[Universalis] Lessons learned

[LordSmerf]

So tuesday night we played a game of Universalis.  The group consisted of:

Me. about 7 games
WW. about 5 games
JG. about 6 games
NL. about 5 games
PW. second game
TW. first game

Disclaimer: this post is primarily concerned with GNS coherency and a brief discussion of the single major weakness i find in Universalis.

Pre play went fine and we ended up going three rounds and setting up a space sci fi game with a retro '70s flavor.  Things went pretty well with the exception of my general apathy and lack of direction (which i will address later.)  We got through our first Complication with almost no trouble mainly (i believe) due to my active suppression of my Gamist desires to Get As Many Coins As Possible and to Win.  Not that these are bad things, but no one else involved was interested in such things.  We finished the first scene without problems, but we seemed to have no real direction.  I guess this is Universalis at it's most Simulationis.  We were just there to Explore.

This is where problems begin cropping up.  WW finished cooking up a delicious Apple-Molassas Cake with a friend and sat down at the table with 20 coins.  WW is decidedly Gamist, especially in Universalis.  If the two of us were to play alone then the game would quickly devolve into Master Component generation and manipulation.  Things continued to develop (again, pure Exploration) without problems until the first Complication arose in the scene.  Things devolved into a "negotiation" war following the Calvinball [Ron Edwards' usage] principle that the Calvinballer is not really interested in negotiation, just getting their own way.  Both WW and i contributed to this (on opposite sides of course) and we spent an incredible amount of time getting nothing done.  At some point in the process WW looked up and addressed TW: "why the long face?"  The answer provided was "now is probably not a good time to discuss it."

At this point i realized that WW and i had once again broken a game of Universalis by letting our Gamist tendencies run away with us over a completely minor conflict.

The problems arise from the fact that Universalis is intentionally Incoherent (it doesn't focus on any aspect of GNS.)  Or perhaps it is simply Abashed Gamist, Narrativist, and Simulationist (it easily becomes any of the three.)  Again, this is intentional in the design, but i had not before recognized it.  Since i hadn't recognized it i didn't provide a direction for Drift (which is so easy in Universalis) so the game fell into the default of Simulationist Exploration of Character and Setting.  Unfortunately i have a profound disinterest in Exploration of Character and Setting for their own sakes.  I can occasionally tolerate Exploration of System and Situation.

So that's my complaint with Universalis.  It doesn't provide a direction.  In and of itself this isn't a problem, but it doesn't recomend that you do either.  After 7 or so games i have realized that a direction needs to be provided, and i believe that from here on out the focus this will provide will make our games greatly more enjoyable, i just wish i had realized sooner.

Also, i used Future scene framing for the first time, i really like it.

Thomas

[Bob McNamee]

When you say that you had a 'negotiation war' when resolving a Complication...

What do you mean by that term?

Were you two arguing over whether Component traits were applicable for the Complication?

or, were you Challenging the complication Resolution?

I've never had Complications take very long to resolve (the most length occurred on IRC play), but perhaps we don't make them very convoluted.

I take it that you were less interested in the Compication as a story advancing proceedure, and more interested in it as a coin generator?

Interesting post, so far,

[LordSmerf]

The actual event came out as follows.  First a component was generated based on the old Flash Gordon Ming Bot.  This was after the conflict first began.  WW ended up making it into a Master Component before he passed an my turn came up next.  I added a single trait to the Master (which of course transferred it to the single instance in existance.)  The trait was "Defective targetting systems."  I then put forward that the defective systems should reduce WW's pool by 1 die.  I did it more as in the interest of balance and because i have never successfully caused WW to lose a die.  Due to WW and my inherent Gamist tendancies neither of us were interested in backing down when he begin trying to justify not losing the die.  This brought the entire group into a discussion and bogged things down for about 5-10 minutes deciding this one thing.

Though i occassionally devolve into coin generation as a focus, in this case it was a desire to "beat" WW.  Unfortunately no one else was interested in competition of this form and our infighting killed the game.

What i learned was this: Premise must be established during preplay or this kind of thing is likely to occur again.  It was a learning experience and one that i found incredibly interesting.  I'm just hoping that we haven't eliminated our desire to play with Universalis for a long time.

Thomas

[Tony Irwin]

The problems arise from the fact that Universalis is intentionally Incoherent (it doesn't focus on any aspect of GNS.)  Or perhaps it is simply Abashed Gamist, Narrativist, and Simulationist (it easily becomes any of the three.)  Again, this is intentional in the design, but i had not before recognized it.  Since i hadn't recognized it i didn't provide a direction for Drift (which is so easy in Universalis) so the game fell into the default of Simulationist Exploration of Character and Setting.  Unfortunately i have a profound disinterest in Exploration of Character and Setting for their own sakes.  I can occasionally tolerate Exploration of System and Situation.

