Hi to all

my name is Rocco and I'm an Italian player, from Bologna. I'm writing here because recently (in the last year and half) my enjoinment playing RPG reduced greatly and, having recently approached the Forge and finding your theories really interesting, I would like to receive some input from you all. I want to apologize in advance if my english is not so clear and fluent. If something is unclear, let me know and I will try to explain myself better.

First a bit of history: I started playing RPG when I was 20 years old, at the University. The only game I have played is D&D 3 and D&D 3.5, mostly in the Forgotten Realms setting. Now I'm 28 years old, happily married and working.

Now the bad part: As I said earlier, in the last year and half the pleasure i usually got from RPGing diminished significantly. At first I thought that the problem was with the GM, having some personal issue and then not really "tuned" on the game. But, having found your essays on the argument I'm thinking that most of the problem originates from a different creative agenda that I have with respect to the other players. Considering our long years of playing in retrospect I'm thinking that 4 of 6 players (GM included) have a strong tendency toward Gamism, in that they approach the game from the point of view of "passing over the obstacles", without any consideration of the context in which the obstacles are placed.

To better explain myself here is what I dislike about our play:

1) Every action doesn't have a clear impact on the setting, nor a clear origin (the GM may know why some things are happening but this is usually outside our knowledge)
1.1) This has the consequence that every action my character makes to modify the setting from an "in-character" perspective almost always fail (and/or is addressed through GM Fiat).
2) Although the combat system is at least "minimally" rewarding, every action outside combat (and in this I especially underline social actions) is not consistently resolved but is usually associated with GM Fiat, again. This lead to some players obtaining more from a given situation arguing with the GM and bending and stretching the rules (this means that a lot of character efficiency rely upon player's ability to discuss and argue). On the other hand I consider the rule as a way to express the "ability" of my PC, that may be (and usually is) different from myself and my own ability.
3) I usually consider my character "integrated" in the setting, with motivations of his own, with his own goals that he wants to accomplish inside the setting. The other players don't care too much about motivations, acting as your character (and not you) should act, and about planning something for your PC that goes beyond doing the next GM-proposed adventure or killing some monster or doing some mayhem in a certain location of the setting and then moving to another one.

What I have said in these points means (from my still newbie approach to your theories) that I and my fellow players have different Agendas but also different Stances. Considering all of this I understand that the problem is not solvible inside our gaming group but that my position and style of play seems unreconciliable with that of the rest of the party.

What am I asking then from you? Some advice on 2 matters:

1) What kind of creative Agenda best suites me? This is better done by someone outside of you.
2) What kind of System could be good for someone who has my creative Agenda?

That's what I'm asking from all of you!

So, to give you more information, here is what I like in a RPG:

1) Create different kinds of character, usually competent in combat but not centered on it.Moreover I like to explore the mindset of my character, how he can react to different situations and planning on why he is doing what he does. Find some meaningful motivation to explain his actions.
2) Ground this characters in the setting in which I'm playing, coming up with a meaningful background on why he is THAT character and not another one.
3) When playing, I like to consider the consequences of my PC actions on the setting. I like to understand the world I'm playing in from the point of view of my character.
4) Have interesting discussion about the setting (usually in a In Character perspective) with the other players.
5) Have a team-work approach to the game, not some kind of solo-adventure.
6) I would really like that the game-world (and the game in general) proceeds in a coherent manner.

Thank you all for your attention!

P.S: just as a side note, I recently bought the Exalted 2nd Edition manual, finding it interesting but with some issue, and the A Song of Ice and Fire (Green Ronin), where i like the setting (or maybe the Color) but I don't have a strong grip on the rules themselves.

Rocco

AFAICT, your preferences sound largely Simulationist in emphasis, possibly with some mild Nar inclinations mixed in (specifically when you talk about wanting your actions to have a larger impact on the setting.)

*  GURPS and FUDGE are reasonably solid-but-bland, season-to-taste Sim systems.
*  Burning Wheel/Burning Empires are excellent Sim/Nar hybrids with a heavy emphasis on characterisation, motives, and emotional development, (but perhaps more complicated than they strictly need to be.  Mouse Guard is the 'lite' version.)
*  True20 is a reasonably simple Sim system clearly derived from/inspired by d20, so it might be easier to get into from a D&D background.

Those are the examples I'd be passingly familiar with.  I'm sure other folks would have a more extensive catalogue.

