Loser roleplaying

[Vaxalon]

So let me see if I have this straight, correct me if I'm wrong.

In winner roleplaying (such as DnD), we pull out our best qualities and watch them triumph over an external evil.  The payoff comes from our connection to and ownership of the character.  You could do this kind of RP in 1-1 with a gamemaster.

In struggle roleplaying (such as Vampire, or, to me, MLWM), we pull out our best qualities and our worst qualities, and we play out our inner struggles with evil in the SIS.  The payoff comes from our connection to the character.  You could do this kind of RP in 1-1 with a gamemaster.

In loser roleplaying (such as KPFS), we pull out our worst qualities, let them flop about hopelessly in the SIS, and collectively forgive each other for having birthed them.  The payoff does not come from our connection to the character.  The connection is there, but it offers no intrinsic payoff.  Instead, the payoff comes from the connection with the other people around the table; the characters are merely a tool towards that end.  Playing this kind of game 1-1 with a gamemaster would fundamentally change the nature of the game, likely draining it of much of its mutuality.

[Vaxalon]

Also worth noting: [kpfs] A Startling Postscript.

I don't know about you, but this seems like a refutation of your point.

They didn't forgive their characters and stop playing, they KEPT playing, and kept throwing the mud around.

[lumpley]

Maybe.

They were getting something out of the game. I didn't figure they'd ever even consider playing it again, their initial experience was so ... appalling.

Now, whether Dimestore Katana's is going to work at all like puppies does, who knows. It sounds to me like Judd's got something interesting to say about violence.

-Vincent

[Christopher Kubasik]

In winner roleplaying (such as DnD), we pull out our best qualities and watch them triumph over an external evil.

Whoa.

Is this true?

I've seen behaviors in D&D* (*and its children) that made me worry about the moral stability of the people playing the PCs.  The difference between this and other games is that there's no acknowledgement of moral issues.  (The fact that everybody slaps an Alignment on PCs and NPCs doesn't -- to my mind -- engender concerns about morality.  It seems to absolve everyone of all concerns about morality.)

In a Star Wars game played once at West End, a guy in marketing -- a Viet Nam vet -- slaughtered two hog tied technicians on the new Death Star.  He shocked everyone at the table.  In his view, he was making sure the mission succeeded.  Was his action a triumph of good over evil?

Was his choice to be brutal in a brutal war a "best quality"?  Or was the desire for innocence of the other players ("Hey, this is Star Wars! We don't kill innocents!") the best quality?  I sure as hell don't know. Its a complicated matter. One that Star Wars kind of sweeps under the carpet if the group is trying to play "genre" -- and not expect that PCs might do horrible things and that examining them is worth the time.

In games like kpfs and MLWM and Sorcerer and more, the moral cards are on the table.  In the Star Wars game everyone was stunned, then simply had to shrug it off and rush to the next cool blaster fight.

I've often had this problem with this presumed "heroic" nature of D&D*.  One slaughters and steals, amasses the ability to slaughter and steal more, every once in a while with a plot line that justifies slaughtering and stealing for the sake of goodness.

A game that relieves me of being aware of life's moral complications isn't moral at all.  It's a kind of lie.  On the other hand, a game that has troublesome subject matter -- an exageration of the bad impulses within us (or, at least me), and reminds me to be aware of them, to see them in others, is a very moral game.

I think this is why people are referring to what's going on with the players.  In one kind of game, the PCs may be doing "heroic" acts -- while the players get to be asleep at the moral wheel.  In the other, the PCs may be horrific, but the Players are having their moral nerves pricked -- and that fresh awareness is apparently refreshing.

Best,

Christopher

[Brennan Taylor]

I've often had this problem with this presumed "heroic" nature of D&D*.  One slaughters and steals, amasses the ability to slaughter and steal more, every once in a while with a plot line that justifies slaughtering and stealing for the sake of goodness.

This is interesting, because I think it is absolutely true. This sort of thing came up the first time I played Burning Wheel. The setup was very middle ages, with nobles and a church as the ultimate authority. We were investigating a supposed demon in a remote village. The demon turned out to be a fake: bandits pretended to be a demon to scare folks off, but the townsfolk really were worshipping some unorthodox god. Our characters overheard the villagers discussing our murder in their town hall, so we blocked all the doors and burned them alive.

Now, when I was playing this game, I was doing immersive role-playing. My character was a mercenary in the knight's employ, and went about the work of murder in an efficient and brutal way.

Afterwards, on Luke's web site, I mentioned our horrific action with some distaste, saying we had perpetrated a real atrocity in character. He mentioned that I was the first person to say anything about it. I think this comes, at least in part, from the role-playing mindset of "I win if I don't die." Our characters succeeded in avoiding harm, and they had the authority and the in-game moral justification for their actions. I was apalled by the events, even as I participated in them. None of the other players seemed to acknowledge this, however.

