Hi all, this is my first Forge post and it's about the first (actually, a pre-play) session of our new RPG initiative. The big themes, if there is any, would probably be player empowerment and maximize Fun. But the first issue I start of with lies at the social level, it's about (assumed) authority. But first some background.

Where I come from

In short, I've been exposed to D&D in college about two years ago. I've played some since that time, got familiar with D&D, got and appetite for the rules. I checked out the Wizard of the Coast boards but found the intellectual experience appalling. Found out about Monte Cook's site and discovered a more open-minded approach to D&D. Spent a while on his boards until I lost interest in the minutia of mechanics and started to focus on the social context of role-playing. I began to regard the play experience higher than the realism and consistency of the rules and gradually found myself alone in this on the boards but supported by this at the gaming table. Then, as so many before me, I discovered the Forge. Spent some time absorbing theory, forgot about it, came back to absorb actual plays, left again. And now it's time to post. Hi!

The people

We are roughly a group of 20-something year old male Dutch (ex) college students (computer science or AI). We all know each other from a social context in which nerdy games, D&D, Shadowrun, a multitude of computer games, and World of Warcraft are very dominant. All are nice guys as far as I'm concerned.

First there's me, Jasper, oldest (27) and graduated a bit over a year ago, with a full-time job. I really don't want to waste my time on Not Fun.
My previous role-playing experiences and other potential Actual-Plays are thus:
1) I've been a player in three D&D "campaigns", of which the last two were very short-lived and Not Fun.
2) I'm currently playing in a freshly-started Shadowrun 4 campaign with a session about once a month, which I hope turns out fun but I'm not convinced. There have also been a few one-session things.
3) I've been the DM/GM/whatever of a pre-written D&D campaign, "Return to the temple of Elemental Evil", RttToEE for short. The players were seeking a DM, they asked me, and I said "sure". It lasted maybe ten sessions before we abandoned it. We had Fun, but not enough. It taught me that this wasn't the way I wanted to DM.
4) I've run a couple of loose free-for-all D&D "survive THIS with your munched PCs" sessions. It was basically a non-stop tactical combat with a veneer of story and limited illusory freedom. Best sessions I've had so far, precisely because of their limited scope and duration and no-nonsense approach.

Next, there's Johan, almost graduated (AI). Recently he has played lots of D&D, often with the same group and almost always with the same DM as far as I can tell, and some Shadowrun. He has played Mage: the Ascension in the past. He was one of the players in the RttToEE campaign.

Up next is Tom, still in college. Besides role-playing we have a shared interest in anime and manga and console games. He has played quite a bit of D&D and a bit of Shadowrun 3 with a small group of people over the past few years, and nothing else as far as I know. He's playing in another weekly D&D campaign as well. Also was one of the RttToEE players, has played in two of the survival sessions, and he has been in two of the D&D campaigns I played in as well.

Then we have Ivan, someone I basically know through Tom. He's been my DM for a smoldering train wreck of a campaign and my fellow player in another smoldering train wreck of a campaign. We both just want to have fun. He and Tom have played D&D together a couple of times. Don't know much more.

Last is Marcel, youngest of the bunch. I've known him as a fellow student but not much past that. He has played a bit of D&D and Shadowrun, perhaps one (partial) campaign each.

The setup

At some point not long ago we figured out the four of us (excluding Ivan) wanted to role-play. About a week ago I took the initiative and emailed the group about it. I presented a list of questions, seven in all, to deal with practical matters such as where and when to play, if we wanted more people, how open-minded people were about RPG systems, and such. We decided to ask Ivan, included him in the discussion and he joined. We got together last Saturday to brainstorm about what we actually wanted from role-playing.

My position in all this is important: I was the one to take initiative. I created the questions and provided the first set of answers with them. I bluntly made the decisions based on everyone's feedback, with the explicit opportunity for vetos, to keeps things rolling. I was basically the de-facto DM. My house was basically the de-facto location, with Johan's place as alternative (we both own a condo; the others don't have a good place to role-play). I believed myself to be most schooled in role-playing theory, for what it's worth.