Rocco,
you can only discover you own preferences by trying out a variety of different (coherent) games and by playing with a variety of people. It's likely that you just glanced at the tip of the iceberg of what roleplaying as an activity has to offer you. The luck is, you live close enough to some of the currently most active roleplaying communities in Italy: plenty of gaming occasions to reap, so we'll sort something out.

@Alfryd

@ Alfryd

Thank you very much for your suggestion. I will look into the system you proposed.

@ Rafu

Thank you a lot. I'm going to respond to you on "Gente che gioca".

@ All

This is the last session we played (D&D 3.5 - Setting Forgotten Realms):

Our group passed through a magical gate leading to a different dimension. Here we explored for a bit, understanding that time and space were functioning differently that in our own dimension. However this feature was only comestic, not having any real impact on the situation we were going to play (I can say this in retrospect).
We arrived to a strange building, made of a black stone that seemed "different" (this was the word of our GM). I tried to examine the stone but two things happened:
1) The other players decided to enter through a metal door, without waiting for me to complete my investigation.
2) The GM just said "mmm, ok, you examine it, it looks different". And that concluded my analysis of the stone because the GM (probably) wanted to move forward.

Then followed a tiring exploration of this building with a small combat in the middle. But because the exploration was quite boring one of the my fellow player said to the GM: "Ok, we will go through every room, search everything. Just take us to the end of this exploration." The GM followed the advice and two minutes later begun the Big Combat with some "apparently" nasty creatures. The combat was over in 15 minutes. The the session ended because it was too late in the night.

The session lasted for 3-4 hours. And the only thing moderately interesting was the last combat.

Completely unsatisfied I asked to my fellow players, when going back home: "Did you enjoy the session of tonight". The responded "Yeah, the last combat was really interesting". And when I noticed that we had really played for only 15 minutes out of 3 hours the said " That's true but you have to admit that the combat was fun." I replyed "yeah, ok" and stopped the discussion there.

Ciao Rocco, welcome to the Forge!

I agree with Rafu in that it is difficult to identify your preferences if you've only ever played D&D of the sort you explained in your last post. At least you seem to have identified that that's not what you like. I was in a very similar situation five years or so ago. Fed up with mastering D&D and not being able to really find anything playable on the market (we did have lots of fun with Call of Cthulhu, which we played in a silly manner, never finishing an investigation, but that's hardly what the text suggests) I almost came to the point where I was "done" with RPGs. I stumbled upon the Forge and quickly tried some of the free games around. If I have to single out one game that reconciled me with roleplaying, I'd name The Pool. It does this wonderful thing of basically just telling the players who gets to describe the outcome of a conflict, with the player being able to give himself more or less chances according to what he is willing to bet on a given conflict. I played PlaneScape, Call of Cthulhu and some kind of Cyberpunk with this system and it blew my mind. A friend uses it to play in the world of Harry Potter. From these simple rules you get the ability to influence the pace of the game as a player, focus on what you really find important and just bloody simple get to speak up and decide something which actually takes effect.
Beware, the text as written is not to be considered a finished game (The Questing Beast is though). If you do not want to play slapstick comedy, there are a few things to watch out for which Ron Edwards explains through one of his own play experiences and some more theoretical analysis.
I always recommend playing this game to people trying to find out what they like in roleplaying. If you try it out and post an actual play report I'm sure we can dig in deeper into what you do or not like.

Rocco, it's good to see an Italian role-player at the forge.

First up, I'd better apologise to Ron for a bit of self promotion here but it does have a point outside of just plugging my game.

I'm half Italian and my Stregoneria role-playing game (even has an Italian name! ;) ) has a setting influenced by renaissance Italy which you might find interesting (It contains the Condottieri for instance.) It's also a game concerned with story and atmosphere over number crunching which sounds like it might be what you're looking for.

In fact, I've been trying to research what the rpg market is like in Italy as I'm looking into getting the game translated into Italian.

Unfortunately it's not released yet (September 31st) but I'll make you a generous offer as it would be nice for my game to be introduced to some Italian players. When the game is released, I'll send you a free copy of the pdf. All you have to do is go to my game's site and contact me via the contact form there so I have your details. Perhaps you could try it out with your group and if you like it, tell some more Italian role-players about it!

www.stregoneriarpg.com

@ Christoph

Hi Christoph, thank you very much for sharing your own problems with me. I hope to regain the same pleasure that I used to have in playing games, and I will look in the game you suggested. When I will have some new actual play not regarding D&D (my actual only experience), than I will post it.

