Recently, I was trying to make a TROS character for a game starting via Indie-netgaming and about five minutes into character creation, I realized something: I had no idea what the heck to put where!

Now, I don't mean the rules were confusing in that they didn't tell me what went where, or how to derive and place points into the various stats. Rather, having not played TROS before, I did not know what I should be placed where, how the various scores I could place would function in play, and thus which scores would best serve my purposes in which particular categories.

Does that sound like Gamist resource management? Or like I am trying to beat the system? Though it could be, it isn't. Consider that if I want to play a particular type of character (which is the usual argument for the use of choice-based character generation) I need to place my points "correctly", so that once in play the actual character effectiveness in particular categories meet my expectations of the character's effectiveness in those categories.

While I could gain answers to all my questions about designing a character by posting to the appropriate forums and asking the right questions (as well as recieving the right answers), I really should not have to consult anything other than the reference book in order to create a character I can feel comfortable with in play. Yet time and again, I find new systems produced where you actually have to have played once or twice in order to really understand the act of character creation itself (in that system) in order to produce a personally-viable character by choice, or have the help of an experienced player of that same game in order to produce a character that will meet your expectations.

I dare to proclaim that this state of affairs is not good for the hobby, as it reduces the chances of selling these games to new groups who do not have an established member-player of a particular game, someone who can function as the character-creation sounding board for the group (ie: "What will happen if I put X into Y? Will he be able to do Z?")

Point-based, choice-based character creation: it's the devil, I say. Give me the purity of a randomized character creation system!

Given that there is generally strong opposition to randomness in modern design, mainly (it is argued) because RPGs should be about playing a character you design, that it is better if you are "involved" in the character's design. The vote against randomness in generation is solidly defended as a fact: one must be playing the character they want to play.

However, I fail to see any compelling reason why one would, by default, be less involved in the playing out of a character over whom they had little or even no initial design input. Actors do this constantly -- they do not design or create the personas they play, yet they make these characters their own, and connect with them as "their" character(s). To me, then, the most given argument as above seems a dodge based upon something other than the player's "involvement" with the character via design.

Obviously, the benefits I am going to talk about will not appeal to everyone equally (or possibly even at all, though I view that reaction as remote if one is considering rather than reacting) but I suggest that there are major benefits, often overlooked or disregarded because of the concept of "what an RPG is" or what you are "supposed to do" (or be allowed to do) with an RPG. So, clear your head of previous judgements and consider...

There are many joys to randomization, such as the fact that it makes character creation easier. Absolutely none of the knowledge discussed above is remotely necessary to make a character with randomized methods. Instead, you roll some dice, and as long as you understand how to roll the dice in play, *bam* you've got something you can sit down with and discover as you play.

Random character generation also prevents the dreaded "system abuse" most gamers are so girlishly-squealing fearful of. There is no number or skill juggling to make that "perfect" character, mechanically, so for those looking for a leg up through superior knowledge of the rules and/or mathematical competence, they are instead forced to win with what they are given. In many ways, that can be the best sort of challenge, and the most rewarding.

This also has the added benefit of making each new character a new challenge. The system might be known after the first character, and with point/choice-based character creation, you know how to work the system to produce the various effects you desire, and often to the best effect. However, when the character is a random design, working the angles with the limitations and benefits of each new character is as fresh as it was with the first one: a process of testing, exploration, and discovery lending a newness and tension to each event.

For those concerned about such issues, random generation also produces more "realistic" characters if the system is set up right. There is no choosing of advantages and disadvantages that often result in the "one-armed blind albino midget genius acrobat" problem, nor other similar mechanical tricks often utilized to front-load characters once a system's loopholes are well-known.

Random character generation also forces an individual to play a role, a role they didn't choose, so they have to make it work and make it their own. Or as I would put it, randomness encourages non-ego-based character creation and non-ego-fantasy play, which (tangentially) is the bane of my existance and I hate to all ends of the earth. This also puts a stop to those (honestly annoying) players who play the same, eventually tiresome character in every game, such as the guy who only plays dwarves who all act alike, or the girl who only plays the bitchy, snooty paladin.

Randomness also encourages creativity. One must work out how all the disparate elements fit together for this character, how he (or she) came to be the way he is. This forces thought about the character, retro-fitting and gap-filling, which is usually an extremely awarding process when one is finished.

A common problem I have run into over the years regarding character creation is that for many players, including myself, one does not truly get a handle on one's character until the character has been experienced in play, often over time. In such cases, having to design the character only adds a level of complexity and frustration to character design, since the very design, via assumptions developed during generation which inform the character's design, may lead to unplayability.

In such cases, randomized generation can be quite liberating, as one is not constrained to pre-conceived notions of "what the character should be like" during the design process, one simply enters play and discovers what the character they have recieved actually is like, unbound by the preconceptions that would have been necessary in the character's original design choices.

As I mention above, random character generation is good for the hobby. It allows new blood to enter into the hobby, or into new games, without necessitating a great deal of system knowledge on their part, speeding entry into new venues of play and encouraging a wide variety of experiences.

The reason we have choice based generations systems is, I think primarily because so many people had highly negative experiences with random generation. I know I did which is why I automatically reject any system primarilly based on it.

Random generation is a disaster for gamist play because it is inherently going to create unequal characters. Gushing about how this is a 'challenge' or 'liberating' simply doesn't change this fact. Some players are going to start out with unequally effective characters. This is not good for gamist play.

Also many people , as a matter of fact simply didn't like the characters foisted on them by random systems. This lead to any number of in game suicices as playter got rid of undesireable characters and rolled up new ones.

Also random systems tended to produce lots of bizarre or inappropriate characters. Again calling the gyrations necessary to accomodate this 'creativity' doesn't change this.

Random systems tended to devolve to 'roll until you get what you want ' systems or 'pick what you want from the list' systems as [people got sick of undesireable characters. ( think of all those D&D fighters with 18/00 strength, something that should occur only 1 in 21,600 roles).

A person who is as concerned about optimization as the example you give of yourself isn't going to loose that concern with a randomized system.

The answer to the problem? Don't design player creation systems that require extensive knowlege of the system to produce a 'good' character. Or simply let people design by concept and toss out the build points which almost never achieve their goal of mantaining balance anyway.

I love random character generation.

Personal thoughts and responses on the subject:

I tend to get really hung up on the -core- of the character I'm trying to come up with; I get wishy-washy about whether or not this thing I'm trying to come up with is "cool enough" or "interesting enough", et cetera. To the point where I usually just give up on the game and get bummed out about ever enjoying roleplaying again.

Most of this can be worked around with that bit of random generation that's still with us: lifepath! I think Burning Wheel uses this; other examples off the top of my head are Mekton Zeta (most RTalsorian games use lifepath, I think) and MechWarrior, and there's a supplement for D&D3E with lifepath (Hero Builder's Guidebook?). Lifepath is super-liberating for me: randomly create this guy's life, relationships, big skill packages, then assign any extra points to mesh with what happened during lifepath.

Another facet I know is working in my subconscious is many, many formative years playing computer/console adventure and roleplaying games. I am incredibly comfortable with taking a pre-packaged avatar/character and fully enjoying putting them through the game's paces.

For me, random- or pre-written characters are all about quickly getting into and playing the game. The game is what I'm interested in most, not necessarily the race car or top hat I'm using to interact with it.

Summary: I wish more games had it, either as an option or mandatory.

Specific responses to b_bankhead:

Random generation is a disaster for gamist play because it is inherently going to create unequal characters. Gushing about how this is a 'challenge' or 'liberating' simply doesn't change this fact. Some players are going to start out with unequally effective characters. This is not good for gamist play.

Also random systems tended to produce lots of bizarre or inappropriate characters. Again calling the gyrations necessary to accomodate this 'creativity' doesn't change this.

I'm a big fan of randomness. My overall theory of roleplaying considers the System only in the terms of oracle systems - it's all about setting limits and giving direction for imagination. Most historical oracles from throwing bones to I Ching have been unforgivingly random.

Actually, I'm so big a fan of randomness that not only most of my character creation is random, much of my game play is, too. Lately I've bypassed the whole hassle of adventure creation for my fantasy adventure game with certain kind of customized random encounter tables, for example.

Controlled randomness is a vital part of design, you could say that complimented by bound customizing (like what's done in HQ) it's all there is to roleplaying.

For me, there's one simple reason I'll take random generation whenever possible: the characters come out more complete and more real.

If I sit down to do a designed character, I come up with exactly what I expected to. It's an interesting character, sure, but it's still basically two-dimensional. Everything fits my original vision, and for that very reason, the character can't ever be more than my original vision. I have good visions, don't get me wrong, but I'm still a human being and inherently limited.

When I sit down to do a random character, the dice almost always deliver up some surprises. A scientists who's not bad in a fight if he has to be, a soldier with great physical toughness, but no willpower, a charming leader who has absolutely no clue what he's doing. I could certainly have sat down to design any of these characters, but by having to explain the quirks, they take on a third dimension. They are real people, not game constructs designed to do x, y and z. In a point-buy system, many of these characters would be deemed inefficient and a waste of points.

