One of my next projects which is gurgling around in the ooze and muck at the base of my skull is a western game. I've decided that I don't really want a Narrativist Premise along the lines of Dust Devil's "Devil" (partially because he beat me to it), but rather I want it to be more of a game about exploring western imagery and drama associated with western cinema: the sweeping landscapes, the creak of leather saddles, the jingle of spurs, the whisper of the wind through the bell tower, blowing dust, faded clapboard buildings...all of that sort of things.

Partially, this can be accomplished through art and the mood conveyed by art, and partially this can be covered through game mechanics. I'm working on mechanics where things happen the way they happen in westerns (generally the more "realistic" gritty westerns then the more pulpy ones) and I plan to include alot of the trappings of western activity.

But in the end, the way color gets into an actual RPG session is through the portrayal of the imagery by the players (usually the GM). I'm not talking just about spitting out loads of purple prose, but trying to capture the overall feel in the way things are framed and described.

Thats what I want the game to "be about" in the rewards sense. I want players to be rewarded for setting up and describing the imagery and drama...the color...of a western movie. This needs to go beyond simple die roll bonuses for "good role-playing", or "interesting descriptions", I want it to be a pretty central mechanic to the game (which will other wise attempt to have fairly sim mechanics).

I have a seed of an idea thats germanating right now (actually I think its pretty close to blooming)...I don't want to explain it just yet because I don't want it coloring the initial responses, but what I'm fishing for is some ideas that may help polish this off for me.

How to reward color, and what can this reward be used for?

Thoughts:

Dying Earths line rewards

Mostly I think its better to make a behaviour you wish to reward USEFUL.

This seems like an area where Story Engine's descriptors have an edge (ha ha) over Hero Wars-style Action Points• . In SE, you bid descriptors to determine how many dice you get (over a PC-determined minimum) in resolving a scene. Check out the free PDF "plug-in" Six Guns & Whiskey for numerous descriptors--they are color and effectiveness-counters in one go.

To tease out a more generic issue, I'd say a good way to cast the question you're trying to answer would be, "how to make Color part of the game's Currency?"

--JB

• Upon reflection, of course, HW has the whole augmentation-roll thing, which is arguably more flexible and does not run into the "descriptor starvation" problem that a reviewer or two have mentioned in SE. It's pretty hard around these parts to get away from noticing that HW kicks abundant ass.

Actually, JB brought up a really good point. Story Engine's forte when pushed is to basically turn color into a concrete system mechanics because ANYTHING can have a descriptor. Characters, of course, have descriptors but locations and objects ALSO can have descriptors. Thus, basically you can put your description of an area or object on the table and then anyone who can use the descriptor in the course of their actions gets instantly rewarded with a bonus die to their roll.

Some people say Story Engine is very Narrativist because of its emphasis on Scene/Conflict Resolution and it's inclusion of Story Points. But it doesn't really support any kind of explicit Premise. The system is almost MORE suited to Simulationism with an emphsis on Color exploration.

Jesse

Theres an idea. Although its mutated greatly, Story Engine descriptors were a big influence on Universalis.

I hadn't thought to plumb that for this game, because I was going for a more traditional type of game mechanic than the collaborative scene resolution of Story Engine, but there might be something there to use.

Hey,

See, this is the tricky thing about Color. When we try to get it more integrated with how the game works, it turns into System. That's a fine thing, but the Color as such is not the issue, rather, the issue becomes Does the System Work.

Some good "almosts" exist already, for which the Color remains Color, pretty much, and still plays into System. As I just said on a different thread, Everway's Color (the Vision cards and the images/layout of the Fortune Deck) factors into System very well.

There seem to me to be two extremes at work, as far as Color and System operate together.

At one end is something like Asylum, in which one generates a number by pulling marbles from a bag. Frankly, the marbles are JUST Color - the probabilities and standards of play are exactly what you might find in a dice system and the marbles are well, gimmicky - not only do they play no role already covered by other methods, they actually add handling time to the play experience.
At the other end is Everway, in which the Fortune Deck is not only a resolution method for the people who play the game, but it is also an existing in-game phenomenon, as the characters themselves know of the Fortune Deck and readings of in-game Fortune layouts may even play a major role in the events of play. Also, to go back to the people rather than the characters, the Deck's "meaning" as system is image-based rather than numbers-based; i.e. Color interpretation can play a big roll in a way that dice or other numerical outcomes can't do.

In between these are games like these ...

FVLMINATA, in which one is supposed to stick Roman talus-stickers onto dice and use them for play. Their probabilities are different from typical dice and the system employs that set of probabilities. (This is a numerical-cultural Color feature relating to setting)

Champions, in which quite a few d6's get rolled for damage or any other effect, and for which many people have cited their enjoyment of the "lots of dice hit the table" equating, viscerally, to "lots of raw power being thrown around in-game." (This is a sound-and-feel Color feature relating to motifs of play)

White Wolf game-specific dice, in which certain colors for otherwise-typical d10's are associated with specific games, such that you have your green ones for Vampire, your purple ones for Mage, and so on. (This is a subcultural consumer-loyalty Color feature relating to one's relationship to the publisher)

Lots more to talk about regarding Color, but that would be my first question regarding Ralph's proposed western game notions ... where would the relevant Color features fall in this spectrum, and what would they be about: setting, system, etc.