@ Stregheria

Thank you very much for your kind offer. I just responded to you on the "contact" page of the site address you gave me.

I've got your details now Rocco thanks.

I'll send you a copy of the game at the end of September for you to try out.

Hey Rocco!

Interesting to read your post.  I can identify with a lot of what you are saying.  I've been in games lately where it felt like we went from A to B just to get into a new fight.  I've been in games lately where it felt like there was not much of a setting, and not much of a point. 

Still, I don't see enough in your post to try to assign a creative agenda to you.  Nor do I think it is really strictly necessary.  You DO seem to know what direction you want to move in.  You want to get away from serial combats, and start focusing more on character development and setting.  The thing is, you don't even need to leave D&D to do that, although there is no reason NOT to leave D&D. 

A free game that I've been impressed with, but haven't played, is FATE 2.0.  It's based on Fudge (a game someone else recommended to you).  You might enjoy reading it to get an idea of some different possibilities of how to build characters and play RPG's.  What impresses me about it is that the game allows you to mechanically represent pretty much anything you want.  You can be a member of some secret society, and the most basic and core element of the rules can take this into account in a way that will affect your actions and their consequences in the game world (ie having a secret society as an aspect of your character could help you accomplish things associated with that society, such as, I don't know, stealing...).  It is pretty simple and very flexible.  Also, I think it would be easy to take some of the cool ideas of FATE and put them into other games, including D&D. 

Even with another system, you still have to zero in on the kind of game you want.  You could do mass serial combat games in a lot of different systems, but that isn't what you want.  You need to get a game going, even if it is D&D, where you can focus on character and setting.  May call for a new group to play with. 

Nick

Everybody: Rocco is suffering of a problem of diverging expectations from his fellow players. He can't "move away from serial combat" unless the other participants also want to move away. Thus, just adopting a different ruleset from D&D (assuming he can even make the other players bother, btw) can't, by itself, solve his problem. Suggesting he checks out The Pool, FATE or Dogs in the Vineyard or whatever is currently pointless (*).

(* Actually, reading gaming instructions is never pointless, especially if those are from games widely different from your habitual one(s). But it's not going to solve Rocco's problem right now.)

Hi everyone,

The core problem with threads about any version of D&D is that they are simultaneously (i) incredibly individualized, in terms of what the primary poster has experienced as the rules and what they think about that; and (ii) presumed to be common ground because "it's D&D" and "everyone knows" what that is. Which is kind of a disaster under normal circumstances, but if two people who each want to talk about problematic D&D play start criss-crossing threads ... well, it turns into a mess. Plus the secondary fun of further participants posting emotionally either in attack or defense mode concerning their issues with the game (or rather with that title, as there are simultaneously too many D&Ds and absolutely no identifiable "original" version).

So I'm saying, Nick and (just in case) Rocco, until we get to substantial "yes indeed" moments that are specific to each of your excellent thread topics, then I recommend that you not post in one another's threads. After that, fantastic, 100%, I'm all for it. But here I'm speaking as weary moderator of ten years at the Forge, and even here, where arguably emotionally-reactive posting is whipp'd from the room more fiercely than at any other website known to humanity, D&D threads are a lurking pit of randomized menace. (Huh - funny how that works, considering the subject of the game is often ... well, anyway.) Let's keep the two dungeons threads separate at the moment.

Again, this is no reflection upon either of you and I am not moderating you in the ordinary sense of the term. My aim is to keep us all sane and especially, not to descend into too much game-bashing, unless it's kept local to your group and exactly what happened in it.

Best, Ron

Rafu wrote:
Everybody: Rocco is suffering of a problem of diverging expectations from his fellow players. He can't "move away from serial combat" unless the other participants also want to move away. Thus, just adopting a different ruleset from D&D (assuming he can even make the other players bother, btw) can't, by itself, solve his problem. Suggesting he checks out The Pool, FATE or Dogs in the Vineyard or whatever is currently pointless (*).

Hello,

Rocco, let's deal with your explicit requests in this thread, because they need some work.

