it easy...

What Tomas proposed is a perfectly acceptable goal for a game.  

If you want to go post another thread on how to do a game that attempts to simulate survival or wilderness experiences, go do it.  This ones about exploring human issues through survival/wilderness experiences.

I think I'll go start one about how to design a game about overcoming the challenges of surviving...

Jonathan

[Tomas HVM]

Who cares?

I do. That's the reason I ask my question, obviously :-)

I wrote: The beast within us all is one obvious focal point. The harsh reality of nature is another one, surviving it, or succumbing to the forces that play with a human life. Fear of the unknown is a third. A forth may be man and beast in conflict. What more is there to investigate in such a game?

How to make a stone hand-axe.  The proper technique for baiting a mastodon into a pit.  The importance of fire in neolithic lives.  The neolothic "task-scape".  How life is lived when your entire range of containers is limited to skin bags and clay pots.  Which plants are edible and which poisonous in a given bit of terrain.  How you construct a proper cleft-stick trap with twigs and twine.  Hunting with dogs, the care and feeding of a pack of hounds, and the sheep-worrying habits of the wily fox.

All of the topics you have proposed are highly anthropocentric and emotive;

I find your topics to be quite acceptable, and useful. Thank you!

They are, of course, quite anthropocentric. They are a bit more detailed than mine, in the focus on ancient hunting techniques, but that doesn't bother me :-)

they have very little to do with the wilderness or with survival; they have to do with human appreciations of the wilderness at best.

Please! "The harsh reality of nature" is not about nature? "Man and beast in conflict" has nothing to do with wilderness or survival? I find your remark a bit off the mark.

A player of such a game might learn some things about human understandings of nature, but nothing about nature itself.

This may be the case in most games with "wilderness" as a shallow varnish. You have not seen the module I am writing (neither have I professed to present it in any detail here) and have a curious way of interpreting the topics I propose, so I fear that your judgement is premature. I will concede that whether a player learn something about nature or not, by a roleplaying game, is dependant on how the game is written and how it is played. "Such a game", as you put it, should be taken to do this as conscientiously as possible, until the opposite is proved.

the point I'm raising is something like this: anyone who's played a FRPG has probably spent a fair amount of game time on horseback.  And yet I have learned next to nothing about horses from RPG's despite this;

A very common occurence, pertaining to many ancient and exotic themes. I agree with you; there is no harm in gamesmiths making some research before writing at length about horses, or swords, or hunting, or the like.

the balance should be redressed by focus on the wilderness in its own right, not merely as some backdrop for a cheesy, heard-it-a-thousand-times "human drama".

The problem with this point is that roleplaying games all are about human drama. There is no roleplaying games where you play the wilderness itself. The wilderness has to be treated as a setting for the drama, just like other settings has to be. That is the purpose of the setting. However; it don't have to be treated indifferently.

I'm proposing to treat it seriously. I'm trying to unearth how it will and shall affect the drama in the most realistic way. I'm also trying to unearth some ancient feelings had by humans of old, in relation to the wilderness. I find this to be an ambition as dedicated to the premises of nature as can be.

Shoot me with your hunters bow if you must, "Contracycle"; but try to aim true...

[Callan S.]

I think your going to have real problems with trying to have a game about hunting not be gamist.

For example, if I wrote an RPG about football and tried to make it about one's feelings during play, I think it's just going to drift to gamist. If the subject is a game, then it'll drift toward gamist.

And I really think hunting is gamist. In fact the 'kill them and take their stuff' joke is really a reflection of the hunting and gathering instincts within all of us.

I think there's a lot of material in the wilderness. At the least, when weve all gone camping, certainly one might be running by a game plan, but one is also getting feelings about the whole event.

I think the thing is, when you do go out into the world, the part of your brain that handles physical movement is the one doing most the work, leaving the other part free to wonder and think. At the roleplay table, this other part has to manage both the imagined physical activity and the emotional side. Really, one will end up taking precedence, because while in RL it only had to handle one task, now it has to handle two.

[contracycle]

Tomas, I'm not sure why you are interpreting my position as a slam of your particular idea.  All I am trying to indicate is that I think that wilderness has been, umm, under-explored in RPG to date, and that this has happened IMO mostly becuase of the stock arts convention that its human drama that is important.  That is true in Drama, I'm not so sure its true in RPG which contains a significant Sim component.  The result, as I see it, is that despite the large number of games set nominally in the wilderness, almost none actually deal with the wilderness significantly.  The D&D expert Set and the Wilderness Survival Guide are pretty much still the state of the art in that respect.

There have been a number of computer games in which non-human nature was eaxtly the primary topic of play.  Sim Farm, for instance, or the shortlived SimWolf, in which yes, you played a wolf.  Boardgames have dealt with the topic quite directly, especially the Avalon Hill game Outdoor Survival (1972):
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/game/1511#stats

Its a simple concept:
"Lost and alone you must survive and escape the woods. There are 5 different scenarios from inexperinced hikers lost in the woods to a rescue party trying to find a lost person. You will have to deal with animals, finding food and water, mother nature and sickness without dying to win."

