Two Day Game:

This is a description and analysis of a game that took place over 2 days. The system was JAGS (a rules-heavy sim system that we've developed. Think GURPS or Hero if you don't know it).

It is interesting for a variety of reasons--one is that it's a study in how to run a game of very short duration (note the pacing). Another is that it sheds, I think, some light on game focus.

Finally, there were a few momemts of tension between player and GM (and there was a point where my narrative sense was totally thrown off). These might be interesting. If not ... well ... it's a LONG post ...

Premise:
GM: "I'm coming down--the window for gaming will be very narrow. What should I run?"

Me: "What do you have ideas for?"

GM: "Like Warren Zevon, I work better with parameters."

Me: "1950's-style/essence alien invasion story but set in modern-day surburbia. Invasion of the body-snatchers vibe."

GM: "What will your characters be?"

Me: "Hmm ... I dunno scratch that."

GM: "Hmm ... the alien idea is *too* good. I need more time. Give me another."

Me: "Three potential PC's. One is an artist--depressed ... or was ... very good, one owns a gallery in NYC: rich, a little weird. One is a dealer--a shady guy who deals with the underworld and tracks down artwork that's hard to find or might deal in stolen stuff."

GM: "done."

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OBSERVATION: I had just finished having an email discussion with Valimir about whether or not games should be focused in terms of rules supporting game-world. In this case I wouldn't know whether to reach for Call of Cthulhu of Top Secret ... or Sorceror. We just didn't know. Because I know and trust the GM, I expected there would be some element of the fantastic but I had no idea what it would be.

Also: not knowing is part of the fun. As events unfolded we didn't know what to expect and a systemic-give-away might have hurt that.

Note: The issue isn't closed. There were some intereseting revelations at the end which apply here.
----

Characters: since one of the players wasn't available, we drew characters from a hat (after determining no strong preference).

We were told to tell the GM two things that were going on in our lives at the start of the game (note: unlike Ron's Kickers, which I discussed with the GM after, there was no request to make them things to which we had to immediately respond--this would have remained the case even if I'd suggested Kickers at the time).

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OBSERVATION: I suppose there are people who like *genres* of fiction--who will read anything with a dragon or a ring or maybe a space-ship in it. Most people I know, however, prefer *authors* and do so because of their vision or maybe their characterization or writing style.

That was the case here. I wasn't so concerned about being de-protagonized as I was interested in the story he had to tell (he told me it was good when we met after the plane trip). As a result, with only 2 days to play, something like Kickers would have meant time outside his vision--his story--which is what I and the other player was interested in. This isn't meant to be anti-kicker at all--I'm simply pointing out that if what you want is the GM's intellectual property as a story teller then you may want to get to, and interact with, that story.
---

Me: The dealer (Vance McKain)--GM mandated history with cops. I played a guy who was (in addtion to being a art expert) an excellent private investigator. I had instinctive intuition, an almost super-natural visual perception roll, and photographic memory. I had been arrested when a con-game to swindle art-buyers was busted.

.-Thing 1: After a year of being clean, but with a ruined repuation, I'd been made an offer to be in on a deal going down involving eBay and vanishing escro accounts. It was the kind of deal that had unsavory people showing up at my house at 2:00 AM and threatening me. I was reluctantly going along--but having seriously cold feet.

.-Thing 2: His annyoing sister was coming into town and any scent of improrpriety would be relayed to the family.

Player1: (Treya Vivian) The artist--GM Mandated a history of depression, now mostly cured with anti-depressants and therapy. A female character who was essentially going to be one of the world's best artists. She had style and flare, a awesome skill roll, and some other liberal-arts style skills.

Her works were described as visualizations of puzzles based on literary themes (i.e. characters from related works of fiction were involved and there were some interesting insights from the terrain and organization).

.-Thing 1: Her wardrobe had some catastrophic flaw and she needed a new one. There was, she said, "too much yellow."

.-Thing 2: She had realized after selling a piece that there was some horrible flaw with it (an intellectual flaw). She wanted it back badly to fix it--and had hired my character to track it down (it had been re-sold since).



Observation: Player1's Thing 1 was (IMO) pretty lame--it had no obvious conflict and, if I'd run it, would have led to a "shopping scene." The others were good (Again, IMO) and would have given the GM some hooks to work with).


The opening: The Naseby Gallery

Myself, NPC Brian (the gallery owner), and his girlfriend (Melissia) were at the gallery The Naseby, working on getting ready for the show where several pieces of Treya's art would be shown. It was hot, summer, and before going outside we sprayed each other with mosquito repellant (I live in Florida and we are just learning the peril of West Nile Virus--since I live near swamps with many mosquitos and have a young daughter I found the campaigns mosquito fixation very disturbing).

