[Polaris] Key Phrases are lies

[GreatWolf]

In another thread, Ben said this:

It occured to me sometime after publishing the game that all three of the elaborate key phrases (game opening, character introduction, game closing) are, to a greater or lesser degree, bald-faced lies.

This is fine, the dissonance there actually has a positive effect on the game, I think.

I was hoping that you would elaborate on this a bit, Ben.  I have an inkling of what you're saying, but I'd be interested in hearing it from the horse's mouth.

[Ben Lehman]

Not a lot to say, really.  Remember that I realized this after having written the game, so I don't really have any more authoritative power than anyone else on the topic.  Let's just look at each case.

Long ago, the people were dying at the end of the world

Except, it isn't the end of the world, because here we are, now, and look, the world is not over.  It's possible to scan "end of the world" as "north pole," in which case this isn't actually a lie, just phrased misleadingly.

But hope was not yet lost, for Algol still heard the song of the stars

Except, hope is lost.  We know it is.  We're told, in no uncertain terms, about the totality of the destruction that the knights are powerless to prevent.

But that all happened long ago, and now there are none who remember it.

Except, of course, we remember it.  We play the game.  (Note I did catch this one before publication -- hence the little note in the colophon about "there are most especially no games.")

Now, what effect does this have, to say these things which we know aren't entirely true?  I think that it gets us into a headspace where we're willing to accept fantasy, and strangeness.  It's a way of viscerally telling ourselves -- "this isn't rational.  this doesn't have to make sense."

At least, that's my guess.

yrs--
--Ben

[TonyLB]

But hope was not yet lost, for Algol still heard the song of the stars

Except, hope is lost.  We know it is.  We're told, in no uncertain terms, about the totality of the destruction that the knights are powerless to prevent.

See, I've been thinking (pretty much having a sense that you'd say that) and I think you are wrong.  Hope is not yet lost.  There is no possibility, none, that anything will survive, but hope still lives.

At the start of a classic zombie movie you could look at the protagonists and think "Okay, they're dead already, they just don't know it yet."  But that would be missing the point.  The point is that they are alive now, and later they won't be.  The movie is about their deaths, and how they face them.  They have to be alive at the start in order to tell that story.

In just that way, Polaris is a game about the death of hope, and how we face it.  Hope has to be alive at the start in order to tell that story.

[Ben Lehman]

That's an excellent point, Tony.

I'll note that, as the game progresses, the phrase becomes less and less true, though.

yrs--
--Ben

[Valamir]

Yeah, just because WE know the hope is in vain doesn't mean THEY do.

In fact, I'd say the whole progression of Zeal to Weariness is essentially them, catching up to us in that awareness.

When they have Zeal they are confident their doom can be avoided.

When they become Veteran they begin to suspect their doom is inevitable.

When they turn demon...they know it is...


Interestingly the point at which they come to understand reality the way we the players understand reality is the point at which they become a demon.  How much more fairy tale can you get.

[WiredNavi]

Now, what effect does this have, to say these things which we know aren't entirely true? I think that it gets us into a headspace where we're willing to accept fantasy, and strangeness. It's a way of viscerally telling ourselves -- "this isn't rational. this doesn't have to make sense."

Actually, what I got out of that all those phrases are true, because compared to them, we - and anything we could remember or make up about them - quite simply doesn't matter.  They held on to hope until it was gone; the world as it should be ended with them; there are none whose memories of them compare to the reality.  They were greater than we are, and if we think there is a world left after they are gone it is only because we are willing to settle for the ruins of one, never having known the world-as-it-should-be.  The phrases serve to emphasize that, and to push our stories further and further towards trying to reach that glory.  But we never will, because we are not capable of reaching their heights even in dreams...

This perspective probably wouldn't occur to me if I hadn't played games in Chorus/Maps, though, because I see the comparison pretty strongly.  Also I need sleep.

[Raquel]

 Reading through this thread I got a Lord of the Rings quote going through my head. "We must do without hope." When I looked it up I found that Aragorn's statement was even more appropriate than I remembered--

"We must do without hope. At least we may yet be avenged."

You'll never win, but just maybe you can take out one more demon before you blow out the candle again...

[Ben Lehman]

Dave -- cool post.

You'll never win, but just maybe you can take out one more demon before you blow out the candle again...

Spite is always an attractive option, yes...

Man, thanks for talking about this game with me, guys.  I'm totally grinning ear to ear, still.

yrs--
--Ben

[GreatWolf]

In just that way, Polaris is a game about the death of hope, and how we face it.  Hope has to be alive at the start in order to tell that story.

I'm going to preface these remarks by saying that Polaris, like all RPGs, is as much about what you bring to the table as it is about the text of the game itself.  So, I'm not asserting that this answer is the right answer.  Instead, this is my answer.  When I play Polaris, this is what I bring to the table.

