I Made a Break-Through

[mjbauer]

Not in the game I'm designing, but in my understanding of game design in general.

It's like the light finally came on. I know this is probably just the basics to most of you, but this was quite a revelation to me:

The movement in game design is not towards narrativism but rather towards having a concise and focused system. The designer decides what he or she wants from the game and builds around that. This turns all of my questions as a designer around. Rather than creating causes and hoping the appropriate effects are produced, I should be focusing on the effects that I want and work backwards to understand how to create the cause.

Instead of saying "I want to make a game with robots and machine guns," I should be asking "What about a robot and machine gun game am I most excited about?" And then focus on how to best create a game that produces that excitement in others.

I've been asking the wrong questions and that's why anytime I ask for advice I end up with a barrage of questions instead. I haven't been approaching the game in the right way. I've been trying to force the type of system I'm most familiar with to fit a game that it may not be best suited for. 

Even though this will certainly set me back in my current game design, in the long run I think the game will benefit from it. I feel like I've made some progress.

[Lance D. Allen]

With only 47 posts? You're quick. I think at about that time, I was still trying to figure out how to cram every neat idea I encountered here into my game, without even questioning why.

More seriously, that is a very helpful realization. It's not helpful in all situations, such as where you start with a neat mechanic and you want to make a cool game around it, (Such as Alexander Cherry's Fastlane) but when you start with ideas about the fiction, then boiling it down to the important bits is a good way to do it.

[Daniel B]

:-) Congratulations

Even though this will certainly set me back in my current game design, in the long run I think the game will benefit from it. I feel like I've made some progress.

I think this is not only worthwhile, but critical. Also, as you suggest, I think people will be much more easily be able to answer any questions you may have from here on out.

Good luck,
Dan.

[Seamus]

I had this same revelation not so long ago. It really has helped my game design a lot.

[Callan S.]

Yay, throw off that causal yoke and embrace full authorship!!!

Speaking of authorship, that may be the next speed bump. As I see it, anyway.

And then focus on how to best create a game that produces that excitement in others.

How much, if at all, will you enable players to use the system to produce the excitement they want? Lets start with them having zero capacity to do so. That's completely constricting (I'm not eliminating it as an option in saying that, merely stating the case. Participationism is fine option to take). With the old 'creating causes and hoping the appropriate effects are produced' it actually reduced the constriction because you could only hope the results you wanted, would happen. I think this is what makes it hard to make the leap to effects first design, because at a default, the only way for players to play is to do it your way. And again, I am not knocking that. It's just that when players have invented in their heads that they have some galactic right to X amount of freedom, they then feel forced by this and chastise someone who was about to make the leap to effect first design.

As I see it, anyway.

Now, after first pissing off the idea of some galactic right to X amount of roleplay freedom, it can be stimulating if the players have some mechanical capacity to change the type of excitement the game produces. By how much the can change it? That up to you and how 'stimulated' you want to be. If not at all, then not at all. I think that right of designer authorship needs to be preserved, but perhaps typically isn't in this hobbies culture. Because it is compromising your artistic creation to grant other people the right to change the games excitement/main thing. And I'm not sure a default assumption of artistic compromise is healthy.

But should the idea of them changing the excitement to some degree, pique your interest, then you can explore 'what the players do'. Because if the players can actually do anything (beyond choosing their characters hair colour or whatever pointless stuff), then it will end up effecting what the games excitement actually is, if only in a little way.

I'm not sure how many would agree with that, at the forge, if any. But in case it does help you or other readers somehow, I just wrote it out.

[TheDeadlyPlatypus]

I've got to agree with that. The major focus of designing a game shouldn't be to force a character's hand. If you want to dictate a story, pick up a pen and write a story. If you want to design a game, then your aim should be to provide an environment and a ruleset that encourages player input. While you might think that a certain mechanic is neat, you should always step back for a moment and look at it from the player's perspective. Even if this mechanic seems novel to you, ask yourself these questions? Does it making the game easier to play? Is it streamlined? Is it easily understandable? And finally, does it enhance gameplay or detract from it?

Just my two cents.

[Callan S.]

Joe, thanks, but I was trying to argue against that. In a musical band, if one player goes and writes a song all by himself, it's still called music/making music. In roleplay if someone writes something that does not take input from others, it's called writing a book. It's immediately expelled from the hobby and forgoes that hobbies social support. There is no solo recource that has non compromised art, when in every other artform there is a solo recourse (well, everyone I think of has one. It seems like all of them do). The perception in the hobby as it stands is that it either has to be compromised art, or it's not roleplay at all. And I'm not sure continually compromised art is healthy.

