Early game idea, but: Avoiding Derivation?

[TomTitTot]

I've been feeling somewhat inspired to finally try designing an RPG I've had kicking around in my head for a few months. Right now it's extremely sketchy but here's what I have so far...
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The Hammer Falls, a game of Dystopia

Every player has a protagonist, and one of the most important qualities that define these protagonists is the element of the Dystopia that they will come up against - for example, the Artist could be up against state censorship - but for added punch, another player may be asked to choose this element. I like the idea that your straight-laced businessman might unexpectedly come up against sexual oppression, or censorship, or something that seems less obvious but could lead to very interesting stories about people, which is what I want this game to focus on.

Every protagonist has an antagonist controlled by another player (maybe the player that defined your oppression?), although this element needn't be an individual or even directly opposed to the protagonist. For example, my secretly dedicated resistance fighter who lives a double life with his wife and kids could have "family" as his antagonist. This antagonism could manifest in a number of ways, from "Make him want to give up the fight and settle down" to " Make him realize he's trying to fix the world because he's scared of fixing his marriage" or something like that. The Artist's antagonist could be drug addiction, or his agent trying to make his work marketable, or time (like maybe he doesn't have much left? Cancer or inevitable death or something?). I haven't yet decided if the antagonist should make this character-defining trait open knowledge or keep it secret, or if maybe a mechanic should be introduced whereby partway through the narriative it's revealed.

Devices to assist the story are difficult for me to define, so excuse me if it's unclear. Basically there is a pacing mechanism, perhaps at the beginning of the game every protagonist is given six tokens. These tokens are scenes, but also the ability to purchase narriative control, so that after your first scene you give one token to your antagonist, so that control gradually slips away and your antagonist is more capable of making narriative decisions that affect your character. There are some scenes that don't require you to pass a token, such as your opening scene. Around the halfway mark (after three scenes in this example) your protagonist has a no-pay scene where he or she crosses a threshold - this is where Winston Smith and Julia go to O'Brien to join the resistance, for example.

Games are designed to be brief, one session usually, although it should be possible to play games that run for a few sessions. At some point, which I want to be partially gradually progressed but with slight random variance, the Hammer Falls. This is the climax, where the thought-police arrive in the apartment, or where the Presence appears to everyone (That's NIN's Year Zero setting, which was my primary inspiration for this game) and things end. Every protagonist gets one scene to resolve their story, showing them during or following the climax.

So, anyway, these are just my opening thoughts. I'm going to be reading a few dystopian novels again, trying to get into the feel of it.

One of my major concerns here is that I don't want my game to be directly derivative of other games I've enjoyed. I don't want this to just be like Shock with tighter focus and optional rules. I want rules that incentivize or at least encourage character and story considerations, and allow us to cleave reasonable close to the function and common thread of Dystopian fiction.

Anyway, thoughts and suggestions are very welcome.

[Ken]

Hi-

This forum works better if you bring specific questions about the project you're working on. Revealing your game synopsis and asking for opinions usually doesn't get the designer the kind of useful feedback they are looking for. One exception, in my opinion, is the Power 19 tool where you answer 19 questions about your game; this usually sparks discussion (you can find the format by searching this thread).

As far as being derivative, thats a tough one. I've been working on a super hero game for a while now and find that to be one of my biggest challenges. My advice, and I give this piece a lot, is to take your major inspiration ( in this case, Dystopian fiction) break down the common elements that make these stories part of a unique genre and turn them into game mechanics; build rules that simulate them, name stats after them, whatever. Use this as the guiding light to make your system, and you may find yourself going in a totally original direction from other rpgs you fancy.

I think most designers are trying to build the game they would love to buy and play. Its probably not uncommon that a designer is inspired by the qualities of other game systems they like (or by features they don't like) and this may show in their work. I don't really catch alot of that vibe here, but I've seen a little of it. Personally, I try to focus on what I want my game to do first, then worry about how it does it, later.

I like your idea, looking forward to hearing more, & post any questions as they come up.

Take care,

Ken

[Chris_Chinn]

Hi,

Never worry about being derivative.  Period.  Every game is derivative- including white box D&D or Chainmail if you want to go back that far.

As you work on your game, you're going to make design decisions about what you want and don't want, and naturally you're going to find bits and pieces you might borrow from one game or another.  And sometimes you're going to make something that's an improvement on something before, and maybe along the way you'll come up with something no one has done before.