Best,
Ron

Well, I think what I'm most interested in might be more precisely termed, atmosphere. Westerns have a very distinctive atmosphere that I want to capture in the game, but I don't want to leave it entirely in the hands of the GM to present it.

So I guess to try and make the question more specific, I'm looking for ideas on how to use system (through the currency of rewards) to rope players into participating in the creation and maintainance of that atmosphere.

I can put all the flavor text into the book about deserted dusty streets, faded signs creaking in the wind, the oppressive heat from the mid day sun, the hard eyed stranger covered in trail dust, etc that I want; BUT what I REALLY want is for that to translate over into actual play, and what I'm attempting to develop is mechanics that promote that.

I realize it's faux pas to dice up someone else's words, but here I'm using them more as introductions to ideas I want to express, as opposed to 'answering them.'

Ron Edwards wrote: See, this is the tricky thing about Color. When we try to get it more integrated with how the game works, it turns into System. That's a fine thing, but the Color as such is not the issue, rather, the issue becomes Does the System Work.

Ron Edwards wrote: There seem to me to be two extremes at work, as far as Color and System operate together.

Ron Edwards wrote: Lots more to talk about regarding Color, but that would be my first question regarding Ralph's proposed western game notions ... where would the relevant Color features fall in this spectrum, and what would they be about: setting, system, etc.

I don't think colour should be a goal, which is or is not rewarded. If we want players to author colour, which is what I think is intended, then that authorships must have its own goal - defeat the villan, whatever. So colour must be systematically implemented as a process or tool which can be proactively used.

Hey,

Fang, that's an interesting post and set of ideas. For the record, I agree with you about "genre" - it's a useful term if everyone using the specific genre-name is communicating and agreeing about the essential stuff (like Setting, etc).

Gareth, I'm inclined to agree with you in principle, but then I was considering your previous example of the improvement-system in The Dying Earth, which is essentially a player reward for pure Color - the tagline is not meaningful in any resolution sense. And I like that aspect of the game a lot, so now I have confused myself ...

Best,
Ron

Hmm, true.

Hey, a tool for applying colour is a paintbrush, right? :)

OTOH, is the tagline a tool for seizing the spotlight? You have to have the spotlight to deliver the line. I'ver not played itm, but I could imagine one player might ask another to back out of the spotlight for a momenty because the situation was appropriate to the delivery of a tagline - anyone seen such an explicit break into the metagame to request the spotlight?

Hi Gareth,

No, the taglines in The Dying Earth aren't even spotlights (as the Confessionals in InSpectres would be). They're plain, simple Color that anyone can interject during a scene ... or to be clearer, as The Dying Earth takes a fairly traditional view of player/character, they may be inserted into a character's dialogue by the character's player, in the course of the character's interactions. That is, the character is already in a scene, a situation is happening with or without dice rolls, before or after the dice rolls if they are happening, and the tagline simply enters the dialogue when and if the player sees fit. No system involvement, and not even a break or shift in the system's application.

Best,
Ron

contracycle wrote: I don't think colour should be a goal, which is or is not rewarded. If we want players to author colour, which is what I think is intended, then that authorships must have its own goal - defeat the villan, whatever. So colour must be systematically implemented as a process or tool which can be proactively used.

Hey Ralph,

I want it to involve being a reward from the GM for narrating appropriate color.

One possible variation I'm considering is instead of awarding 1 point for a really powerful narration, to award 1-6 points based on the scope and quality of the narration, and then have the points spent to buy whatever success level is desired (with maximum success costing 5 points). But thats just details.

Primeval, which I saw Wick and Scott Knipe playing last year at GenCon, treads some of the same territory. They could probably explain the mechanics better than I, but essentially there were four things a player was supposed to have in his narration (one of them was recognition of the heroism of the other players), and the GM rated the player's narration on how well they incorporated the four things. From an observer standpoint, it seemed that the game pretty much revolved around rewarding color.

What you've written about your mechanic is a little confusing to me. I have the notion that there'd be an awkward disjunction between the narrations and the amount of points spent on success. If I came in strong, planning for a 5 point success, and narrated a bunch of very colorful stuff, would it be self-fulfilling that I'd get the points I need? If it's not, then the game could feel strange, with very colorful narrations being attached to minor successes. The reverse is less likely I guess, because a matter-of-fact narration rewarded with a greater number of points would maybe result in the player banking the extra.

How about this alternative? A player writes down what level of success he's targeting with his narration before he begins. When the GM evaluates the narration, according to whatever criteria you come up with, and determines the reward, it is compared to what the player wrote down. A deficit is made up by GM introduced complications. A surplus is automatically banked.

Paul