Of course you win, but at what cost?

[Mike Holmes]

What Jeff said.

First, I'd say that I do trust the players to make decisions when they have to. That is, if the system is, "When the GM sees a sacrifice that he thinks is appropriate, he gives bonus points," that's fine with me. It can and will work.

I fail to see how having a system that has a GM do this is less reliable than just hoping that the GM will figure it out on his own.

Now, that all said, I don't like making the GM make judgement calls on stuff like that. If your bad reaction is based on that, I can sympathize. But what you're missing is that one can make this all much less subjective. That is, one can rate the car that's being sacrificed, or the money, or the person, or whatever. In games like Story Engine, Hero Wars, Donjon, Universalis, and many more, you can rate absolutely anything you want.

So in Hero Wars, for instance, the player would have an ability like "Grovnar 19" which represents the PCs relationship with Grovnar. If the player sacrifices his relationship with Grovnar, he loses some serious in-game potential. Thus the "investment" idea I have above can cover absolutely anything. In fact, what such mechanics do is to make the players aware that this is exactly the point of play.

Hell, to be very explicit, in the game Sorcerer, you get a one die bonus for each significant thing that the player sacrifices in summonning a demon (and gaining the attendant power). How's that for an explicit mechanic that does exactly what we're describing in an already existant game. And I can tell you it works just fine.

This is all very easy.

Mike

[M. J. Young]

I keep bumping into problems with the GNS outlook.  Maybe because it seems to be applied in a mutually exclusive way.  Why can't you have a Narrative and Simulationist system?  Why can't players play for both reasons within a single game?

I may be the best person to answer this, because that's exactly what I argued in the early threads. I maintain still that I, as a player and as a referee, respond to situations in all three modes, depending on many factors; and I maintain that games can be designed, whether system heavy or system light, in such a manner that they loosely facilitate all three modes of play.

However, Ron is right: no one can act in all three modes, nor even in any two modes, at the same moment.

Let us suppose that you are a player in a game, and you face a choice. You must now consider what choice the character will make. Simple, right? O.K., what are you thinking?

[*]If you are focused on what this character would most likely do in this situation, based on what he knows and who he is and how he usually reacts, then you are probably making a simulationist decision.[*]If you are thinking primarily in terms of what decision will make the best "story", the coolest outcome, the greatest development of conflicts and resolutions, you are thinking in narrativist terms.[*]If you are considering what choice will put your character in the best position for whatever will come next, or best advantage him (or you) within the game, that's gamist.[/list:u]
Now, it is certainly possible that the answer to all three questions is the same answer. If you're playing a noble holy warrior, and it's clear that he would not flinch at the current challenge; and that having him risk his life in this combat is going to advance the underlying themes of play significantly; and that he's got a good chance of winning which will give him benefits (whether points or increased abilities or equipment taken from the fallen); then all three approaches to the decision will point to the same answer. But the thing GNS approaches isn't really what did you decide, but what led you to decide that? It could as easily be the case that your cowardly thief would most likely (simulationist) abandon his companions and flee the scene, that he's got the best chance of winning and improving his position within play (gamist) by hiding behind that rock and stabbing the villain in the back, and that it would clearly make the best story (narrativist) for him to overcome his cowardice and step forward in front of the villain and challenge him. Which do you choose? It depends on how you approach these decisions.

In the end, for any given decision, you have to decide based on one of those three factors: the thing that best fits to the character, the thing that best addresses the themes of play, or the thing that gives you the best advantage.

That's why you can't have two active at once. The best you can do is have them shift during play, answering some questions from one perspective and some from another.

Does that help?

Footnote: there are a lot of terms that are thrown around relative to GNS that are specifically not included in the theory. Story and motive are clearly two of these. I am aware that I have included in this explanation concepts that are not strictly "kosher", but without another half hour to write my way around them I don't know that I could answer the question without them.

--M. J. Young

[LordSmerf]

Man...  I need to look into Universalis in a serious way.  The little i've been able to glean has been really intriguing and all these references to investment of resources in everything makes me want it bad...  But there are so many other systems i want to explore, and i have no money...  I'm sure i'll think of something, eventually.