[Bankuei]

Hi folks,

I can see where Vincent is coming from this- but I can also see loser roleplaying as a catharsis and/or as a way of negatively expressing everything you DON'T like.  You can see the former in such activities as Carnivale, or revenge fantasies, so it makes sense that it would find expression in roleplaying as well.  The latter appears in all kinds of stories, from the enemy deities in religion and myth to classic tragedies where people bring about their own downfall.

I think loser play is fundamentally different based on where the group is coming from.  In catharsis, doing everything wrong is a freedom, a release, and the approval/reward is in being free of moral strictures, or free to flaunt them completely.  Grand Theft Auto comes immediately to mind.  In tragedy, you create the protagonist who will drive themselves to their own doom, and through it, you make a statement about those folks.  Requiem for a Dream is the movie that I think of for this sort of them.

Perhaps the difference between raw villainy and loser play is the amount of protagonization or self-inflicted deprotagonization of the characters.  A villain is empowered, the cartharsis or downfall comes from power.  The loser is all about disempowerment, the pathetic and petty nature of their goals and "power".  I could easily see this is where it either goes into the pity and human compassion Vincent mentioned, or just raw ridicule, in the form of mean humor that just likes to watch protagonists suffer(Ah, Charlie Brown...).

Overall, as players, you make statements on what you think pathetic, evil, or stupid is, as opposed to what you think heroism is.  D&D on the other hand, negates the concept of using morality as a statement device, as alignments are more boxes to be fit into.  System wise and soft techniques advised in general discourage alignment shift, and so, players are also discouraged from making those neat moral statements.  What would drive a Lawful character to break the law?  Where is that line?  At what point crossing it goes too far?  etc.  Stuff like Dogs in the Vineyard or HeroQuest work perfectly because the lines aren't drawn for you- you draw them yourself through play.  Likewise, loser play is all about drawing the lines of what you think all these negative "virtues" are.

Thoughts?

Chris

[Bill Cook]

In our first TROS game, my character and another came to a shipyard in the middle of the night on a horse-drawn wagon. A guard approached, and my friend drew his attention to a city map .. and then shoved a dagger in his throat. I was utterly shocked. I'd killed untold numbers of orcs and all manner of weird-looking monsters in D&D, but this, I couldn't handle. He was just some guy in a crap job trying to feed his family. And my "friend" murdered him, without hesitation, so we could plunder a local center for commerce.

In the Traveller game we played last year, my character came under fire from a security guard in the yard of an installation while fleeing a break-in. He took a knee and emptied his clip. The guard fell. My character got up, put in a fresh clip as he approached the body and put another round in his chest and face. Everyone was aghast. There'd been nothing but spy work up to this point, and now the ugly truth of being a field operative came out: killing is part of the job.

[Christopher Kubasik]

Hi,

Just so I'm not responsible for derailing this thread with inspiring people to post annecdotes about violent, if not murderous, behavior on the part of PCs....

My point simply stands like this: I think "loser" behavior is much more slippery to define than most gamers assume.  We have ides of "coolness" "strength" and "competance" -- but how limited or arbitrary are those definitions within the context of an RPG group.

This is a seperate point than Chris' imporant post above.  In Chris' post, one can choose to say, "We're going to go for the 'bad'".  I'm saying, I don't think many people even think in terms of good and bad when playing.  And this leads to complete loser play without anyone thinking about it.

Christopher

[clehrich]

You, the real person, have to cope with your own warped imagination using humor - and the coping is real. Playing kill puppies for satan is an exercise in self-discovery, and surprisingly, it's usually a positive one that I never would have anticipated.

In spite of being fairly extensively covered in the review, this is something I don't get.

You seem to be saying, that by playing a PC who treats the people below them on the pecking order in terrible ways, we learn to have compassion for the people on the ladder below us?

Actually, I think you're missing something very fundamental about kpfs.  See, if these guys were really the completely evil horrors they think they are, they wouldn't be losers.  Demons, for example, aren't losers.  But if these guys do demon things, they're scabbing on the demon union and the demons come and kick their ass.  These guys are just losers.  Pathetic losers.  I mean, the best they can do is kill puppies.  Why?  Because they're losers.  And when it gets right down to it, if you read a bunch of actual play for this game (I always do because they're hysterical and I'm a sick freak), you start noticing something: at a certain point, killing puppies just becomes a pointless, meaningless routine.  These guys aren't even creative about it -- they just kill puppies.

Allow me to quote some of Vincent's elegant, refined prose (warning -- inappropriate language alert!):

so that's gerald stebbins and let's face it, the guy is not a charmer.  he's funny looking, weasely, he's got no dignity, and his breath is for fuck all. but like pretty much everybody, even ghouls, he's got a few friends (including your pcs). they're people who maybe just feel sorry for him, or maybe owe him one from back in the day, or hell maybe actually kind of like the guy. i mean it takes all kinds, right?

and he's not a bad friend, not at all. sure he calls you for help, and says he'll make it up to you and never does, but he's always so genuinely grateful that it's hard to hold a grudge. he's loyal and he won't make excuses when you ask him for stuff, if he can he will and if he can't he really feels bad about it. he won't fuck you up the ass with a sharpened screwdriver as soon as you bend over, not like some people. you could do worse.

anyway, he's having his thirtieth birthday party and he's inviting all his friends. it's like eight people and he's having it on a thursday night so it won't conflict with anybody's weekend. he's saved up and booked the banquet hall at the motel 6 off the pike, you know he's been planning it for a while because he doesn't have much to spare. (he has a job sweeping up at feeney's funeral parlor, of course). he's borrowed a cd player (maybe from one of your pcs) and checked some cds out of the public library. he's even shoplifted a box of little girls' birthday party invitations and carefully written in his name and the time and place.

your pcs will break his pathetic ghoul heart if they don't go. plus god damn it how many friends do they have, that they can just blow one off?