I considered myself in the centre of it all thus far, but I desperately didn't want to be the unconditionally followed "boss". What I wanted was for us to be equals. So I proposed Johan's place being our first meeting place, as he mentioned it was available that day. I did this because I feared that being the host of the physical location as well would put me in a position of total dominance.

Is my decision weird? Do you recognize it? Does it make sense? Do you need more info? I have no degree in psychology or whatever, but that was my train of thought and I considered it very important at the time (and writing it down made me realize this even more). Is there a topic about exactly this subject that I missed?

That's it for now. I'd like to focus on this perceived issue of social authority a bit before carrying on with what actually happened that day.

Makes sense to me.  If it's weird, it's only because most people aren't so sensitive to interpersonal dynamics. 

Some of the best posts on the Forge, over the last 3-4 months, have focused on the fact that the rules-moderator, the guy who plays the bad guys, the host, the "creative director," and the guy who simply organizes the game and coordinates everything, are entirely distinct functions.  It sounds like you recognized this on your own, and are making sure to get buy-in from other people before any system dumps more authority on you (or someone else).

I'm curious about what was Not Fun for you, but that's probably not directly relevant to this issue of leadership. 

Welcome to the Forge!

Hi, Jasper, let me begin by welcoming you to the Forge!

My position in all this is important: I was the one to take initiative. I created the questions and provided the first set of answers with them. I bluntly made the decisions based on everyone's feedback, with the explicit opportunity for vetos, to keeps things rolling. I was basically the de-facto DM. My house was basically the de-facto location, with Johan's place as alternative (we both own a condo; the others don't have a good place to role-play). I believed myself to be most schooled in role-playing theory, for what it's worth.

I considered myself in the centre of it all thus far, but I desperately didn't want to be the unconditionally followed "boss". What I wanted was for us to be equals. So I proposed Johan's place being our first meeting place, as he mentioned it was available that day. I did this because I feared that being the host of the physical location as well would put me in a position of total dominance.

Is my decision weird? Do you recognize it? Does it make sense? Do you need more info? I have no degree in psychology or whatever, but that was my train of thought and I considered it very important at the time (and writing it down made me realize this even more). Is there a topic about exactly this subject that I missed?

James, yes I'm quite sensitive to that stuff. If I were a fictional character I would probably be an empath. The "monolithic GM" carries an immense burden and I'm happy that more people recognize it is not the only way to go.
I'll talk about the (Not) Fun stuff later.

Your thread reference is golden, Ricky! Personally, I was afraid that people would come to our first gathering in passive follow-the-leader mode and that snapping them out of that would be hard. I believed that not playing the host would make me less intimidating, so enticing proactive behavior would be easier. I think it did help, but I can never be sure how much.

So last Saturday we got together at Johan's place. I was the first to arrive and we were complete in about half an hour. We chatted a bit about role-playing in general but I held off the serious discussion until Tom, the last one missing, arrived. We all brought some snacks or drinks (we emailed what we would bring ahead of time or what was at the house).

D&D it is

Tom started with asking whether he could assume we would be playing D&D (v3.5) because we all knew that system and not much else. As no one had any objections we limited our scope to D&D there and then.
I think the most important reason was distaste for learning a new system. Not really surprising if all you know is D&D and Shadowrun, more or less similar systems which take quite a while to learn and reward having a strong grasp of the rules. Why learn a new system when you expect the play experience is going to be the same except you'll be less effective? (In our little RPG climate the most significant arguments used to promote D&D or Shadowrun are limited to setting and "realism".)

I did throw in a teaser, by the way. I put the first page (two sides) of Capes Lite on the table before things really started, talked a bit about it with people individually and said that in case we had lots of time left we could give it a try. People were intrigued but not really interested at that moment. In the end we didn't have any time left. I'll just keep Capes Lite with me in case there's a lost hour somewhere and someone asks "what shall we do?" Capes Lite seems perfect for that.