We went outside and started workign the caterers. At one point Brian mentioned that a man (an old man--but big and strong looking) named Gothe had come looking for me and left a card. I paused. My character could remember the face of the first cab driver he'd seen in New York ... could memorize and repeat 32-digit number strings forward and backwards after hearing them once ... but although I *knew* I'd *met* Gothe, I couldn't remember him ... or his face.

He'd left a card upstairs. I went up to get it.

Upstairs in the creepily empty gallery was a huge wooden crate that held Treya's paintings. A corner of the box was opened (Brian had started to open then and then stopped). Next to the box was Brian's bag with the card. As I went to retrieve it I paused: I smelled something rotten from the triangle of darkness on the huge box--like a dead mouse caught in a trap. Then the scent was gone. I waited, worried by the "blind spot" in my memory--and feeling a vauge sense of fear at the name 'Gothe.' I took the card and my phone rang.

It was Harriet Ashford, a "patron" of the gallery. She was young (21), cute, and marvelously rich. Brian was wealthy. Harriet's father was like "Sam Walton" rich. She had commissioned Treya and hired me (despite my ruined reputation). She was a "good girl" who didn't smoke or drink, and often fought on the phone with her conservative mother who lived out in like Colorado and was often very unhappy due to pressure from her family despite having amazing resources.

She was downstairs: Brian and Melissia were fighting over the location of the Sushi platters and Harriet wanted to know if I had some time to kill--to actually go out--with her. We'd gone places together--the group were all "friends" but never just me and her. I decided to.

CUT TO Treya

She was sleeping (the times were off) and she was having terrible dreams that her paintings, finished after months, and already framed, packaged, and shipped, were wrong. somehow VERY WRONG.

There were two paintings:both HUGE (bigger than 8' on a side) oil paintings.

One was a woodland scene with mythological beasts hidden in the leaves and scenes from fairytales and fairytale-themed works represented.

One was a mountain scene (ski village) with red brick houses. This had strong elements of optical illusion to them. Sky and ground and frozen lake were sometimes reversed. The sky was whitish with clouds and it seemed almost that the painting might be hung upside down.

When she awoken, having a fit, she took a look at the polaroids she'd taken of the finished pieces before shipping: in the picture the frames were blurry--as though they'd refused to come out on film.

She ran to her closet to get dressed--she had to see them--maybe "recall them before showing." When she opened her closet the mass of yellow clothes looked like a spread of jaundiced flesh--she was repulsed. She recoiled and in a panic dialed her therapist. She didn't get him.

She knew what he's say (this, the paintings, and the reactions were role-played).

He would say that her works were intellectual masterpieces but almost devoid of emotional content. They were puzzles that were made to appeal to the mind, not the spirit and that this was a "break through" ('Dr. Carter has a sunny disposition--that's why I keep him around," she quipped at one point in the game).

In a cold panic she dressed (in black) and left for the gallery, beliving she had created masterworks--possibly the only things in the universe that were utterly devoid of beauty.


OBSERVATION: This was interesting. The character was psychologicaly analyzed by the GM and the player disagreed with some of it--the descriptions of the work were intellectual but the player was kinda 'hmmph.' about it.

It did work though--the Player accepted the analysists opinion (she quietly held her own--it is TOO emotional!) and the idea that Dr. Carter saw her as essentially being healthy was establsihed. It was a counter point to the sick flesh-tones of her wardrobe.


CUT TO VANCE
I was driving with Harriet. She told me she had to go "check in" and parked behind a building. Mosquitos buzzed in the sodium lights above us. I went in with her, feeling a little weird--it was the back lot, it turned out, of a church. She went down stairs very deep (two sub-basements) to a sick ward where a desparately ill homelessman moaned "catch me momma, I'm falling! Catch me!" and a woman named Sophia worked with the ill.

It turned out that Harriet worked at the church--the same church her parents went to--and she was "checking in" with someone they knew. She went upstaris to light a candle and I went as well.

Upstairs was strange: there were stained glass windows back-lit with men featured: Seth and Enoch ... names I didn't know--but that I as the player remembered from ... somewhere (this was disturbing to me). Behind the altar was a glass window of a cruifixation with the word Docete underneath. My Art Appreciation skill told me something was wrong with the Christ-figure: the depection showed other objects represented with shadows ... but not Him. I asked the Church's name and was told: "St. Timmothy's"

She lit the candle and we left. We went to her apartment (she paid the door man not to report me to her mom--"they pay the staff to keep tabs on me ... I pay them not to .... it's a good racket" and she proceeded to rant against her mother and get drunk (a new thing for her, it seemed.).

