[Misery Bubblegum] If you REALLY loved me ....

[TonyLB]

That's sorta spiffy.  I particularly like the idea of adding it (for free) as a sort of provisional "This could be important" step, then inflaming it in more contested settings.  It lets people say clearly "I'd like to do this" and then find out through the system whether other players agree.

Now that also highlights the distinction between the social system and the non-social conflict system (in this case, I think, combat):  what I've been calling in my head "Truth" vs. "Dare."

It strikes me that much of the fun of teen stories, particularly teen comedies, is the way Truth (what you believe, what others believe of you) and Dare (what you achieve, what others do) intercut back and forth.  Tokyo student wants to get girl X to love him.  Girl X explains (off-handedly) that she could only have a relationship with a boy who goes to her college.  Tokyo student now must pass those entrance exams!  It is the test of love!  And if he doesn't, he has to lie about it, because ... God ... anything to defer the inevitable.  Maybe, somehow, he can lie for a whole year, then get accepted in the next set of exams and it will be as if ... oh, who's he kidding?  He's going to be found out.  We all know it.

So, here's some follow-up questions:

• Should a standard syllogism run "If you are a good person then you will try to defend Kinsey from Heather" or "If you are a good person then you will succeed in defending Kinsey from Heather"?
• Should a character get a bonus to succeeeding at a task if a large amount of their personality is riding on it?

[joepub]

In answer to

Should a standard syllogism run "If you are a good person then you will try to defend Kinsey from Heather" or "If you are a good person then you will succeed in defending Kinsey from Heather"?

I think that it is case dependant, because it depends who's making the syllogism.

In this case, Heather doesn't want anyone reaching out to Kinsey, so even trying to help Kinsey makes the impact wanted.

In the case of Tokyo Student, trying isn't enough to meet the objectives. He needs to succeed to get in.

In answer to

Should a character get a bonus to succeeeding at a task if a large amount of their personality is riding on it?

I think a lot of that rests on the question: Do you want a "cinematic" game, or a more realistic one.
If cinematic, then yes. Characters will have bigger highs, and bigger lows.

If you want a realistic one, then I say no. I don't get a bonus to winning girls over, even though that matters to me. Characters are like people in this game. Not heroes, just regular people.

Another suggestion: Maybe have a couple backgrounds/aspects/etc that players can say, "This action fits in with htis core value of mine. I'll check off a box to gain a bonus."
Is there anything like that in teh game? Could there be?

[Josh Roby]

Should a character get a bonus to succeeeding at a task if a large amount of their personality is riding on it?

I thought success and failure of the conflict resolution system put traits on the character sheet as it is?

[TonyLB]

I thought success and failure of the conflict resolution system put traits on the character sheet as it is?

Yes, but I don't see what you're drawing from that.  That doesn't (to my eyes) bear on how easy or hard success or failure are.  There are lots of ways those could be intertwined.

If I fail at (say) "Defend Kinsey from Heather" then I get a -2 to my "Good person" stat (or whatever).  Should that mean inherently that I am more likely to succeed at defending Kinsey?  Or should I have exactly the same odds to succeed at that as I would to succeed at "Cross the street," which is utterly meaningless to me?  If I've got limited resources that I (as player) can dedicate to any conflict then I will presumably spend more of those in the things that can impact me, and less in the cross-the-street variety ... so that would provide a middle ground where I get a bonus not directly because of my Stakes, but because those Stakes entice me to spend more of my resources.

Or, other options:  Do I get to choose how hard it is to defend Kinsey?  And if so, what drives my choice?  Do I get a bigger bonus to my "Good Person" roll if the difficulty of defending her is very great?

For instance:  Suppose I get three dice to roll on ... well ... anything.  And then I have a pile of dice which I can add to a roll, but I lose them when I roll.  That's the spendable resources.  Plus, I get to decide what number I need to roll higher than (possibly based on how many times I've deferred this conflict in the past ... is this the opening scenes of the movie, where I just show who my character is, or is it the climactic confrontation when everything's very difficult?) in order for a given die to be a success.  The higher that difficulty, the greater a bonus I get if I win.  Heather has the same options.

So I roll six dice at difficulty 4, and she rolls 3 dice at difficulty 1 ... I've spent more on the roll (resources I won't get back easily) but I'm also more invested.  If I win then I get +4 to my "Good person" dealy-bob.  If I lose then I only get -1 to my "Good person" dealy-bob.  But, of course, I'm much more likely to lose than to win, because Heather's difficulty is so low.

