Hey all,

We have been over (and are still going over) some of this before, but I want to try a different spin on the topic. There are hardly any GNS-neutral games out there, but if we were to design one, what would it be like?

My take is that you would reward behaviour by making the player more able to engage in that behaviour. For example, by exploring, you are rewarded with the ability to explore further; by being effective, you are rewarded with the ability to be more effective; and by tackling moral issues, you are rewarded with the ability to better tackle moral issues.

My challenge is this: can one of you, or the lot of us working together, describe what this game would be like?

Later,
Grant

Hi there,

Fang got some distance toward this goal with Scattershot as currently presented. I'm still pretty convinced that it drives mainly (or best?) toward Narrativism, with strong possibilities for Gamism, but not so well toward Simulationism - slippin' toward N and/or G seems way too easy at any given moment, and all it takes is a little bit.

However, that "convinced" is highly qualified by (a) the game's not being finished and (b) reading not playing.

It's mainly a matter of customizing reward systems and player-power, which in Scattershot are almost exactly the same thing.

Part of the problem, both for Scattershot and for the more general question you propose, is falling into the trap of presenting a design that's so customizable that it is, itself, nothing. d20 as such (not the OGL, not D&D3E, etc) is an example. It's not a system, it has no properties as System - it's merely a resolution mechanic and a couple of strictures that are so vague as to be meaningless, if Mutants & Mastermind is an acceptable application. Saying "it can do anything" means, "you have to design your own game system."

To the extent that Scattershot avoids this problem, it becomes more GNS focused. The interesting question is how well the game will permit actual customizing via play itself, which remains unknown.

Best,
Ron

Hey all,

Hmm... okay, to narrow the discussion, assume "game" means an actual instance--a "game session", rather than an actual text. Theoretically, a text could then be made detailing the social contract permitting such play.

Scattershot was in my mind, but I want this thread to be more open than simply discussing one particular rules-set.

Later,
Grant

It does seem to me that you're imagining a system that starts out neutral, but then inherently Drifts with the players' interests and foci. The way I understand the concept in Scattershot, at least, what happens is that you sort of let the players set themselves into a groove, then make it easier for them to stay in it. So it's not that the system is neutral, it's that it starts so.

Suppose you have some traits or skills or attributes or whatever you'd like to call them, and they're set up in such a way that more or less explicitly they have GNS priorities coded into them. So you have a few traits the use of which will generally entail Sim, a few that entail Nar, and so on. I'm not quite sure what those would be, but hypothetically one could design them by basing them on the goals of the GNS sets.

Now each time you use one of these, you get rewarded in it. This encourages you to keep using it, obviously. Because of the natural tendency toward coherence, you will tend then to use more of the related traits, building a character with a strong GNS preference. Presumably the whole party will to some degree build together, in the name of congeniality and general popular consensus.

In the end, you have a game which is entirely coherent and distinctively marked in GNS terms. What you don't have is a neutral game, at that point.

This sort of system facilitates the group's discovery of their GNS preferences through play, and encourages them to do so consensually.

Is this what you have in mind? To me, that's not a hybrid, really; a hybrid would be a game that regularly demands gear-shifts, not one that naturally drifts and stays there.

Of course, I may have totally misunderstood Scattershot and your post.

Hey Chris,

That is a good start, but what would the actual game be like? Based on your theory, give me an actual example based on three players: Sam, Gary, and Ned. They have three different preferences, so by the Nth session, their characters should be rather focused. What is that like?

Are they playing in a genre? Is there a gamemaster? What does a story turn out like? Do they swear at each other and resolve conflicts with baseball bats, rather than dice?

Gimme the details, man.

Later,
Grant

Er, sorry --

what would the actual game be like?

Hi Grant,

Unless I'm mistaken, neither Chris nor I am talking about a group with disparate players, in terms of GNS preferences. We were talking about a system that permits itself (or encourages) specific transition to a given mode of play that is common to the players involved.

Looking over your initial post, I don't see the stipulation that the game should support functional play specifically when the different players take it in different ways. Is that what you had in mind? 'Cause if so, I don't see it as a working possibility. It's certainly not what Scattershot does; in fact, Scattershot is predicated on consensus in terms of goals and even has a whole rules and vocabulary-set aimed at forming it.

Best,
Ron

Hey Ron,

I did not specify either way. If it suits you, assume the game has controls that focus the group in a particular direction. My point is that I want a description of what the game(play) would be like. It is okay if no one can even imagine such a thing as what I have described, but my challenge still stands. MUDs and LARPs have to accomodate diverse play-styles, and I have definite use for the results of this thread.