Polaris is not about the death of hope per se.  Rather, it's just about death.  The death of friends.  The death of beauty.  The death of dreams.  But not necessarily the death of hope.  I think that is, in part, what the Veteran's choice is about.  It's not really about death or demonhood.  It's about choosing between hope and despair.  Becoming a demon is a choice of despair.  Some deaths are also a choosing of despair.  But, some deaths are about choosing hope.  And, as the struggle goes on, a single question rises to the surface.

When the world has been destroyed, what remains?

The stories that are told answer this question.

That's what Polaris is about.

[Arturo G.]

Amen, Seth!

[Ben Lehman]

I'm going to preface these remarks by saying that Polaris, like all RPGs, is as much about what you bring to the table as it is about the text of the game itself.  So, I'm not asserting that this answer is the right answer.  Instead, this is my answer.  When I play Polaris, this is what I bring to the table.

Polaris is not about the death of hope per se.  Rather, it's just about death.  The death of friends.  The death of beauty.  The death of dreams.  But not necessarily the death of hope.  I think that is, in part, what the Veteran's choice is about.  It's not really about death or demonhood.  It's about choosing between hope and despair.  Becoming a demon is a choice of despair.  Some deaths are also a choosing of despair.  But, some deaths are about choosing hope.  And, as the struggle goes on, a single question rises to the surface.

When the world has been destroyed, what remains?

The stories that are told answer this question.

That's what Polaris is about.

It's funny, I was just having a conversation with Dave about how cool it is that I can learn things about my game from other people.

Seth -- this is awesome.  I also think that it's deeply Christian.  (I mean that as a compliment.)

Me, I don't know.  I think maybe the demon are trying to save the people.  Maybe the knights are so stuck in their nostalgia that they can't bring themselves to do what's necessary, and only the demons can.  Maybe becoming a demon is the ultimate expression of hope.

Maybe the people are just rat bastards, every one, and the only thing keeping them in check was their Queen, and she's dead.  Maybe they deserve to die.

Maybe the demons are just something strange and alien, and the evil that the people do is simply some sort of cargo-cultish social breakdown.

I don't know.  That's why I play.

yrs--
--Ben

[Bankuei]

Hi Ben,

I've always liked the ambiguity of the demons and the fact that they're not completely described in the game except in that they look weird, they attack, and sometimes they possess people.  It's like if you took the Dogs in the Vineyard Demons, and hacked off the "Hate & Murder" requirement at the end- you get "False Worship", but is if false?  Or just different?

It's change and the knights are fighting against change.  Perhaps that change is for the worse, perhaps it's -just- change.   Certainly that's a battle one can't win.

But really, that's not what anyone's fighting for anyway, right?

Chris

[Arturo G.]

Seth -- this is awesome.  I also think that it's deeply Christian.  (I mean that as a compliment.)

I so much strongly agree with Seth that I can also apply this to me. I should know I was highly influenced by my deep Christian formation.

Indeed, now I'm thinking that I grabbed Polaris so enthusiastically because its inherent freedom let me show, for the first time,  what were my ideas about knighthood, despair, hope, redemption and many other related issues.

Ben, Chris, your comments are just opening a new perspective for me. I thought the game was about what I wanted it to be. Now, I'm very very curious about what the other players in my group have to say about this. Have I influenced them with my preconceived ideas? Or are we experienced different perspectives at the same time? Perhaps it is too early, and I should wait for  us to reach the end of our knights to know.

Arturo

[Valamir]

Yeah.

In Polaris, the people and the demons can be anything.

From a non-play-just-read-the-book perspective the knights struck me as the 'bad guys', leaving in the past, focused solely on their dogma and ritual, totally missing out on the fact that a new day had dawned (the metaphor being quite literal), and determined to stop anyone from thinking independently.  The people struck me as the foolish ignorant masses who run pell mell after every new fad becoming totally immersed in counter culture simply because its the hip thing to do.  The demons struck me as the enlightened, saying "listen morons, and pay attention.  Things don't have to be the same old same old.  We're tired of all this dogma and posing...we're changing the world whether you want to come along or not.  My initial plan for Rastaban was totally to become a demon and declare myself one of the enlightened.

What made it even cooler for me is realizing that while that may have been my initial take from reading the text...the setting is such a blank slate that you can map almost any metaphor you want onto it (like the Activism discussion from awhile back) and it works.  So in play the game is totally NOT about the above, but instead totally about what results from the collision of 4 people's own personal metaphors...meaning Rastaban's story can totally go any number of ways because there is no actual "true" metaphor.

Or rather...like the speculation that the world of Polaris is actually a snowflake melting in the course of a day...every game of Polaris is its own snowflake...complete with a totally one of a kind metaphor.

[Andrew Cooper]

Dammit people!  Now I'm going to have to buy Polaris at GenCon.  Have mercy on my bank account and quit having such cool discussions about games I don't have yet.