An Exalted Ghost Story

[Thor Olavsrud]

Following a truly excellent session on Sunday, I've started thinking about a question that I'll put forward here: How much do our expectations, as GMs, guide our players' decision-making, even in relationship map, bang-driven games?

And a related question: Assuming GM expectations do influence player decisions, does this de-protagonize them?

It might help to illustrate the situation at hand:

Red Snake Fairy -- leader of the Red Snake Fairy Gang and likely a Solar Exalt

Dr. Bao -- The city's alchemist, geomancer and exorcist, a mortal
Bao Li -- Dr. Bao's daughter, a mortal
Shu Ting -- Dr. Bao's wife and Bao Li's mother, deceased. Now a ghost known as The August Personage of Water

Lord Zuo -- Ruler of the city, a mortal
Zuo Tan -- Lord Zuo's favored son and heir, a mortal


The characters arrived in the city of Tuashen and soon learned that a gang, run by Red Snake Fairy was all but running the show. They witnessed the gang shaking down the foreman of a construction crew building a new temple, and killed a number of them, running off the others.

They then learned more about Red Snake Fairy. She demands the city deliver up one youth to her gang every month. No one knows what the youths are used for. However, Red Snake Fairy has declared war upon Mask of Winters, a nearby Deathlord (a sort of uber-powerful ghost that seeks to bring death to all Creation, for those of you unfamiliar with Exalted). Most believe that the youths are used as a sacrifice to buy allies, possibly a Fae Noble and his retinue, for her cause. The youths are chosen each month through a city-wide lottery. The protection rackets supposedly go to paying for her war.

After befriending Dr. Bao and his daughter, the characters learn that Bao Li has been selected as the next sacrifice. After deciding that Red Snake Fairy's cause did not justify her actions, the players decided that their characters would go to Lord Zuo and offer to rid the city of the scourge. While meeting with Lord Zuo, they learn that his nephew has just been found murdered in a nearby Bath House.

The characters investigate the horrific murder, and determine that two demons were responsible, likely Blood-Apes (or Erymanthoi), a favored tool of sorcerers. Soon after, the Blood-Apes murder one of Lord Zuo's sons at a brothel. They leave indications that Zuo Tan is next. As an aside, one of the characters see Lord Zuo's men round up everyone who was in the brothel at the time of his son's death and put them to the sword before burning the place to the ground. Evidently the son was up to something extremely unsavory.

The characters soon determine that there is considerable bad blood between Lord Zuo and Dr. Bao. It turns out that both the Lord and the doctor vied for Shu Ting's hand. She chose the doctor and the Lord never forgave either of them. After this, they learn that, in fact, it was Zuo Tan that had been chosen by the sacrifice lottery, not Bao Li, but Lord Zuo read her name anyway. They also learn that Zuo Tan and Bao Li are deeply in love. Either would be willing to sacrifice their lives and their souls for the other.

Finally, one of the characters discovers that Dr. Bao is the one that summoned the demons, bargaining his life to Hell in the process. He knew, from the ghost of his wife, that Lord Zuo had lied about the sacrifice, and threw away every belief he held dear in order to take vengeance on the lord. He was extremely remorseful about the whole thing when confronted.

So here's where the question comes in: As I expected when mapping out the relationships and coming up with the bangs, the players decided that they would help Dr. Bao, not Lord Zuo. In fact, they plan to take out Red Snake Fairy, save Tan and Bao Li, and then depose Lord Zuo in favor of Tan.

As I said, this is basically how I expected things to go (though I didn't think they would try to depose Lord Zuo). But now I'm wondering why they made the choice they did. The situations of both Lord Zuo and Dr. Bao are roughly analogous. When faced with the loss of his son, Zuo found someone to take his place. When faced with the loss of his daughter, Dr. Bao sought vengeance and was responsible for the murders of two people who weren't even directly involved. Both did evil things to protect their own.