Later,
Grant

Ron Edwards wrote: Unless I'm mistaken, neither Chris nor I am talking about a group with disparate players, in terms of GNS preferences. We were talking about a system that permits itself (or encourages) specific transition to a given mode of play that is common to the players involved.

[If the idea is] the game should support functional play specifically when the different players take it in different ways. .... I don't see it as a working possibility.

Oops, x-posted.

ThreeGee wrote: If it suits you, assume the game has controls that focus the group in a particular direction.

Hey Chris,

You bet. Assuming a group of GNS-diverse players sit down to play game X, which rewards them individually for their play (their play being influenced by their GNS preferences), what might game X be like?

Theory is fine, but fabricating the details whole-cloth is great, too. For example, would you reward exploration with greater metagame ability to call things into existance to be explored, reward successful use of resources with increased resources, and reward focus on moral quandaries with increased metagame control? What kind of setting could take this sort of abuse without alienating the players? Etc.

Since coherence has been brought up, is there a way to do all this, and bring the game into coherence, too? What would that be like?

Later,
Grant

Hi Grant,

For my thoughts about this, check out the thread Can a game designer work for all three (G/N/S)?, especially my post of 10 Sep 2002 10:14 about the hypothetical players. Both M.J. and Fang provide some extensive posts after that which really lay out the issues for their respective games Multiverser and Scattershot.

Best,
Ron

I want to thank Ron for pointing to that thread; my comments on the second page thereof will save me some typing here, but I will attempt to brief them as I expand a bit.

First, I think I should note that Ron has tagged Multiverser as a simulationist game; and I'm neither complaining nor objecting, particularly as he has said it's a particularly good one. It only surprises me, because although I do have some players who are simulationist, most of my players are very gamist and quite a few are narrativist, and I find myself supporting all three in play.

One of the things that makes Multiverser work for all three GNS modes is that it has no reward system at all. I'd like to say this was a brilliant insight on our part; I'm afraid I have to admit it was an accident, sort of. We didn't ever see a need for a reward system. To us, play is its own reward; and the more we've played, the more that appears. Simulationists find an inherent reward in exploring what has been created. Gamists find an inherent reward in overcoming the challenges they face. Narrativists find an inherent reward in facing the moral and personal issues that arise and working through them. In short, if you get what you enjoy from a game, you have been rewarded.

Rewards systems, in general, are merely reinforcement for this (and look for my comments on two pronged rewards systems if you want more on that). However, to the degree that a reward system rewards any one type of conduct, it penalizes others.

This would, I'd wager, result in the sort of approach alleged for Scattershot--that as you are rewarded for acting within the chosen mode, you are discouraged from getting outside it. That doesn't, as far as I've seen, happen in Multiverser games.

Yet I do think that even within Multiverser, the game to a large degree responds to the mode choices of the individual players, even if those mode choices conflict.

In the referenced thread, I mentioned a player who built a dam and was working on a steam engine. I think he's probably among my more simulationist players. He eventually left there and proceeded to explore the world. Sure, he got involved in a few serious battles, and enjoyed them thoroughly; but he tended to enjoy them more from the standpoint of can I devise a catapult from the materials at hand that can be used to throw flaming pitch at the enemy ship and similar ideas. There was some character attitude about wanting to beat those who were abusing him, but it never really became the reason for the game--it was just part of what it would be like if this were happening. Now, in all of this, he's been improving his engineering and related skills, and as he goes on to other worlds he takes those with him, and can continue to explore possibilities. Right now he's in a much more magical fantasy world, and is fascinated by a particular magical artifact which is being studied as a possible aid in an imminent war. He keeps it explorative, and he gets better at exploring, even though sometimes exploring means the sorts of battles and adventures that make good tales.

At the same time, I've landed a player in a world with a serious issue: the good people of this world are slavers, and have never recognized that there's anything wrong with that. In fact, they consider their slaving activities to be generous treatment of the slaves, who are primitives lifted, in the slavers' view, from the mire of their barbaric lives and given the benefits of civilization. My player is quite cognizant of the issue after less than a day of game time, and is trying to come to grips with the moral ideas (even as she wrestles with the more basic questions of how she got here and what she can do about it). This is going to be very narrativist as it unfolds. It doesn't have to be--I ran this world for someone else some time ago, a more gamist player, and his response to the prevalence of slavery was to buy a slave, tell him to consider himself more a companion free to leave whenever he wished (although leaving could be problematic, given that he'd most likely be taken for a runaway), and went about exploring other aspects of the world. A player who focuses on issues and likes that, though, invites the idea of bringing more issues into play.