So that's my complaint with Universalis.  It doesn't provide a direction.  In and of itself this isn't a problem, but it doesn't recomend that you do either.  After 7 or so games i have realized that a direction needs to be provided, and i believe that from here on out the focus this will provide will make our games greatly more enjoyable, i just wish i had realized sooner.

Also, i used Future scene framing for the first time, i really like it.

Thomas

Chapter One, The Basic Concept
Conceptually, Universalis is a collaborative story telling endeavor in the form of a game. Players begin by selecting what kind of story will be told during that session. No time needs to be spent preparing this ahead of time. It is decided at the table in round robin fashion, using Coins to purchase aspects of the game world as desired. When all players are satisfied that they understand the nature of the game to be played, actual play begins. Players will create all aspects of the setting, including all characters (main and supporting), all locations (and all setting details), and all props (basically anything else, animal vegetable or mineral). They will then use these elements (collectively called Components) to develop the plot; telling the story through events and dialog and through the use of dice during plot complications.

Hey Thomas, I think from it's introduction Universalis is absolutely clear in it's GNS direction: we are going to sit down and have fun making a story happen now. You haven't identified anything in the system that waves a flag at you shouting "Step on up Thomas and prove yourself". It seems to be sitting at a table with your buddy that initiated the challenge to step on up. Consider the possibility that telling funny jokes, or eating pizza, could just as easily become "gamist" if WW is at the same table, yet there's nothing intrinsically competitive about these activities.

In isolation, maybe the use of coins does wave that step on up flag at you - it's something tactile you can win, count and compare. Also you can invest coins wisely to win even more coins. However within the context of all the other game rules would you agree that coins are more useful for their story telling power?

In the Rough categories of Narrativist play/design thread Ron Edwards writes

1. The Window (partly), Over the Edge, Castle Falkenstein, possibly Puppetland - strong setting ("genre") emphasis, relies highly on GM control (hopefully beneficent) of IIEE, liberal Drama resolution; dangerously vulnerable to railroading; I think Soap, InSpectres, and Universalis represent a development in this category of stronger IIEE-structure but retaining the Drama emphasis for resolution. This sort (or rather, the play best promoted by these games) of play asks, What happens? And, then given that the answer to this question is not randomized, What am I trying to say?

I don't think Universalis is abashed Gamist, but rather that like Soap, Inspectres, and also Questing Beast, there is a rigorous "game" to the system that gets played in order to give some forced variety with the Drama resolution. There's always a chance that someone will find that playing the underlying game is more satisfying than using it for what it's best at: to make story happen right now. If you were to play Questing Beast with WW you might find that you were constantly trying to out do each other in winning more dice, with Inspectres it might become about hosing each other in more and more hilarious ways. I don't think that means an incoherent system, it's just drifting it to a point where everything that doesn't spark the gamist player's interest is ignored.

Is Universalis abashed Simulationist? I don't think so - I agree that it can do High Concept Sim well. If everyone loves a particular genre then we can all be spending our coins to make sure that what happens is faithful to the genre rather than what we want to happen in this story. But again, the coins are more useful for their story telling power - I think that actually until Story Now happens, you're still in the set up phase, even if you're well passed deciding tenets. I've found that sometimes the first half dozen scenes can just be about establishing relationships, routines, environments, before the moment hits and you instinctively know what you want to happen next. Rather than describing that as sim play, I'd compare it to pregame discussion - you're not sim-exploring so much as feeling things out before they really kick in and you start making story.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

Universalis would only be considered Gamist-facilitating, or almost so, if playing it the way you began to do were fun.

In other words, if you all had looked up three hours later and said, "Hey, we played this Gamist and had a blast!"

Instead, you got something else, and I think it might be worth asking you a couple of questions about that.

1. When's the last time you had an undisputably excellent time role-playing? Date, place, people involved, system used, and why.

2. And if it's different, when is the last time this happened with you and WW at the table? Same requested information.

Best,
Ron

[Bob McNamee]

Thanks Thomas, that clears up things in my mind a lot!

Personal Competition, rather than a game system thing, cool.

 For what its worth, here's my two cents on the defective systems trait. It should have added to the opposing side (yours?) in the Complication, not subtracted from the side Controlling the Bot (WW).

