Getting players to define their characters... also, character death by suicide.

[David C]

So I'm back to play testing my game and some of the new mechanics in it.  The current group of players are interested in developing a story and a character personality, but they just don't know how. They tend towards power playing, but I believe a lot of that has to do with the group's regular GM.  Also, some of the players are really not picking up how creative they can be with their characters.

My game is mostly a typical fantasy setting. I'm trying to focus the game around the idea of the characters each having an "Epic Destiny."  There is a game mechanic I am using to promote that where each player creates an eventual destiny they imagine their character completing.  Working towards that destiny is rewarded with character advancement. 

The intrepid adventurers are locked inside a temple.  To gain entrance to the temple, they used four amulets keyed to the elements... But once inside, two of their amulets were stolen by their employer, who then locked them inside.  They were then trying to figure out how they could leave.
Adam, "Hmm, can I use my magic skill to change the element of the wind amulet to fire?" 
Me, "Sure. Difficulty 8."
Adam, "10, I succeed.  I place the 'fire amulet' in the alter."
Me, "The flames recede from the doorway."

Eric to Karl, "This game's magic system is confusing."
"Yeah, I don't get it at all."

Later, outside the temple, I described the grand entrance.  They originally entered the temple from underground, but now that they were exiting the main entrance, they got the full view of the place.  The temple is a place of worship for a dragon cult, who worship the apocalyptic world devouring wyrm.
Me, "You stand in a huge unlit chamber. Your light doesn't reach the ceiling and you can barely make out the doors on the far side, about 300' away from you. The room is completely barren except for numerous scorch and claw marks. To your far right, you see a dragon sleeping. It wears a chain and a collar."
Eric, "Well, I know they say 'let sleeping dogs lie, but what the hell!  I'm going to fly over their and rip off it's eyelid." 
Me, "That's a really bad idea."
I should mention at this point that they had encountered a dragon earlier and had been completely overpowered.  They hadn't become any more powerful than they had been before.
Eric, "Yeah, I'm gong to do it anyways."
Me, "Ok, you fly over... make an attack roll."
Eric, "12"
Me, "You rip off it's eyelid... Its body shudders as it awakens painfully, then the dragon snorts and starts rolling over to a standing position."
Eric *stares at me blankly*
Me, "Do you want to do something?"
Eric, "Uhh, I fly away I guess?"
Me, "The dragon stares at you, then starts flying after you.  He's a lot faster than you."
Eric, "What the hell, why isn't he blind?"

Uhm, it basically went really down hill from here.  I was really hesitant to kill his character. I mean, it was going to be the stupidest character death I've ever seen. I felt like it was character suicide and all of the players had "WTF" expressions, or were actually saying, "Wtf?"  Some of the players felt betrayed, because they could help in a battle like that, but would have been better off if they set up an ambush.  Finally, I had the dragon trap him in a dead end tunnel and then the dragon pushed a boulder in front of it. The dragon was content that he was dead, without the player actually dieing.  Later I asked the player if he was committing suicide, and he said he was.  He said the reason was because he had failed to kill his arch-nemesis earlier.  (Although it should be said, this was the first time the player had met his arch nemesis, after finding out he was his arch nemesis...)  I kept showing Eric that he was outmatched by his rival in the current situation, as well as power.  Also, who's heard of a story where the hero immediately kills his nemesis after he was revealed? 

Usually after a situation like this, I feel like I need to take my game back to the drawing boards.  I feel like I must be missing some crucial pieces that are failing to guide the players into making well defined characters (for everyone).  I also feel like maybe it would benefit from some mechanic that would allow the players greater control over their story. The GM is supposed to guide the whole progression of things, but it is supposed to be up to the player to set a scene. 

[David C]

I wanted to expand on the last thing I said.

The GM is supposed to guide the whole progression of things, but it is supposed to be up to the player to set a scene. 

For example, one time I was playing some midwestern/fantasy high bred game.  We were sent on a mission to blow up a mine owned by the company we worked for.  Well, we got to the mine and found out it was full of the slaves who had worked there.  One of the other players decided to complete the job and blow it up anyways.

My character was quite disturbed by all this, especially since he recognized one of the slaves in the mines. In fact, the GM decided to place his long lost love in there.  That night, my character sat and thought about what to do.  Then some people attacked us. We fought them off and managed to capture one.  We found out the company that hired us put a hit out. They wanted to cover their trails.