First, your list of what you like about role-playing is not going to help much with Creative Agenda discussions. Although your specific list is not universal for everyone, it addresses something that is universal for any kind of effective role-playing.* I call this something "Exploration," and it's composed of ... well, pretty much everything you listed. Characters in Settings face Situations and stuff happens (System), all in an engaging and relevant Colorful way; the capitalized words are formal terms in my so-called Big Model (the first couple of pages in the The Provisional Glossary lay this out as well as I can, with a diagram.)

Therefore what you're asking is a bit like "For what purpose or what kind of enjoyment do I run," and then providing only the information that you would in fact like to run successfully as opposed to being tripped or otherwise sabotaged by others for whatever reason.

All of this means that I think we should revisit your question. I don't want to plunge into the waters of Creative Agenda talk if you're actually more interested in how to get the basics of playing at all under way (and they involve a hell of a lot more than merely having people willing to show up, as I tried to point out in A year of crappy roleplaying). If that's the case, then I have some specific questions for you, and if you feel like it, the older thread HERO System, M&M and assessing incoherence seems like it's describing frustrations similar to your own.

Conversely, I don't want to miss talking about Creative Agenda if that's what you think you're ready for. But to do that, we should get a better idea about a specific time that you genuinely enjoyed, and just as importantly, that you enjoyed as a participant with others rather than as an isolated or private experience that the others never noticed or cared about.

Let me know which of these two approaches seems right to you.

Best, Ron

* For the legally-minded as well as the hyper-sensitive ... the term "role-playing" is unfortunately a legacy term with no definition and diverse applications. Here I'm referring to what's often called "table-top" hobby gaming and talking about when it does or does not work at a very basic level. I'm not claiming that different activities within gaming like boffer LARP, or entirely different non-gaming activities like therapy techniques, job training, or staging little costume games for sex, shouldn't be called role-playing.

@ all

I would like to thank you all for your reply. Every suggestion is interesting and every post is useful in its own way.

Ok now I would like to say that Rafu got part of my problem. I have diverging expectation of what is a "satysfing" play in regard to my fellow players. And that I realized only recently. Before I got this revelation I tried to understand what wasn't working, from my point of view, in the actual plays we had. This lead me to the Forge, in a way to better understand what is behind the actual play I experienced.

@Ron

I'm trying to better understand all the fantastic theories that have been elaborated here. But it's something that must be done slowly and clearly. Therefore I suppose that my "exploration" of the Creative Agenda was done too early. Considering this I think that the first approach you suggested could be more in line with my actual needs. I will read the topic you suggested and if you had in mind some question for me, please come along with them.

But after exploring this first approach, I don't exclude delving more deeply into the Creative Agenda issue.

Thank you very much

Rocco.

I would also like to explain better the reason for my actual disenjoinment as I feel it:

1) Part of the problem is with my actual gaming group. We are 7 (GM included) and here is how I perceive the other players: two of them play with us only to stay toghether: for them playing in a RPG, playing a video game or going all toghether in a pub and having a beer is the same. I'm happy that we stay toghether, but I don't really like to play with them because they are not commited to "play". One of them is difficult to understand as a player (he is usually the mastermind, acting after having thought about every possible consequences. For him is more like playing chess than a RPG) but I like to play with him, even though I think that he should partecipate more in actual play. Another one I completely dislike as a person. Period. I don't like to play with him but....he cannot be excluded (because I'm the only one that has this strong adversion of him). He is the one that usually try to force his rules on the game, with th GM avail. He also usually play for himself alone, never trying to include the other players in his PC actions. Then there is the last fellow player, which I consider a friend. Even though we don't like excatly the same things in a RPG we play well toghether. And then there is the GM, which recently I started to dislike.

2) The other part is that I don't find anymore D&D as appealling to me as it used to be.

Point 1 is a big part of my problem and actually I'm trying to leave behind my old group and trying to find new people to game with. Part of the problem is that not all of my friend like RPGs and I don't have so many friends to start with.
Point 2 is what drived me to the Forge. But I think that the two are interwined and that I can understand better my favourite hobby talking here with you.

Rocco

Hi Rocco,

I apologize for the lateness of this reply. The good part of the delay is that I decided exactly what I want to do with you.

Let's start with Color. I mean, nothing but Color, just the fun and image-rich description of some topic or genre or whatever that you'd like to play. In fact, try to forget anything you ever knew about what role-playing games are about. Never mind dungeons, vampires, or anything of the kind. Never mind any sort of subculture you share with others and the way you may dress or talk when you're with them. Think instead about books, movies, comics, history, biography, sex, politics, music, humor, cartoons, advertising ... anything you like to experience as media. What's a topic that turns you on? Or for that matter, pisses you off to the extent that you'd like to do something about it?