At first I thought the murder of the people at the brothel may have tipped the scales. It wasn't really necessary to the story -- the players didn't really respond to it -- but I had thrown it in as an expression of the cut-throat nature of politics in the city. But when the characters went to confront Dr. Bao (at the time they had not confirmed that he had summoned the demons), they suspected that he had summoned the demons, and even suspected he might be Red Snake Fairy herself!

And yet they turned on Zuo rapidly after hearing Dr. Bao's story. I really love how everything has turned out. The confrontation with Red Snake Fairy next session should be awesome (the Circle's drunken boxer is going to wear a dress and pose as Bao Li!). But I can't help wondering if I led them here by the nose.

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Thor,

There is indeed some chance that nose-leading was going on ... but if I'm reading your post correctly, I'm thinking that instead, we're only talking about fun interactions leading to fun play. After all, you're a player too! Nothing's wrong with others following your cues.

The thing that keeps this from being subtle railroading, then, is simply whether you or anyone else in the group is equally responsive to input of exactly the same sort from someone besides yourself. And whether you as GM refrain from exercising shut-down tactics when that starts to occur.

I went through this myself, the exact same reflective worries, when running Hero Wars. When running Sorcerer, railroading is practically impossible once the players get on a roll (no pun intended). It's like sex with an especially athletic and forthright partner; the key is to make sure that some mutualism is involved. But in Hero Wars, the Premise is largely Setting-derived, and the GM is the key figure in presenting conflicts that everyone is to get invested in. The issue is whether you want to have sex, not to become a choreographic porn director.

[Hey, this analogy is working perfectly for my point. Cool.]

My solution was to make those conflicts as problematic as possible, which in Glorantha, is no stretch at all (arguably, it's what the setting is i]for[/i]). That meant that players became more and more aware that what they wanted to do was being spotlighted, even if most of the conflict-input was from me. It helped that heroquesting, as a game mechanic and in-game event, makes that dramatically possible, but even without that, I think it'll work OK.

Best,
Ron

[Mike Holmes]

To be more general, it sounds, Thor, like you're saying that Simulationism is to be avoided. Nothing wrong with a functional Sim/Nar Hybrid session, is there?

Mike

[Thor Olavsrud]

Hi guys, thanks for the responses.

Ron, glad to hear you went through this too. I can always tell the sessions in which I don't shut the players down because they get really excited AND I really enjoy myself because I have to stretch my role-playing muscles by responding to the players. It used to be that I would have a really intricate plot to present to the players, and often they would have a good time, but I would be bored silly because nothing really surprised me.

I try not to prepare anything that requires the players to make a decision in one particular way anymore. In this case I was equally excited by the possibilities of having the players work WITH Red Snake Fairy, or support Lord Zuo, or to support Dr. Bao. But I will freely admit that when I imagined playing out the situations in my head, I was rooting for Dr. Bao.

I definitely try to give players free rein to suggest scenes and input. The eventual confrontation with the demons was an example. One of the PCs is a sorcerer, and had warded a room from demons after gathering Lord Zuo's family in the room. He had then gone on to confront Dr. Bao. Meanwhile, another character had gone to speak to Zuo Tan, during which Tan, who had been indulging in self-pity, was inspired by a speech given by the character and set off to find a seamstress that could alter Bao Li's dress so he could secretly take her place.

Meanwhile, the character who had warded the room (and was no longer 'on set') said "Oh no! You've just wandered outside the ward!" That led to a nifty scene where I had the ghost of Dr. Bao's wife appear before the sorcerer (he had just confronted Dr. Bao) and warn him that Tan and the other PC had left the warded area. The sorcerer was able to use a ritual to send the ghost with a warning to the other character, who thus had a chance to formulate a quick plan before the demons ambushed him.