My question, overall, is how do teen romance/angst stories work?  Because they seem (at first glance) to be inconsistent, even within a given story.  Sometimes the character has to care deeply about somethng and fail anyway.  Sometimes, however, their passion guarantees victory.  And I don't know when it's "right" to apply one principle and when it's right to apply the other ... or, rather, how they interact with each other and balance.

[Josh Roby]

Yes, but I don't see what you're drawing from that.

That's cause I misread your question. >.<  I thought you asked 'Should a character get a bonus for succeeeding at a task if a large amount of their personality is riding on it?"  Damn prepositions.

That said, since the character will get a bonus for succeeding at a task, I'd be wary of giving them a bonus to succeed at that task, if only because this can be a source of rules-abuse.  (Get a bonus to succeed which earns you a bonus to succeed which stacks with the first bonus to succeed at a second conflict, which gives you another bonus to succeed...)  On the other hand, that sort of iterative progression may be exactly the engine you want to drive the game.

My question, overall, is how do teen romance/angst stories work?  Because they seem (at first glance) to be inconsistent, even within a given story.

I think it's a matter of pacing.  They are inconsistent -- the protagonist fails at the beginning and succeeds in the end, usually by doing the exact same thing.  What usually changes is why they're doing the exact same thing, or how much personal 'oomph' they invest into the exact same thing (because they've learned that it's important due to X).

Perhaps you should collect a list of titles and watch/read to suss out common tropes.  Just think: you can watch Pretty in Pink and call it 'research'.

On the other hand, the teenage romance/angst story is a different genre than the Buldungsroman, which is the asking-questions-about-yourself thing.  You might be getting some dissonance from basing off of two sources.  That wikipedia article sucks, so as an example, Weird Science is a whimsical teen romance right up until the tacked-on ending where Wyatt and Gary have to stand up to the zombies -- the writers apparently felt compelled to add a moral / character growth element (and did it poorly).

[MatrixGamer]

Interesting. The sylogisms (really stakes setting) is put forward by a player as a gambit. It sets up the conflict to be resolved, potentially very narrativist.

Your original question was about who should have the power to do this and when. The conversation then spoke a lot about Loser/Not Loser as a trait or attribute. I think this misses the original question.

For example: If I'm given the authority to make a statement (set the stakes) I want to be free to make it about anything (not just about specific traits/attributes), but if I'm given complete control then I may not use it well. I might set my fellow players up so I win and they lose - gamism kicking narrativism in the teeth - dysfunctional play real fast.

Arguments in Engle Matrix Games can be used to introduce stakes setting in games but they are not automatic. Arguments that build on past arguments or which take small steps have a better chance of happening than extreme ones. This "gamble" suggests that players moderate their gambits.

If you give any player the right to make an argument like this it pulls thinking away from the individual character to a higher level. At that point I'm using my character as a prop more than playing them. If players are given arguments every turn it does this even more. That's what Matrix Games do. The results can be fun are but not as personal.

Good luck with the approach - sounds very useful.

Chris Engle
Hamster Press = Engle Matrix Games

[TonyLB]

On the other hand, the teenage romance/angst story is a different genre than the Buldungsroman, which is the asking-questions-about-yourself thing.

Is it?  I'm not so sure.

The light-weight teen romance/angst story, sure.  But Rambo isn't the same genre as All Quiet on the Western Front either.  But if we look at Heathers, and Say Anything and Kare Kano and Fruits Basket and the like ... these are stories of discovering yourself through others.  Now that's not exactly the same as a Bildungsroman either ... a lot of those stories are pretty heavily introverted.  But it's certainly a subset of the "asking-questions-about-yourself thing."  The distinction is of whom you're asking the questions.

[Josh Roby]

Does Misery Bubblegum work to emulate the light-weight stuff, too?  I'm personally not sure what the goal is, so I ask for clarification's sake.

[TonyLB]

Prrrrobably not ... but I'm not honestly sure.  I think the difference is going to be in the questions that people originally ask, and how seriously they take them.

Like, if players go around the table and ask questions like "Am I ready for sex?" and "Am I a good person?" and "Am I happy?" and "Am I important to anyone?" and then they deliberately drive scenes that make those questions real and non-trivial ... well, I don't think the result is going to resemble Wierd Science very much.