Agendas, Fun, and Not Fun

Next up was the discussion about play style, Fun and the Not Fun. Basically, the questions that I repeatedly asked were "What do you like?" "What don't you like?" "What do you mean by that?" "Can you give an example?" "Anyone recognize this?" Despite lots of laughs and a few sidetracks discussion was quite focused and intense. I won't try to reproduce the conversations but will instead highlight each person's point of view as far as I was able to determine. Some people added more to the discussion than others, as you will see below.

Johan

Johan identified two distinct objectives that he enjoyed: playing an interesting character and playing what he called a munchkin character. He believed you can combine both objectives but he wanted to know which had priority. He basically wanted to hear "this game is about combat" or "this game is about playing a character". Regardless, he would still make his character as effective as possible in what it would do.
An example of an interesting character was one with an unusual and thematically colorful background, highly integrated in the setting. The key aspects I identified were being unique, keeping it a secret from the other players, and role-playing a specific kind of behavior. As he's currently playing the character (in a GURPS game it turned out) I'll keep out the actual details.
An example of a munchkin character was a half-orc barbarian he played in the RttToEE campaign I was the GM of. D&D is about combat and the PC was a kick-ass combatant and not much more. The interesting thing about this barbarian was that Johan tactically minimized his intelligence and charisma scores but also portrayed him accordingly, or even more extreme than required. He enjoyed playing a dumb and socially inept powerhouse, but had the system not required him to penalize his character so I'm not sure he would have played that way.

Another thing he showed interest in was playing the funny type, though he didn't list it as one of his preferences. It's the half-orc bard or elf barbarian in D&D or the intelligent and refined savage; the anti-stereotypes. I've seen more people have fun talking about playing such characters, but I have never met one who actually did. I wonder whether such characters would hold up in actual play.

Johan defined one of the most Fun he had was when he accidentally killed someone his party wanted to keep alive by rolling a critical hit. After cleaving the NPC in half he smiled sheepishly and said "sorry" to his furious teammates. All players had Fun that moment.
He also described as Fun but not as a specific moment, having the feeling that he could go anywhere, that he could roam without a neon sign saying "Go HERE next!" He also liked the real possibility of death in combat (which became clear after one fatality). All examples are from the RttToEE campaign, by the way.

What he considered Not Fun was being kept alive by the GM and PCs being made into fools by the same GM, like accidentally setting a bookcase on fire because you're standing next to it with a torch.

Tom

Tom focuses on the "story" as he calls it. As far as I can tell that means two things to him: being his character and watching the story of the GM play out. On multiple occasions in the past he had told me he was willing to give up control of his character if it benefited the progression of the GM's story. (I made the GM explicit here, he didn't.)
An interesting conflict Tom seems to have with himself is that he creates PCs with story and background in mind, basically disregarding combat effectiveness, but then becomes unhappy because his PCs often suck in combat. I know multiple occasions where I've pointed out his PC configuration was suboptimal but he kept it because it apparently fit his character concept better. I think he's stuck playing the wrong system.

Tom likes to be in character and talk in character. He's happy to spend half an hour buying a sword. I didn't get an explicit Fun moment from him though. He also didn't provide a strong Not Fun moment of his own.

Ivan

Ivan's agenda, as far as I can tell thus far, is basically to be along for the ride. That is, he wants to role-play and will go ahead with any focus the group decides. His most distinctive feature so far is that he likes to play exotic creatures or half-beasts but he doesn't limit himself to it.

He cited pulling a daredevil move as an example of Fun. He was playing a gnoll (hyena-man) and jumped from a balcony on top of a flying creature, trying to grapple it. He got in a hit but failed the maneuver, falling to the ground. I believe the most significant part was that he was allowed to perform this not-by-the-book action.
He explicitly considers having no freedom and being of no significance Not Fun. His example was the train-wreck we were both in, where he felt like he could do nothing to influence the story.