All in all, it was a very satisfying session. It was only after everyone had gone home, and I was ruminating about bangs for the ultimate confrontation in the next session, that I started thinking about the players' decision to depose Zuo. He really isn't much worse than Dr. Bao, but they have taken an extreme dislike to him -- that's what led me to wonder whether I'd been guiding them to my preferred outcome.

It also leads me to wonder whether I should twist his vileness up to 11 in the next session and play into their expectations, or to find some other way to play up the similarities between the situations of Lord Zuo and Dr. Bao.

Hi Mike. I didn't really see it as a Sim/Nar issue, but maybe you see something that I didn't notice. Could you expand on your thoughts?

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Thor,

It also leads me to wonder whether I should twist his vileness up to 11 in the next session and play into their expectations, or to find some other way to play up the similarities between the situations of Lord Zuo and Dr. Bao.

Well, I feel a bit like a broken record. You're a player too. There is no "should" - this is exactly the sort of decision you've shouldered by playing the role of the GM. Just do whatever you'd like. If you're pretty sure that you're not violating the social contract (i.e. any aspect of play) with what you're doing, then all is well.

I really think your post-game concern is worry-warting for no good reason. Here's my advice: take a good look at the two NPCs in question. Now, how do you want to play them? Whatever it is, do that. It's your passion and enthusiasm in playing them, to such an extent that they hit all possible hot-buttons for you, that makes them better NPCs for the other players to work with. When you start double-layering the issue, to say, but how do I want the other players to react, and then triple-layering it to say, and is it OK to ask that question, that you'll get all gummed up.

Hey, Mike, I also think you're swinging a GNS-stick that isn't too important. Thor's playing pretty Narrativist here, as far as I can tell, and the concern is whether he's permitting enough latitude for everyone else to do so too. It's an "options in the N thing" thing.

Best,
Ron

[Mike Holmes]

I guess my point, Ron, is that, unless they've decided on a specifically Narrativist ideal of play, that some of the more Sim technique that may be seeping in here or there isn't problematic. That is, sometimes as one of the players it's OK for the GM to control the plot. Even in a hybrid game, it doesn't have to be open for Narrativist potential all the time.

Basically, if he's feeling the need to control things at some point, as you say, as long as he's not violating the social contract, then it's all good. It seems to me that we're assuming a Narrativist priority here when that's not been established. If, in fact, there is a Narrativist priority, then by all means, try to figure out how to eliminate the Sim part.

Mike

[Ron Edwards]

Mike,

I haven't the faintest idea what you're talking about in terms of "controlling the plot." Thor is wondering about whether his values (sense of who's the bad guy) are being communicated tacitly to his players. I'm saying, "Even if so, so what?" unless he really wants none of that sort of thing going on for some reason.

Thor, is any of this helping? Tell Mike and me to shut up if we're getting off track.

Best,
Ron

[Thor Olavsrud]

Hi Ron,

It's certainly helping. I think you identified it here:

I really think your post-game concern is worry-warting for no good reason. Here's my advice: take a good look at the two NPCs in question. Now, how do you want to play them? Whatever it is, do that. It's your passion and enthusiasm in playing them, to such an extent that they hit all possible hot-buttons for you, that makes them better NPCs for the other players to work with. When you start double-layering the issue, to say, but how do I want the other players to react, and then triple-layering it to say, and is it OK to ask that question, that you'll get all gummed up.

I think what's happened is that these characters have accomplished exactly what they were supposed to do -- force the players to make decisions and draw conclusions about who's right and who's wrong, and then act on those decisions -- and I'm coming in with my post-game analysis and second-guessing their choices instead of going with the flow.

What it comes down to, I think, is that my image of Lord Zuo was not strong enough coming into play, which meant my portrayal was weak, causing my mental image of him to clash with what the players perceived through play.

None of us really approached the game with the idea of making it especially narrativist or simulationist (I think discussion of that would confuse one of the players), but I do strive to make sure that important choices by the players drive the game. It's working well for the most part and now I'm just overthinking things.