And that brings up the game balance issue, which is a complete lie. Point-buy systems have NOTHING to do with game balance. I played GURPS for years, and discovered that hard-core GURPS players see character creation as half the game. The challenge is to get the best (i.e. least-balanced) character despite having the same number of points to spend. If a newbie and a 10-year veteran player both design soldiers, I'll guarantee you that veteran's PC will mop the floor with the newbie, even if the newbie gets more points to spend. How many of us here already know that Intelligence and Dex are more valuable to sci-fi GURPS characters than Strength and Health? Even though they don't cost more. Where's the balance?

Or how about my college "detective campaign"? I spent a lot of points on investigation, interrogation and political contacts, thinking that these would be useful. My roommate said the CIA wanted to kill him and his crippled sister and then dumped all of his points into shooting. During the campaign, the CIA and the sister never showed up once... and I rarely got to use any of my investigative skills or contacts because all of our "cases" followed this model: receive an anonymous tip on location of bad guys, kill bad guys, find clue. Wash, rinse, repeat. Sure, this is the GM's fault, but at which point did the system help make these characters equal?

Now, I'm not saying that point-buy and designed character systems are flat-out bad. They certainly fit well with some play styles and gaming groups. To each their own... but for me, even a poor randomized chargen beats a well-done choice-based system.

Yep,
I need to add my vote for random character generation, for essentially the same reasons as posted above. I made the main character generation rule for It's a Dog's Life to be random, but have included an optional 'point-buy' system in the 2nd Edition, just to cover all bases. For Dreamscape (forthcoming) it is even more appropriate to generate stats randomly, but again, I have decided to pander to players who hate this and have optional point-buy rules too.
It probably doesn't hurt for most games to give both options, to be honest. However, I think for some types of game random generation works best and for others the opposite is true. I just can't think offhand of specific examples.

Simon W
http://www.geocities.com/dogs_life2003/

Something that I haven't noticed anyone mention so far in this thread is that there are degrees of random generation. It might be good to distinguish what is randomly generated about a character.

For example, many "random" systems randomly generate attributes, and stop there. Other "game stats", such as class, skills, race, etc. are left up to player choice. That choice may be somewhat restricted by the generated attributes, but it still exists.

Some randomly determine other "game stats". For example, the original Top Secret system randomly determines what "Areas of Knowledge" (skills) a character has, and randomly determines their ratings in them. I don't have any of them here to refer to, but I remember some of the Palladium systems "officially" working with random generation of race and class. The Arduin systems have a set of tables for "special abilities" depending on character class.

Lastly, and what always annoyed me the most, some systems randomly determine factors that aren't actually used in the game, but help to define the character. E.g., AD&D had random generation of character height, weight, and age. Original Top Secret randomly determined height, age, and whether or not the character needed glasses/contacts. I recall the Palladium games randomly determining alignment and having a random table for insanities.

Most of you are probably talking about random attribute generation, but the term "random character generation" makes me think of the horrors of those systems where class, race, skills, etc. are random.

There are also degrees of randomness -- e.g., the difference between the classic 1st edition AD&D "roll 3d6 for each attribute, in order" and "roll 3d6 six times, place the scores in the attributes you want" or "roll six sets of character stats, choose which set you want". Different methods have different characteristics.

Some systems have "whiff-proofing" built in. E.g., "reroll all 1's" when generating AD&D characters. I've also seen systems where if the total of the character's attributes was less than a certain threshold, the player could start over.

I recall some systems where attributes were randomly generated, then totaled, and the player then got some points to distribute -- the lower the total, the more points the player got. This provides some whiff-proofing and some player choice.

At any rate, what I'm trying to get at is that a blanket statement like "random generation is good" or "random generation is bad" seems to me to be ignoring the huge amount of variation in what "random generation" is.

Personally I'm a big fan of random generation at character creation (the full-scale kind) with point-buy modification as the game progresses. The best of both worlds (IMO) it gives you the challange of playing a character you might not have thought of, while allowing you to tweak the character as you like after the fact. (I also like playing with pre-generated characters and making them my own, to the point where I've been known to swipe an npc out of a module and make it my pc)

Sidestepping the precise topic a bit (though I think it's related enough to be pertinent), I believe the majority of gamers actually prefer guided (if not actually random) character generation more than they think they do. As evidence, I offer the number of popular games using classes, templates, package deals, or whatever the new word of the day is for "here's a character you can play using only minor modification rather than starting from scratch."

The only thing I'll add is that, IME, random chargen creates a different experience than... umm, 'player-chosen' chargen.

'Player-chosen' chargen makes play about doing the thing you want to do.

Random chargen makes play about conforming to this PC/role that you didn't invent, and trying to give meaning to that randomly generated PC/role.

Either is 'better,' just different.

greyorm wrote: Consider that if I want to play a particular type of character (which is the usual argument for the use of choice-based character generation) I need to place my points "correctly", so that once in play the actual character effectiveness in particular categories meet my expectations of the character's effectiveness in those categories.

I think that the false-dichotomy in this thread is stunting it a bit -- random vs. point based. This is not all there is to a character generation system.

For example, there is also the "one from column A, one from column B" sort of character generation. Sadly, in many previous examples (RoS, WoD, etc.) this sort of chargen is also combined with an often complicated series of smaller point pools, but there is no need for things to be like that. I feel sort of bad using my own game as an example, but in Polaris, character generation is "Choose two traits (from a list) and one name (also from a list.)"

Speaking of names, that brings up another type of character generation -- decided. For instance, when I run D&D games, I often let the players simply decide what their attributes are. No points. No dice. Just whatever they want.

I think that all character generation systems involve one or more of these elements, but usually several: Fortune, Points, Choose From List, Free Choice. Are there any others?

For example, D&D is all of these in some aspect: (Random for attributes, points for skills, choose from list for feats, spells, race and class and free choice for height, weight, age, name, background and appearance.)

Sorcerer has three of these: Points for attributes, Choose From List for descriptors and demon powers, free choice for Kicker, names, background and demon.

I agree with Raven that Fortune is often overlooked in modern game design as a character generation technique. But are there limits to that? Is purely random chargen fun?

yrs--
--Ben

p.s. edit: Just to tie this back to the original thread topic, I think that "choose from list" in particular has the ability to eliminate "bad choice" in the same way that fortune can. Especially if the list is small.

Sounds like a feature pointed out as a bug.

System mastery (there's gurps example is in this thread) is a gamist prize. It's more than character development, it's a way you yourself have improved in skill with the activity in question.

Getting what you want is a skill like it is in sport, where you want to get a certain effect but have to play and practice to get it. The sport isn't broken if you don't get it straight away.

Basically sounds more like a simulationist desire (I want to explore a hero who is just like so and so) clashing with a gamist design (outside of its nar bits, TROS is quite gamist).

I mean, random stats? As someone else said, a 2E D&D hero with 5 strength doesn't suit gamism...but to explore that purely at an imaginary level there's quite a lot of interest there I can see. But tactics wise, screw that!

Ben Lehman wrote: Speaking of names, that brings up another type of character generation -- decided. For instance, when I run D&D games, I often let the players simply decide what their attributes are. No points. No dice. Just whatever they want.

Hmm, I have mostly abandoned random character generation because of the wiff factor. I have personally played too many characters who were randomly generated who had nothing they were particularly good at. To me, it is not fun to be playing a character that almost might as well not be there. As a GM, I noticed that with random generation, I kept escalating the bar that random rolls had to meet to not be considered a wiff and be re-rolled.

I did explore using random generation to allocate from a fixed pool, but I never really achieved a satisfactory result when working with attributes. My idea was to randomly distribute "10 points" worth of attributes (or whatever). Of course this does still have a wiff factor if different combinations of those 10 points can be significantly different in effectiveness. Depending on the system, all attributes being close to average could be ineffective, or having one attribute extremely low could be ineffective.

I did have better success with randomly assigning skill levels. For the longest Traveler campaign I ran, after determining how many terms the PC had served in pre-play, the player rolled on a table to find the distribution of skill levels. Some characters would wind up with a few really good skills while others would wind up with a broader range of skills (but still some good skill levels - no one could wind up with 1 level in every single skill which probably wouldn't be very effective in play).

Now I could see taking Ben's point of pick one from column A, one from column B, and one from column C, and randomizing those choices and having a workable system.

But you still have some potential sources for problems. What if random creation creates a strong-dumb character but the player really is tired of playing such? What if random generation produces 5 doctors and no starship pilots?

Increased realism was brought up as an advantage of random generation, and that is valid to a point. The validity ends when there is a selection mechanism. Sure, only one in a million people might make a good startship pilot, but if the premise of the game is that the players are operating a starship, then they will have that one in a million person as a PC. Of course that selection mechanism should function in a player choice system also. Once the starship has a pilot (and perhaps a backup), there shouldn't be any more pilots generated (and we saw this in my Traveler game, people tried to come in with new pilots when there was already an overabundance of pilots, and the existing players said "No, we can't use another pilot, why don't you play a doctor?" This happens all the time in D&D ("We already have a wizard, we need someone who can fight.").