I ask this because role-playing begins with Color, and it is effective only insofar as the content deep within the Color - a highly personal thing - finds expression through the processes of play. The essence of Exploration, or if we talk in terms of process, Shared Imagined Space, is giving the primal and initial Color some kind of weight among as a group of people who are talking and listening to one another.

Let me know!

Best, Ron

Hi Ron

Thank you for your help. I hoper I have clearly understood what you would like to know, so if it's not correct, please let me know. There are many things that I really like. I will start with some of them:

1) One of my first love was "The Silmarillion". I like a world inhabited by creature greater than mere human, like the elves of the First Era. The elves were fighting for something greater than themselves and they almost succeded. But what really caught me in the Silmarillion is the impending tragedy always at the door, the sense of sadness of the elves...and at the same time the struggle to succed no matter what (especially, in this regard, the frail human).
2) I like the stories told by G.R.R. Martin in " A song of Ice and Fire". I like the idea of an almost real medieval country, rich in misteries but at the same time more real than the Middle-Earth. I also like the political maneuver behind the stories of Martin, seeing them as a struggle to put reason and consequences above mere luck.
3) I like a lot of different Japanese Anime. I can cite a few and the reason why: Escaflowne (great story with epic characters struggling against lot of powerful enemies), Neon Genesis Evangelion (mistery and machinations), Trigun ( I really like the character of Vash the Stampede, powerful but at the same time humble), Saint Seya (I was a child and I liked great heroes fighting in shining armors...)
4) Star Wars (the films): flashing laserswords and people trying to uphold their higher moral ground in spite of a gritter reality.

If you want me to give you some other information on my interests or if I completely missed what you were asking me, I will do my best to correct myself.

Thanks
Rocco

Wow! That is fantastic, exactly what I hoped for. This is one of those times I wish that the internet would just stop for a while so we can talk in peace, and I both apologize (and am myself frustrated) that you've had to wait so long for me to reply. I'll summarize a bit ...

1. Gritty tough reality. Most people have a hard time just getting by. Injustice is wide-spread, and privileged people can indulge their petty power-trips and feuds at the expense of the under-privileged. The privileged are making a tough situation really bad, unnecessarily, because they are really dicks.

2. Moral fibre under fire. There are codes and viewpoints which a person can learn and try to uphold, and they are indeed valid - effective and admirable. But those who uphold these views are marginalized for any number of reasons, and they have an uphill social battle as well as dealing with the more direct dangers and injustices they encounter. A lot of the time, they suffer and die, and their victories are often local, or one small step in a larger struggle they'll never see.

3. Friends and relationships. Other characters' opinions matter. The hero's own values don't really come under question or doubt, or not much, but they can be threatening to others. Or inspire others. The hero is a catalyst for bringing out others' core values, or helping those core values mature for either good or evil.

Conclusion: the most exciting conflicts in this role-playing game (the one you and I wish existed) concern a character who is very powerful, but facing foes which are socially better positioned and absolutely uninterested in his or her ethical views, in circumstances which are very adverse, with the fate of individuals and probably communities at stake. The hero may well be already paying a terrible price for doing this, and has done so in the past, and bears the mental and physical scars for it. The real point is that there is no guarantee he or she will prevail this time either. Maybe "prevailing" will consist, after the hero is dead or horribly maimed, and after the victimized people have been killed and further abused or oppressed, of one small child remembering the event and vowing someday to revive the fight. And even if the hero is victorious, it is likely that he or she will have to flee or otherwise move on, with little reward.

Do I have that right? Would this kind of thing be the personal payoff for you in play, at least if we're talking about this one role-playing game which you and I wish existed?

If so, then it's clear that no version of D&D will facilitate this. Oh, it's possible you might get this kind of play with nominal use of D&D (again, of whatever version), but only with a group which is 100% on the same page as you, and almost certainly by re-writing and selectively editing the textual rules pretty extensively.

And furthermore, it's clear that your current group is not going to be fun for you to play with. I can't put that any better than you have described yourself.

I suggest one thing: find two people who are as jazzed about that material as you are. Maybe one from this group and one from somewhere else, maybe one from this group, maybe from somewhere else entirely. I don't think you need more than that.

