Massive Internal Conflict

[mjbauer]

I'm an old-school, power gamer who has been out of it for quite a while and I re-entered gaming by joining a group that was playing a D&D 3.5 campaign. My last gaming experience was when I was 15 (20 years ago) and the more sessions of D&D I played the more problems I began seeing with it. I had always wanted to design and develop my own RPG from the ground up, and I saw this as my chance. My game design was a direct reflection of the things that I thought were wrong with D&D.

Now, I'm nearly 2 years into the development of the system & setting. I've spent hundreds of hours listening to gaming podcasts, making notes, writing and re-writing content, trying out different mechanics, reading through other game systems, reading blog posts, forum threads & articles and I'm finally realizing that all of the work that I'm doing on my game is mirroring the evolution of RPGs throughout the 20 years of gaming that I had been absent.

At least I can skip to the end and see what was the final outcome of this evolutionary process is, but this is where the problem comes. I'm stubborn. It seems like the current state of RPGs is heavily focused on narrative gaming, but I like rules. I like structure. I like fairness and balance. It seems like these things are frowned on right now, that the modern, enlightened game designer is above them.

I'm not completely against the ideas I've been reading, I actually think that many of them have incredible value. It seems like game designers have finally gotten to the heart of gaming and focused on why people game and what people want to get out of a Role-playing experience. It just seems at odds with my concrete way of thinking. I enjoy the game aspect of RPGs, not necessarily the story aspect. Is there a way to use the knowledge and work that exists now in the RPG community to direct the design of a game that is following out-dated game concepts? Am I just lying to myself? If I gave in to the narrative style of gaming would I find that it really is what I want? Am I really just trying to design a dice rolling video game?

I'm having a gaming crisis and I'm not sure what to do about it. I enjoy game design but constantly designing "new" mechanics to find out that they have been done (better) already is discouraging. Am I just walking down a well-trodden path and eventually I'll catch up with everyone else or is there still some validity to Gamist games?

[Amadeo]

I like Gamist games, my very own Biohazard Dawn game is gamist. Structure can be fun, and the thoeries and discussion that you've been reading up on needn't be at odds with a gamist agenda. Just because the "mainstream" of indie has gotten into a love of Nar doesn't mean other creative agendas aren't valid, everyone plays for different reasons. I like competition sometimes, and where would I be if all the games became Nar? So make your Genesys game, I want to play it, and if you ever need help let me know I'll be more than happy to chime in.

That having been said, try a Nar game before you shed the mortal coil, you'll see that it does things differently than gamist games, not worse not better, they cater to different groups. Sometimes I feel like playing through a story, other times I want to compare kills like Gimli and Legolas, all games have their purpose and no one agenda is more important than another.

At least, that's my opinion.

[JoyWriter]

If you wonder where the gamist RPG makers have gone, look on your console: Whenever I start designing a rules heavy system, I stop and say, why isn't this a PC game? The answer invariably is that I cannot program it, not that it is too flexible and so outshines the limitations of that medium. The only other reason I've found is "Because I'm bored of reading flat screens". As far as I can see, those games that fit most smoothly into our modern habits are those that take account of their natural medium: If their all about structure and pattern, they generally do best on computers, but those that are more chaotic or really rooted in a certain physicality, they work best as boardgames or rpgs. Chess for example is a game that straddles the two, as there is a certain niceness about moving the pieces about, but the rules structure is very well suited to computers.

That is why I think we are seeing a shift into computer rpgs, narrative ones and Larps, picking the right tools for the job.

Now I don't want to discourage you, I think that it is good to have games that mix and match between the still-forming categories, as I suggested with chess. But if you do make a game that does that, it should be pretty tight. People are getting lazy on maths, and expect lookup tables to come when they call. Making a rules heavy gamist tabletop rpg is more of an art than ever, because the quality on every side is up, and those who do it for nostalgia give design constraints that are hard to understand, let alone fulfil!

[mjbauer]

If you wonder where the gamist RPG makers have gone, look on your console: Whenever I start designing a rules heavy system, I stop and say, why isn't this a PC game? The answer invariably is that I cannot program it, not that it is too flexible and so outshines the limitations of that medium. The only other reason I've found is "Because I'm bored of reading flat screens".

I come up against this same (internal) argument all the time. If I could make a video game would I? Maybe. I don't really know. I like to think that my setting is more complicated than a computer RPG would be able to properly portray, but I'm not sure. I would like to assume that I prefer sitting around the table with friends rolling dice to sitting by myself in front of a computer, but I don't know if that's true either.