If you're concerned about the game being too much like Shock, ask yourself what Shock does, or doesn't do that makes you want this to be it's own game.  It's a useful way to use a game to help you gauge your own design goals.

Chris

[TomTitTot]

Thanks for the feedback, guys. So, as Ken reccommended, I have some questions relevant to my game.

1. Is it particularly confusing to have slightly different rules for one-shot and long-term play? Because I have an idea that each Protagonist has "Ideals" that are binary in short play, and numerical in long play. Ideals (as they currently exist) can be risked to turn around the power dynamic between Protagonist and Antagonist. Ideals can be lost if you risk and fail, in short play they are just gone, but in long play they have a rating that is gradually eroded. Does that sound fairly straightforward?

2. I'm wondering how people feel about incentivizing handing elements of the character to other players? For example, you can decide what element of the Dystopia your character is most opposed to, but if you allow the character playing your antagonist to decide, you're given an additional narraitive token or some such thing?

3. In thinking about the general creation of the background setting (color? Not sure which term to use here) I think each player can define one element of the Dystopian "government" or whatever force oppresses the Protagonists, and one peripheral fact about the setting, such as wether or not there is a Resistance, global situations, other changes worldwide, etc. These can be doubled for a small group. Does this seem workable? (undoubtedly I will change my mind later and refine this, but I just want a little framework for now.)

[Ken]

1. Is it particularly confusing to have slightly different rules for one-shot and long-term play? Because I have an idea that each Protagonist has "Ideals" that are binary in short play, and numerical in long play. Ideals (as they currently exist) can be risked to turn around the power dynamic between Protagonist and Antagonist. Ideals can be lost if you risk and fail, in short play they are just gone, but in long play they have a rating that is gradually eroded. Does that sound fairly straightforward?

Not really, as long as you make the difference clear in your rules. Personally, I think its neat to have an abbreviated rules set for short-run games.

[/quote]

2. I'm wondering how people feel about incentivizing handing elements of the character to other players? For example, you can decide what element of the Dystopia your character is most opposed to, but if you allow the character playing your antagonist to decide, you're given an additional narraitive token or some such thing?

3. In thinking about the general creation of the background setting (color? Not sure which term to use here) I think each player can define one element of the Dystopian "government" or whatever force oppresses the Protagonists, and one peripheral fact about the setting, such as wether or not there is a Resistance, global situations, other changes worldwide, etc. These can be doubled for a small group. Does this seem workable? (undoubtedly I will change my mind later and refine this, but I just want a little framework for now.)

I think that these are both good ideas. Anytime players are allowed to share in the ownership of a game, it forms a vested interest in game events
and reduces the chances of someone zoning out or just kind of sleepwalking through a campaign. Its also cool to have someone who is not yourself apply their perspective on their fellow players and your game setting.

Interested in hearing how this works out.

Take care,

Ken

[TomTitTot]

I seems that my game concept lacks reward systems - for example, since a Player has to hand over a Token after every scene (bar a few), it's almost as if there's a punishment for play, which I don't want to be the case.

On the other hand, your Antagonist character is given more ability to influence events as the games wears on, so that could be seen as some sort of incentive.

Is this enough, or would you, as a player, need more?

[Ken]

I seems that my game concept lacks reward systems - for example, since a Player has to hand over a Token after every scene (bar a few), it's almost as if there's a punishment for play, which I don't want to be the case.

Now, the way I read your introductory post, these tokens are also used to take narrative control over the game. Does this reduce you token pool, inhibiting you from paying your token between scenes? Or, is your current token rating the number of times you can assert control over the story, per scene? (I like the latter one better.) Given the potential for a bleak outcome in a dystopian campaign, I don't think this is really a disincentive; just the price for playing the game. Your mechanics do a very good job of simulating the downward spiral a character is going to suffer, as their antagonists slowly overpower them in the game (physically, mentally, socially, psychologically, etc). I think that is very cool.

I don't know that I see it has punishment; its the natural progression of the kind of story you want to run. People who get your concept will get the rules mechanic. If you're worried about this, maybe you could rule that you only loose a token if you've use one (or more) during the previous scene; here players can abstain from turning narration in their favor to rob their antagonist of the same ability later down the road. Or, maybe you could allow characters to loan their tokens to each other; sorta sacrificing their shiny outcome to help another attain theirs. Either way, this is cute mechanical way to control how the characters eventually loose ground to the forces against them. Keep it up.