That now leads to the next question ... given those exciting moments of play, what about them would be most gratifying, especially if everyone at the table were committed to it? (i) Your personal, real-person strategy and guts in using the game system to beat the odds? This would be more like a video game version. (ii) Your personal and perhaps conflicted involvement with the issues exemplified by the conflict, and eagerness to see how it plays out in terms of a thematic statement? This would be more like becoming a weird blend of both author and audience. (iii) Your excitement about the source material cast into a new mold? This would be more like fan-style celebration of the original material or certain aspects of it.

Correct me if I'm off track about any of this. If I am, then ignore the above paragraph.

Best, Ron

Hi Ron

I always like to discuss my interests with people who can understand them and like to elaborate on them, even if we disagree on the matter. And don't worry for the timing of your reply, life is busy and every help comes in its own time. I'm happy that you (and everybody else here in the forum) found out enough time to reply to my posts.

Now, for the matter at hand: You perfectly caught what I meant with my previous list of interesting topics. That's what I really like to see in play.

For your second question my answer resides between point II and III. I will explain myself better: as I said earlier I like to discuss principle and ideas important to me with other people. Their inputs can spin my mind on paths I never thought of, or make me reflect upon what I think is "carved in stone" and elaborate on them. Therefore I think that point II is what I'm searching.
However, even though principle and ideas are "abstract" matters, they have a strong reflection on the material world, and this interaction goes two-way, from abstract to material and viceversa. Thus the material aspect of certains idea must be reflected upon, and different situations and different settings can lead to very different interaction between "abstract" and "real" aspects of a certain topic. Different source materials can lead to different answer to the same question. And that's something that I like to explore. So maybe, point III is not far away from what I search, even though is not the principal object of my interest.

I hope I have made clearer what I meant.

Thanks
Rocco

Hi Rocco,

You're being perfectly clear! I think we may be nearer to Creative Agenda discussion than I thought.

Or more accurately, we may be near to Creative Agenda preference discussion for you, which as a practical reality is unfortunately quite out of reach as far as your current gaming group is concerned. I think that you've been clear that we can't be discussing how to make play more fun for you in this group, because it is flatly not fun and shows no sign of possible improvement. This means that our conversation will be more hypothetical than I'd like.

This next part of our conversation may be difficult because I'm asking a weird question. It is ... if we were to be role-playing, and if such a character and such scenes were actually becoming the climactic, payoff moments of play, and if those moments were neither constant (because that's exhausting and trivializes them) nor forever in the future (which is frustrating) ...

... then would you like to see some kind of game mechanic that illustrates a change in the character when/after that kind of scene happens?

I need to be careful in talking about this because we all reflexively snap back to what's familiar to us instead of thinking about all the possibilities. I'll list some examples from existing games:

1. The chance of death, meaning the final end of that character, and in many cases, the end of that player's investment in the game to date
2. The chance of impairment or limitation of effectiveness for that character
3. The chance or guarantee of improved effectiveness and/or resources for future character actions
4. The chance or guarantee of cosmetic, visual alterations in the character
5. The potential transformation of views, values, relationships, and other psychological aspects of the character, or other characters
6. The potential transformation of features of the setting: other characters, communities, structures and other aspects of locations, or even large-scale phenomena

Casting all your previous experience with role-playing systems to the winds - for example, #1 and #3 are often assumed to be givens, and they don't have to be - which of these, perhaps more than one, and perhaps any you think of that I didn't mention, strike you as the most enjoyable risks and consequences of the kind of scenes we're talking about?

Note as well that the fully negative option exists too: that no such mechanic exists, and the character and the setting are not changed by such scenes - at least, not by referring to special numbers or check-marks or tokens or any other kind of procedural features. In that case, all that stuff I numbered above would be worked out or established strictly through people talking without structure, or even through one person's imposed decree. If you would prefer that, then say so.

I suggest that saying "all of them" is not especially insightful or practical. Remember, I'm not talking about whether these things happen, but rather about specifically mechanical aspects of a role-playing system, whose outcomes are strongly influenced by decisions and procedural outcomes during play.

Best, Ron

P.S. For those following along, the above questions are not a "GNS test." Any number of responses would be consistent with any of the three known Creative Agendas. The GNS-relevant information has already been established prior to this post; I'm merely not talking about it yet.