[chance.thirteen]

Note that many thigns aren't so exclusive. I play write games with heavy emphasis on rules to do things, details about how one thing is different from another (situation, characters, skills, equipment etc) yet the focus of game play is split between basic action and conflict, and trying to get across characterizations and stories about these characters in particular. Despite playing very combat heavy games, most of the memories people have, you couldn't imagine how it would have gone had someone been playign a differnt character, because character makes such an impact on what happens.

The absolute best idea I have seen come out of theory is being concious of what you want, of what the other players want, and being given examples of terms to help define thought about these topics, and examples on how to better enjoy play as a whole, in it's many forms.

[Callan S.]

Hi mjbauer,

I can relate to your conflict, to a fair degree. I think part of my own conflict is that I am a rules first imaginer - I use the rules options, then start imagining from the results (sometimes I imagine a bit before, but it's usually pretty minor). While, from what I've observed over the years and finally realised, most people in roleplay culture are imagination first. They imagine something and then pick and choose amongst the rules for ones which fit that, if any at all. And often enough they can't find rules that fit, even in (interestingly enough) in the newer indie games. They say the game system doesn't work or it gives bad odds for how things are supposed to go (ie, their imagination is supposed to come first).

I think roleplay is coming around to rules first imagining (not as in it's the only way to do it, but more asin imagination first is not the only way to do it). The recent threads on before and after traits are the germinating seeds of this cultural change. But it'll take a few years yet for the imagination first intertia of thirty years prior, to be stemmed. Till then if your a rules first designer, it's a desert out there. They'll call it a board or video game, not because there's an absence of room for imaginative effect in it, but because they would never lend their imagination to a rules first game. Of course it's just a board/video game, if they deliberately banish their imagination when playing it (or even just when thinking about playing it).

Since I could relate to what you've described, I thought you might be in a similar position. If not, just wrote this in case. Good luck, either way!

[Abkajud]

Hey, MJ! I think there's a world of difference between video games and Gamist RPGs. We all know that, and for me, it comes down to "Well, I'm not a computer programmer. What ideas do I actually have?"
For me as a huge fan of Nar, I know that computers don't quite provide the flexibility I'm seeking; that's true for any CA.
I think Callan's post reflects on the overwhelming Sim influence on our hobby, especially historically; this makes both Gamist and Nar efforts still a relatively new thing, and means that G & N are comrades-in-arms, of a sort.
"Balance" is a loaded term, with unclear specific meaning, but I assume it means "In the mechanics, there should be a set of options that are roughly equal in how much agency they afford, for the kind of endeavor the players engage in".
Thus, it's relevant to Nar as well - all players need to be able to make interesting, relevant choices, and the characters or whatever that they design to do that should all be roughly equipped.

This made me smile, in a sense of camaraderie:

At least I can skip to the end and see what was the final outcome of this evolutionary process is, but this is where the problem comes. I'm stubborn. It seems like the current state of RPGs is heavily focused on narrative gaming, but I like rules. I like structure. I like fairness and balance. It seems like these things are frowned on right now, that the modern, enlightened game designer is above them.

Real quick - let me say that, in my experience, the vast majority of Nar folks are NOT saying there's anything wrong with doing things differently from them; I think in a lot of cases, folks who do things in a more traditional fashion assume we must look down on them or dislike them for what they do, but aside from a few little jabs here and there (very few), it's a relatively poison-free atmosphere. At the Forge, mind you - I've seen so little Forge theory outside of this community and its friendly tentacles (Vincent Baker's site, f'r instance) that I can't speak to the rest of teh Webs.

If you feel like you've missed out on 20 years of design, I would say this to catch you up to speed: Ron and many others have said, time and again, that the absence of game mechanics does not equate with effective storytelling. That's what the Lumpley Principle is all about: "system" is the entire process that's happening at the table - the rules, the mechanics, the social dynamic, and how all of that melds together to create the way we play as a group. House Rules are a clear example of why this is true - the actual people playing have changed their understanding of the game, together, to accommodate something that works for them.
This also means that System, so defined, is extremely flexible. So be it; different people game differently.
But it also means that when you say "rules... and structure", you're pointing at a very specific kind of game out there - stuff that's heavy with Drama-based resolution, but lacks specific methods of going about doing that. Look at Dogs, Polaris, my game, and, I daresay, almost all Nar games, and you'll find that, whether Drama or Fortune (or Karma) is used as a resolution method, there is most certainly a structure to it.
Polaris is a great example - the use of structured Key Phrases replaces dice-rolling nearly entirely as a way of negotiating an in-game/in-plot conflict of interests. This is highly structured; but it does differ from the more Fortune-heavy traditional way of doing things.