So one way to do random generation that produces a "complete" group of PCs if such is necessary to the game is to put each important ability on a card and then deal the cards to the players. If there are several tiers of importance, one could make several decks (column A, colulmn B, column C, etc). This way the starship gets a pilot, a doctor, a science officer, a marine, an engineer, and a merchant, but with three players, the six roles could be divided into 15 different sets of pairings (if I've done my combinatorial math correctly). Of course more possibilities are possible if there are some columns that don't have any required abilities. If you have a column with fewer required abilities than players, there are lots of ways to solve that. For example, you deal everyone one card. If all of the required abilities got dealt, you're done. If not, everyone who got a required ability sits out, and each remaining player in turn discards their card and draws a new one. Rinse and repeat until all required abilities are drawn.

In all cases, I feel that it is required that the generated group of characters both be believable, and provide close to equality of play value (whatever that means to the particular group of players). I think system choice can helo in the latter and setting choice can help in the former.

Frank

I don't think the enthusiasm is for randomness when a certain result is "required" (i.e. a high strength for the warrior you've decided you must play).

If anything, what gets me excited about random character generation is that it can force you to question whether you really must play that warrior. In 2nd edition D&D, in many groups I played in, if you rolled a five strength the answer was not "My warrior can't live with this", it was "I guess I won't be playing a warrior then". Is it possible to do that badly in all stats? Yes, but exceedingly rare.

What was more common was to see things like "God, another weakling with high intelligence? What are we, a pack of wandering scholars? Hey... actually... that's a sort of neat idea. But we've got that one guy who's so perfect for a thief... what would a thief be doing trailing along with a group of bookworms?"

One of the notions I've grown fond of here on the Forge is that a GM should give players a choice, and be absolutely okay with whatever way they choose to make that choice... it makes the game better, even if the players do everything exactly the way you'd have done it yourself. I think that if you treat the dice as a player then random character generation encourages the same sort of openness... you come into the process of making a character with a healthier attitude, even if the dice then roll exactly what you would have chosen yourself.

Well, I will note, with reasonably freeform chargen, there's nothing to stop you from having some general random tables/lifepaths, and then making the character in question based on what you roll up using the actual system. I believe the Central Casting series of books from Task Force Games was based on this idea, though there was some contraversy over the authors injecting some of their personal beliefs into the tables, such as listing homosexuality as a "Dark Side" trait.

xiombarg wrote:

Ben Lehman wrote: Speaking of names, that brings up another type of character generation -- decided. For instance, when I run D&D games, I often let the players simply decide what their attributes are. No points. No dice. Just whatever they want.

Right. I'd like to note in passing that Pretender does this, and quite successfully, I like to think.

Good post, Raven. I did some articles on character generation for Game Ideas Unlimited last year, and random generation got strong marks from me for a lot of the reasons you posit here.

Bankhead's comments about the negative aspects are worth considering.

• Random generation creates unequal characters which are detrimental to gamist play.• Players often don't want or like the character they wind up rolling.• Some characters created are wildly inappropriate or ineffective.

All of this is not the fault of randomized generation itself, but of flaws in early designs.

For example, D&D began with the idea of all characters being created by rolling 3d6 for each of six scores. This created characters who tended toward a defined average. It overlooked the fact that player characters were, presumably, already the outstanding members of their communities, and should have at least some above average scores in specific areas. In BD&D1, if I recall correctly, this problem was addressed by having the referee review the characters rolled and call for new characters whenever any was likely to be unsurvivable. Of course, this assumed that the referee had sufficient experience to make that call. OAD&D addressed the problem with four Methods of creating characters:

• Roll four dice for each score and keep the best three.• Roll twice as many scores as you need and keep the best six.• Roll each score six times and keep the best roll.• Create twelve characters and keep the best one.

Each of these was designed to provide an above average character of some sort, with different advantages and disadvantages to each method. With Unearthed Arcana, though, a considerably better approach to player character generation was devised, known as Method V. This approach allowed you to select your character's profession (class) first, and then gave you support for rolling that type of character. You would keep the best three of nine dice rolled for that ability score that was most important to that type of character, of eight for the second most important score, and sequentially down to a straight three dice for the score least important to that character type. This assured that your important scores would almost certainly have strongly above average values, while the unimportant scores had the normal odds of being good.

Devising a system in which the random generation is geared to produce appropriate characters answers all Bankhead's objections, while at the same time enhancing the very advantages Raven sees in randomness. Further, as the OAD&D example shows despite its age, choice can be incorporated into the randomness such that a player doesn't roll "a random character of some sort" but rather "a random character who is likely to be a superior example of a specified type"--exactly the goal Raven observes point based systems do not achieve for first time players who do not know how to create that character from the resources provided.

I should also put in a positive word for point-based systems, as well. One complaint about these is that in reality all men are not created equal, and building even a perfect system in which your strengths and weaknesses genuinely balance each other is unrealistic. A randomized method of determining available points for the character overcomes this, forcing one player to work with perhaps three quarters of the "normal" point total while another can have an extra twenty-five percent above "normal". (Of course, this should be "normal" for the unusually talented sort of character that is a player character type, however that works for this particular game.) It would also be feasible to let a player spend his points to buy random bonuses. For example, an adaptation to a D&D system would allow that the player can roll 3d6 for any ability score free, but by spending points on that score he can add a die to the roll and take the best three. Similarly, he could roll 3d6 and then spend points for the right to pick up any one of those dice and roll it again, stipulated that he doesn't get to keep the old number if the new number is worse. He could spend a lot of points to get an 18 out of that, but he is more likely to settle when at least two dice are at least five and the third is not less than four, because at that point it's not cost effective to push it.

The point, I think, is to develop a character generation system that combines some amount of random development with some amount of choice. Some lifepaths, some choice systems, some dice-based, and some point-based systems do this effectively.

--M. J. Young

efindel wrote: Lastly, and what always annoyed me the most, some systems randomly determine factors that aren't actually used in the game, but help to define the character. E.g., AD&D had random generation of character height, weight, and age. Original Top Secret randomly determined height, age, and whether or not the character needed glasses/contacts.

The most satisfying single character I ever played was generated by me rolling dice for various attributes and the GM (a Brit named Alden Speiss) giving me back totally unrelated values for those attributes -- to the extent that the stat I said was most important didn't end up being my highest one. This was, in theory, AD&D.

At the same time, I had come in with a very clear character concept (elf who hates the whole elven superiority schtick, is in rebellion against her Elf Lord father, and cut off the points of her own ears) that fit perfectly with GM's campaign (rogues on the run from a dictatorship ruled by racist elves). So this wasn't an example of a random creation method challenging me to come up with a character I wouldn't have thought of -- although being tossed a 17 Charisma which I had neither rolled nor asked for was in the "pleasant surprise" category and may've changed how I played the character somewhat.

I suspect this was actually a variant of "just pick your number" (i.e. Drama) where the GM did most of the picking in accordance with (a) his understanding of my individual character concept and (b) what was needed to balance out the group as a whole. It worked, astoundingly well, but I'd say, "don't try this at home."

M. J. Young wrote: Bankhead's comments about the negative aspects are worth considering.

• Random generation creates unequal characters which are detrimental to gamist play.• Players often don't want or like the character they wind up rolling.• Some characters created are wildly inappropriate or ineffective.

All of this is not the fault of randomized generation itself, but of flaws in early designs.

M. J. Young wrote: The point, I think, is to develop a character generation system that combines some amount of random development with some amount of choice. Some lifepaths, some choice systems, some dice-based, and some point-based systems do this effectively.

Interesting topic, but a lot of the problems that are being bandied about that random or non-random systems 'solve' are realy fundamentaly down to bad system design, and aren't anything particularly to do with randomness or determinism per se. From the orriginal post:

greyorm wrote: Rather, having not played TROS before, I did not know what I should be placed where, how the various scores I could place would function in play, and thus which scores would best serve my purposes in which particular categories.

Consider that if I want to play a particular type of character (which is the usual argument for the use of choice-based character generation) I need to place my points "correctly", ...

However, I fail to see any compelling reason why one would, by default, be less involved in the playing out of a character over whom they had little or even no initial design input. Actors do this constantly --

In many ways, that can be the best sort of challenge, and the most rewarding.

The system might be known after the first character, and with point/choice-based character creation, you know how to work the system to produce the various effects you desire, and often to the best effect.

Random character generation also forces an individual to play a role, a role they didn't choose, so they have to make it work and make it their own.

This also puts a stop to those (honestly annoying) players who play the same, eventually tiresome character in every game, such as the guy who only plays dwarves who all act alike, or the girl who only plays the bitchy, snooty paladin.

In such cases, randomized generation can be quite liberating, as one is not constrained to pre-conceived notions of "what the character should be like" during the design process, one simply enters play and discovers what the character they have recieved actually is like, unbound by the preconceptions that would have been necessary in the character's original design choices.