Rocco,

To begin, your GM is clearly bad at what he does.  A good GM can make an underwater battle - in space - against zombie pirates - the most fun you've ever had.  It's all about build-up, proper cadence, and most of all: coherence, even if the concept itself is absurd.

If you don't want to put the effort behind trying to find a new group of friends, I suggest either game mastering yourself or having the "mastermind" do it, as someone who thinks everything through is least likely to fall victim to the pitfalls your current GM seems to chronically walk into: being guided by the players like the dog on the leash dictating where it wants to sniff around (in soviet Russia, Players GM you!); insisting on combat being the only real aspect of play, with all the other role-playing treated as obligatory filler-content, etc.

Finally, it appears as if the players are merely reflecting the GM; that they aren't immersing themselves into the story simply because the GM's story isn't immersive.  You can't blame them for that.  Show them a better way to game, and maybe they'll start playing along.  Hopefully, instead of saying, "...but the combat was fun", your friends will start saying, "Hey, wasn't tonight's session awesome?"  "Yeah, but the pizza sucked".

Ron wrote:

Ron, I know you're trying to have a one-on-one conversation with Rocco, but for those of us reading, a clarification. You seem to be asking if Rocco would like a game mechanic that reflects a change in the character after any of the situations listed, but the first one you list:

1. The chance of death, meaning the final end of that character, and in many cases, the end of that player's investment in the game to date

Doesn't this one imply a mechanical change no matter what game you're playing? After all, a character's death would in almost all cases indicate that the player can no longer play the character? Possible ways "out" of this, of course, are either some sort of resurrection or "ghost", both of which necessitate changes to the character (with resurrection, character is rendered unplayable until the resurrection mechanic is performed; if the character is now a ghost, then there are new mechanical limitations and perhaps even new powers as the character has undergone a critical phase change). Therefore, isn't character death inherently a mechanical phase change regardless of system?

Again, I ask this merely for clarification of this one point.

Hi Ron

I'm sorry of replying to your post so late, but this weekend one of my best friends married and I was quite busy (and happy too!).

Ok, I was tempted to say "all of them" but, thinking carefully about the options suggested I think that the two that I would prefer to see in the scenes we were talking about are number 6 (mostly) but also number 5.

On the other hand I don't think that number 1 should be a "necessary mechanic". I would like to be the one, also in agreement with the other people playing with me, to decide "when, where and how" a given character ends his usufulness for the scenes/story/idea we are playing.

Thank you very much

Rocco

Ar wrote:
Rocco,

To begin, your GM is clearly bad at what he does.  A good GM can make an underwater battle - in space - against zombie pirates - the most fun you've ever had.  It's all about build-up, proper cadence, and most of all: coherence, even if the concept itself is absurd.

If you don't want to put the effort behind trying to find a new group of friends, I suggest either game mastering yourself or having the "mastermind" do it, as someone who thinks everything through is least likely to fall victim to the pitfalls your current GM seems to chronically walk into: being guided by the players like the dog on the leash dictating where it wants to sniff around (in soviet Russia, Players GM you!); insisting on combat being the only real aspect of play, with all the other role-playing treated as obligatory filler-content, etc.

Finally, it appears as if the players are merely reflecting the GM; that they aren't immersing themselves into the story simply because the GM's story isn't immersive.  You can't blame them for that.  Show them a better way to game, and maybe they'll start playing along.  Hopefully, instead of saying, "...but the combat was fun", your friends will start saying, "Hey, wasn't tonight's session awesome?"  "Yeah, but the pizza sucked".

Hello,

One thing I forgot to include in my earlier post was to open the discussion again to everyone. So anyone's who's interested, post away.

To oculusverit, you asked whether my #1, character death, wasn't necessarily a game mechanic. That's a good question, because the answer is "no." Or rather, let me be more specific to be more clear - by game mechanic, I mean any of the following: quantitative threshold, plot/event threshold, or special sequence of spoken terms. Most RPGs, historically, have imitated the most well-known early designs which used a quantitative threshold, i.e. hit points. But many have not. Of those, a few have not used any game mechanic (as used in this post) at all. See Interview with Vincent and me, 3rd page, Marshall's question to me and my answer, for a brief overview.

