A new face with a new game

[Valamir]

Hi,
I've never encountered the idea of player rewards as opposed to character rewards.  I love it.  To me the strong point is that it will inspire the players by not binding their rewards within the scope of the game mechanics like character advancement does.

You'll find alot of that here.  That's sort of a Forge Hallmark.

Probably the biggest design direction you'll find at the Forge is in regards to rewards.  What game activities earn reward and what can those rewards be spent for.

Frex, as you know, D&D gives rewards (primarily) for killing stuff, and they use the rewards to make the characters more powerful so that they can kill more stuff.

All games have rewards like this.  These rewards define what your game is about.  You can spend all the flavor text in the world saying "my game is like this" but how you set up your rewards will determine how people actually play.

So, you may get alot of suggestions here about adding metagame story driving mechanics, but thats just a common theme found here.  What's REALLY being said is this "First thing, before you do anything, decide what your game is ABOUT, and plan on rewarding that activity."

In other words, FIRST: if you wan't your game to be about killing stuff, reward killing stuff, if you wan't your game to be about story telling, reward story telling, if you wan't your game to be about completeing missions and goals, then reward missions and goals.

SECOND: make sure that the use of the reward that you give, motivates more desired behavior.  In your game specifically: reward players for completeing missions, but make sure the reward you give ties into reinforcing that mission oriented behavior.

I've decided to add something like this to my game.  Stress like...I want to limit the scope of their influence.  I know this contradicts what I like about the idea but I have my reasons.

Granting power to players doesn't have to mean granting total power to players.  Most forms of "authoral" or "directoral" power are limited in some manner.

Namely I know that my players have all to human flaws and the mayhem which could ensue with unrestricted control over the storyline (shudder) (I don't care - your rich uncle did not just die and leave you a super-star destroyer!).

Don't overblow this fear too greatly.  The key here is to make sure all of your players are on the same page about what the game is about and what everyone wants to get out of it.  If you throw players into a new game with new powerful mechanics without any preperation, you're likely going to get them using those mechanics to play the way they've always played in your other games (which likely isn't what you want).  Be clear up front about expectations (often refered to as a Social Contract) and you'll find you're players are more likely to be cooperative than disruptive with the power you give them.

Bad example, I could have a lot of fun making them work to keep it; neh, heh, heh, heh (evil laugh).

That's the key.  This is exactly why you give players this kind of power.  Not so you can screw them over later, but so you know what kind of story they want to be involved in.  One of the most difficult jobs of a GM is to craft a story that's compelling to the players.  Often times the story seems great but the players just "aren't into it".

The best way to make sure the players are "into" your story is to let them choose some of the key elements of it.  By and large (unless he's just being a dick) if a player trys to introduce himself in command of a Star Destroyer its because he thinks that the type of story that could be told in that environment is more interesting than the one he's currently in.

Giving some power to the players allows them to signal to you what aspects of the game or story they're most interested in, rather than being at the GM's mercy in this regard.  Heck, some games around here (like Donjon) practically GM themselves.  With very little prep work, you're up and playing, and the players are coming up with their own plot complications and obstacles to overcome.

In my experience players will through nastier and more difficult complications at themselves then they'd be happy at me creating and throwing at them...because their complications THEY'RE interested in, not just complications that I'M interested in.

Its a very powerful tool.

What I'm thinking is to some how tie it back to the character history generation and allow them to pick personal events upon which we can hang new story ideas.  Influence without tyrany.

Here's a thought I had.  You had mentioned that the missions and goals are just set very informally and adopted by the GM.  What if that wasn't the case.  What if the missions actually had to be puchased with...I don't know...call them Goal Points, or something.

Things like "Material Reward", "Noteriety Gained", "Scope of effect", "Difficulty", "Expense", etc. would be determined in general terms.  For example if a player had a long term goal of becoming Mayor of Shineing Port...that would convey a certain level of fame and power, the scope would depend on whether Shineing Port was a village or a great metropolis, the Material Rewards could be great, and so on.

This might cost 132 Goal Points to establish as a goal for the character.  Certainly the character could have that as a goal without paying points for it, but the GM is under no obligation to set up adventures focused on it and the characters chances are no better than my goal to become President of the World.  But by paying the Goal Points, now you have a player defined story hook for the GM to begin building adventures on.