Complication Dice Pools only get added to. Which Pool gets added to depends on the trait ( you can call on negative traits to benefit your side).

[EDITED IN: IGNORE THE ABOVE...I don't know how I've failed to notice / play with it...see post below pg 65]

You can take your Coin Winnings and buy down the Losing side coin reward. You may have mixed those up a bit. (This buy down is something I usually Gimmick against myself)

I hope you don't have to wait a huge time before playing again.

Sounds too like you had an informal Challenge over whether a trait applies to the Complication.

Remind the other players that they can  make a "Get to the Point" kind of Challenge too.
Or even institute a Challenge and Fine, if they catch you two going off on a competitive tangent.

Just an idea, what ever works...

[rafial]

Complication Dice Pools only get added to. Which Pool gets added to depends on the trait ( you can call on negative traits to benefit your side).

Top of page 65: "Drawing upon Traits is FREE.  This adds 1 die to, or subtracts 1 die from, a Dice Pool if the Trait applies"

Read down for more detail.  I've been in games where this was done.  It helps keep die pool sizes more manageable.

[Bob McNamee]

Heh, shows what I know...

I've played, who knows how many times...?

I've never used the subtraction, ever... makes me wonder if I ever even read the bolded line before... probably, but skipped over the part I don't like.   :)

So ignore what I said (I'm going to edit in an ignore message)... still Challenging a drawn out Complication is good advice, if everybody else has had enough.

Thanks Rafial, that gives me anouther rule to think about Rule Gimmicking at the start of the game from now on.

;D

[LordSmerf]

Ok, good questions from Ron, so i will address them first.

WW was at the last session that i truly enjoyed which happened to be last night.  I'll post an Actual Play of our first MLwM game.  The only change in people was that one person (PW) was missing from the group.  So the five of us whipped up a Master and four Minions and got a solid hour or two of play.  I enjoyed it a lot, the reasons will become evident when i post it (i hope.)  I always feel a little bit restrained playing Narrativist games with JG since there's an incredibly preference for Simulationism there.  But even with that i think that everyone had fun.

And to address Tony:

After reading your post i have come to agree that Universalis is not in fact Abashed Gamist, your analysis seems to be the correct one.  However, i still think that Universalis is some sort of strange Sim/Nar hybrid.  I don't even think that it's abashed Sim.  The reason is this: Universalis doesn't provide a specific instruction to find a Premise, and no specific systemic reward is provided for forwarding that Premise.  Now Universalis does provide ways to produce these things which is one of its greatest features, but they are not there already.  This to me seems to provide an obvious outlet for Exploration (of Character and Setting especially.)  I may be convinced otherwise, but for now i'm pretty sure that this is the case.

Thomas

[Christopher Kubasik]

Hi Thomas,

Here are my thoughts on this:

I don't think there's anything in a good Universalis game that demands "negotiation" rather than "getting my way" when jerking the story to the left or to the right.

As someone already pointed out on this thread, the focus of Universalis is making a good story.  However, as others have already noted all over this board, what one person calls a "good" story another calls pap.  One of the features I love about Universalis is that it demands each person put on the line what he thinks will be a good or bad story.  And if *this* way, rather than *that* way is the way I want it, then I'm encouraged by the rules to work the tale toward that end -- even if it means disappointing someone else at the table.  (They can, if they wish, jerk the story back into another direction again, if they so choose.)

But the guiding compass is "good story."  Just wanting to win is one thing.  Wanting to win to make it what I consider a good story is another.

Which brings me to the crux of matter:  In your first post you wrote, "Things went pretty well with the exception of my general apathy and lack of direction."

I.... Don't know how that sentence can actually make any sense.  

The direction is the desire to put one's tastes on the line and make a good story.  The excitement comes from the desire to do this.  Apathy suggests that no one cared much for the game's direction: putting your taste on the line to make a good story.  

If this was the case, how could things have gone "pretty well"?  It sounds, without, I admit, having been there, absolutely dreadful.  It'd be like playing Monopoly with people who had no interest in bying title deeds and buiding up properites -- but kept rolling dice to go around the board anyway.  Is this what it was like?

I don't know if one can win just to "win."  No matter what the event: atheltic, intellectual, girls in bikinis nearby, getting higher status in the group, keeping your job.... Whatever, there's something at stake.  In Universalis it's *making a story* the way you think it should be made.  If no one's into that, into making a story and committing to making it their way, then, yeah, there's gonna be trouble.