I guess that i'm hesitant to specify a mechanic for sacrifice since it seems so open to abuse.  Of course i guess abuse is a relative term and stems from my preference for Narrative play.  I guess there is no way to abuse a system unless the specific group you are with decides that it is abuse...

M.J.  Thanks.  I have slowly been reaching the same conclusion, that any given instance is governed by one of the three.  The only caveat i make is that sometimes the overlying Social issues step in and intercede such that you make a decision based primarily on the real world social relationships of the players.  You could look over at the Three Levels thread for more on that.

Thomas

[Bob McNamee]

The other thing to consider with GNS decisions.

Its often hard to define what type of decision you are making , when, like the above example of the Holy Warrior, any of them fit what you are doing.

The big spotlight comes on when you hit a decision that would go quite different ways depending on your GNS inclination... kind of like the Thief. That's the instances of play to look for, if you want to know GNS leaning.

[Jeffrey Miller]

I guess that i'm hesitant to specify a mechanic for sacrifice since it seems so open to abuse.  Of course i guess abuse is a relative term and stems from my preference for Narrative play.  I guess there is no way to abuse a system unless the specific group you are with decides that it is abuse...

Its good that you're examining your own biases - we all bring perceptions about the modes of play that we've experienced along with us, and we have to shed the pretention that any one form is superior to another.

I do want to ask you though for a bit of clarification.  In the above passage, you link "abuse" with "narrativism".  Can you elaborate on that a bit?  

My personal take is that its very difficult to "abuse" anything in a Narrativist fashion, since N play isn't about advantage or excess unbalancing play (outside of social contract issues!)

-j-

[Mike Holmes]

Let's be careful on terms here. Thomas said, "narrative" which I have no idea as to what that is. Narrativist I know, but I'm not sure that's what Thomas is saying.

But it does beg the question, I'd agree. How would one "abuse" such a mechanic?

Mike

[LordSmerf]

Sorry, i was a bit unclear there.  I mean "narrative" in the "Narrativist" sense.  The "abuse" is actually derived from Gamist players who are screwing up the "right" way to play (Narrativism) by min/maxing.  A specific mechanic for sacrifice, even if it is intended to increase the Narrative or Simulational gameplay, may be "misused" by the Gamists.

Of course, as i said, there is no "wrong way" to play.  The "problems" i see with the idea of systemizing sacrifice simply allows a new way to play.  Whether that is used in Narrativist or in Gamist ways is besides the point.  So, i guess what i'm saying is that there is no abuse since as long as everyone is having fun it's all good.

I guess i need to continue to remind myself that just because i think that Narrativist play is the "right" way to play, that doesn't mean that it actually is...

I hope that's at least a little clearer than my previous statement and that you can understand what i'm getting at.  It's not really something profound, it's just something new for me...

Thomas

[M. J. Young]

I think that the problems which stem from a system encouraging sacrifice which might be abused by gamists (in the eyes of narrativists) lie more in the design of the system than in the players. That is, if you build a system that rewards a particular kind of action in play, it will encourage that kind of play, even if it's gamist play in an otherwise narrativist context.

In an earlier thread, http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=4075">GNS and Player Rewards, I suggested that rewards systems had to be two-pronged. (I've actually fallen in love with this idea; I have since expanded it into http://www.gamingoutpost.com/GL/index.cfm?action=ShowProduct&CategoryID=54411&ProductID=71532&publisherid=54849">Gam Ideas Unlimited: Rewards over at Gaming Outpost, and briefed the idea in a recent issue of Roleplaying Tips.) A reward encourages a particular type of play in two ways. One is that it encourages the kind of play  for which the reward is given; the other is that it encourages the kind of play to which the reward leads.

An ideal example is the simple reward system of Dungeons & Dragons, where you gain experience points for killing monsters and collecting treasure. Everyone recognizes that the game encourages these activities by giving you experience points for them. However, they miss the other side: what do these experience points do? They make you better at killing monsters and getting treasure. Thus when people tweak the rewards system, it usually results in an incoherent rewards system, one in which good role playing or right action or story advancement is rewarded with experience points which make you better at killing monsters and getting treasure.