Check out the image here for a view of the map and some of the tables:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/6694

Would should hopefully be apparent is that this game is not a million miles away from orthodox RPG structures.  It has an attritional health system, a sorta "wandering monster" system and keyed locations on an open hex map.  One assumption it employs, from memory, that is not usually found in RPG is that the character automatically loses resources, there is no neutral state; the point is to get out before the decline is terminal.

Clearly, the subject of this game is the wilderness; the lost human is just a pawn.  Although the players may well exhibit emotional responses, that is not what the game system is about.  I think its entirely possible to build an RPG system around the wild and leave the emotional content and whys and wherefores of motivations to individual local games.

[Tomas HVM]

I think your going to have real problems with trying to have a game about hunting not be gamist.

Sure, there is going to be gamist elements in it. It is, after all, a game.

At the same time I think you will have to build some kind of narrative elements into such a game. Some simulation-elements too.

I do not involve myself with the GNS-model, but one thing I give the creator of it; the G or the N or the S in the model is not to be applied as singular labels for any roleplaying game.

[Tomas HVM]

All I am trying to indicate is that I think that wilderness has been, umm, under-explored in RPG to date, and that this has happened IMO mostly becuase of the stock arts convention that its human drama that is important.  

I understand this position. I agree with you in the observation of the field. I do not, however, find the focus on human drama to be at fault. In my view, this notion is not supportable. Reason is that you've got to have the human drama. I consider the problem to be not in the focus of gamesmiths, but in their lack of knowledge. the average gamesmith treat the wilderness (and a lot of other areas of expertice) in a shallow way, making abstractions based on an unrealistic view of the wilderness and it's elements. This leads to a "human drama" that is shallow and unremarkable.

despite the large number of games set nominally in the wilderness, almost none actually deal with the wilderness significantly.

I agree with you in this.

The D&D expert Set and the Wilderness Survival Guide are pretty much still the state of the art in that respect.

I'm no great supporter of D&D. I find it a tedious game. Even when played out with some of the most interesting and accomplished players in Norway, all very enthusiatic about it, I've found it to be boring. That aside; I take your word for this. There is a lot of products out there on D&D, and a lot of followers of the game, so it got to have qualities I'm blind to. This might very well be one of them.

One assumption it employs, from memory, that is not usually found in RPG, is that the character automatically loses resources, there is no neutral state; the point is to get out before the decline is terminal.

In my game, Fabula, I have some pretty straightforward elements in the conflict system, pertaining to health and diet. These elements in combination makes it simple to deal with effects like endurance, disease, hunger, and trying conditions of nature. By simple means Fabula simulate the bodily and mentally traumas connected with such states.

Although the players may well exhibit emotional responses, that is not what the game system is about.  I think its entirely possible to build an RPG system around the wild and leave the emotional content and whys and wherefores of motivations to individual local games.

Yes, it is possible, but it is not what I'm doing. My ambition is to build a game where motivations is dealt with in the game method, and to give techniques for manipulation of the characters according to the conditions they experience. I do not leave it to the game master to work out the game method. I do it myself, and I am in constant search for the practical advice that makes the game master play my game, and not some concoction of his thrown together on the spur of the moment. I want the game master to be able to improvise, but I want him to do it within the framework of my method, using the techniques I have created.

Mind you; I consider what you refer to by the term "system", to be only one part of the game method (my theoretical term for this part is "conflict system"). As far as I'm concerned the "method" consist of a lot more than the conflict system, and I insist on concerning myself with the other parts of the method too, as a game designer. It seems to me that the acceptance of the term "system" leads to a whole range of common misconceptions regarding roleplaying games. I often meet with assertions to the effect that "you can't do that in a roleplaying system", when I tell people that I've actually done it. My advice is: think "method"!

So my game, even the wilderness module, is absolutely meant to deal with emotional responses and human relations, as well as the various elements which influence these conditions. The means to do so is found in the storytelling-techniques presented in my game, and in the links between these techniques and the conflict system (to make a fully functional and well rounded game method). I see no conflict in making a game which covers both the concrete conditions of the wilderness, and the particular reactions a character may experience under these conditions.

That's me then, me and my wolfish appetite for ambitious game design...

:-)

[contracycle]

So my game, even the wilderness module, is absolutely meant to deal with emotional responses and human relations, as well as the various elements which influence these conditions.

Fair enough.  Lets say I had hoped we might be able to move on to a discussion about how to bring inanimate apsctes of setting more into the centre of play, the foreground to use my own term.  If this is not your interest I probably have little to contribue; I recommend HeroQuest for your purposes.

[Tomas HVM]

Fair enough.

Great!

I had hoped we might be able to move on to a discussion about how to bring inanimate apsctes of setting more into the centre of play, the foreground to use my own term.

Even greater!

I am very much interested in doing this. We might not see eye to eye on certain things, but I am sure we may do this to great effect.

I'm occupied with bedding my sons at present, and have some writing to do later on. If you give us some framework to discuss by, I will indulge in it sometime tomorrow. Okey?

And everyone else is of course welcome to contribute. Please do!