Take care,
Christopher

[LordSmerf]

Well, i'm not sure that i entirely agree.  I feel that Universalis bills itself as Narrativist and provides a solid framework for Narrativist play.  However, my experience with it has been profoundly Simulationist.  The lack of any encouragement to have a metagame Premise for play quite possibly leads me back to my old (unsatisfactory) simulationist roots.  The apathy i mention is an outgrowth of the apathy i have developed for the pure Simulationist agenda.  The group tends toward Simulationism because that's what we are familiar with (though i believe that most of use tend more towards a Narrativist agenda.)

I'm not sure if that's entirely coherent, but i think that it's more a matter of Universalis not quite taking a stance on whether it's intended to be Narrativist or Simulationist that is giving me problems.

I'll have to ponder this some more so i can present a more coherent analysis...

Thomas

[TW]

I suppose this is worth de-lurking to comment, if only to provide a slightly different perspective. As the TW from Lordsmerf's group, I have to disagree that some feature of the Universalis system, or any other system for that matter, is responsible for the success or failure of our particular group's sessions.

I'm not saying that the system doesn't matter, but personal concerns are separate from system concerns. The G/N/S model isn't intended to deal with the everyday conflicts over where to play, who rides with whom, what kind of food is served, and so forth. These social relationships are the framework within which play occurs and so necessarily preceed (and override) the system conflicts. Even without going into specifics of the session, a general run-down of the evening points more to these sort of conflicts rather than a system one.

Consider:

At this point i realized that WW and i had once again broken a game of Universalis by letting our Gamist tendencies run away with us over a completely minor conflict.

I would say that Lordsmerf is being a little to hard on himself, but this is the crux of the evening's problem. Within the group's game of Universalis is a subgame of WW vs. Lordsmerf that not only excludes the four other people at the session but also uses them as props in an fight they have no interest in.

WW and Lordsmerf describe themselves as the only Gamists of our group. WW only played for half of the game. Nevertheless, the six-person game became a showdown between two players, using the developing game as excuse (the actual conflict, remember, was minor). Regardless of the stylistic preferences of the players or the rules of the system, this sort of hijacking does not indicate much respect for the other members of the group. Six people don't agree to play a game so that they can watch two people go at it.

My particular concerns are slightly different, but they are unnecessary to the larger discussion and I have still haven't spoken with WW about the session as I promised. From the group perspective, however, my impression was that this is more about social issues that are not part of an evaluation of a game system, possibly not even in terms of social contracts.

[Paul Czege]

Hey Thomas,

WW was at the last session that i truly enjoyed which happened to be last night. I'll post an Actual Play of our first MLwM game. The only change in people was that one person (PW) was missing from the group....I enjoyed it a lot, the reasons will become evident when i post it (i hope.)

Please carry on here with the Universalis discussion. I just wanted to say for your planned thread that I'm very interested in your thoughts on how/why the traditional social dynamics of your group weren't so much of a sticking point when you played MLwM.

Paul

[Christopher Weeks]

Within the group's game of Universalis is a subgame of WW vs. Lordsmerf that not only excludes the four other people at the session but also uses them as props in an fight they have no interest in.

WW and Lordsmerf describe themselves as the only Gamists of our group. WW only played for half of the game. Nevertheless, the six-person game became a showdown between two players, using the developing game as excuse (the actual conflict, remember, was minor). Regardless of the stylistic preferences of the players or the rules of the system, this sort of hijacking does not indicate much respect for the other members of the group. Six people don't agree to play a game so that they can watch two people go at it.

TW, do consider using the rules to lay some "smack" down on the problem players as Bob suggested above.  And get the other three players involved.  WW and Thomas might not even mind being kept in line if they understand that they have this tenacious urge to duel which makes things less fun for the others.

Thomas, do you think you can have fun with Universalis while being regulated that way?  (I can imagine such interruption to work or not depending on the people involved.)

I too, would like to know what the crucial difference between Uni and MLwM is.

Chris

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

TW, I'm glad you joined the discussion and made that point, because I suspected that pure-and-simple social dynamics were the real issue - well "above" the GNS-issues, and in fact enclosing them. You might be interested to know that Social Contract as a rules/text item in Universalis is only a subset of what I mean by "social contract" in discussion.

My questions to Thomas were aimed right in that direction, and in fact, Thomas, I wish you'd re-answer them. Why? Because I'm asking about long-past play, not recent sessions. I'm interested in how you and WW seem to have a long history of clashing as people through the rather ragged veil of "just role-playing."

Which, as I think you suspect, TW, is not a matter of "Gamist-ness," at all. And if that's the case, then looking at Universalis as a game system will be fruitless.

Best,
Ron