Then again, I can see where you're coming from, and perhaps why you would see things (and describe them) in this way: Gamism is all about the Challenge, all about testing yourself and maybe even overcoming the other players. It's about winning and losing. When a game is balanced to offer story-agency equally, but not sheer power on an equal basis, that messes with Gamist potential. In Mask of the Emperor, for example, you can boil down Honor and Infamy to being different sources of power with different perks and limitations, but it's arguable that Honor, having more internal (rather than external) consequences for chasing down that path, is more "powerful". On the other hand, one of my players does everything she can to be Infamous, wanting nothing to do with Honor at all. A game's balance has a set of implicit choices shoved inside it, with the assumption that there's a particular mindset the players will bring to the table. That's what makes a game Incoherent, or a Hybrid, or dysfunctional: when those assumptions about what's important in play don't jive with the group or the game itself.

Um, kinda went on a tangent there, but my point is: us Nar folks know and care about balance, too. It's just a different kind. Could it be that an explicitly Gamist crowd has yet to really gel, the way we had a huge Sim crowd to start (the specifics of that are arguable, but let me be glib), and then the Forge became a haven for Narrativism enthusiasts. It could well be that the biggest audience of "dedicated" Gamism fans is still scarred and scared by overly Sim experiences with D&D, so takes refuge in video games.

I hope you find what you need, MJ. Don't lose hope!

- Abby

[mjbauer]

Thanks for the advice and encouragement everyone. I'm still trying to decide what to do next, but I'm feeling much better about things.

[Echolocating]

I'm new here, and arguably not that experienced with traditional table-top gaming, but from an awkward perspective... it sounds like power-gaming is more of a strategist's endeavor where as role-playing is more about being an actor / story teller. D&D seems to embrace both to appeal to a greater audience, but actually causes a bit a of rift in the process.... which means that there is a need for an RPG system that does one or the other; not both.

By taking the design to the extreme, you might be describing a niche product and that usually comes at the price of popularity. But in the end, you have to make something that appeals to you... or what's the point? If there's nothing out there that rocks your world, then design something that does. The people that end up appreciating what you've made will love it way more than something that sacrifices in order to appeal to the masses. Things that are popular are typically uninteresting anyway. ;-)

Good luck.

[Luke]

At least I can skip to the end and see what was the final outcome of this evolutionary process is, but this is where the problem comes. I'm stubborn. It seems like the current state of RPGs is heavily focused on narrative gaming, but I like rules. I like structure. I like fairness and balance. It seems like these things are frowned on right now, that the modern, enlightened game designer is above them.

Holy Baby Jesus, I'm almost insulted by this assertion! My life is a daily war against poorly designed imitations of My Life With Master* and Dogs in the Vineyard*.

Design your game for you, man. Design it hard and heavy. There's an audience for it out there, I swear. Believe me, if people play my freakish games, they'll play yours. The key though is to make the ideas unique, don't just regurgitate designs you've already seen and put new names on them. Really get in there and tweak the mechanics until they give you the results that you want!

-L

[mjbauer]

At least I can skip to the end and see what was the final outcome of this evolutionary process is, but this is where the problem comes. I'm stubborn. It seems like the current state of RPGs is heavily focused on narrative gaming, but I like rules. I like structure. I like fairness and balance. It seems like these things are frowned on right now, that the modern, enlightened game designer is above them.

Holy Baby Jesus, I'm almost insulted by this assertion! My life is a daily war against poorly designed imitations of My Life With Master* and Dogs in the Vineyard*.

Design your game for you, man. Design it hard and heavy. There's an audience for it out there, I swear. Believe me, if people play my freakish games, they'll play yours. The key though is to make the ideas unique, don't just regurgitate designs you've already seen and put new names on them. Really get in there and tweak the mechanics until they give you the results that you want!

-L

Hey Luke, sorry for the inflammatory comments. I was (and still am) going through a bit of crisis when it comes to my gaming philosophy. The fact that I even have a gaming philosophy is bizarre to me. I just like fun games, regardless of the style or medium and I guess I'm trying to figure out how I can translate that into the game I've been working on. "Fun" hasn't always been the goal, but I'm recognizing that in the end the enjoyment I get from playing it is really what matters. What do I consider fun? What makes those things fun? Are those going to be fun to others?

Maybe fun isn't the right word. Engaging? Compelling? Challenging? Nuanced? Those are all too vague to be helpful.