Some individuals may be selfishly inclined towards complete control of their avatar, to the detriment of their own enjoyment;

simon_hibbs wrote:

greyorm wrote: This also puts a stop to those (honestly annoying) players who play the same, eventually tiresome character in every game, such as the guy who only plays dwarves who all act alike, or the girl who only plays the bitchy, snooty paladin.

Now we're getting to the bottom of it. You want everyone to roll characters randomly, because you don't like the choices other people make when they're given the chance. Your previous rhetoric ("Suppose I want to create a certain kind of character") is smoke and mirrors. You don't want anyone to be able to genereate a certain kind of character because you don't like the choices they make, and therefore any system that give other people a choice must be faulty. What on earth gives you the right to trash other poeple's preffered mode of fun in this way?

I find it curious that Raven (of all people) has not responded to any of the comments generated on this thread which he initiated.

Are you still reading, Raven? Are we talking about your subject?

--M. J. Young

Hi Raven,

I think there are uses for any type of character creation- part of the question is what kinds of character generation work for what purpose? That is, does it fit? With that, there are many ways random generation can be either useful, or counterproductive, depending on what you're trying to do.

That all said, another solution to the problem you've mentioned about not being familar enough to proficiently design characters, is to have archetypes of mostly or completely defined characters. Feng Shui is the first game that comes to mind. Want to do Kung-fu? Pick the Martial Artist. Want to do magic? Pick the Sorcerer. Classes typically are similar ideas, but most games layer it with tons of other options, making it a complex affair.

I think the common aspect between "mostly done" character archetypes and random creation is that the players aren't being asked to make a lot of decisions. I find a lot of players are at a loss when presented with a system that allows them to completely define their own traits, such as Over the Edge. It's easier when folks have a list to choose from. It gives them directions and ideas. Likewise, with random generation, a lot of the dice make the decisions.

Thoughts?

Chris

I have to apologize to everyone, I have been reading the thread, and trying to get a response together in my limited spare time -- family and school have been eating up more than their regular share of time this past week.

The baby ate the lengthy response I had written on Sunday (ie: I wrote it up, and then she hit the "Power" button...{imagine me weeping}), but I will be putting a new response together late tonight or tomorrow evening sometime.

So, again, my apologies for my lack of input. I would like to thank everyone for participating thus far, even without my feedback! I am glad to see the topic has generated much good discussion.

Thanks for your patience!

JKohn's probably right, perhaps I could have been more terse and polite in my post.

John Kim wrote: But to address the point, I don't think that forcing restrictions is the same thing as trashing people's preferences. Following this logic means that all rules are bad, because they prevent people from doing what they really want to. The flaw in this is that people can and often do find that they enjoy playing under restrictions even if those restrictions make them play in ways they hadn't originally conceived or would have come up with on their own.

simon_hibbs wrote:

John Kim wrote: But to address the point, I don't think that forcing restrictions is the same thing as trashing people's preferences. Following this logic means that all rules are bad, because they prevent people from doing what they really want to. The flaw in this is that people can and often do find that they enjoy playing under restrictions even if those restrictions make them play in ways they hadn't originally conceived or would have come up with on their own.

But that's not the argument that was offered, the argument was that the choices other players make are bad, so therefore it's best not to let them choose even if (actualy especialy if) they want to. That's quite different from saying that rules structure in the pursuit of creative agenda is good, which I wouldn't deny. The offered argument isn't aimed at any particular creative agenda, it's aimed at restricting the creative agenda of others because they choose bad creative agenda. That's a pretty brutal judgement call.

Now ok, maybe I personaly don't have a whole lot of personal time for people who always choose to play transgendered dwarven ninjas or whatever in every goddamn game, year after year, but at the end of the day who am I to deny them their fun? Nobody's forcing me to play with them, after all.

Heya all,

Just had time to type up some quick responses to various statements and issues that have been raised; I have tried to cover everything I felt immediately relevant to the direction of the conversation. Also, a great deal of what I feel has been said already by Mike, John, and others, so I won't be going into great detail where they have already.

I did want to reinforce one of the issues John touched on, one of the main oppositions voiced regarding randomization (that of the preservation of game balance). Though he has already adaquately covered it, let me say I am in full agreement with him, as some may recall that such is even my battlecry: "Game balance is a red herring!"

Everyone should immediately note and adjust their understanding of Gamism, for as noted prior, Gamist play is not necessarily impacted by a difference in power levels between characters. The only real impact such differences have is in the Step On Up for each individual player, whether they have a more difficult or easier time in relation to one another is not an issue of the Gamist mode, or even of "fairness" (necessarily -- the word is far too vague to use as a defense, or to object to).

As such, a D&D character with a 5 Strength is not an impediment to Gamist (or tactical) play. A 5 STR has far more to do with expectation and desire than fairness or tactics, for which it simply changes the tactics required in play of that player.

As to realism and starship captains: it seems obvious to me that if a game is about starship captains, then the randomizing system would take that into account in the first place, and not generate anything except realistic starship captains (even if they are random). In fact, a choice-based system had better take this factor of play into account as well, and also not allow choices that would produce non-starship captains.

Regarding actors and characters...with rare exception, no, actors do not choose their roles. They are given to them, thus I fail to see how this is "oft repeated rubbish." Yes, directors may choose actors, but who was talking about directors? Unfortunately, such mistakes are characteristic of your response in this instance, Simon (hibbs), so rather than spend more time uselessly refuting arguments I had never made, I am going to invite you to reread my post without predjudice.

You do make one good point I want to respond to, however. That in my example I could produce randomness by simply assigning the points I am given willy-nilly, without knowledge of what effect they will produce. I believe the hurdle here is more psychological than systemic: that being the idea that with a presented choice-based generation methodology, the player will go into "Must...create...character!" mode, ignoring completely the idea that he could just slap things together.

Related to this, Iron asks what I mean by "expected effectiveness"...well, just what it says! What I (the player) expect the character will be effective at in the game -- what I expect him to be like, be able to do, and behave as. To return to the TROS character example, if I create a character who I describe to be a fencing master then I expect that he will win fencing matches against the majority of his opponents, know the uses and care of his weapons and armor, be acquainted with various other fencers and organizations. Even if I can pick the (supposedly) "correct" skills to represent all this during generation, as I do not know what the scores will actually produce in play I cannot truly say any of the above is true, and the character may very well end up being only a moderately good fencer, rather than a master.

This also came up in our D&D game: the player expected his elven warrior to be good at melee combat and archery, as that is the way he built the character. This has not happened yet, and has become something of a running joke (if still frustrating for the player) that his expectations about the character are not being met, that the framework he built the character around is incongruent with his in-game experience of the same character. Simply, "He's been a warrior all his life, and suddenly he goes adventuring and can't hit the broad side of a barn from two paces!"

This is what is meant by "expected effectiveness": that the character will perform, in general, as the player expected them to prior to and during creation.

Ultimately, random generation is not the only way to solve this problem (or any other), but it is one way to do so, by removing "expectation" from the equasion. As Chris notes, another method is to utilize character archetypes players can choose (though in this case, they also choose the expectations!).

Also, a couple of folks have noted that no one has said anything about "degrees of randomness" thus far, but you'll note that very thing was one of the points made towards the end of my post. One of the main points regarding random generation versus choice is not that one should have no choice, but that many players have been crippled by choice, for example consistently choosing the same sorts of character, for reasons of effectiveness or for reasons of ego, ultimately using system at generation to tip the game's odds in their own favor or playing the same character over-and-over, in either case stunting their own creativity and experience in the process.

Finally, even considering the strong language used in my original post, I find that I am fascinated by some of what I see as kneejerk reactions to the argument posted. For all the GNS-inspired play and self-as-gamer enlightenment encouraged on the Forge, it seems that we haven't gotten very far away from defensive -- if not reactionary -- stances about other sacred cows of gaming?

I'll post more later about the various ideas for randomization in generation that support the above benefits, and/or problems caused by current systems that utilize it (and how those might be mitigated?), but in the meanwhile, if anyone has any more input along those lines, feel free to add to what has been started by MJ and others.

greyorm wrote: Everyone should immediately note and adjust their understanding of Gamism, for as noted prior, Gamist play is not necessarily impacted by a difference in power levels between characters. The only real impact such differences have is in the Step On Up for each individual player, whether they have a more difficult or easier time in relation to one another is not an issue of the Gamist mode

greyorm wrote: As to realism and starship captains: it seems obvious to me that if a game is about starship captains, then the randomizing system would take that into account in the first place, and not generate anything except realistic starship captains (even if they are random). In fact, a choice-based system had better take this factor of play into account as well, and also not allow choices that would produce non-starship captains.

greyorm wrote: This also came up in our D&D game: the player expected his elven warrior to be good at melee combat and archery, as that is the way he built the character. This has not happened yet, and has become something of a running joke (if still frustrating for the player) that his expectations about the character are not being met, that the framework he built the character around is incongruent with his in-game experience of the same character.

greyorm wrote: Finally, even considering the strong language used in my original post, I find that I am fascinated by some of what I see as kneejerk reactions to the argument posted. For all the GNS-inspired play and self-as-gamer enlightenment encouraged on the Forge, it seems that we haven't gotten very far away from defensive -- if not reactionary -- stances about other sacred cows of gaming?

