Second-guessing Self in Synthesis

[Paul Czege]

Mike, JB,

So, I've been reading Synthesis. And I have to say, I literally can't envision how Self will play out during an actual scenario.

PCs always have a level in a Trait labeled Self. In the game, this represents a person's self-image, self-integration, self-confidence, self-assuredness and other positive things that start with "self-". Negative "self-" things like self-centeredness are actually the result of a low Self Trait. In other words, a character with a high Self level, knows himself well, and does not need excessive introspection, or self-absorption. Those with a low Self Trait are searching for themselves, are lost in their own egos, or are otherwise limited by a lack of self-knowledge. This is an important distinction.

My reaction to this paragraph, from my first pass through the rules, was that it reads like the designer is carrying a chip on his shoulder over a history of too many unsatisfying, angsty games of Vampire, and is trying to create a linkage between protagonism and characters with a bold, forward-leading personality. And I guess I wouldn't have a problem with that, if the design intent was to create a sort-of proto-genre for the game, but I didn't think that was part of the design intent. And besides, I was doubting the rules delivered mechanically on that linkage. Consider a hypothetical player who decided to create a self-absorbed, self-doubting, introspective, angsty character, and conveyed that understanding of "self" to the play group. How would the Synthesis mechanics respond? If the character entered into a conflict in a manner in keeping with his self image, perhaps by begging his girlfriend for a token of her affection, then his Self Trait would contribute favorably to his die pool. If he behaved boldly, and romanced her confidently, then his Self Trait would act as a penalty. That seemed functional to me. See why the paragraph above feels more like a personal bias, than explicit description of the system? I couldn't see any necessarily linkage between bold, forward-leading personalities and the game mechanics. And my recommendation was going to be that if you wanted to develop that proto-genre about bold, outwardly focused protagonists, to do it explicitly. Otherwise, I was thinking you should ditch the paragraph, and replace it with some text about the player defining the character's Self however he wants.

I had the distinct impression that actual gameplay would expose the Self Trait as almost an abstraction, a resource for ongoing and dynamic character construction that would increasingly devalued in its significance to individual conflicts over the course of a few sessions of play. The more as a player that I could invest in Traits, the less significantly my conflict outcomes would be affected by Self, either positively, or negatively. The great truth of protagonism that goes unrecognized and undermined in most RPG's is that an interesting character is a transgressive character. The samurai who violates the code of bushido to save the life of a dishonored friend is far more interesting than the samurai who rigorously follows the code of bushido and lets the friend die. It just seemed to me that a strong Narrativist would work to put himself in the position of being able to ignore the constraints of Self penalties on his character, so he could be effective when he felt the need to transgress against it. I was convince that protagonism wouldn't emerge for the character if the player couldn't manage this, if the character was, in fact, actually constrained by Self.

It seemed to me that despite descriptive text to the contrary, "Self" was more of a constraint mechanic, than an empowering mechanic. It would help the character directly only when he behaved in keeping with his established personality. Still, I couldn't help but consider that the game would deliver on the notion that protagonism is an outgrowth of triumph of the spirit, because gameplay would become a process of architecting a character that could surprise the audience by disregarding Self.

And that's when I started to second-guess myself. The more I thought about it, the more I could see that maybe the game would in fact function exactly the way it thinks it would. What we'd be talking about though, is a Mack Bolan novel. The player character would achieve success by doing what he does best, not straying from the formula, and staying true to himself. That isn't really my idea of character protagonism, so it took me a while to consider that it might be the design intent.

And I found myself forced to admit that building a framework of Traits that get you to the position of being able to disregard Self would be enough of a protracted process, and a noisy process, not unlike announcing your intentions through a bullhorn, that it probably wouldn't come across as particularly transgressive and protagonizing in play.

So, my suggestion is, maybe you shouldn't delete that anti-angst paragraph after all. Maybe you should just get explicit up front that the game is about the genre of characters that stay true to themselves? I now find myself reading the game as far more traditionally Sim in its dynamics than it would seem from the inspired-by-Story-Engine mechanics, in that the job of the GM is to fuck with the characters, and the job of the player is to resist, buy off negative Traits, and generally preserve the character as originally envisioned.

Or am I misinterpreting this as well? I guess I'm having trouble understanding when a character gets the benefit of Self as a secondary Trait in a conflict. Is it based on the original vision for the character, or the aggregate of the character's current incarnation, Indefinite Traits and all?

Paul

[Mike Holmes]

Hmmm. I didn't mean to imply much of what you interpet Paul.

First, the paragraph on what Self is, is meant to be merely descriptive. Honestly. High Self allows you to do certain things in the game that had to have a rational description. If Self can be used to boost your ability, it has to mean something that makes sense withthat when high, and does not when low. I was simply trying to get across what that is.

I have played little Vampire, and mostly used GURPS, FWIW. :-) I'm not the guy with the anti-angsty agenda.

In fact, the game is supposed to allow just that sort of play. One of the things that I designed to be a feature of Synthesis is that the size of your Traits is not really an big issue. That is, a zero in something often says as much as a ten. The idea in Synthesis is that there is a dynamic trade off. One has the advantages of Self if it is high, or they have the advantages of what it has bought if it is low.

Really it's a sort of Sufi thing. You either are yourself, or you are what you invest youself in. Philosophically speaking. So, high Self, low Self, it's just a choice. What the game promotes (hopefully) is transition between these highs and lows. You do stuff that makes sense to the character in terms of his Self Image, Self goes up. You invest in things that are new to the character, Self goes down.

Thus the character dynamism is powered by both the will to change and improve, and the will to remain true to oneself.

One can play at many different themes, theoretically. One can wallow around with a low Self, searching for himself in any sort of externality. Or he can focus on what makes him, himself, and grow to great heights of Self-knowledge. So, yes, a player can play a character who is constantly unchanging in his self-assuredness. Or play one that never changes from his Self-centeredness.

But most characters will go back and forth. They are incentivized to do so by the Character Conflict mechanism. In this case the character gets his Self Trait and may change. When does the character get his Self Trait you ask? Well, only if he's acting like himself, or if he's addressing his Premise. In other words the player still has options, but is only incentivized to either have the character behave in accordance with his nature, or to cross it in that area where he is currently been idetified as struggling with himself. Thus the game promotes adressing the particular Premises at hand. When you are really roaring along, you are rolling mostly character conflicts.

So, the system gives you the option, dynamic or static, but gives incentive for changing. In the end you see more of the dynamic protagonism in play (or at least in the small amount of playtesting I've done so far). And in the vast majority of cases, the dynamism is focused on the character's Premise. Which was the goal: QED.

Now I just need further playtest to see if the mechanics carry the theory.

Mike