Now wasn't that lovely?

See, there are people lower on the pecking order than the PCs, though not many, but actually the PCs aren't necessarily horrible to them.  Hell, they save Gerald!  (Or try to, anyway -- that's the first adventure.)  What they're cruel to is puppies (and kittens, and so on).  And you know what?  Puppies are waaaay above these losers on the pecking order.

I think your question is whether there's value in wallowing in filth like this, and Ron's remark is on that point.  It's not your characters that you should have a problem with.  It's the fact that you, the player, the freely independent person, actually chose to say, "Hey yeah, I need some Evil, so I'm going to go blow up a bunch of kittens with this stick of dynamite I stole from the construction site."  What kind of sick person thinks of something like that?  What kind of sick person finds that funny?

You do.  (Well, not you maybe, but players of kpfs.)  And then they have to think about it, and live with themselves.  And that makes them think a little more clearly about the real world, and ethics, and being a halfway decent person, and why one's mind occasionally drifts off into deep, disturbing waters.  And the theory is that this is good for you, because at least you don't pretend you don't ever think like this.

Does that help at all?

[Vaxalon]

In winner roleplaying (such as DnD), we pull out our best qualities and watch them triumph over an external evil.

Whoa.

Is this true?

I've seen behaviors in D&D* (*and its children) that made me worry about the moral stability of the people playing the PCs. ...

In a Star Wars game played once at West End, a guy in marketing -- a Viet Nam vet -- slaughtered two hog tied technicians on the new Death Star.  He shocked everyone at the table.  In his view, he was making sure the mission succeeded.  Was his action a triumph of good over evil?

In this case, the quality (perhaps not his "best") that this guy was bringing out was, "I get the job done."

I am deliberately leaving out what might be called "perverse" gaming... one where you take a game that can be used for one of the three I list, and twist it around to be an expression of the opposite; such as Sabbat PC's in a Vampire game, or people using "Book of Vile Darkness" to make PC's in a DnD game.

I'm not talking about perverse gaming... what I'm learning (slowly) is that games like DSK and KPFS don't have to be perverse; there's another style there, and I'm trying to get my head around what it is.

[Vaxalon]

.... What kind of sick person thinks of something like that?  What kind of sick person finds that funny?

You do.  (Well, not you maybe, but players of kpfs.)  And then they have to think about it, and live with themselves.

I learned a cosmic lesson a long time ago, "You become that which you hate."  Now that's not to say that I don't hate anyone... but I like to believe that when I become aware that I have started to hate someone, I know what to do to expunge that hatred and replace it with something less poisonous to my psyche.

I guess that's one of the reasons I have trouble with all this.

And that makes them think a little more clearly about the real world, and ethics, and being a halfway decent person, and why one's mind occasionally drifts off into deep, disturbing waters.  And the theory is that this is good for you, because at least you don't pretend you don't ever think like this.

Does that help at all?

I think so... but let me ask this.

Is loser roleplaying (specifically, KPFS and DKS) founded primarily in characters who hate?  Not just other people, but themselves as well?

[clehrich]

Is loser roleplaying (specifically, KPFS and DKS) founded primarily in characters who hate?  Not just other people, but themselves as well?

DKS I can't speak for.  KPFS seems to me about people who hate themselves a great deal more than they hate anyone else.  Of course, they don't really know that, but then, they also think they're really cool.

Vincent, you want to chime in on this?  You're the puppy-killer extraordinaire, after all.

[lumpley]

Puppies characters are hated. It's a stat on the character sheet: "This many people hate me: __."

If they also hate - some do, but probably a minority - they hate ineffectually.

They lack the capacity for accurate self-reflection that would allow them to hate themselves.

-Vincent

[Vaxalon]

Yeah, I remember now.

Wouldn't you say, though, that the standard unenlightened response to hatred, is to hate in return?

I haven't played or read the game (a big handicap in this discussion, I know) but I find it odd that KPFS PC's aren't big in the hating department.

[jrs]

Ya know ... I've both read and played kpfs, and I don't recall anything about the player characters hating per se.  I don't think such characters have sufficient focus to hate, or as Vincent said, they hate ineffectively.  

Hate is too big a concept for your standard kpfs character.  Think smaller like ignorant and petty and overlooked.  We're not talking about clever villains here.  

Julie

Edited to correct bad spelling.