If they ask "Am I a geek?" and "Am I as cool as I think I am?" and then they drive scenes that pretty much make those questions trivial (i.e. provide a clear, pre-existing answer without examination) then I suspect you can get something very much like Wierd Science indeed.  But that's not what I want.

Still, if people decide not to put real issues on the line, I'm pretty sure I can't force them.  Shallow comedy is such an easy defense mechanism, after all.

[Mark Woodhouse]

I'm going to suggest something, Tony. Play some PTA. No, play a bunch of PTA. Because the deeper you get into the "what is the essence of the teen drama" question, the more I think some fieldwork is necessary. PTA ought to work as an engine for creating these kinds of stories. Does it? What things happen in play that feel like they need more system support to really hum?

My intuition is that this is an incredibly tricky genre to make work as a game, because it's SO artificial. Why don't these characters solve their problems and get to the Happy Ending in the beginning? Because it's not time yet. Why do they suddenly become able to do so after X episodes? Because it's Time. I think you CAN make that work as a game, but it's going to need some really aggressive management of pacing.

[Sydney Freedberg]

Why don't these characters solve their problems and get to the Happy Ending in the beginning? Because it's not time yet. Why do they suddenly become able to do so after X episodes? Because it's Time.

But in all the really good stories in this genre, it's not just "oops, we're at minute 80 of a 90-minute movie, better have the protagonists succeed," it's 1) try and fail 2) change as a person 3) try again and, as a result of the change, succeed.

Which brings me back to

Should a standard syllogism run "If you are a good person then you will try to defend Kinsey from Heather" or "If you are a good person then you will succeed in defending Kinsey from Heather"?

I'm a little uncertain here, but I'd suggest these stories mostly operate by Yoda-logic: "Do, or do not. There is no 'try.'" The difference between the initial failure and the ultimate success is not merely doing the same thing better; in some crucial way, the internal change means your second try is at something entirely different -- even if it looks like the same activity. You start with "try to win the Big Game, and fail," but you don't go to "try to win the Big Game, and succeed"; you go to "try to prove yourself worthy to your love interest/estranged father/hardbitten couch, in this particular case by winning the Big Game, and succeed." You go from "try to keep my cool and be unfazed by Heather's bullying, and fail" to "try to protect Kevin from Heather, in this case by keeping my cool and being unfazed by Heather's bullying, and succeed." You go from "try to defeat Darth Vader in single combat, and fail" to "try to defeat Darth Vader in single combat, to save my sister and maybe even my father." You go from "become a person I feel good about being, and fail" to "become a person who does some specific good thing for someone else I care about, in the process becoming a person I feel good about being, and succeed."

In other words, the thing you cared about so much at the beginning doesn't matter so much anymore, because you've outgrown it, and it's been subsumed into something greater than itself or yourself. You only get what you wanted when you stop trying to get it. ("He that findeth his life, shall lose it; and he that loseth his life for me, shall find it." - Matthew 10:39).

[TonyLB]

It's interesting ... that sounds like a series of examples of the difference between Task Resolution and Conflict Resolution.

"Okay, yes, you could name 'Defeat Darth Vader' as your stakes ... but think about how different it feels if you name 'Show that I am a Jedi' as your stakes, and defeating Vader or choosing to be defeated by him are both just ways you pursue those stakes."

[Josh Roby]

A potentially useless observation: all of Sydney's examples are selfish at first and selfless when successes.  Is the difference that at first the character is an individual unconnected to society and in the end they are socialized and taking their place as members of a community?

[Sydney Freedberg]

Tony: I hadn't thought of that. Hmmm. Well, at one point you did propose a system for this game that hybridized Task and Conflict such that you could win at one and fail at the other.

Joshua: Yes! I was struggling to think of any way to mechanize my logic, and I think connectedness is the key, because the internal change that makes you grow up is something that makes you less focused on internal change -- adolescents are self-absorbed, (functioning) adults are not. To make this a mechanic, perhaps you could give some kind of bonus or superior power to any goal that's focused on another person rather than yourself (perhaps because you get to tap resources on the other person's character sheet you couldn't access when you didn't care about them so intensely?). Now, whether your goal is about helping or hurting that other person is your big (Nar) choice that says what kind of person you've become.

[TonyLB]

Sydney, Joshua:  Does Emma, who starts off as oriented completely on helping others and her community, and then gradually learns the importance of listening to her own desires and needs as well, fit this mould?  I'm honestly not sure whether I think she does or doesn't.  It's just the first example that leapt into my head as being confusing under an otherwise very enticing pattern.