Dialogue during narration

[Overdrive]

Hey all,

Suppose you're playing some game that allows players to narrate conflicts, outcomes of actions and whatnot. There is an NPC in the scene, a player gets to narrate.

Normally I as the GM would speak what the NPC has to say, perhaps in character or sometimes in third person. "Well, I just came from south, horrible wars going on there" or "The man says he comes from south, there being some horrible war."

But this time the player controls both his character and the NPC, right? I can imagine the poor guy presenting in character dialogue between the two characters :) No seriously, is IC dialogue impossible in this case? How to handle this?

Btw, we played Dust Devils last night. I had only a bottle of Kentucky Gentleman, a glass and the pack of cards on the table when the players showed up. Pretty cool.

[Jack Spencer Jr]

It is not only possible, but common. Professional storytellers do this sort of thing all the time. The trick is to find the voice of the character and to speak in that voice. With two characters it's simply a matter of switching back and forth.

[Simon W]

It is not only possible, but common. Professional storytellers do this sort of thing all the time. The trick is to find the voice of the character and to speak in that voice. With two characters it's simply a matter of switching back and forth.

Yes, but it's also a bit weird. Or at least it seems that way, when I'm talking to myself.

Perhaps the answer is to let the GM talk for the npc, but phrase your conversation correctly so that she can take the cue from what your character is saying.

Example - rather than asking the npc "so where is the treasure hidden?"

say "so you hid the treasure up in the mountains?"

Crap example, I know but if you can feed the GM a line, hopefully she can see where you are coming from and go with your narration.

[Lance D. Allen]

GMs are often required to talk to themselves when playing out an expository dialogue between two characters. Where is the major difference in a player doing the same thing?

Which is to say, I see no difficulty here. Just have the player play it out as they feel comfortable, or simply narrate the results of the dialogue, if they so choose.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

The GM analogy is the right approach to the issue. As it happens, when I'm the GM and I narrate the outcome or interchange of a scene, I rarely put words into player-characters' mouths. If I do, I make sure I'm doing so with permission (and the player has full "editing" rights).

So if the non-GM player is narrating, as in Dust Devils, then the same social rules apply ... presto, no possible conflict at the table.

Note that I'm talking about NPC dialogue, not actions or outcomes. In a game like Dust Devils, these are indeed under the control of the current narrator. So in a funny way, it's OK to plug Bastard Billy dead as a doornail through your narration, but not OK to make him say something that violates the aesthetic concerns of his nominal "owner."

Best,
Ron

[Simon W]

Hello,

The GM analogy is the right approach to the issue.

I don't think this is necessarily the right approach to the issue. Go with what works for you. For me, as I described works best.

I still feel daft, even as a GM talking for two npc's. I prefer to paraphrase when this happens. Or give the 'gist' of what was said. I know it's not exactly role-playing, but then, in this case you are the GM and really just describing the scene.

Simon
Beyond Belief Games
The home of Lashings of Ginger Beer, Babewatch and It's a dog's life

[ks13]

I can understand Gideon's concern here. It does feel odd to simply talk to yourself, and if you are not someone who gets into accents and different speach patterns for various characters, it could also turn out to be confusing. But I think that this will only be problematic if the whole exchange is carried out "in character".
When such a stituation occurs (one player speaking for two or more characters at once), I consider the fact that there other characters (player characters) observing the exchange. So I throw in a lot of OC descriptions, and always indicate who the active speaker is. Describe their posture, tone, action, etc, in addition to the IC speach. This also works in situations where a character might be spying on a coversation but has no visual clues. The other auditory descriptors that are presented add valuable information, and enhance the mood of the scene. I think that can help remove some of the odd feel of this self-conversation, since it is much more like reading out loud from a book.

[Jack Spencer Jr]

I can understand Gideon's concerns, but then, to newbies, the act of roleplaying or speaking in character is just as odd and embarassing.

Might I suggest some displacement, such as miniatures or sock puppets? Using miniatures to speak to each other with you simply providing the dialog may work for you.