I decided that my character was going to go back to our "headquarters" and shoot our employer right in the forehead.  In my mind it was poetic. I would just walk up and shoot him at 20' (I was a straight shooter.)  He'd go flying backwards out the window.  Maybe his guards and everyone else would gun me down. Maybe not. I

knew that he was just a lower management stooge, and so did all the other players. My character didn't know that and the GM could have easily let him die without derailing any of his master plans.  I told the GM all of this, but it just couldn't be that easy. The GM decided that he was protected by a forcefield (it was a fantasy hybrid, remember.) 

I lost all my motivation for that game and it soon fell apart.  This is the type of moment I wanted to capture as a player and it is the type of moment I want the players to be able to make.  The GM should be in control for most of the story, but the players should be able to decide those defining moments.

[Lance D. Allen]

Okay, first impression:

Dickery. Who the hell goes over to a dragon, knowing he can't defeat it, knowing he doesn't F-ing have to, and rips off its eyelid? His motivation was made of fail and topped with a savory weaksauce, as you yourself commented.

You know these guys far better than I do. You're in a much better position to determine if it was just the guy being a dick. That's what it looks like from here, though.

If it's just dickery, then there's nothing your game can do about it. So I guess it's best to proceed with the assumption that the player was being genuine.

This is the type of moment I wanted to capture as a player and it is the type of moment I want the players to be able to make.  The GM should be in control for most of the story, but the players should be able to decide those defining moments.

How is authority apportioned by the game rules? What, in the rules, gives the player the ability to decide defining moments?

[Callan S.]

Reminds me of constructive denial and the 'package' unraveling.

From that post

A great deal of the aesthetic power of Simulationist play, as I see it (and I mean that literally), lies in (a) adding to or developing that package, and (b) enjoying its resiliency against potential violation.

To stick with the example, let's say your group is enjoying this Star Trek role-playing experience. Then someone in the group announces an action for a character which demonstrates that he or she, the player, doesn't understand the group's shared agreement about what Star Trek "is" in the first place. At all. The announced action simply cannot be tolerated, even as a suggestion, partly because it undermines the source inspiration, but especially because it makes the (b) step, which is the real payoff, totally impossible.

When that happens, everyone else gets that sickening feeling which I should have a name for, the instant and non-verbalized knowledge that "he's not doing it right"

I'm seeing an unraveling in the package. The funny thing is, is the player seems surprised the dragon isn't blind. I really don't think calling him dickish helps here. I think he was commited to some package - and his package unraveled as well.

I think it takes some skill to add to the package without violating it - this player lacked enough skill to do so in this moment of play. Calling him a dick wont help him learn the skill, though.

[Lance D. Allen]

Callan,

If it turns out that the player *is* just being a dick, you cannot teach him the skills, because he isn't interested in learning. That, in addition to it simply being a first impression, was my point. You have to put that on the table to decide whether it's true, or it's not. If it's true, changing the system will not be beneficial, and may in fact be detrimental to the system, if it works for players who are properly invested. If it's not, then there's reason to move forward. I said as much in my post, and moved on to ask a question with the assumption that dickery isn't the root of the problem.

You say it "seems" like the player was genuinely surprised the dragon wasn't blind. I say the player was trying to kill off his own character (he admitted as much) and therefore "seems" like a dick. We're both on our respective ends of the internet though, so our impressions may be completely false. Additionally, I think your "package unraveling" is flipped around back'ard. David made it fairly clear that dragons weren't to be fucked with lightly. Everyone in the group seemed to grok this. Hence, *that* is the package. David's actions weren't unraveling a package, Eric's were.

Anyhow, I don't think I'll have much more to add until I know more about how authority is apportioned between GM and players.

[Callan S.]

I gave evidence (he was genuinely surprised the dragon wasn't blind) and I expect that to be examined critically AND there is no way of concluding for sure (barring scary levels of MRI technology). Alot of people use 'I think' to mean 'it is' and yes, I didn't put in alot of disclaimers that I wasn't doing that.

I'll also give a couple more pieces of evidence in terms of killing himself: A: He flew away and B: Pull out dagger, slit own throat? Why bother with a dragon when a dagger would do?