Marcel

Marcel was like Ivan, pretty much neutral. If anything, he was like "let's role-play and I want to help making it great".

He had a pretty strong Not Fun moment, once I pulled it out of him. He had a Shadowrun PC who suddenly had a bomb put in his head. It turned out ok, but the big Not Fun was that he felt like he lost the ownership of his PC. He had no say in the matter, I believe both in getting the bomb in there and in getting it out. Turned out Ivan was his Shadowrun GM, and he didn't know Marcel felt that way about it! That was a nice moment.

I should now include myself in the summary and then move on to the next part, but I'm at the end of my day and I fear I'll rush things, if I haven't already. So that'll have to wait.

Wow, those are some astute observations. 

D&D It Is . . . I did throw in a teaser, by the way.

An example of an interesting character was one with an unusual and thematically colorful background, highly integrated in the setting. The key aspects I identified were being unique, keeping it a secret from the other players, and role-playing a specific kind of behavior.

Tom focuses on the "story" as he calls it. As far as I can tell that means two things to him: being his character and watching the story of the GM play out.

I'll support James's observation: the guy who wants to play an unique character, but keep it hidden from the other players, what's up with that? I mean, it's apparently an archetypal way of playing, as I've encountered it myself several times. If anybody has a good theory for what brings up this behaviour, I'll be interested in hearing it. I have no idea myself, so I'm curious.

Eero, I have a theory for the guy I knew, but it's not very complimentary, and hopefully has nothing to do with Johan.  I played with RZ for six months through Internet chat, and concluded he was a whiny prima donna who wanted everyone to acknowledge how powerful, important, and mysterious his character was. 

Of course, this character had a species he created himself, a class he created himself, skills he created himself, and magical powers he created himself.  Oh, and weapons and armor he created himself.  This was fair because the GM permitted it--if anything, it was unfair to him because "the GM said no to most of what I wanted.

Clearly it was RZ's way of waving his imaginary dick around.  Naturally his character was "emotionally inhuman" and didn't care whether any of the rest of the party got killed due to his "imperative needs."  My character had various leadership skills to foster team synergy--and of course, his character's (made up) race would never respect mine, etc.  All of this, of course, justified by 'My Guy Syndrome'.  I never knew his real name, and he disliked breaking character. 

It was total bullshit; some of us called him on it; the GM refused to take sides; we walked.  Our places were filled by other people almost as bad.  Last I heard, the game had been going on for four years.

This was first gaming experience in over ten years.  It blew.  But whatever doesn't kill you...

--Anyway, this presumably has nothing to do with Johan, about whom we know very little at this point.

You bring up an interesting point, James. The decision was predictable. The scenario I has in mind was that I would make a case that there were other games, wildly different games, designed to cater to specific kinds of play, but that we would stick to D&D because it is inside the comfort zone and anything unknown is out. I wouldn't really call that flawed logic but it sure is self-limiting. I pointed that out and that was as far as I was willing to go. I used Capes like you use bait to attract fish to a spot where you would later like to catch fish. It was Something Shiny.

Johan's character is unique in the sense that it's a very rare existing part of the setting (and supported by the rules as far as I can tell). It's unique flavorwise because of its inhuman nature, which allows for nonstandard behavior. It is important to point out that he isn't playing a superior character but something like Rain Man; an authistic specialist.

Indeed, Eero, what's up with the secrecy? The most obvious part of it is that it stays out of play; it doesn't become explicit. The key issue seemed to be that it was basically limited to the player's head, manifesting in play mostly as a bit of color. It was perfectly save. The other players couldn't touch it, but also couldn't appreciate it as much because they didn't know about it in the first place. I called Johan on that and he agreed. So what could we have here?
- Johan has private fun because of his character's secret.
- The GM is happy because Johan will always have his private stuff to be happy about even if actual play sucks.
- Because Johan is engaged in play other players will be happier as well.
- The GM can savely ignore Johan's added content and storyline until he decides to use it in his own story somewhere in the distant future, which might very well never happen.
- If everything else fails, Johan's big reveal could be used to spice things up temporarily.
- Johan will have fun memories about the campaign, mostly consisting of things about his character, which mostly never actually happened in play.
It's a friggin' insurance against a boring game!