It's funny that you, of all people, should respond to this because one of my first instances of disappointment came when I found out about Burning Wheel's Scripted Combat. It is very similar to how I intended to do combat in my system, and I thought it was a pretty original idea. It got me wondering whether I should be designing a game or just looking for an existing system to apply to my setting.

After reading through a few games I found myself disappointed, not in the games themselves but in the idea of not creating my own system. I came to the realization that I enjoy making games and to me, that's the whole point of the exercise. I'm open to borrowing, modifying or even copying bits and pieces from other systems but wont be satisfied until I've created (or, at least, assembled) a game system that is exactly what I want.

I agree that I need to make this game for me but, hopefully I'll find that I'm not the only person who thinks it's fun. Knowing that someone else is enjoying something that I made sounds really satisfying. I guess that'll only be true if I'm proud of the work I do on it. 

[DanielM]

Hey Luke, sorry for the inflammatory comments. I was (and still am) going through a bit of crisis when it comes to my gaming philosophy. The fact that I even have a gaming philosophy is bizarre to me. I just like fun games, regardless of the style or medium and I guess I'm trying to figure out how I can translate that into the game I've been working on. "Fun" hasn't always been the goal, but I'm recognizing that in the end the enjoyment I get from playing it is really what matters. What do I consider fun? What makes those things fun? Are those going to be fun to others?

Maybe fun isn't the right word. Engaging? Compelling? Challenging? Nuanced? Those are all too vague to be helpful.

It's funny that you, of all people, should respond to this because one of my first instances of disappointment came when I found out about Burning Wheel's Scripted Combat. It is very similar to how I intended to do combat in my system, and I thought it was a pretty original idea. It got me wondering whether I should be designing a game or just looking for an existing system to apply to my setting.

After reading through a few games I found myself disappointed, not in the games themselves but in the idea of not creating my own system. I came to the realization that I enjoy making games and to me, that's the whole point of the exercise. I'm open to borrowing, modifying or even copying bits and pieces from other systems but wont be satisfied until I've created (or, at least, assembled) a game system that is exactly what I want.

I agree that I need to make this game for me but, hopefully I'll find that I'm not the only person who thinks it's fun. Knowing that someone else is enjoying something that I made sounds really satisfying. I guess that'll only be true if I'm proud of the work I do on it. 

Here's what I'm thinking: You're going about everything in the wrong order. You're writing things and then later reading things other people wrote. That's backwards. You can't build new things without understanding everything that's been written before. Read other people's RPGs. Read the good ones and the bad ones. Read the ones that make you physically angry. Read the ones that don't make any sense. Understand why you like what you like and why you dislike what you dislike. Play a lot of them. That's the only way you can write something new and original.

As for the validity of gamist games, I feel that there's a 900 pound gorilla in the room: Dungeons and Dragons. The latest edition of D&D is barely an RPG in the traditional sense, and more a perfectly honed system for running really fun grid-based combats. I've seriously run adventures under 4th edition that were "There's some hobgoblins over there, by the lake. Go kill them" and the players said "Okay" and then there was a ton of combat and everyone had a real good time. I don't think in terms of purist gamist design anyone will be able to compete with them, especially with a small-shop indy game, so there's a tendency for people to call sour grapes and move away towards games that don't directly compete.

[Callan S.]

Hi again, MJ,

I came to the realization that I enjoy making games and to me, that's the whole point of the exercise. I'm open to borrowing, modifying or even copying bits and pieces from other systems but wont be satisfied until I've created (or, at least, assembled) a game system that is exactly what I want.

That seems a bit of a conflict of internal interests right there. If designing systems is the point, then you wont be happy if you stop designing systems. So you wont be satisfied if you ever created a game system that is exactly what you want, because stopping at that point wont satisfy you. And indeed it'd probably make the perfect game system for you seem imperfect, since it would mean you stop designing systems.

[Echolocating]

Hi again, MJ,

I came to the realization that I enjoy making games and to me, that's the whole point of the exercise. I'm open to borrowing, modifying or even copying bits and pieces from other systems but wont be satisfied until I've created (or, at least, assembled) a game system that is exactly what I want.

That seems a bit of a conflict of internal interests right there. If designing systems is the point, then you wont be happy if you stop designing systems. So you wont be satisfied if you ever created a game system that is exactly what you want, because stopping at that point wont satisfy you. And indeed it'd probably make the perfect game system for you seem imperfect, since it would mean you stop designing systems.

It's the journey, not the destination. ;-)

[Librabys]

mjbauer, I think you would love Aethera, lol. (it is really this kind of evolved d&d like i think )