So I would say to mjbauer, start from the idea of dictating a story. Utterly. Collaborate if you happen to want to, not because you have to if you want to keep your shiny roleplay badge.

[TheDeadlyPlatypus]

I suppose that's really a clash of philosophy. The stance that I have is that if you want to make mechanics, it needs to fit what you predict a player to try. Incorporating a shiny mechanic in the game that doesn't enhance gameplay is like hanging a stale car freshener from your rearview window. When creating mechanics, you have to try to account for what a player might want to do, not neccesarily what you think would be cool to do. You shouldn't want to bog yourself down with mechanics if you don't have to. It doens't matter what plans you make, what mechanics you put in, because a player is going to throw a wrench in. The short reason why is because that's one of the player's jobs: To screw the GM's plans. Just like it's the GM's job to try to kill the players.

Case in point:

My brother was running a group that I was in through a 2nd edition D&D campaign in the Underdark. He had conceived this elaborate mission for us to find a way into the fortress of an enemy house. He sent some assassins from the enemy house to make the trek a bit more colorful, but our priest cast Commune with Dead and asked him for the password into the fortress. After about five minutes of him swearing because we circumvented his entire adventure because of one tiny oversight, we proceeded to mount our assault on the enemy fortress. Long story short, we ended up murdering the house soldiers until we walked through an enchanted doorway that triggered the summoning of a T'anari.


So that my point isn't lost in the example, you should stray away from creating mechanics with a story in mind because more often than not, the players will find a way to muck up your best laid plans. At the end of the day, the game is supposed to be for everyone's enjoyment, and while there is much enjoyment to be had at your expense when the players circumvent your plans, it's much better if you don't end up feeling like you've wasted your time creating mechanics unless it's applicable to something that the players would want to do anyway.

Either way though, creating a story is one thing. Designing a mechanic to make the story playable is not artistic design, it's a practical design. Artistic vision has no place in creating a mechanic for something that is supposed to work for everyone. Mechanic creation needs to be a neutral process, not something implemented to force a player's hand.

... I fear that I digress a bit. My apologies.

[Seamus]

I could be wrong, but I don't think the OP is saying anything about restricting player freedom, or railroading them. It sounds to me like he is interested in designing mechanics that produce a flavor or feel. Personally I don't see anything wrong with this. Savage Worlds set out to make a game that felt cinematic and high energy, then they built mechanics that achieved that. Call of Cthulu tried to recapture the brutality, fear and madness of Lovecraft's stories. Their system was tailored to that setting. I would much rather play a game that has personality than one that tries to be everything to everyone.   

[TheDeadlyPlatypus]

That might be, it's just the way it appeared to me was that he was saying that player freedom should fall to the side for the sake of making something the way you want to. The whole thing seemed like he was saying that the players' wants from the game have no bearing on it because the GM is the one putting in the work to create it.

It comes down to this. It's a game. Games are supposed to be fun. If you don't give a player the freedom to get out of a game what they wan to, then they don't have fun. Stifling the potential for players to have fun for sake of artistic vision is counter intuitive and pretentious in this medium. If you want to focus on artistic vision without regard to forcing someone's hand, then you might as well be writing a story. If you're making a game forsaking the player interaction for artistic vision, it's nothing more than egotism.

[Lance D. Allen]

Uh, the original poster wasn't talking about GMs and players at all. He's talking about game design. He's talking about examining your goals and designing to meet those goals, rather than plugging in mechanics and hoping that they produce the kind of play he wants.

To put it another way, he's talking about the one shot, one kill school of game design, as opposed to the spray and pray school of game design.

Honestly, though I am neither moderator nor original poster, I think this thread has outlived its purpose already.

[Seamus]

That might be, it's just the way it appeared to me was that he was saying that player freedom should fall to the side for the sake of making something the way you want to. The whole thing seemed like he was saying that the players' wants from the game have no bearing on it because the GM is the one putting in the work to create it.

It comes down to this. It's a game. Games are supposed to be fun. If you don't give a player the freedom to get out of a game what they wan to, then they don't have fun. Stifling the potential for players to have fun for sake of artistic vision is counter intuitive and pretentious in this medium. If you want to focus on artistic vision without regard to forcing someone's hand, then you might as well be writing a story. If you're making a game forsaking the player interaction for artistic vision, it's nothing more than egotism.