But...132 is a lot of Goal Points, more then what the player has.  The player can earn more Goal Points by completeing other missions.  Rescueing the Princess might be worth 32, Marrying a local heiress might be worth another 12, serving as the Constable of Shining Port could net another 20, and being elected to Alderman another 27.  Eventually the player accumulates enough to pay for his REAL Ambition...becomeing Mayor.

In this case having Mayor as a long term goal would cost nothing, it would merely serve as a signifier to the GM of where the player would like to get to eventually.  Buying a goal turns it from a long term goal to a shorter term mission...essentially telling the GM "start including stuff about this in the campaign".  Resolving the goal earns more Goal Points which then can lead to greater goals.

Anyway, thats just a half finished idea, but the point is players are rewarded for completeing goals, and their reward is the power to set their own goals for the future (rather than rely on GM set goals).  It feeds on itself and so the game becomes being about what the players want to accomplish with their characters lives (which could be anything) and the series of events they manufacture to take them there.

[Brian Hose]

Hi,
Valamir, that was great and there is a lot ther that I want to address but at the moment the only things keeping me awake (is that the sun?) are cigarettes and thy're not working any more so I'll get back to this tomorrow.. or today.. whatever...sometime soon.

May the schwartz be with you,
Brian.

[Lance D. Allen]

Well, though at first I was slightly annoyed to have two different games under discussion in this thread, with some of the points being addressed and the ideas being expressed, I don't guess I mind anymore.

First to answer Mike's points..

Yes, there is a difference, but it's not big or new. What EXP and CP have in common are that they are both designed to improve the character's power. The problem in rewarding with power is manifold. You inform the players that power is what they should be interested in, instead of the goals (goals simply become a means to power). And then there's the power curve problem where you have to make the foes tougher and tougher until the characters are offing gods. These things can be addressed, but they can also just be eliminated.

Well, I wasn't trying to say I was being innovative with the concept of Character Points. ::smirks:: But you do raise a good point. While characters should naturally raise in "power" as time goes by, not every reward should be a "power-up". However, I can't really think of a way to reward the player/character with anything other than points, stuff, fame/status, fortune, etc. Any concrete suggestions?

Fer real? Not to get off track, but by memorized, do you mean like D&D?

No no no. Not like D&D at all, really... Well, maybe the tiniest bit. The way it works is that characters have a Grimoire with all the spells they've been taught inscribed within it. They can cast the spells directly from the book, if they have access to it, or are able to look through it (middle of a melee is not particularly conducive to thumbing through a spellbook, for example) The spells they cast from the book are not necessarily memorized. Memorized spells can be cast anytime they are conscious (as there are no somatic or verbal components, though some require physical components) without resorting to the spellbook. For certain spells, this flexibility is vital, for others it is not so. As the character can only start out with a certain number of spells memorized, they will want to memorize more during gameplay, to increase their versatility.

Right, but again, they (stuff) are power oriented. Lots of woes go with "magic inflation". "Hey, anyone need a +2 Sword? Nope? Everyone's got better? OK, we'll just sell it at the next town." And what if character's don't want to be famous (or the player doesn't want the character to be)?

I can see your point here again. However, with magic being fairly common, it's not quite so big a deal, I think. As for fame, I would hope that the GM wouldn't "reward" a character with fame if that wasn't what he/she wanted. (Though I could definitely see plot twists with a character who wants to avoid fame suddenly being the hero of the populace...)

Metagame was just an idea. You're version sounds like Fame and Fortune Points from Top Secret. By limited do you mean they can never get any more? Then they are not rewards?

That is pretty much what I was considering, actually. A limited pool of points (say, 5) that can be spent at times of great need to elevate the character to truly heroic (read: superhuman) levels for a short period of time. I'm also considering the additional mechanic of having them be further limited in that, if they are ever ALL spent, the character MUST die within 1 game session of their reaching zero. This would reflect that all of that character's heroic deeds have been done, and that his lifethread has reached it's end. This would mean that the points would not be spent in vain.
Actually, though I was considering another reward mechanic which would only be invoked in very extreme cases. As an example, if the character risked their life and saved the rest of the party (or an entire town, or whatever) from certain doom, they would warrant regaining a point of Heroism. However, if I were to do this, the pool would still be unable to raise above a set amount (considering 5 at the mo').