Everyone should immediately note and adjust their understanding of Gamism, for as noted prior, Gamist play is not necessarily impacted by a difference in power levels between characters. The only real impact such differences have is in the Step On Up for each individual player, whether they have a more difficult or easier time in relation to one another is not an issue of the Gamist mode, or even of "fairness" (necessarily -- the word is far too vague to use as a defense, or to object to).

As such, a D&D character with a 5 Strength is not an impediment to Gamist (or tactical) play. A 5 STR has far more to do with expectation and desire than fairness or tactics, for which it simply changes the tactics required in play of that player.

This is the second time this has happened in this thread, so I'm coming down on it in the hopes of making sure everyone realizes I don't take it lightly and it will henceforth scramble away never to be seen again: Dan, line-by-lines are NOT allowed here on the Forge.
Why is that?

Your segue about "what is the real problem is for my player" illustrates the problem of such responses perfectly: what the actual problem is for the player is utterly irrelevant to the point it was illustrating (the meaning of the term "expected effectiveness"). Did you understand what expected effectiveness was based on the example? I don't know, because you've taken the point, run with it, and spiked it somewhere else.

Another problem with line-by-lines occurs with your response to the bit about "starship captains" -- your refutation fails to take into account any of the prior context to which the text is bound: a game wherein the point was to be starship captains. OF COURSE if someone wanted to play a game where they weren't starship captains, there would be a problem with them playing that game if all it generated was starship captains. That's just bloody obvious, and completely irrelevant in context. Once again, grab, run, spike...to no use.

Folks, if you are going to line-by-line, you'll be pegged for it, and it will likely be ignored. Fair warning. Second, everybody go read Chris' On Charitable Reading. Now.

Regarding ideas about Gamist play: I'm as guilty in this case as anyone, but this is probably not the thread in which to discuss what is or is not a factor of Gamist play. Let's start another thread about it and we can rip into it over there. I'll be more than happy!

inky wrote: Hmm, I assume your point here is that everyone loves point-based characterization?

I worry that adding randomness inevitably means deleting options to make the randomness "come out right".

I thought our central example, the gamist/nar TROS meant that discussion on what would suit it's gamist design is important. As I said, if you want randomisation, that may kill the amount of choices that the TROS design needs to give some gamism.

If were not talking about TROS, what are we talking about? A sim design or nar design? For either of those (in the case of nar, in terms of purely PC powers), is there any arguement to be had as to whether there would be probs with randomisation of stats there?

greyorm wrote:

inky wrote: I worry that adding randomness inevitably means deleting options to make the randomness "come out right".

Could you expand upon this statement, as I am not certain what precisely you mean by it? (ie: Deleting what options? Make what particularly turn out correctly?)

I dont mind random generation in some games however it's not the panacea that the initial posting made it out to be. It definitely does not solve the problem of matching player expectations to character performance. Whether I choose a 14 strength or randomly roll it if I dont know the system well enough to understand what that means then my expectation of performance may not match up to reality. All you are doing by making it random is changing when the expectations come into the game before or after generation.

Of course, The Five Doctors was a pretty good--oh, no, that was something else.

This went past me the first time without my really considering it; but when Raven brought it back to focus, his response caught my attention.

greyorm wrote: You do make one good point I want to respond to, however. That in my example I could produce randomness by simply assigning the points I am given willy-nilly, without knowledge of what effect they will produce.

I'm not convinced that a random character generation system cannot produce equally-viable play options.

For example, looking just at ability score generation in D&D, I can invent a system in which a roll or set of rolls distributes an 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, and 18 among six abilities. Everyone ends up with the same numbers but they're distributed differently.

Taking it further, the system could have you roll to select a class, then have a specific distribution of scores across abilities based on that class. For example, the fighter class would randomize the 10, 16, and 18 across Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution, then randomize the 8, 12, and 14 across Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma.

greyorm wrote: Related to this, Iron asks what I mean by "expected effectiveness"...well, just what it says! What I (the player) expect the character will be effective at in the game -- what I expect him to be like, be able to do, and behave as. To return to the TROS character example, if I create a character who I describe to be a fencing master then I expect that he will win fencing matches against the majority of his opponents, know the uses and care of his weapons and armor, be acquainted with various other fencers and organizations. Even if I can pick the (supposedly) "correct" skills to represent all this during generation, as I do not know what the scores will actually produce in play I cannot truly say any of the above is true, and the character may very well end up being only a moderately good fencer, rather than a master.

This also came up in our D&D game: the player expected his elven warrior to be good at melee combat and archery, as that is the way he built the character. This has not happened yet, and has become something of a running joke (if still frustrating for the player) that his expectations about the character are not being met, that the framework he built the character around is incongruent with his in-game experience of the same character. Simply, "He's been a warrior all his life, and suddenly he goes adventuring and can't hit the broad side of a barn from two paces!"

This is what is meant by "expected effectiveness": that the character will perform, in general, as the player expected them to prior to and during creation.

Noon wrote: I thought our central example, the gamist/nar TROS meant that discussion on what would suit it's gamist design is important.

that may kill the amount of choices that the TROS design needs to give some gamism.

For either of those (in the case of nar, in terms of purely PC powers), is there any arguement to be had as to whether there would be probs with randomisation of stats there?

If were not talking about TROS, what are we talking about?

I believe that would depend on what sort of randomization occurs -- there might be problems, or there might not be. What arguments do you see regarding the problems that could arise in using randomization for Sim or Nar modes?

As far as Gamist play, competition among players via characters, and whatnot:

Yes, I think it’s usually true that players do compete in this way, so that my wimpy character sucks compared to your tough-guy. I realize some folks found a way around this, but way back in the day I remember being told right up-front that Illusionists in OAD&D were inherently weak characters, not as good as other classes, and I recall thinking that on that basis I sure as hell wouldn’t want an Illusionist character.

But I think Raven is pointing toward a different perspective on Gamism – one that in many ways was probably intended in D&D from the start. The whole party has to win, you see, so it doesn’t matter if one character is a wimp because the others have to make sure he survives. Because the party is out to beat the dungeon, they can’t waste their efforts on carping at each other. Together we stand, divided we fall, and all that jazz.

Now by extension, suppose we all simply roll random characters and have to take our lumps. As players now, not characters, we have a purpose: to make this set of characters achieve the mission, whatever that may be. And if one guy rolled a wimpy character, that doesn’t mean we leave him behind in the bar.

Now step it all on up one notch. As a player, I’ve been handed a seriously crappy character. He’s weak, and crippled, and no rocket scientist, and he’s allergic to dungeon moss. But wait – is that really a crappy character? This is the nub of the thing: if you see only “crappy character” then in this sort of Gamism, you’re a crappy player, because you can’t step up to the challenge. Sure, he’s not great at a lot of things, but nothing here says he can’t be one of the most interesting and liked characters. How is a guy like this along on a mission team anyway? He must be good at something. Hmm. Well, let’s suppose he’s a natural leader of the subtle kind, i.e. not the one who says, “Once more into the breach, dear friends!” but the one who says, “Hey Bob? You know, I think if you climb that wall there, and Jane holds the rope, then Fred here can swing across to that ledge. What do you think?” You know, quiet, easy-going, but keeping everyone working together as a team. Now that’s an interesting role, and it could be vital – in which case the constant nose-blowing and limping isn’t going to be such a problem.

Now to my mind, this implies that Raven’s proposed a false dichotomy – but a very useful one. If you consider this hypothetical crippled sniffle-meister, in fact I had a great deal of choice in the character design. I just was working within certain constraints about physical and so forth abilities. But personality and style and such were up to me. This is a classic division, right back to D&D, right? But there’s no intrinsic reason for the divide.

Suppose I have a huge list of characteristics in terms of personality, and I roll randomly: honest, easy-going, likeable, bad with women, etc. And then I pick my stats as appropriate, just make them up. Why is this any different? It’s the flip side of the same coin. It’s less common, of course, but that has a lot to do with the wargame origins and such, in which it’s the stats that matter most rather than the personality because it matters how many orcs you can kill in an alley.

Now it seems to me that the move away from random generation has been because character design was already 50% non-random, so things moved toward complete non-randomness as a way of incorporating greater choice, freedom, and flexibility. But as Raven says, one of the most common things to happen is that people start min-maxing or whatever to get powerful characters. Which, of course, depends on the same old false assumption that the stuff that used to be random is all that’s important, and continues to ignore the stuff that was always non-random.

What I think Raven is implying here, and I’d agree with him, is that random generation has a lot of value partly because it deflects choice into the stuff that really ought to be central to gaming as he sees it: personality, character, style, group dynamics, etc. Since you can’t choose about the other stuff, you put all your effort into these, and that’s probably a good thing.