The aforementioned thread (my post is November 1, 2002) and the article go into more detail, including some ideas on what kinds of rewards work for narrativist and simulationist systems.

In this context, if you're looking for a way to reward sacrifice as a narrativist function, you need to find something to give the players that doesn't advance gamist play.

Does that help?

--M. J. Young

[Matt Wilson]

In this context, if you're looking for a way to reward sacrifice as a narrativist function, you need to find something to give the players that doesn't advance gamist play.

MJ:

Agreed. So lemme think for a sec here, and see what each type of play would be like. Say there's a resource you can sacrifice when necessary to provide a mechanical bonus above and beyond what the resource would normally provide.

The gamist player avoids sacrificing the resource if possible, since having not had to sacrifice it is a sign that he/she made good strategic choices. So what would make this rule more interesting for G play is to make it hard to replace used resources. Maybe if you lose a resource, you have to use up currency to buy a new one, currency that you could have used on other things.

The N player wants meaning embedded in the sacrifice, so that the way the sacrifice is made, and what the thing being sacrificed is, determines the impact on events. The shallow cop losing his/her favorite car in a chase isn't a big deal, but Bruce Willis in Pulp Fiction losing his father's wristwatch is. He actually suffers complications (understatement) in choosing not to sacrifice it. In this case, whether or not the player can buy new resources in the future is irrelevant. You could say, "sure, have as many resources as you want," but that won't matter.

[Jeffrey Miller]

Say there's a resource you can sacrifice when necessary to provide a mechanical bonus above and beyond what the resource would normally provide.

How about abstracting the reward?  Distribute a small reward to the group at large, or make the sacrifice of an itemrequire a scene about its importance or the absence of this item/person/idea in their worldview.

-j-

[Scripty]

I'm relatively new here, having wandered over from rpg.net, but I have to say that I find the discussions very interesting. Please forgive me if I retread over mechanics ideas or things that have been discussed ad nauseam in the past. Although I have read this thread from start to finish, I haven't had time to read everything here at the Forge yet.

An idea that occured to me on this topic was to make advancement contingent upon achieving certain goals. I can hear people saying "Oooo... big revelation" now, but give me a second to explore this and I think you'll see where I'm going with it.

A system that I like at the moment is the modified Castle Falkenstein proposed by Christopher Kubasik, so I'll use it as an example. Say your character has three traits (akin to those found in Over the Edge). To advance those traits he/she needs character points. Now, typically, character points would be earned from attending a game session or performing tasks that are pretty standard in a typical game session (kill monsters, make progress in stopping the bad guys).

What I would propose is eliminating ALL of that and make advancement contingent upon achieving specific goals within the game itself. All players want their characters to advance. It is one of their stronger desires in game and I have many a helpless, dead kobold infant to support that statement.

So, say you have Buffy at the end of Season 3. She has the Slayer trait at  Good (6) and 2 Character Points saved up by the time of the season finale. Her listed goals are "Cure Angel so she can be in love with him again" which the GM has valued at 2 points, "Stop Akathla and save the world" which the GM has valued at 4 points. The complication emerges when Buffy realizes that she must "kill" Angel to stop Akathla. In game terms, Buffy's player chose to save the world even though Angel was "cured" and she could love him again. In predictable gamer form, the player went where the points were and at the end of the season Buffy had enough Character Points to advance her "Slayer" trait to Great (6).

None of this is new, but I'm surprised it hasn't been explored in this thread just yet. Inherent within this idea is the capability of the GM to manipulate the player's goals to support further plot threads. If the GM had wanted a post-apocalyptic "Wish" style campaign to follow Buffy Season 2, then he/she could have just offered 4 points for curing Angel and 2 for saving the world. If the GM really didn't care, he/she could have offered 3 points for either one and left it completely at the player's whim.

In the case of Bruce Willis and his watch ("Pulp Fiction"), the character could have just taken a flaw of some sort that caused him to lose a character point every game that he didn't have his watch.

Personally, I think ditching the idea of "everytime you come to the game you get 500 XP" notion and using advancement as a means to drive a character's story is the way to go.