By the way, one of his fellow players did figure out what he was, but that player doesn't let his PC act on that knowledge and won't spoil the secret to the others. I think that's the thrill part Johan likes as well: "Can my fellow players discover my secret?" It's a silent challenge that stands regardless of actual play.

James I think you're spot-on correct about Tom.
Players derailing the story is terribly vague, it needs examples. The players fail to spot the clue. The players accidentally destroy the clue. The players fail a roll that should not have been failed. Am I on the money? I think that all those examples are to be resolved in the same way, if you ask Tom: basically that the players wander around aimlessly until the GM provides a clue to get them back on track. In case you mean something extreme like killing the princess they were supposed to rescue, I don't think that ever happened to Tom, both as player or as GM.
Funny thing is, there's not really much in-game risk involved here as far as I can tell. The real risk I see here is Not Fun. As that lies outside of the in-game events, it's simply not considered. An in-game risk I can think of is character death. I think in Tom's case this means two things:
- having to break the story to go somewhere to get the dead character resurrected
- having to break the story to artificially introduce a new character that has to replace the dead character's role in the party
So Tom doesn't like the risk of character death... but he is fine with character death if it is good for the story!

Jasper wrote: - Johan has private fun because of his character's secret.
- The GM is happy because Johan will always have his private stuff to be happy about even if actual play sucks.
- Because Johan is engaged in play other players will be happier as well.
- The GM can savely ignore Johan's added content and storyline until he decides to use it in his own story somewhere in the distant future, which might very well never happen.
- If everything else fails, Johan's big reveal could be used to spice things up temporarily.
- Johan will have fun memories about the campaign, mostly consisting of things about his character, which mostly never actually happened in play.
It's a friggin' insurance against a boring game!

William, why do you actually play? I think what you wrote down is basically why you don't quit yet. It makes me sad. It would be cool if you made that into an Actual Play for yourself.

I'll continue my AP with a new post in a few hours.

Jasper wrote:
It was perfectly save. The other players couldn't touch it, but also couldn't appreciate it as much because they didn't know about it in the first place. I called Johan on that and he agreed. So what could we have here?
- Johan has private fun because of his character's secret.
- The GM is happy because Johan will always have his private stuff to be happy about even if actual play sucks.
- Because Johan is engaged in play other players will be happier as well.
- The GM can savely ignore Johan's added content and storyline until he decides to use it in his own story somewhere in the distant future, which might very well never happen.
- If everything else fails, Johan's big reveal could be used to spice things up temporarily.
- Johan will have fun memories about the campaign, mostly consisting of things about his character, which mostly never actually happened in play.
It's a friggin' insurance against a boring game!

Role-playing requires strong creative collaboration, and it seems funny to say, "The thing that excites me most about the game, I'll keep to myself."

Jasper wrote:

Tom

Tom focuses on the "story" as he calls it. As far as I can tell that means two things to him: being his character and watching the story of the GM play out. On multiple occasions in the past he had told me he was willing to give up control of his character if it benefited the progression of the GM's story. (I made the GM explicit here, he didn't.)
An interesting conflict Tom seems to have with himself is that he creates PCs with story and background in mind, basically disregarding combat effectiveness, but then becomes unhappy because his PCs often suck in combat. I know multiple occasions where I've pointed out his PC configuration was suboptimal but he kept it because it apparently fit his character concept better. I think he's stuck playing the wrong system.

I think it's very much a GMs responsibility to give all players an opportunity to hog the spotlight for a while on their terms and show what they are capable of. Don't run an evening where one character is constantly feeling left out just because that's module hasn't considered the possibility of non-combat roles.