Lance, just check your not fighting to argue he's a dick because you already called him that/sent him to the firing line. And if it turned out he wasn't a dick after you did that, then you would look like a dick yourself. Your not arguing he's a dick just to save your own bacon, are you? Because I don't care - no ones been sent to the firing line yet, so even if we somehow totatally figured out he was legit, your fine by me atleast, as no ones been shot yet. Maybe your totally ready to shoot, but that's not the same as having already shot. Or maybe this doesn't apply - but I'm adding disclaimers now and this is one of them.

Additionally, I think your "package unraveling" is flipped around back'ard. David made it fairly clear that dragons weren't to be fucked with lightly. Everyone in the group seemed to grok this. Hence, *that* is the package. David's actions weren't unraveling a package, Eric's were.

Even in Rons even handed post, there's bias in the wording, refering to someone violating the group package - but wait, isn't the person violating, part of that group/part of the group package himself? Is he violating his own package??

TWO packages, Lance! Two packages that could not be melded together at the time and thus both unraveled. Let's avoid the old human habit of saying *we* have a package and the other guy has abomination and anathima.

Again, disclaimer: Or he's a dick and there was only one package. But by the same degree one should also consider the possiblity David was a dick with no package and only Eric had a package that was violated. That's another reason why I said I don't think calling anyone a dick helps here. If were treating David as genuine, let's, as you said yourself, treat Eric as genuine. Yeah, maybe Erics pulling a fast one over all of us, but that's always a risk with trust.

[Simon C]

I'm with Lance.

This sounds like a bored player, or an intentionally disruptive one.  I can't tell from what you've written which it is, but in my experience this kind of thing stems from one of two sources:

Either: The player is feeling like their character's actions don't influence the outcome of the game.  They don't feel like they have any say over where the game is going, so they respond by working with the only thing they can control - their own character.  They're not any more excited by the results of their character's actions than you are, it's just that these results are something they caused.  They're taking control.

Or: The player is pissed off about something out-of-game, or is unhappy with the general direction of the game.  The player doesn't want to deal with this out of character, so they use what they've got in the game - their character. 

In both cases, it's about taking control of the game. 

In the first case, you can respond by making sure the characters' actions do influence the outcome of the game.  A classic thing I see in "epic" fantasy games is the idea that all the cool stuff has to be "earned" by sucking for a really long time first.  "It'll be cooler if you work for it" is the idea, I guess.  The GM has all these great ideas for how the characters are going to totally change the world, but they've got to piss around doing errands for people first.

If that's at all applicable to what you're doing, throw that shit out now.  Let the players play the main characters of your story.  Let them make world-changing decisions right now.  Have their actions matter.  Above all, let the players make decisions, and have those decisions really affect the direction of the game.

In the second case, no amount of in-game tweaking is going to fix your problem.  Talk to the player about what he wants out of a game.  If you're interested in doing that too, maybe you can work something out.  If that's not what you're interested in, don't try to force the guy to play it your way.

[Simon C]

Also, Callan, I have no idea what you're talking about.  Violating your own package?  I understand the issue you're referring to, but I don't think it's useful in this thread.  Maybe start your own?

[Lance D. Allen]

Guys,

I think we're moving in a non-constructive direction. David needs to come back here, and make a decision.

A. He thinks about it, and realizes "Hey, he was just being a dick. I don't need to change rules to deal with behavior I can't control."

B. He thinks about it, and decides "No, I don't think that's it. Something about the rules lead to this behavior, and I need to know how to fix it."

If A, David's current problem is not something we can help him resolve by talking about rules. If B, then we've got something to discuss. Any further discussion based on speculation is kinda pointless.

At the conclusion of his posts, he talks about what he wants this game to do. I think we need to know how he's trying to address that goal with the rules before we go further. I am not a moderator, but I think we should wait for David's response.

[David C]

I like hearing people's opinions, because some of them are so dead on that I can't help but agree.  Let me first say that I don't think Eric is trying to be a dick. He can come off as dickish at times, but I think he genuinely is there to play.  After all, he spends hours every week making his own D&D campaigns (and sometimes we let him run them *shudders*) but that's a different story.