Take care,

Ken

[TomTitTot]

Now, the way I read your introductory post, these tokens are also used to take narrative control over the game. Does this reduce you token pool, inhibiting you from paying your token between scenes? Or, is your current token rating the number of times you can assert control over the story, per scene? (I like the latter one better.)

Yeah, that's absolutely what I was going for - your tokens return to the number they were at when the scene began minus one. (Unless it's a special scene, such as the first for your character, or one of the turning point type of scenes.)

Given the potential for a bleak outcome in a dystopian campaign, I don't think this is really a disincentive; just the price for playing the game. Your mechanics do a very good job of simulating the downward spiral a character is going to suffer, as their antagonists slowly overpower them in the game (physically, mentally, socially, psychologically, etc). I think that is very cool.

Thanks! I was very much shooting for that, but wasn't sure if it simulated well or not. I'm working on a mechanic to risk character hopes and ideals in order to mitigate failure, temporarily raising your number of tokens.

I tend to see three types of endings to games run with this system: tragic, pyrrhic victory, and uncertain. There's never going to be a straight-up happy ending to a Dystopian game - it's just the nature of this sort of fiction.

I'm concerned about the conflict resolution system, because I'm torn between tokens allowing players to simply spend for narrative control, or a slight introduction of chance, like every token translating to a fudge die to resolve narrative conflicts. There has to be an element of chance somewhere for the aforementioned "risk hopes and ideals" system to be implemented, and the risk system is pretty important to this game, I think. Need to sort this out in my head. Fudge dice might be too chancey.

I don't know that I see it has punishment; its the natural progression of the kind of story you want to run. People who get your concept will get the rules mechanic. If you're worried about this, maybe you could rule that you only loose a token if you've use one (or more) during the previous scene; here players can abstain from turning narration in their favor to rob their antagonist of the same ability later down the road. Or, maybe you could allow characters to loan their tokens to each other; sorta sacrificing their shiny outcome to help another attain theirs. Either way, this is cute mechanical way to control how the characters eventually loose ground to the forces against them. Keep it up.

Excellent ideas there. The no affect/no pay one seems very solid. In fact I decided before to allow characters with the same Hope/Ideal to lend tokens to one another, but it started to get a bit muddled in my head, and I decided against it. You put it well, however, so I'm going to take another look at it.

I really appreciate all of your help and feedback, Ken. You're really helping spur me on, and making me solidify my ideas as I discuss. Thanks so much.

-TTT

[TomTitTot]

Things have come along hugely. Game structure is pretty well finished, conflict resolution just needs polishing, and endgame mechanics are exciting me. However I have a couple of questions that are rattling around in my head before I start typing this down in a coherent, readable fashion.

1. I'm having some difficulty with the group Dystopia Creation. I'm torn between

a) Leaving it to discussion with the group, basically freeform and rule-less
b) Giving a small incentive to each player for a contribution or two, helping buy-in, but not structured beyond that, or
c) A questionnaire or flowchart-style Dystopia Development, where each player in turn or through a simple mechanic determines an element of the setting.

Which would appeal most to you as a player? Why?

2. Currently, characters don't need more than two or three qualities on their sheets (an Ideal and one or two Hopes). I'm concerned that such a low-detail character definition on the sheet will rub some players the wrong way, but I also feel that any more information would just be superfluous.

Would that sort of sheet be off-putting for anyone?

[Ken]

1. I'm having some difficulty with the group Dystopia Creation. I'm torn between

a) Leaving it to discussion with the group, basically freeform and rule-less
b) Giving a small incentive to each player for a contribution or two, helping buy-in, but not structured beyond that, or
c) A questionnaire or flowchart-style Dystopia Development, where each player in turn or through a simple mechanic determines an element of the setting.

Which would appeal most to you as a player? Why?

Personally, I would lean more towards b, with maybe an optional light mechanic as described in c. I think player ownership in a story is a great way to insure interest by all involved. Its possible that not everyone who plays your game is going to be up to the challenge of contributing to the dystopian background, so a fallback random generator (or whatever) may be a good idea; also, some groups may prefer the challenge of adapting to a complete random setting.