Her: "They want me to come home. They're demanding it ... I've got tickets. (she looked scared) "I'm afraid something BAD is going to happen.

Me: "Something ... bad?"

Her: "To New York. Or worse. I don't think they'd call me home unless it was the end of the world."

later
Her: "You smell good. What are you wearing? Is that cologne?"

Me: "Um ... no ... nothing."

Her: "You smell like ... like a birthday party. You smell like a birthday party when I was five years old. I *loved* that party. Mmmm... it's so good."

later[\b]
Her: They make me do those things for them... make their phone calls ... I *hate* it."

later
Her: "I'm going to fly off that balcony."
Me: "Umm ... no you're not." (moves to stop her)
Her: (delighted) "You know what you are? You're what Leonardo was in that Titanic movie."
Me: "Irish!?"
Her: "No--(laughs). If I fell, you'd catch me. Ohhh ... that's what it is!"
Me (laughing): "What what is?"
Her: "It isn't cologne at all ... the smell. It's Off."

All I can say is. . .whoa. That was awesome.

Very. Sounds superb.

A random thought. I've mentioned before that I once threatened to drop an orbital rock on Florida in a Hardwired game, and that my players were "playing along" with a threat they knew I wouldn't use. Turns out, they bought it after all. I didn't know that till a couple of months ago.

So would you say Marco, that this game played out kind of like Myst?

A lot of really cool images to look at and wander through, but the appeal is mostly in uncovering the story that is already there? Its hard to tell from your write-up how scripted all of this was by the GM vs. how much he was creating in response to your actions.

Valamir wrote: So would you say Marco, that this game played out kind of like Myst?

A lot of really cool images to look at and wander through, but the appeal is mostly in uncovering the story that is already there? Its hard to tell from your write-up how scripted all of this was by the GM vs. how much he was creating in response to your actions.

I'm sure it was just the abbreviated format of your transcript then. It seemed to me from what you'd written that the NPCs played such a large role in what was happening that I couldn't tell if your PC's were just along for the ride.

For instance you point to the choice that you made that resulted in cutting 5 hours of play time out.

It seemed to me (based on nothing more than what you wrote) that you as players had no idea what was going on and no real way of judging the consequences of your actions. You had Goethe's version of events, and the Dr's version of events, and you more or less picked one.

It wasn't clear to me that you were really making a meaningful choice. It struck me as very similiar to a classic dungeon crawl decision where players get to choose...they can go right down a hallway to who-knows-where, or they can go left down a hallway to who-knows-where. A "choice"...of sorts...but not a very meaningful one.

That's why I made the Myst comparison. Obviously you didn't find it to be like that in your actual play.

Part of the problem in reading the report is the Immersioist nature of the text. There is no dissociation of player and character. To the extent that you related the whole thing as if you had actually done it all.

What happens is that we don't know when it was that you decided what to do and why. We are forced to assume that it was all Actor stance, and that you were just making the decisions based on the Tropes that your character represented (ex-cop, PI, etc). There's no commentary like, I went with this choice because I thought that my charracter was a hard case, or any of that sort of analysis. Which makes it seem like you were just following your cues.

OTOH, you do point out how at certain points you didn't seem sure what to do. So you did the obvious thing, like hunting down Gothe. Often it's not that the GM is railroading forcefully, but via ommission. If this seems to be the only rout to anything interesting, then, of course you do it. What else? But it still means that the choice of where to go is in the GMs hands. This plot reads that way. OTOH, again, it may just be a problem in translation.

Mike

A few quick notes ...

1. The *game* was, if anything, more immersionist than the text--for the duration of play there was almost NO player-player interaction. We were in character the whole time.

2. The end-game choice was far more telling that right vs. left: we had to choose whether we trusted our gut. Whether the sane world was worth belieiveing in enough to die for ... whether or not we would bank that the world wasn't as screwed up as Gothe thought it was.

And because we didn't have a total grasp on the situation or the Narrativist arc (for me at least), we weren't sure at all that we were right. In other words, we did trust our gut and decide it was worth dying for what we believed in. The dramatic tension in the end wasn't simply left vs. right for us.

-Marco

I don't disagree that the plot was "railroaded" or GM controlled. It clearly was - but I thought that was explicit at the outset when the GM expressed how pleased they were with their own idea. This is IMo a good example of how immersive, (contentiously) illusionist gaming can be and is succesful; the identification with the character is so profound that for all intents and purposes they DID experience it - and they got The Fear accordingly.