To stick with the example, let's say your group is enjoying this Star Trek role-playing experience. Then someone in the group announces an action for a character which demonstrates that he or she, the player, doesn't understand the group's shared agreement about what Star Trek "is" in the first place. At all. The announced action simply cannot be tolerated, even as a suggestion, partly because it undermines the source inspiration, but especially because it makes the (b) step, which is the real payoff, totally impossible.

When that happens, everyone else gets that sickening feeling which I should have a name for, the instant and non-verbalized knowledge that "he's not doing it right"

From time to time Eric definitely does something like this. I think it excites him to break the status quo? Either that, or he's testing his boundaries.  (Sometimes, I wonder if he tests me to see if I'm just "bluffing" the danger.)

TWO packages, Lance! Two packages that could not be melded together at the time and thus both unraveled. Let's avoid the old human habit of saying *we* have a package and the other guy has abomination and anathima.

Sometimes this is an issue as well. Since I am using a custom fantasy world (it's not a D&D world, but it has similarities. It is partly inspired by the anime movie Princess Mononoke and the computer game Thief) he does try to apply D&D logic to the game frequently. However, D&D dragons are FAR deadlier than the dragons they've encountered (for their size.)  He should have been more fearful than he was, not less.

This sounds like a bored player, or an intentionally disruptive one.  I can't tell from what you've written which it is, but in my experience this kind of thing stems from one of two sources:

Either: The player is feeling like their character's actions don't influence the outcome of the game.  They don't feel like they have any say over where the game is going, so they respond by working with the only thing they can control - their own character.  They're not any more excited by the results of their character's actions than you are, it's just that these results are something they caused.  They're taking control.

Eric is frustrated with the game. As I said, he met his rival, who could be compared to the power of Sauron. He himself was about as powerful as a.. 3rd level D&D fighter (older editions.)  He told me several times that he was very upset that he failed to kill him the first time he was revealed. Later, he was tricked into helping him (which I thought would help build tension.)  This just embittered him.

On top of that, the group's dynamics are... not good. Eric wants very badly to be the super hero with his spunky side kicks along for the ride.  But even more than that, he wants to be the leader of the group.  He wants people to ask him how they should plan a battle. He wants them to listen to what he wants to happen.  Instead, the other players tease him.  When he makes a complicated battle plan, they'll follow it for a turn and then do their own thing (which makes sense anyways.) When he tried to trick a dwarven merchant out of his precious mithril ore, the other players played a prank on Eric involving the merchant and some fake ores.   

How is authority apportioned by the game rules? What, in the rules, gives the player the ability to decide defining moments?

The players make a character. They put some points into a limited skill list. More points make the skills better.  Skills are what you roll to resolve a conflict. Then they fill out some standard character description questions. After that, there is a section where you decide where you were born and raised (within the setting) and how that may have affected you. Then the player has to come up with a Destiny.  They determine what their eventual destiny may be (Become King, Defeat the Dread Lich Bob). It can be anything.  Then, based off of what their Destiny is, they determine past events that have triggered that Destiny. (I was a prince stolen from the crib, Dread Lich Bob wiped out my hometown.) That type of stuff. 

The GM is then supposed to make scenes that lead the characters down a shared path.  Along that path, elements from all their Destinies are pulled into it.  At any point during a session, a player can declare that something is a defining moment in their Destiny.  Then ?? happens.   As it is written, a player can describe what happens (gets narrative control).  The player cannot do anything unbalancing, and he cannot control the other players.  I have two problems.  My mechanic is exactly that... I think it's shit. Whatever "magic" that narrative games create, I'm just not capturing it for these defining moments.  Hence,

I also feel like maybe it would benefit from some mechanic that would allow the players greater control over their story.

My second problem is the players are so... boring (which, for the sake of argument, is because my game isn't enticing them).  I have the char description, birth and destiny mechanics, but the players are half assing them, despite the "biscuits." (You have to progress your story/destiny in order to get any additional character power)

Eric's character is supposed to be born and raised in a military outpost. His Destiny is to defeat "Sauron."  Adam's character is just a nice town blacksmith that was kidnapped by "Sauron." His Destiny is to create a hidden sanctuary from "Sauron."  (Eric copied Adam's story...)  Karl's character was a noble who rebelled against his parents and went to live in the mountains to be a ranger (in the modern day sense.) His Destiny is to become "Greatly renowned."  Eric's issue is that he isn't acting at all like he described himself (he's random and has no self control, not the disciplined military man he described). Also, it wasn't very cool that he listened to Adam's story and then made Adam's protagonist his Destiny.  Adam's issue is that... I just don't see why he wouldn't hide in a hole in the mountains. Instead, he's getting dragged all over the continent and being less than safe. Karl's destiny is too broad to be interesting.