2. Currently, characters don't need more than two or three qualities on their sheets (an Ideal and one or two Hopes). I'm concerned that such a low-detail character definition on the sheet will rub some players the wrong way, but I also feel that any more information would just be superfluous.

Would that sort of sheet be off-putting for anyone?

That sounds like a perfect fit for a story-driven game like this. Making the characters interesting definitely seems more necessary than making them strong or fast or combat effective (like in other games).

Glad you are making progress, and take care,

Ken

[David C]

Avoiding Derivation

I think the best way to avoid derivation is don't copy ideas. For example, if in their work, they use dark elves that live underground and are evil, don't have underground dwelling dark elves. However, maybe you have a race of stonemen that live underground. The distinction between "copying" and "creating" makes itself clearest when you find yourself getting carried away by your own ideas (creating) or if you find yourself repeating more and more themes from the other game (copying) because you've locked yourself in.

The next piece of advice I have to give is, the more you work on it, the more your ideas will take over and less of a shadow of what you started with will remain.

[Robert Bohl]

I, too, would encourage you not to worry about being derivative. My game started out as an atrocious Frankenstein's monster of mechanics from a bunch of games I like, and playtesting whittled away the extraneous bits, and caused some deeper fundamental changes which made it something I can call unique without wincing too much.

For question 1: I would probably design long term play rules, then explain how to change them for short term play (or vice versa). However, I don't think it's a problem really to have rules have multiple interpretations.

Question 2: Incentivizing through other players is very cool. It's quite exciting as long as there's strong guidance from the rules text to pay attention to the Flags on the character and to be flexible with regard to what they want their characters to be capable of. I might split the person who comes up with the Incentive and the one who plays antagonist.

Question 3: I'm doing something like this in Misspent Youth so I certainly advocate it.

One other thing: economies (like your token system) are extremely hard to get right. I'm not advocating you drop it but I wanted to sensitize you as to how difficult it can be.

Second set of questions:

1: I'd recommend making adding to the world a requirement. Also perhaps reward people when they invoke an aspect of the world.

2: Primetime Adventures has 4 game-mechanical things that are constant on your character sheet and that works just fine.

[Ken]

One other thing: economies (like your token system) are extremely hard to get right. I'm not advocating you drop it but I wanted to sensitize you as to how difficult it can be.

Robert-

In an effort to better help Tom, could you go into more detail on your opinions here? I'm interested, too.

Thanks,

Ken

[Robert Bohl]

One other thing: economies (like your token system) are extremely hard to get right. I'm not advocating you drop it but I wanted to sensitize you as to how difficult it can be.

Robert-

In an effort to better help Tom, could you go into more detail on your opinions here? I'm interested, too.

Thanks,

Ken

I'd be happy to but I'm really not sure what else to say. It's just that I've found, whenever I've tried to create an economy where certain things flow back and forth that it's been quite difficult to get the numbers right so you don't run out of stuff before you want to, weird log jams don't get created, etc.

[TomTitTot]

I'd be happy to but I'm really not sure what else to say. It's just that I've found, whenever I've tried to create an economy where certain things flow back and forth that it's been quite difficult to get the numbers right so you don't run out of stuff before you want to, weird log jams don't get created, etc.

This is oh so very true. Unfortunately I really think the token system is the way forward for the time being. In my earlier idea (tokens flowing from Protagonist to Antagonist) it wasn't as much of an issue. However, the complexity has increased due to wanting to support a wider variety of narrative conceits and final scenes. As a result, the token economy is being a pain in my arse. I'm ignoring it in favor of dystopia creation at the moment, but it's something that will need to be addressed.

Thanks for pointing it out though - I was a bit concerned it was just something I was doing wrong.

I've decided to provide a chart with optional rules for randomizing the setting, and am making slow but encouraging headway on that. It's also leading to some interesting conversations with friends about dystopian fiction, which is nice.

I certainly think that if contribution to setting-building is allowed it must be mandatory in some sense. I don't know how to explain this better, but if one player is allowed major input, they should all have to input a similar amount of the setting.

I'm trying to narrow down a half-dozen essential elements of dystopian fiction to aid in this, and I think it will help my thought process even if it doesn't get used in the game.