In order to make it work, let’s say with OAD&D, I think you’d want to do three things.

1. Impose a role-playing bonus, where the whole group decides who was the best player for the session, as in a tournament. Importantly, this isn’t the person who most helped toward the mission, necessarily, but the one who was most interesting as a character, someone to interact with, who made the session fun at that level.

2. Have any character’s death be paid for by 100% of the gold and x.p. gained in the dungeon. So if somebody dies, nobody gains anything for all their trouble.

3. As was always the case in some campaigns, make absolutely all the x.p. for monsters or treasure exactly divisible, where even if the Illusionist didn’t do anything in the fight he gets x.p. just for being there. If the party decides just to keep him out of the way all the time, though, have a nice spider or something attack from behind.

And, of course, more than anything else:

State at the outset that the random generation is intended to produce characters who have odd strengths and weaknesses, things that aren’t completely consistent, and explain that the excitement of playing such a character will be in dealing with the flaws, not in simply highlighting the strengths. Encourage people to vote, in terms of the roleplaying bonus, for the guy who made his flaws an interesting part of the game. Be explicit about the false dichotomy of choice: you choose who you are, but you don’t choose what you are. Kind of like life, no?

To sum up:

I think that Gamist play is a matter of stepping up to whatever challenge presents itself. It’s traditional to think of that challenge as exterior to the character: monsters, traps, etc. But they could be interior to the character and exterior to the player’s choices, for example the weaknesses of a character as presented. The challenge is to step up and make this character, no matter who or what he is, effective and interesting. So long as the randomness doesn’t go to such extremes that I can be handed a character who will die if he trips over his shoelaces, this seems to me a legitimate and important type of challenge. Gamism isn’t about winning some particular kind of challenge; Gamism is about meeting the challenge of the particular game. And if that challenge is, “Make this character cool,” saying, “Yeah, but he’s wimpy” is another way of saying, “I can’t do it, I lose.”

I think that Gamist play is a matter of stepping up to whatever challenge presents itself. It’s traditional to think of that challenge as exterior to the character: monsters, traps, etc. But they could be interior to the character and exterior to the player’s choices, for example the weaknesses of a character as presented. The challenge is to step up and make this character, no matter who or what he is, effective and interesting. So long as the randomness doesn’t go to such extremes that I can be handed a character who will die if he trips over his shoelaces, this seems to me a legitimate and important type of challenge. Gamism isn’t about winning some particular kind of challenge; Gamism is about meeting the challenge of the particular game. And if that challenge is, “Make this character cool,” saying, “Yeah, but he’s wimpy” is another way of saying, “I can’t do it, I lose.”

clehrich wrote: But I think Raven is pointing toward a different perspective on Gamism – one that in many ways was probably intended in D&D from the start. The whole party has to win, you see, so it doesn’t matter if one character is a wimp because the others have to make sure he survives. Because the party is out to beat the dungeon, they can’t waste their efforts on carping at each other. Together we stand, divided we fall, and all that jazz.

Now step it all on up one notch. As a player, I’ve been handed a seriously crappy character. He’s weak, and crippled, and no rocket scientist, and he’s allergic to dungeon moss. But wait – is that really a crappy character? This is the nub of the thing: if you see only “crappy character” then in this sort of Gamism, you’re a crappy player, because you can’t step up to the challenge. Sure, he’s not great at a lot of things, but nothing here says he can’t be one of the most interesting and liked characters. How is a guy like this along on a mission team anyway? He must be good at something. Hmm. Well, let’s suppose he’s a natural leader of the subtle kind, i.e. not the one who says, “Once more into the breach, dear friends!” but the one who says, “Hey Bob? You know, I think if you climb that wall there, and Jane holds the rope, then Fred here can swing across to that ledge. What do you think?” You know, quiet, easy-going, but keeping everyone working together as a team. Now that’s an interesting role, and it could be vital – in which case the constant nose-blowing and limping isn’t going to be such a problem.

Now to my mind, this implies that Raven’s proposed a false dichotomy – but a very useful one. If you consider this hypothetical crippled sniffle-meister, in fact I had a great deal of choice in the character design. I just was working within certain constraints about physical and so forth abilities. But personality and style and such were up to me. This is a classic division, right back to D&D, right? But there’s no intrinsic reason for the divide.

Suppose I have a huge list of characteristics in terms of personality, and I roll randomly: honest, easy-going, likeable, bad with women, etc. And then I pick my stats as appropriate, just make them up. Why is this any different? It’s the flip side of the same coin. It’s less common, of course, but that has a lot to do with the wargame origins and such, in which it’s the stats that matter most rather than the personality because it matters how many orcs you can kill in an alley.

Now it seems to me that the move away from random generation has been because character design was already 50% non-random, so things moved toward complete non-randomness as a way of incorporating greater choice, freedom, and flexibility. But as Raven says, one of the most common things to happen is that people start min-maxing or whatever to get powerful characters. Which, of course, depends on the same old false assumption that the stuff that used to be random is all that’s important, and continues to ignore the stuff that was always non-random.

What I think Raven is implying here, and I’d agree with him, is that random generation has a lot of value partly because it deflects choice into the stuff that really ought to be central to gaming as he sees it: personality, character, style, group dynamics, etc. Since you can’t choose about the other stuff, you put all your effort into these, and that’s probably a good thing.

I think that Gamist play is a matter of stepping up to whatever challenge presents itself. It’s traditional to think of that challenge as exterior to the character: monsters, traps, etc. But they could be interior to the character and exterior to the player’s choices, for example the weaknesses of a character as presented. The challenge is to step up and make this character, no matter who or what he is, effective and interesting. So long as the randomness doesn’t go to such extremes that I can be handed a character who will die if he trips over his shoelaces, this seems to me a legitimate and important type of challenge. Gamism isn’t about winning some particular kind of challenge; Gamism is about meeting the challenge of the particular game. And if that challenge is, “Make this character cool,” saying, “Yeah, but he’s wimpy” is another way of saying, “I can’t do it, I lose.”

ffilz wrote:
I am interested in seeing how randomness could be used in character generation without it writing players out of the game, but all the players (including the GM if any) have to buy into the system.
Frank

Noon wrote:

I think that Gamist play is a matter of stepping up to whatever challenge presents itself. It’s traditional to think of that challenge as exterior to the character: monsters, traps, etc. But they could be interior to the character and exterior to the player’s choices, for example the weaknesses of a character as presented. The challenge is to step up and make this character, no matter who or what he is, effective and interesting. So long as the randomness doesn’t go to such extremes that I can be handed a character who will die if he trips over his shoelaces, this seems to me a legitimate and important type of challenge. Gamism isn’t about winning some particular kind of challenge; Gamism is about meeting the challenge of the particular game. And if that challenge is, “Make this character cool,” saying, “Yeah, but he’s wimpy” is another way of saying, “I can’t do it, I lose.”

"I can't do it, Vs the primary challenges in the rule book". This is the same as tripping over your shoe laces and dying, because if you trip over and die at the first real challenge presented without the chance for you as a player to influence that with your choices, it's not gamist.

Frank basically said it already. If you have no choices or have significantly reduced choices compared to the other players, it doesn't matter if your working as a team. Your basically not doing anything...why invite someone to just observe rather than contribute their choices to the game session (perhaps participationism?)

clehrich wrote: What seems to be happening here, if you ask me, is you're violently opposed to randomness as a constraint, but you're piling up illogical reasons to defend the position. I wonder why, since it's used in many parts of lots of games, including gamist ones -- for example, in combat systems. So what's the objection to putting a little at the start? A sort of Fortune-in-the-Opening system, as it were? Why does that somehow break everything, whereas constraint and randomness at any and every other point is perfectly okay? This is cultural, not logical.

Hmm, if you think randomness of character is so good, and a good gamist will rise to the challenge of playing the character he's given, would you be willing to play a game of chess where we flipped a coin for each piece to see if you get to start with that piece or not?

I know I used to hate the Avalon Hill war games that were so concerned with being perfectly historical all the way to the victory conditions (you don't win Afrika Corps as the German player by doing better than history, you only win by winning). At one time I was really exploring a space boardgame, Starfire. The first scenario seemed very weighted for one side to win. I solo played it a bunch of times trying to get a win for the other side. I couldn't. Then one time I introduced another player to it. I suggested we skip the first scenario because it was a forgone conclusion. He still wanted to play it. So I suggested he play the side that was fated to win. He wanted to play the other side. I won. He said the game sucked and stormed off.

Gamism is not possible if your character is not able to rise to the challenge raised by the group. It might be possible to play gamist with a wimpy character if the group as a whole plays to the challenge of playing your character. But I've never seen a group do this. I've always seen gamism being played as rising to the challenge of the scenario.

But then I dislike gamism so what am I to say?

All I can do is repeat again, in all of my experience, random character generation has led to unequal play potential. Having the greatest theory in the world about how games should be played isn't worth a damn if the rest of the group doesn't buy that theory.