Out of all of them, Adam's is the most well done (despite the logical fallacy of him wandering around as an "adventurer.")  But despite any story telling that is happening, I feel like the characters are mundane.

To review the issues. 1) The shared Narration mechanic is inadequate  2) The game isn't encouraging the players to make interesting characters.

[Jasper Flick]

Isn't this an issue of no buy-in to begin with? They play to humor you, but actually just don't really care? Perhaps they say they want story and character development, but perhaps this isn't really true. Have you played other games with them that facilitate such things, and did it work then?

It sounds like Eric simply wants to kick ass (not Step On Up, not Story Now, but Dreaming a power fantasy).

[Simon C]

I'm going to talk about my own gaming history here.  It's possible that it's not at all relevant to what you're experiencing in your game, but it's the best advice I have.

I used to play a lot of Rolemaster.  Rolemaster is an incredibly detailed and complex game, and it takes a heck of a lot of time to make characters, resolve conflicts, and achieve anything in the game.  Nonetheless I planned these huge, sprawling fantasy campaigns, imagining in my head that one day "when the characters were powerful enough" they'd achieve amazing, world-changing feats.  Of course, at first level they mostly got to fight goblins and things.  So we had all these goals about what play would actually be about (world-changing conflicts), butting up against what actually happend in play (fighting goblins).  No matter how much I exhorted the players to come up with characters with cool stories, and interesting goals, people always ended up making characters that were silly, or "power gamy" or just didn't fit the concept.  They were making characters that they wanted to play now, when I wanted them to make characters that would be fun to play later.  Of course, what I didn't realise was that "later" never came, and all we ever did was fight goblins.

Now, I don't think your game is exactly the same as what I was doing.  It sounds like you're trying really hard to have play revolve around the characters' goals, and to make that directly relevant to play.  I think though that maybe you're using some of the same techniques as I was, and they're not working for the same reason.  You're focusing your energies on "later", and the players are interested in "right now".

So what techniques can you use to make the characters' goals and personality relevant to play, right now, in every moment?

The first thing I'd say is that mechanics don't work in isolation.  I'd be very wary of introducing ideas outside the context of the games for which they were created.  That said, here are some ideas that I think might work for you:

Conflict Resolution:
This is a kind of overused term, but here's how I understand it: When a character is doing something in a game (or in a novel, or a play, or anywhere), there are two aspects to that.  There's "how" they're doing it, and there's "why" they're doing it.  In other words, what are they trying to achieve, and what are they doing to achieve that.  

"Task Resolution", which is how most traditional games usually work, is very good at resolving "how".  Using the example from your game, Eric says his character rips off the dragon's eyelid (ouch!), and the system tells you he has succeeded in that task.  It doesn't tell you however, whether he's succeeded in the intent behind this task (evidently blinding the dragon).  These systems often leave resolving intent up to the GM.  

"Conflict Resolution" means resolving both the how, and the why (though a lot of people, and a few games, interpret it as meaning just "why" without "how").  So from your example, when Eric is like "I'm gonna go rip its eyelid off", you're like "what are you trying to achieve?".  And he'll say something like "um, I wanna blind the thing, so we can beat it up".  And you'll either be like "sweet, here's the difficulty - if you fail, it'll wake up fully sighted and ready to eat you" or you'll be like "pulling its eyelid off isn't gonna blind it.  Want to try something else?".  So the idea is, every time the dice hit the table, something exciting is gonna happen.

The advantage of conflict resolution in your situation is that it gives the players real power to change the world.  You, as GM, can't get away with hedging stuff.  There's no more "you succeeded, but now you've got to roll this other thing" and no more "you failed, but if you roll this, it might still be ok".  Players state intent, they say how they're achieving that intent.  You tell them what'll happen if they don't get that intent, and then you roll.  Things happen!

