Adversity: What's in a scene?

[TonyLB]

Okay.  It basically comes down to this dynamic which you (quite correctly) pointed out:

Thing is, the scene was, "Here's a scene with my spotlight character. Now, attack me." And we're like, "how, what's going on", and he was like "you know, whatever. I'm here, I'm open, I got debt, come and get it."

I look at that and I think "Yeah ... okay... if I feel like it.  But, honestly, why would I feel like it?"  The other players aren't obligated to follow the scene framer's intent, and if the intent doesn't grab them they won't and shouldn't.  Framing the scene is your best chance to sell the idea that attacking you is the most fun the other players can have in the scene.  If you let that chance pass you by then the other players are going to wander off and find something that seems more fun (which they may do by quickly ending the scene and letting the next person pitch something, or by creating and profiting from their own conflicts unconnected to the original intent of the scene).

I'll posit two possible scene frames:

• "I frame a scene in which I play Major Victory in his secret identity.  He is independently wealthy.  He's sitting in his mansion."
• "I frame a scene in which I play Major Victory in his alter ego, Arthur Knight.  He is hanging around with his millionaire friends when his social arch-nemesis, Randall Bleakly, starts dominating conversation across the ballroom.  Arthur makes his way toward the cluster of people who should be his sycophants, and hears that Bleakly is holding forth on some hippy nonsense about how Major Victory is an outmoded symbol of american cultural imperialism!"

My experience is that the first scene ends with me earning next to nothing, whereas the second scene ends with me rolling in resources.

When I get a chance to frame, I want to make the second kind ... but not out of a selfless obligation to my fellow players.  Rather, I want to do it out of a purely selfish desire to get the most out of my rare chance to frame the scene to my advantage.