So am I violently opposed to randomness in character creation? Yes and no, well actually mostly no because I'm not violently opposed. I am against randomness that creates different play potential. I am interested in how to bring in some randomness that doesn't affect play potential (or at least to much of an extent, if randomness means we range from 95% to 105% of average play potential, then it probably isn't all that bad).

Hmm, on clerics. Clerics (in D&D) seem to be almost univerally despised by players. Why is this? Because they don't get to kick ass in a game about kicking ass. Sure, they help the other characters kick ass, but they don't do it themselves. As long as the game is about kicking ass, the cleric player is likely to be dissatisfied. Now sometimes you're lucky and there is a player who really wants something different and he's happy playing the cleric, but that player is probably not gamist, and certainly is playing a different game than everyone else.

On simulationism and exploration of wimpy characters: I personally would not find this interesting. And that's something to remember, for each CA, there are numerous individual goals. I actually get the most interest in exploration of setting. So sure, it's possible to posit a gamist interest in rising to the challenge of a wimpy character, but it's just as likely (if not more likely) that gamists are interested in rising to different challenges and would see the wimpy character as just that.

On the poker analogy, something to consider is that you don't get one hand in poker that you play all night with. Now if you knew the deck was stacked such that you would never get a hand better than a pair (and usually a low ranked pair at that), would you still find the game enjoyable? Because that's a better analogy for the wimpy character.

Frank

One more thing...

Is there interest in discussion how to include randomness without including a whiff factor or is this thread just going to be about berating folks for not wanting to rise to the challenge of playing a "wimpy" character?

I've several times raised the point that I am interested in talking about how to include randomness in character generation if we can explore ways to avoid the whiff factor.

One interesting point that was rasied in the discussion of fudge vs. no fudge over on Monte Cook's boars was that you should never roll dice if you aren't willing to accept all possible results. This is particularly interesting as regards to character generation. D&D has steadily been including more methods of generating ability scores in attempt to produce more playable characters.

In my Arcana Unearthed campaign I tried an experiment. I allowed people to roll 4d6 take the best 3 6 times, re-rolling a single die. If they didn't like the scores that produced, they could spend 32 points using the point buy method from the DMG. I even would "score" their rolls and tell them if they were better than 32 points. This was an interesting system, that some analysis I did suggested that about 40% of the time it was worth taking the rolls. At first we saw almost no one take the rolls except one player who rolled incredibly well (2 or 3 18s, worst ability score was a 15 I think). Certainly no one had a whiff, but I also noticed one player running through characters (I made it easy to punt and start a new character). I'm not sure that part of his motivation wasn't seeking a better character (how many folks remember trying to kill off crummy characters in Traveller's previous experience system?).

Based on what I saw from this experiment, I will be going with straight point buy for my next game unless I can come up with a better random system. I did play around trying to create a random system which had opposed attribute pairs (each pair would add up to the same number). I never convinced myself it was actually workable but it was an interesting exercise. I also played around with the system trying to encourage non-middle results (so one thing I did was have one die distribute a bunch of points to one side or the other, while the rest of the dice just distributed one point).

Frank

Noon wrote: If were talking gamist, then you need to facilitate choice.

Frank wrote: Based on what I saw from this experiment, I will be going with straight point buy for my next game unless I can come up with a better random system.

By the end of the first adventure, mine was the only character who made third level, and was the most respected character in the game. I played smart, and took calculated risks when I needed to, and won them more often than not. I strategically out-maneuvered a skeletal warrior and out-talked a demon, as well as leading the party in and out of serious danger to complete our mission, and making them all rather wealthy in the process.

Take a look at the D&D Method V rolling system

How do you judge step on up in a player?

By his choices. Suppose the GM in collaboration with a group expectation, decides to test your fighting tactics? Mostly an opportunity for melee combat. And you rolled 5 strength (which puts your probabilities down the plug hole). What choices can you make to be judged by?

But, you might say, quickly change the challenge to being a leader, or a researcher or such like.

So you dodge the challenge. That's step on up? Eh? Your stepping on up to the challenge of avoiding the step on up given?

I'll grant, there is gamism there. But quite frankly it sounds like a certain article:

"my GM Herbie can run anything. The game can suck, but he can toss out what he doesn't like and then it rocks." OK, fine. Herbie is talented. However, imagine how good he'd be if he didn't have to spend all that time culling the mechanics.

ffilz wrote: ...or is this thread just going to be about berating folks for not wanting to rise to the challenge of playing a "wimpy" character?

That would be great if that was the way campaigns were run...I spent a lot of time not contributing to the game...I am interested in seeing how randomness could be used in character generation without it writing players out of the game, but all the players (including the GM if any) have to buy into the system.

Gamism is not possible if your character is not able to rise to the challenge raised by the group.

clehrich wrote: Gamism says step on up to the challenge. If one of the challenges is a randomly-rolled character, then you have to step on up to it. That IS the challenge.

"Gamism is about meeting the challenge of the particular game."

ffilz wrote: I've several times raised the point that I am interested in talking about how to include randomness in character generation if we can explore ways to avoid the whiff factor.

Noon wrote: How do you judge step on up in a player?

By his choices. Suppose the GM in collaboration with a group expectation, decides to test your fighting tactics? Mostly an opportunity for melee combat. And you rolled 5 strength (which puts your probabilities down the plug hole). What choices can you make to be judged by?

But, you might say, quickly change the challenge to being a leader, or a researcher or such like.

So you dodge the challenge. That's step on up? Eh? Your stepping on up to the challenge of avoiding the step on up given?

I'll agree that the above is a valid and really existing form of gamism.

But compare chess with poker, they are nearly diamteric opposites. In chess, the sides are exactly even, and everything is in the open. In poker, the sides are definitely not even, and little or nothing is in the open.

These are both games that you can step up to, but I suggest that are very different experientially and aesthetically. I like chess, I dislike poker. I like point systems, I dislike random gen systems. I think its quite possible that different gamists are attracted to different forms of game.

contracycle wrote: I think its quite possible that different gamists are attracted to different forms of game.

Sorry for getting snarky. I admit that I've got a pretty big chip on my shoulder from dysfunctional play. Thank you for responding to my attempts at opening something for discussion, that was most of what was frustrating me, it seemed like we were talking past each other, and if I was misreading posts, I appologize. Perhaps there's also a misinterpretation that a gamist should be willing to step up to all challenges.

I'll grant that you are right about the dysfunctional play being most of the problem. However, I'll raise one thought: I see GMs who look at using choice over randomness as one way of recognizing dysfunctional play and seeking to change the way they play. So in one camp, we have dysfunctional play groups insisting that you suck up your 5 strength, and the other camp deciding that as part of making play functional, we won't force a random strength roll on the player. Of course there is a valid third camp which says rather than eliminate the randomness, let's make it part of the system.

My hackles were raised by the insistence that if one is dealt a 5 strength, then the step on up response should be to find another way to step on up than be a combat machine. This disregards the fact that the play group has to support the alternative step on up.

So I think part of the problem is that we're trying to talk in generalizations when we really need to be more specific, at least in examples, there ought to be some generalizations that can be made.

Frank

There's no argument going on in this thread. (further, people are moderating other people for very little reason).


One side says that the other says that there's only one sort of gamism, and that their argument is that randomness messes with it.

The other side says that there is a form of gamism which is messed by with randomness.

See the subtle difference everyone?

What's really the case is that we all agree that there are some forms of gamism, PVP being the obvious one, in which it's desirable to have a balanced starting point, which is made problematic by randomness. And others where randomess is not a problem.

So gamism does not suggest one solution or another, automatically, you have to know what sort of gamism you're shooting for. Which is personal preference, so there can be no indicator of what's generally better or worse for a design.


Then people go on to point out all the badly designed games where either randomness or point-based choice doesn't work. None of these arguments is worth anything, because they're all predicated on the idea that the designer using that method will design inappropriately. We have to assume otherwise.

What I will say is this. The reason that I believe we went to point based modes of generation is because it's easier to ensure that the problems of bad random design don't crop up. That is, if you rely on player intelligence, then the system can't be blamed for bad character's produced by the system.

Yes, that's throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

But then I also agree with Simon and others that this all assumes you're attached to the baby. Frankly, personally I can get along completely without it. I don't have the problems of players who make the same characters, or any desire for the immersion that might come out of randomization.

Which is to say that any and all arguments about this are invalid, because they're all based on personal preference. Use randomization if you want these things, don't if you're not concerned.

Basically it all comes back to preference. So no argument that's been made so far has any validity.


Raven, you say now that your idea was simply to say that randomness is no worse than any other method. Well, you'll have to understand how some of us made the mistake of thinking otherwise in the early part of the thread. Look at the title. Look at your rhetoric, the actual things you said. Until you said that you weren't trying to promote the superiority of randomness, I sure thought that was what you were trying to do.

So, sorry, but I think you've lead us all on a wild goose chase here. Which, BTW, we've gone over before, with the same result.

