A Dwarf Fortress tabletop RPG (long)

[Callan S.]

There's two types of tension and decision making and both seem to get blended together pretty regularly in roleplay culture. One type of tension and decision making is the sort you'll find in chess.

The other sort is best called faux tension and decision making. This is the impression of tension and decision making - it's kind of like narrating a chess match between a PC and Death. Is there a game of chess/is it actual tension and decision making? No. It's the impression of it.

I would say in dwarf fortress the PC game, there is actual tension and decision making, as there are a bunch of resources around as much as there is on a chess board.

The thing is, Abkajud, it sounds like you want to lift the tension and decision making of dwarf fortress out of the PC game and into an RPG. But you seem to want to keep treating it as real (as in chess) tension and decision making? Or am I getting you wrong?

[Abkajud]

I'm intrigued by your synopsis, but I'm afraid I don't understand it. Can you say more about "real" vs. "faux" decision-making/tension?
Perhaps you mean that in one situation (the chess match), something is actually on the line for the player (i.e. a trophy or what-not), whereas in the other it's like the tension of watching a film?

[Callan S.]

Pretty much that. It's real decision making when it's some part of your real life on the line. If you were playing chess for fifty bucks, it's easier to see how the decisions in the game can affect your life (well, fifty would add something nice to my life, anyway). Now if it isn't fifty bucks, but the glory of winning, or having a dwarf colony you've spent part of your finite life crafting, on the line, it's still affecting your life. They are real life decisions, even if only small ones.

Simply narrating dwarf fortress like events is indeed like watching a film. Even having rules for narrating still just means your narrating faux tension. There might be tension in using the rules themselves, like in the RPG Capes system use, but the end narration is still faux tension and decision making.

Though alot of roleplayers do try and strongly insist that what they narrated means that X mechanical rules option can't be used anymore, as part of them genuinely believing the narration is a real decision. A smaller segment seem to know it's not a real decision, but as a group enjoy the idea of it being so and as a group help support the idea it is, even though outside of play they know it isn't.

Sorry for going on - the whole thing links into alot of complicated notions and it's hard not to give a quick nod to them. You could just ignore the third paragraph, the first two should be the helpful ones.

[Abkajud]

I can see the difference, I think, but I have to say: it sounds like you're not just distinguishing the two; because you call one of them "faux tension", it sounds like you think one is inherently better than the other.
Of course nothing real is on the line when you're playing a game (okay, aside from money, or a big time investment). But does that make films any less enjoyable? Or story-oriented RPGs, for that matter?
I'm so curious to find out what you're getting at with this. I know sometimes I'm not the best at deciphering ya but pray, continue!

[DWeird]

Hey, JW!
Hmmmmm well, I suppose my question to you would be "How do the players have an impact?" I'm envisioning a bunch of faithful gamers crowded around a computer screen, essentially ... playing Dwarf Fortress together.

DF community game?

This post menaces with spikes of pithiness.

[Callan S.]

Heh, that forum reminds me of when I got excited about the 'lets play' of dwarf fortress on RPG net and posters got to name dwarves after themselves. Of course it was entirely cosmetic, but the idea of writing a game where they could set the attitude of their character and such, then he'd run off the attitudes rules, came to mind. I crashed into an effort vs payoff issue with it...but this reminds me...

I can see the difference, I think, but I have to say: it sounds like you're not just distinguishing the two; because you call one of them "faux tension", it sounds like you think one is inherently better than the other.
Of course nothing real is on the line when you're playing a game (okay, aside from money, or a big time investment). But does that make films any less enjoyable? Or story-oriented RPGs, for that matter?
I'm so curious to find out what you're getting at with this. I know sometimes I'm not the best at deciphering ya but pray, continue!

I don't know - does the matter pivot solely upon how it feels? I'm reminded of Cypher eating the steak in the matrix, while talking to agent smith.

I would estimate that what was important to you when actually playing DF was not simply the feeling of DF (like Cypher's feeling of eating the steak), but the events that were actually happening. It's not just what you feel, it's what you've decided is important. If those things were indeed important to you - well, in going to narration, you heading away from what was important to you. But I don't know - what was important to you?

[Abkajud]

Particularly in Adventurer mode, the feeling of it is more important, or at least more emotionally relevant to me at this point. It's a tough game to get the hang of, and a recent experiment proved to me that I'd forgotten all the controls.
Given that the medium can be so tricky, and my excitement for the computer game has faded, what I'm left with is that old desire, so common to RPers, I think, to create a "classic" fantasy RPG. It's pretty much the Heartbreaker urge.

[Callan S.]

The dwarf fortress actual play/stories that seem to get written up are kind of an story after thing, typically not so much characters making choices in play, but sticking with choices already made, to the bitter end.

This is just like a sounding out suggestion in case it rings something with you, but does sticking with choices made, regardless of how bitter, sound kinda cool as a gameplay thing with you?

[Abkajud]

!!!!

Callan, you always come through with awesome insights once we've batted things around for a bit.
That ... rocks.
Sticking with choices to the bitter end is exactly what "Losing is fun!" is all about.