This is the kind of GM I like, and the kind of game that I like; someone with a Vision. What I find uninteresting in many of the examples of Narratavist play is precisely the extent of player input. I mean above, Valamir complains that the characters just had to decide which of the stories to believe, Gothes or Carters, on the basis of no more than what they the characters had experienced in game. Yes exactly... just like life. To me, if the players had acted on knowledge of dramatic need etc, it would have totally undermined the joy of the experience. Kudos to a GM who is both willing to write 5 hours of play and bin it as necessary.

Valamir describes the choise the made as meaningless, becuase they didn't know. To me, it was meaningful because they didn't know.

contracycle wrote:
This is the kind of GM I like, and the kind of game that I like; someone with a Vision.

Hey folks,

Great discussion. I wanted to contribute a tad by saying that I think railroading really isn't an issue in this case. I don't see the GM taking over player-power regarding character decisions - only providing a certain kind of context for those decisions that some of us like, and some of us don't like. It is a Balance of Power issue, but not a railroading one.

Terry (Doc Midnight) and I are both pretty good at GMing this mode of play, especially for games like Call of Cthulhu. Some time, I'd like to discuss how to propose such play, as opposed to proposing, say, Sorcerer (or Otherkind or Dust Devils or, or, or ...), such that the other members of the group aren't blindsided. And vice versa.

In other words, what sort of language can we use so that the term "story" doesn't end up performing its usual negative, plural confusions.

Damn, getting off topic; must return. Marco, I'm especially interested in that moment of "disconnect" that you experienced. Can you explain that a bit better? Not so much from the "if I were in Author stance" perspective, but just explaining why and how you turned it into a positive experience.

Best,
Ron

Ron Edwards wrote: Hey folks,
Damn, getting off topic; must return. Marco, I'm especially interested in that moment of "disconnect" that you experienced. Can you explain that a bit better? Not so much from the "if I were in Author stance" perspective, but just explaining why and how you turned it into a positive experience.

Best,
Ron

contracycle wrote:
Valamir complains that the characters just had to decide which of the stories to believe, Gothes or Carters, on the basis of no more than what they the characters had experienced in game. Yes exactly... just like life. To me, if the players had acted on knowledge of dramatic need etc, it would have totally undermined the joy of the experience. Kudos to a GM who is both willing to write 5 hours of play and bin it as necessary.

Valamir describes the choise the made as meaningless, becuase they didn't know. To me, it was meaningful because they didn't know.

In the end we had to make a choice: to go to the church or to go to the diner.

At the end, even with the evidence we had (she sees the Dr. she gets better, she goes to see Gothe--worse--sees the Dr. Better again) I was reasonably sure we'd die in nuclear fire.

The world ... our world, at least, did not end

Had we lost our nerve and gone for St. Timmothy's at the last moment, the GM would have killed us.

The fact that the world didn't end is the treasure.

Going to St. Timmothy's and getting killed by the GM is the equivelent of falling into a pit trap and dying.

Yeah, it makes sense, Marco. Your explanation coincides with what I was thinking about - that what we are really talking about here is an element of trust, or rather Balance of Power (which is a trust issue if you prefer to take a positive spin on the terminology).

There are three or four threads all hitting this issue at once yesterday and today. They include Paka's Dust Devils inquiries regarding spreading narration across participants in a game, some of Max's comments regarding play at conventions in Jesse's thread, this one, and at least one other.

What I'm seeing is that the trust issue is essential to both sorts of play which are being discussed:

1) In GM-loaded story play (for lack of a better term), the player trusts that "it all makes sense" and moves with those curve balls like Marco describes.

2) In multiple-narration story play (for lack of a better term), everyone trusts everyone to contribute GM-type stuff sensibly. [This can vary from the GM-full play of Universalis, in which such input includes actual setting/situation elements, or InSpectres to the single-GM play of Sorcerer or Trollbabe, in which such input includes mainly time/space junctures.]

Now! Here's the hard part. My claim is that both of these are happening, in both styles of play. It's not a 1:1 thing like my numbering system above would imply.

That's why heavy GM-input during Narrativist play isn't necessarily railroading. And that's why a bit of OOC-discussion or break-times during the Sim-Situation play isn't "bad role-playing."

Thoughts? I'm really enjoying the interchanges across the various threads I mentioned.

Best,
Ron

Ron Edwards wrote: In other words, what sort of language can we use so that the term "story" doesn't end up performing its usual negative, plural confusions.

Mike Holmes wrote: I keep suggesting Participationism. And I sense that it's being recieved as negative. Which is probably my fault, as I keep saying that I personally don't like it. But I also keep poiinting out that it's apparently a valid form of play. As Marco's example points out.