Mike

I am going to take the risk of trying to add comments to the thread after reading only about half of the replies (some from the front and some from the back). I apologize for any redundancy.

First, I see no reason why players who don't want to design characters should have to, but that doesn't mean that players who want to design characters shouldn't be allowed to. It seems like you could have a nonrandom character generation system, but also a random generator that only creates characters obeying the rules of the nonrandom system.

It's been argued that players will somehow benefit from being forced to play something they don't want to play. I think that if you can convince the player of that, you shouldn't need to force him, and if you can't, then he's not going to play with a random system anyway (or not happily, at any rate).

Second, while starting equality is important in some games and not important in others, I submit that balance (in a more general sense) is very important in any gamist setting. All characters don't need to be created equal, but you should know how powerful a character is (or is going to be) or the GM can't even set the challenges at the right level for the player. Perhaps what we want here is a parameterized system, where you can create a character with more or fewer "points." Of course, this only works if "points" are actually an accurate measure of a character's effectiveness, which is a nontrivial design challenge, with or without randomness.

Either a random or a nonrandom system can be good or bad at keeping characters at a desired level of effectiveness. However, there is an important difference in performance, which arises from the fact that game designers are not perfect: nonrandom systems which are exploitable can be exploited systematically, whereas random systems which are unbalanced can only be exploited probabilistically, which tends to make overly powerful options more obvious in nonrandom systems (because they can be reliably exploited) and excessively weak options more obvious (relatively) in random systems (because they cannot be reliably avoided). Which, again, seems to argue that giving players both options may be a good idea, but traditional wisdom holds that overpowered options are worse for balance than underpowered ones, so a nonrandom system (even if it's only for play-testing) strikes me as more important in developing balance.

I'll pose a question in terms of design, so were a little more concrete.

Now, if I can randomly produce a strength of 5, does that mean such a strength will be supported by the rule book for gamist play.

Will it? It can be, and in that case yes, it's really pretty wimpy to say you can't handle the challenge with your PC.

But quite frankly we have a history of 'system doesn't matter' in the industry. And I believe that random stats are something you have to work on very, very carefully so any result (like STR 5) is supported. I'm reminded of the rules 3E has for scrapping rolls if their just not good enough. Instead of accomidating a strength 5 in the design, that proffesional team decided to trash such results (as well as making them highly unlikely).

Now, can you play gamist with 5 STR where it isn't supported? Yeah, I'd say you can. But you'll be doing more work than other players just to keep up with them, typically (if not...well done, somehow the system did support STR 5 and you found it. That or your group has introduced house rules and play elements they'd probably swear they didn't).

The idea of 'system does matter' is a repeating one on the forge. Casually throwing in random stats without thoroughly checking the consequences of it isn't working under that idea. You have to work on random stats for them to support the play envisioned.

Also, yeah, this is just one type of gamism that STR 5 usually messes with. I just find it odd that if I buy a book about gamism type X, I should have to switch to gamism type Y if someone rolls a poor strength score. Weird product.

Noon wrote: Now, if I can randomly produce a strength of 5, does that mean such a strength will be supported by the rule book for gamist play. ... Will it? It can be, and in that case yes, it's really pretty wimpy to say you can't handle the challenge with your PC.

Noon wrote: But quite frankly we have a history of 'system doesn't matter' in the industry. And I believe that random stats are something you have to work on very, very carefully so any result (like STR 5) is supported. I'm reminded of the rules 3E has for scrapping rolls if their just not good enough. Instead of accomidating a strength 5 in the design, that proffesional team decided to trash such results (as well as making
them highly unlikely).

John Kim wrote: Now, there are many designs out there which will say things like "If you don't like a roll, ignore it" -- like Vampire: The Masquerade and Fudge and the Lord of the Rings RPG. Sure, I'd agree that these are in the "System Doesn't Matter" camp.

John Kim wrote: But not D&D3.

DMG wrote: The DM really can't cheat. You're the umpire and what you say goes. As such, it's certainly within your rights to sway things one way or another to keep people happy or keep things running smoothly. It's no fun losing a long-term character from getting run over by a cart. A good rule of thumb is that a character shouldn't die in a trivial way because of some fluke of the dice unless he or she was doing something really stupid at the time.

efindel wrote:

John Kim wrote: Now, there are many designs out there which will say things like "If you don't like a roll, ignore it" -- like Vampire: The Masquerade and Fudge and the Lord of the Rings RPG. Sure, I'd agree that these are in the "System Doesn't Matter" camp.

I can't speak for V:TM, not having played it since the first edition, nor LotR... but I don't believe that Fudge says that anywhere. It does say that one should not roll when success or failure should be certain, but that's a different thing.

efindel wrote: Well, actually, D&D3 does say that. DMG, page 18:
...
That's not quite "if you don't like a roll, ignore it" -- but it's closer to it than anything I can find in my copy of Fudge Expanded Edition. And while it doesn't say anything specifically about character generation, that section doesn't say much of anything specific, period.

No one should try to GM Champions, or any other game for that matter, without having a thorough understanding of the rules.
...
However, there is an extremely important caveat to this -- don't let the rules get in the way of having fun. If a particular rule is spoiling your fun, ignore it, discard it, or change it to suit you. One of the greatest things about role-playing games is that they allow you and your players to change the game to make it better for you -- take advantage of it!

Similarly, don't let "rules lawyers" among your players ruin everyone else's fun. There have to be some rules, to make everything fair and consistent for everyone, and that in most situations the rules should be followed. But if Player A consistently comes up with clever maneuvers or ideas that are fun but don't strictly follow the rules, and Player B is constantly point out that rules are being violated and trying to stop what Player A is doing, then shut Player B up and let Player A charge ahead.

Mike,

Out of everyone on the Forge, you coming down on me for using strongly worded rhetoric to make a point is, well, forgive me, but it's rather ironic, as I believe you would agree.

Now, while I do have problems with certain statements in your post, I'd prefer to concentrate on things relevant to the subject, and touch on the other item later.

Which is to say that any and all arguments about this are invalid, because they're all based on personal preference. Use randomization if you want these things, don't if you're not concerned.

Mike Holmes wrote: See the subtle difference everyone?

PVP being the obvious one, in which it's desirable to have a balanced starting point,

So gamism does not suggest one solution or another, automatically, you have to know what sort of gamism you're shooting for. Which is personal preference, so there can be no indicator of what's generally better or worse for a design.

What I will say is this. The reason that I believe we went to point based modes of generation is because it's easier to ensure that the problems of bad random design don't crop up. That is, if you rely on player intelligence, then the system can't be blamed for bad character's produced by the system.

So, sorry, but I think you've lead us all on a wild goose chase here. Which, BTW, we've gone over before, with the same result.

So no argument that's been made so far has any validity.

John Kim: No no, my paragraph is just confusing. I meant to say completely what your saying. I was refering to a history of 'system doesn't matter', and refered to 3E since I think it is an example of 'system does matter' design. Mentioned it to show how they wanted to avoid certain scores, most likely because those scores are unplayable. Though I didn't know you could get a five...but the other stats would have to be quite high for it to be a valid roll...and then you choose where you assign it. Pretty much avoiding the STR: 5 prob entirely.

Hope I didn't confuse everyone else on that bit.

clehrich wrote:

Noon wrote: Now, if I can randomly produce a strength of 5, does that mean such a strength will be supported by the rule book for gamist play. ... Will it? It can be, and in that case yes, it's really pretty wimpy to say you can't handle the challenge with your PC.

Callan, can you explain a little more what you mean by "support" here? I'm not quite getting that. Insofar as I do understand you, I think you're saying that if system does matter, and if the system is designed coherently such that this is consistently true, then a crappy strength (or whatever) is a challenge one can genuinely overcome and that's worth playing with. But I don't quite see, not remembering quite all the intricacies of OAD&D (it's been a while) and not knowing 3E at all, how that system made this an unplayable character. Or was that your point? I'm a little lost. Can you go back to OAD&D or use another example? Could you talk through an example of how a crappy random roll is not supported? I think this is the real bone of contention, and if I get the hang of your point we'll at least be on the same page.

Okay, so you're saying that the problem with random chracter design in gamism is that most gamist designs are oriented around a single type of challenge and approach, such as combat or whatever. And if you allow random generation that produces characters ineffective for that approach to that challenge, that sucks. Right?

I guess I'll buy that, but that's not my recollection of D&D. As you say, that wasn't entirely coherent gamism anyway. But I do think that it was very possible to run weakling characters effectively. Part of how it worked, of course, was that you had huge parties, so the division of labor allowed a greater range of niches.

But I think I see where you're coming from. My sense is that Raven is talking about the principles of design rather than the actualities; that's why he's talking about an approach that's rarely taken these days. So the difference is de jure on his side and de facto on yours, which is a basic mismatch in argument.

Hello,

This thread's closed now for several reasons.

Please take all substantive sub-topics and specific issues to daughter threads.

Best,
Ron