[Ends and Means] Managing Miscommunication

[Adam Cerling]

Thank you, everyone.

Regarding solving miscommunication issues, I'm leaning toward thinking it will be largely case-by-case, but I still might be able to wrap it in a "soft" system. Step 1: The Stagehand decides on the solution that requires the fewest people to adjust their SIS, Step 2: The Stagehand offers compensation in Plot Points to each person who must adjust, Step 3: Carry on... Something like that. Only not that, because it is too abusable.

Clyde, I totally agree that greater and greater trust issues occur as the game gets larger and larger. Those very issues have driven the design of many of my mechanics. I made it legal, for example, to freely give away your game currency -- because if that weren't legal, cheating players could gain an advantage by colluding to do it anyway.

So the trick is to address miscommunication in a way that doesn't make it profitable for someone to intentionally miscommunicate.

Andrew -- at the moment my design does seem to require Claus to call for a conflict. Like you, I've got my doubts about that, but it is part of a different question (perhaps for a different thread): How can Conflict Resolution work if there's information being kept secret from the players? Especially if that information would, if known, lead to immediate conflict?

[Callan S.]

Thank you, everyone.

Regarding solving miscommunication issues, I'm leaning toward thinking it will be largely case-by-case, but I still might be able to wrap it in a "soft" system. Step 1: The Stagehand decides on the solution that requires the fewest people to adjust their SIS, Step 2: The Stagehand offers compensation in Plot Points to each person who must adjust, Step 3: Carry on... Something like that. Only not that, because it is too abusable.

Your not going to decide? Whether A: The world is just used as inspiration for conflicts - nothing is agreed to have happened without a conflict mechanic being used or B: The real world is a conflict mechanic (if you can get away with the treasure, you do)

Basically people are going to pick the one that suits them best. Your example is one where two people chose the opposite one from each other, even though it was the same conflict.

How do you resolve who gets to choose it?

Although you could flip a coin. Actually that might be kind of neat, using a coin flip resolution to see which resolution system is implemented (of course if they both choose the same system, no coin flip).

[Adam Cerling]

Sorry, I thought I'd impied my answer somewhere along the way. Maybe not.

I choose A: this style of LARPing uses the physical world as an inspiration for conflict. (It is also a visual aid, a mechanism for framing scenes, a medium that facilitates large group interaction...) I enjoy the imaginative freedom this choice affords me.

But the physical world is not a conflict mechanic: there are better LARPs than mine for that.