I think we may be getting our wires crossed here. My interpretation of the OPs post was he wants to design mechanics to meet an overall feel. That isn't about freedom. Its about creating a system that produces flavor and style. every game does this to some extant. But many fail to consider how their mechanics impact the flavor. And that is what the OP was discussing I think. I can see what he means. Right now I am working on a Spy Game and Setting. Before I did anything, I sat down and asked, what are the basic elements of the spy genre. I made a list of things like Action, Suspense, Grit, etc. Ultimately I decided the system needs to be deadly, characters shouldn't be able to take a huge number of wounds, or it would be kind of silly. So I made gun combat extremely lethal. I also realized that things like tactics and position, should probably matter. So I designed my combat rules around those things. This isn't the only way to make a spy game. There are plenty of sub-genres within spy to handle other approaches. But this achieved the style I wanted for my game. PLayers who buy my game, will buy it because they want that style. I don't see how this impacts player freedom. Any mechanic you put in a game will restrict player freedom to some extent I suppose. The idea is to balance the need for players to do what they want, and have the game produce an overall feel and level of excitement that is fun.

[TheDeadlyPlatypus]

Uh, the original poster wasn't talking about GMs and players at all. He's talking about game design. He's talking about examining your goals and designing to meet those goals, rather than plugging in mechanics and hoping that they produce the kind of play he wants.

To put it another way, he's talking about the one shot, one kill school of game design, as opposed to the spray and pray school of game design.

Honestly, though I am neither moderator nor original poster, I think this thread has outlived its purpose already.

My response was to the comments that Callan was saying about player input being unneeded. And whether or not the original poster was talking baout GM's and players doesn't really have much merit, because when approaching game design, you need to look at it from a GM's or a player's point of view to make sure that the game you're designing is workable and enjoyable.

I think we may be getting our wires crossed here. My interpretation of the OPs post was he wants to design mechanics to meet an overall feel. That isn't about freedom. Its about creating a system that produces flavor and style. every game does this to some extant. But many fail to consider how their mechanics impact the flavor. And that is what the OP was discussing I think. I can see what he means. Right now I am working on a Spy Game and Setting. Before I did anything, I sat down and asked, what are the basic elements of the spy genre. I made a list of things like Action, Suspense, Grit, etc. Ultimately I decided the system needs to be deadly, characters shouldn't be able to take a huge number of wounds, or it would be kind of silly. So I made gun combat extremely lethal. I also realized that things like tactics and position, should probably matter. So I designed my combat rules around those things. This isn't the only way to make a spy game. There are plenty of sub-genres within spy to handle other approaches. But this achieved the style I wanted for my game. PLayers who buy my game, will buy it because they want that style. I don't see how this impacts player freedom. Any mechanic you put in a game will restrict player freedom to some extent I suppose. The idea is to balance the need for players to do what they want, and have the game produce an overall feel and level of excitement that is fun.

I was trying to impress upon the idea that at base a game should be fun for all people involved, so a person designing a game should always be wary that the mechanics they are creating is there to enhance gameplay, not to stifle it.

My comments about player freedom is in direct response to the comments that Callan was making, about how a player deciding what kind of excitement they want from a game being immaterial to the design of a game. Your last statement about striking a balance is what I've been trying to get at, though in different words. I was arguing against the ideas posited by Callan about not taking the enjoyment of the players into consideration when creating a game.

The major point I'm trying to make (and it probably shouldn't have taken me four posts to be able to get it across) is that when designing a game, you need to look at the big picture. That picture is whether or not the restrictions on player freedom are justified in order to make a balanced and enjoyable game for all parties involved.

[TheDeadlyPlatypus]

On a separate note, I hope I'm not coming off as argumentative, that's not my intention.

[mjbauer]

I could be wrong, but I don't think the OP is saying anything about restricting player freedom, or railroading them. It sounds to me like he is interested in designing mechanics that produce a flavor or feel. Personally I don't see anything wrong with this. Savage Worlds set out to make a game that felt cinematic and high energy, then they built mechanics that achieved that. Call of Cthulu tried to recapture the brutality, fear and madness of Lovecraft's stories. Their system was tailored to that setting. I would much rather play a game that has personality than one that tries to be everything to everyone.   

I didn't really expect this to cause any controversy. Maybe my post wasn't clear enough but you summed it up nicely Seamus.

It just seems to me that too many new designers (myself included) start the process of game design by creating rules to govern every aspect of their reality, without thinking about what's most important. That being: what is the game about?

It's the idea of using the rules to emphasize the theme of the game, rather than distract from it. This is a break-though to me, because my original way of thinking was that I needed rules for everything. It seems to me now that I should focus and tailor the rules on the areas that I'm trying to emphasize.