Participationism is heavy handed Illusionism where there is no real attempt to hide the fact that the GM is performing Illusions. THe players are simply complicit in coming along for the ride.

What you describe is more standard, open-ended, Sim, Seth. Participationists not only cannot make decisions, they are never really presented with any when it's being done "correctly". As in the vampire example, the GM leads the characters about. You get a lot of this sort of thing:

GM: there is a big door leading out of the black featureless room. What do you do?

Players: Um, we go out the door.

Participationists not only cannot make decisions, they are never really presented with any when it's being done "correctly". As in the vampire example, the GM leads the characters about.

The fact that for most of the rest of the game they were unlikely to have been able to decide as players to have their characters make any meaningful choices, is why I would put this session down as being predominantly Participationist.

Marco wrote: Why is this seeming negative?

None of that sounds like very much fun. It certanly wasn't what I experienced. It sounds negative. When Jesse was subjected to it, he didn't enjoy it. It's not you saying you don't prefer it.

Let's take a look at this:

1. Your PM asks if I could kill Gothe.

The GM says: "In the initial meeting unlikely--I wasn't well armed, we were in Gothe's reality where he had trained, loyal, expert bodyguards, and he was meeting on his terms."

You say (in PM): " But did you have any choice on how to approach this situation? Or, better put, coould you have killed him if you had really wanted to?"

If the answer is "Yes, if I'd really wanted to." then you are advocating Equalty as I pointed out (i.e. the GM thinks the odds are low but since a player wants it to work, it does).

If the answer is No: then it's illusionism.

If the answer is Play It Out then it's Sim. Now, you suspect it wasn't. Why? I'm not sure (because the story came out so satisfyingly?)

The litmus test is: could the game-story survive me killing Gothe. The answer is yes. We were introduced to William Ashford, father of Harriet--he was the head of the compound. In the absence of Gothe, he would have continued after us.

Could I have killed him after my revelation (after which it would have been sane to attempt?): Absolutely (the GM thought I might--would have been satisfying)--we were told by Harriet that Gothe was afraid of me. If I'd killed him we'd still have had to figure out what to do about the impending nuclear sanction. So yes, it would have survived.

What is it that makes you think it was all pre-scripted? Because it worked out to what we felt was a "good" story?

Had we decided not to allow the Dr. to make the phone call to the cops (when we came to the art gallery and saw police cars there we were *greatly* relieved and back in Carter's reality) that would have precluded the end-scene right there.

Since I could be mind-controlled over phone and wasn't *sure* who Carter called (we discussed that prior to me picking up the phone) it sure was possible. If that's not meaningful, what is?

Or are you certain would the GM have forced me to?

3. Finally, I was interested in the GM's story as a situation, not a pre-scripted series of scenes--in fact, finding Gothe's number led us to him skipping the mind games he was going to play with us (we arranged a meeting on our terms).

The "story" was the set-up--the depth, the impending choice, the disease, the bombers ... the events in motion that we were thrust into.

I really don't get why that's "along for the ride" unless:

You object to the GM creating NPC's with agendas and events on schedules that will eventuall demand actions from the PC's or have consequences for them (that's where you could be read as advocating advocate Staticism).

You say you don't prefer Equality or Staticism, so where's this coming from?

You told me once you used to tell players there were options they didn't take and that it was an obvious tell to your illusionism. Maybe that's why you see it here?

re "complains": sorry I meant that in the generic sense, didn't mean to imply whingeing or the like.

Valamir wrote:
Going to St. Timmothy's and getting killed by the GM is the equivelent of falling into a pit trap and dying.

Hey,

Ron wrote: That's why heavy GM-input during Narrativist play isn't necessarily railroading.

And I completely agree. It was one of the most surprising realizations I had from running The Pool last year. I think three things worked together to create a gameplay experience with heavier GM-input in the first couple of sessions:

1) the use of Kickers
2) my shocking and aggressive style of scene framing
3) a low level of player experience with conflict resolution systems that deliver Authorial power

Things transitioned naturally to heavier player input in the later game. It was a great dynamic that created a lot of grist for conflict when it was needed, and surprising and protagonising resolution when that was needed. In fact, it worked so well that replicating the dynamic has been a design goal of My Life with Master. That's because I think the circumstances that produced the heavy GM-input phase in that game is likely a one-time bonus for a play group that can't reoccur once players know better what to expect. A more experienced Narrativist comes out the gate swinging with Authorial power, tending to skip over the "settling in" phase that made heavier GM-input possible when I ran The Pool. So, without getting into specifics, what I hope I've built into My Life with Master is a regulated transition, good for the experienced and inexperienced both. We shall see.

Paul