The other technique I think you should look at is the way you award XP.  Consider making it much more immediate, and for things you actually want to encourage.  I've gotta run so I can't talk about this too much, but check out this link: http://files.crngames.com/cc/sweet20/experience.html

[Lance D. Allen]

So it seems you've got a few factors at work here. I see agenda conflict, abused player syndrome, and some plain ol' interpersonal issues.

Agenda Conflict: It may turn out that your game's goals do not jive with the goals of your group. If they are, as Jasper states, there to kick ass, then you're failing to meet their goals by presenting challenges that they *cannot* overcome, and you're failing by folding when they call your bluff. If their goals are Step on Up, they want challenges that they can overcome by skill, wit, and luck. They don't want things like dragons lying around that can munch them with ease. If there's a dragon, they may read it as "be clever, and you can overcome this dragon". They also don't want you to fudge rolls, or have the dragon lock them away in a cave instead of killing them, like it normally would. (They, in this can, may also simply be read as "he")

Abused Player: They may be afraid or merely apathetic toward setting goals, or coming up with big stories because they've been abused in the past. GMs may have run roughshod over their character concepts, used their backstories not as cool hooks, but as ways to screw them over, and ignored their goals. Often, this is done by the same GMs that demand short novels of backstory, so the fact that you're putting it out there isn't necessarily helping. The only thing you can do under this circumstance is keep at it, keep requesting this stuff, and reward shit that they contribute that's cool. Suggest "hey, wouldn't this be an appropriate time to declare a defining moment?" The words "that's badass!" spoken with feeling are much more effective than "You can do better."

You definitely need to nail down ??. It needs to be concrete, it needs to have constraints. Just saying "I win!" isn't going to fit with the rest of it. The rest of it seems pretty traditional, and so players who are used to that sort of game are going to flounder when you're suddenly telling them that they get to decide what happens. They're either gonna come up with something boring because they don't want to be slapped down, something stupidly over the top because they want to push your limits, or something lame because deciding what happens is the GM's job. Give them a way to be badass in the moment but with constraints that they can work within, and you'll be much better off.

[Callan S.]

On top of that, the group's dynamics are... not good. Eric wants very badly to be the super hero with his spunky side kicks along for the ride.  But even more than that, he wants to be the leader of the group.  He wants people to ask him how they should plan a battle. He wants them to listen to what he wants to happen.  Instead, the other players tease him.  When he makes a complicated battle plan, they'll follow it for a turn and then do their own thing (which makes sense anyways.) When he tried to trick a dwarven merchant out of his precious mithril ore, the other players played a prank on Eric involving the merchant and some fake ores.   

I'll say their not good dynamics?

You want commitment to the imagined package (that dragons are super dangerous) and yet everyones going into meta-game play a joke on Eric time? Where's everyone elses commitment to the package? Why are they doing things which are soley motivated by having a bit of an out of game joke or tease?

I mean, they follow his plan and then a turn latter do something else? Isn't that what he's doing with you - going with your plan, then a turn latter doing something else?

That's why universalis has the whole coins thing - if he wants characters to follow another characters plan, he pays for it. If a player doesn't want a certain character to follow, they pay for that.

[David C]

If I knew everything I know now, I'm not sure that the game I'm creating would be the way it is.  It is fairly traditional, but I definitely enjoy the non-traditional parts of a game.  I think they are what gets me coming back to a game. I'd like to finish this game in the way I envisioned it before moving onto something else, though. I am a game mechanics guy. Every game designer has their strong suits, and mine is definitely in mechanics, which is probably why I use it to "solve" the things I think need solving. 

I'm wondering if my game would benefit from a narrative token mechanic?  Perhaps players could bid tokens to make things go the way they want them to go.  Eric could bid tokens to successfully steal the ores from the merchant, if the other players cared to stop him, they could bid against him.  If Eric wanted to kill "Sauron" immediately, he could bid tokens to do so. (Would the GM then have tokens?)  Would it be appropriate to tie this into the character rewards? (ie. unspent tokens could be traded in for "XP" or advancement points or w/e you use)

I've purchased and read some games that push a narrative agenda, but I haven't played any of them, and I don't feel like I fully understand these things until I see them happen (kinistetic learning.)

I am going to talk to the group some of the things people have brought up.  I thank everyone who has helped me understand what might be improved upon.