He just means that after achieving a goal, the player would get to make up stuff related to the resolution. For example, if my goal was to kill Evil Fred, after doing so, I would get to narrate the results of cleaning up Fred's kingdom or maybe just his lair. The advantage of such a mechanic is that often the player will indicate through play where they would like to go next with their character's "story".

I could go with this, though unless it was the final thing a character did in the ongoing game, I would have to limit it to a few days of activity, to keep the continuity of the story intact.

All games have rewards like this. These rewards define what your game is about. You can spend all the flavor text in the world saying "my game is like this" but how you set up your rewards will determine how people actually play.

So, you may get alot of suggestions here about adding metagame story driving mechanics, but thats just a common theme found here. What's REALLY being said is this "First thing, before you do anything, decide what your game is ABOUT, and plan on rewarding that activity."

In other words, FIRST: if you wan't your game to be about killing stuff, reward killing stuff, if you wan't your game to be about story telling, reward story telling, if you wan't your game to be about completeing missions and goals, then reward missions and goals.

SECOND: make sure that the use of the reward that you give, motivates more desired behavior. In your game specifically: reward players for completeing missions, but make sure the reward you give ties into reinforcing that mission oriented behavior.

Damn good point.. Fact is, before I came here, I didn't even think about all of this stuff. I'm realizing I've further to go than I thought. (::bitter snarl:: Thanks a lot. As if I didn't have far enough to go already. ::winks::) I've been told, in a conversation with Jared of Memento-Mori, that my game has a strong Simulationist slant, and I can't disagree.
I'm thinking, after reading Valamir's post, of making the goal-setting mechanic a central concept in the game. Make the choosing of at least 1 primary long-term personal goal a part of character creation, and the completion of that goal means the retirement of the character. The goal could change during game-play, but it would help keep the games story-oriented and the stories at least partially in the power of the Players. Overall, I think it would add a decent narrativist element to the game, as well.
I doubt I'd go so far as to make the accomplishment of goals point-oriented, but it's an intriguing idea. Maybe Brian can make use of it, if it suits what he's looking for.

You guys are awesome. Keep up the topic, and I'll love you forever.

[Lance D. Allen]

It's not much, but it's here, finally.

http://members.aol.com/JohanusMorgan/Home.html

Use the link at the bottom of the site to e-mail me, or just post any commentary here. Thanks in advance.

Oh, btw.. Some of the images don't come up right the first time. If you right-click and select Show Image, it usually works to bring them up. ::shrugs:: AOL's webspace is kooky, but hey, it's free with the membership, so I might as well use it.

Oh, and ONE more thing..
http://members.aol.com/JohanusMorgan/CharSht.gif

If you go to this, you can get the blank character sheet. It won't do you much good without the rules (and it prints best IMO as a .bmp file) but it's there if anyone wants it.

[Lance D. Allen]

Hey Brian,

Rather than piggybacking off a thread which hasn't seen any responses in 2 weeks, it'd be wiser to start your own thread. My original thread here is dead, man.

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Lance,

Um, you're still going to finish and run Mage Blade, aren't you? And tell us how it goes? Inquiring minds are on your side.

I've split Brian's post into a starting thread of its own, with his permission.

Best,
Ron

[Mike Holmes]

Hey Ron,

Lance and I have been discussing heavily in PM, and from what I hear, he's got something coming along sooner rather than later.

Mike

[Lance D. Allen]

Well, I hope not to disappoint anyone, (though if I did, I'm flattered) but I won't be discussing Mage Blade on the boards again until I begin playtesting. I'm still following various conversations in a few of the folders, and incorporating any suggestions given to others that I happen to like. But overall, other than the points being discussed with Mike in PMs, I'm letting Forge involvement in Mage Blade lie for the moment. Rest assured though, that you will hear from me on Mage Blade again. The play sessions will be notated and kept chronicle fashion, with key points being thrown up for your edification on the boards. Also, once I'm certain I'm currently satisfied with the rules and setting, I'll post that up for you all as well.

Peace, and I'm off to bed.