In either case, it is a matter of what works for you as well as a matter of what you are willing to make work.

[Marco]

I ... I ...

umm ...
Go with the sock puppets man, that's *brilliant!*

To speak in character:
1. Vernacular is easier than accents. If you can't do accents well, stick to word choice.
2. Shifting back and forth in the chair a little is a good visual for who's talking.
3. Listening to Books on Tape during my drive to work did more for my speaking in character than GMing did.

-Marco (gettin' some socks for the next game)

[Ron Edwards]

Hi there,

I'll have to start all over, because I don't think I was clear.

Issue #1: Playing "someone else's" character during narration. This could be a non-GM who's speaking for an NPC, or a GM speaking for a PC. This is what I was addressing for Overdrive, and again, I didn't clarify that.

Issue #2: Playing two characters talking to one another while the other people at the table listen. I agree with you that role-playing two characters talking to one another is weird.

My hope is that my advice for issue #1 can set up more of a solution for the #2 ... in that once the group is used to sharing some ownership of various characters, then more than one person can be enlisted in the narration, so the "main" narrator doesn't have to do the sock-puppet thing.

Best,
Ron

[Jeph]

DO NOT TRY THE SOCK THING IF YOU DON'T WANT A SILLY GAME.

Speaking from experience here.

*sigh*

[Simon W]

DO NOT TRY THE SOCK THING IF YOU DON'T WANT A SILLY GAME.

Speaking from experience here.

*sigh*

Thats pretty much how I saw it!

Simon
Beyond Belief Games
check out Babewatch here
http://www.geocities.com/simonwashbourne/babewatch.html

[Clay]

Ron,

Narrating and speaking for somebody else's PC can be done, but never particularly well.  We actually never do this in rpg sessions; the controlling player will always participate. If they're running for beer or the toilet, we wait.  The is because we have experience from sharing character voice in collaborative writing.

Put simply, somebody who did not originate a character can never really understand the character in the same way and capture the proper spirit.  For a prime example, look at the Shadowspawn character from Thieves' World. By the second book, everyone wanted to write their story about Shadowspawn. Unfortunately, every last story was crap, except for Andrew Offut's stories.  Not because the others weren't excellent writers, but because they didn't understand the character and how he worked.

Even in Dust Devils, the high card cannot be total narrator. They can't effectively use dialog, and we always have the controlling player create the dialog, appropriate to the scene.  We can describe action, because action is either not identifying in the way that speach is, or because the identifying action is entirely obvious (e.g. Don Alejandro will always grab the wine and the wench before making his escape).

[Jack Spencer Jr]

I put forward that  one person performing the dialog of two or possible more characters is possible. It does require some skill to keep who's saying what straight which probably gets exponentially difficult with each additional character. But it is possible. "Weird" is a value judgement. As is thinking of techiniques to avoid it. I hope that those who've had positive experience with doing this are not scared off because they don't want to be weird.

[rafial]

Even in Dust Devils, the high card cannot be total narrator. They can't effectively use dialog, and we always have the controlling player create the dialog, appropriate to the scene.

Interesting specific case to bring up!  I ran a Dust Devils game just this week in which this dynamic came up.  A player, whose character was the sheriff, was having his deputies investigate the nefarious activities of mayor and her bully boys.  I dealt cards for a conflict between the sheriff and the mayor (a major character controlled by me), but indicated ahead of time that the narration should be couched as a run in between the deputy and one of the mayor's thugs.  The player won the hand and the high card, and started to narrate.  He did dialogue for the deputy, and then stared at me until I realized he was expecting me to do dialogue for the thug.  At the time, I wavered between saying "hey this is all your show" and giving in to his expectation.  I finally did take over the dialogue for the thug as expected, but I'm not entirely certain I made the right decision...

Anyway, the thing that struck me in context of this thread was that the expectation of "who does dialogue" went even beyond PCs, to "my NPC" vs. "your NPC".