To Ar Kayon, you're proposing the classic role-playing tautology: if the GM is good, then everyone has fun; and if everyone had fun, then it must be because the GM is good. This is a cycle of beautiful nothing. If you want to state something substantive instead, you must describe what this alleged GM does which is so good, and causally, how that results consistently in others having fun, and if it's supposed to be independent of the system in question, explain that independence. All of which is possible and viable, but you might discover that your definition of "good," or anyone's, is not universal. I suggest this topic belongs in its own Actual Play thread.

Rocco, I appreciate your patience and attention to the conversation. Clearly, #1-4 can certainly be involved in the hypothetical game we're talking about, whether as narrations using the ordinary mechanics or as subordinate mechanics, leaving #5 and #6 to be "the biggies" in rules terms.

So far, looking over your current ideal game (shall we call it Rocco the RPG?) we have Color, Situation, Reward system and strongly-related mechanics. I submit that we are very nearly done actually designing it. The specific setting - far future, otherdimensional, historical, semi-historical, whatever - actually doesn't matter except insofar as you really like it. The characters, character creation, and resolution mechanics should all be recognizable as subsets of the reward mechanic, even if in some details they are divorced from it. So whatever you'd pick for starting features of a character, or whatever you'd like to use as a resolution device, well, it's whatever you might enjoy greatly and the only real design-job is to hook it to the methods for generating relevant situations, immediately or eventually, and for applying the reward mechanics at their harshest and most exciting.

I suggest further that your extremely strong answer to my "three possible aesthetic approaches" has already covered the Creative Agenda question: you are aiming at Narrativist play quite coherently - even urgently. A certain attention to genre or source inspiration is no impediment to this.

Are there existing games which you might turn to? I think there are. FATE isn't one of them; its Aspect system is pretty mild compared to (say) The Riddle of Steel or The Shadow of Yesterday and would be anemic in light of the intensity of what you're describing. Certain applications of Burning Wheel would be quite excellent, as would a hack of HeroQuest, but I think your technical preferences are pointing in a different direction, toward The Pool. If you were thinking in terms of animated TV series, which is consistent with some of your inspirations, then Primetime Adventures, definitely a daughter of The Pool, would do the job.

Let me know if you think this discussion has helped.

Best, Ron

Hi Ron

I think that this discussion has helped me a lot in understanding my own preferences about RPG, because I was able to express this preferences, examine them once they were written and discuss them with other people. Really, really useful.

When I read your post a smile appeared on my face: you suggested "The Pool" and "Prime Time Adventures". During the last week I read the "pool" mechanics and some discussion and Actual Play of Prime Time Adventures and, when I was reading, a thought suddenly stroke my mind: "WOW, that's the way I would like to play! This games seems to help generating the kind of conflict that I would like to see!" and "It's fantastic! I can put my idea in game with this games, and the other players can too, and we can collaborate!"

So, as you see, talking with you and all the other people here at the forge, helped me clear some disillusionment that I had acquired toward RPG and cast some light on what is "good and fun" for me.

Thanks you a lot.

Rocco

P.S: When I will have some Actual Play I will post them and I would really appreciate to discuss them.

Ron,
You've made a strawman argument out of my statement.  I said that a good GM can make a play experience fun, not that a good GM will make the play experience fun, as if by some arbitrary force.  The audience is not passive - they interact - and the mechanics of the game itself must be taken into consideration.  It would be pure absurdity for me to subscribe to the assumption you've made, preach such assumptions, and then go on designing the elaborate game systems that I do. 
By good I mean a general consensus.  And while it is impossible for every single person to have similar ideas of fun, in the context of gaming there are underlying principles which make a positive consensus more likely.  If this were not true, then you would have wasted your time with your articles.  To spare myself walls upon walls of clarifying text, I assume that veteran role-players, of all people, can intuit these underlying principles.  I see no sane reason for going into autistic mode whenever I have an informal conversation with my fellow gamer.

Rocco,
You've said that you've tried online gaming.  Have you tried OpenRPG yet?  It has a platform that supports the actual gameplay (chat room with dice rollers, battle grids, miniatures, etc.), and users from all over inhabit the hub, making it very easy to set up gaming groups.  Personally, I think it's superior to face to face gaming for several reasons.  1) You don't have to look at or smell your fellow nerds.  2) If you don't like them, you can ditch them and set up another gaming group in the same day.  3) Which means you don't have to feel bad about killing their characters.  4) They've actually played something other than D&D.  5) No painful drama club acting.