The gamists are easiest. One thing they almost always do is build up their characters into at least moderately potent heroes. They vary in what that means, and how potent they wish to be, and how much variety there is in their skills, but overall they build up characters who can stand toe-to-toe against some formidable adveraries. What happens? Almost without thinking about it, referees provide challenges for these players that meet their abilities.

Why don't these player types come into conflict? The answer is almost too simple: because the game makes no effort to have them work together. From time to time they land in the same world and meet up, trade notes and war stories, sometimes teach each other things they've learned, sometimes work together on whatever appears--but even when they're in the same world, they'll often ignore each other and do what they individually want to do; and even when they work together, the disparity in play styles and abilities doesn't particularly matter. Gamists who have built powerful characters will put themselves on the front lines, with the others supporting them; narrativists will find the issues and focus on these; simulationists will explore. If it gets too hot for some character, that character probably gets killed, and he's off to another world where the others aren't particularly relevant--back to doing what he enjoys.

Yet it also happens that players who are not locked into one mode (me, for example) move between modes as situations arise. Drop me into a situation with strong moral and values questions, and I respond to them seeking resolution to the story. Face me with a challenge, and I rise to it as well as I am able. Give me something interesting, and I start to explore (I hold the record for number of times killed by experiments gone bad; the first was the explosion of a psionic weapon I was trying to build).

So in a sense it goes both ways. If you want to play in one mode exclusively, it will fit itself to that mode; if you want to switch between modes, it will move with you.

That's how I see it working.

--M. J. Young

'K, I'll bite.

(Jason places half-baked idea into catapult for proper hurling at Grant.)

Wacky Little System:

Traits:
Pick two of the following traits, define them, and rank them using 4 points.
Traits are defined with decimal points. (2.0, 3.0, etc). The decimal point is used for rewards. It is assigned to N.0 at character generation.

Training (experience: skill-esque)
Talent (natural ability: stat-esque)
Drive (a goal of some kind)
Virtue (A positive quality: patience, hope, charity, etc)
Vice (A negative emotion: greed, envy, hate, etc)


Resolution:
Add Trait + Tokens.
Resolution is all opposed.
The decimal point does not apply to resolution.
Each player gets 10 tokens and 3 actions (including defenses) per round/scene.
Tokens do not accumulate higher than 15, and actions do not acculumate higher than 5.
As many tokens as desired may be committed to a single action/task.
If it applies the Trait value is added to the numeric total of the Tokens committed to the action/task.
In an attack versus defense situation tie goes to defender.
In an attack versus attack situation a tie is a simultaneous hit.

Rewards:
Training: Increased through learning. Each day devoted to the practice of the Training Trait increases it by 0.1.
Talent: Increased through use. Each use (successful or unsuccessful) in a scene adds 0.1 to the Talent.
Drive: Increases when the goal is quested. Each scene the character works toward his Drive increases the Drive by 0.4. Once accomplished the Trait may be replaced by a new one which starts at 1.0.
Virtue: Increased with self confidence. Each scene a Virtue is successful in resolution increases the Virtue by 0.2.
Vice: Increased when desires are blocked. Each scene a Vice would be triggered (the emotion that it defines happens) by an unsuccessfully resolution increases the Vice by 0.2.

Example Characters:
Sam (Explore: Char)
Vice (Rage)
Training (Weather Sorcery)

Gary (Explore: Kill Things...What is that Sit? System? I dunno.)
Training (Soldier)
Talent (Strong)

Ned (Explore: Sit)
Drive (Free himself of the cranky second face on his stomach)
Virtue (Courage)

*****

MJ makes himself a kickin' point about not having a rewards systems at all 'cause playing is it's own reward. After all, he's right - you don't come back to the gaming table for EXP, you come back to play.

An off-topic note: I don't think it's really that big of a deal to make a system that stays out of the way enough that it can play all Congruent like. But...I don't think the real nasty GNS problems have anything to do with mechanics - they're all about taste preference conflicts.

clehrich wrote: Suppose you have some traits or skills or attributes or whatever you'd like to call them, and they're set up in such a way that more or less explicitly they have GNS priorities coded into them. So you have a few traits the use of which will generally entail Sim, a few that entail Nar, and so on. I'm not quite sure what those would be, but hypothetically one could design them by basing them on the goals of the GNS sets.

John Kim wrote: Now, arguably you could come up with different Gamist and Narrativist representations of the same character, say. However, that still seems suspect to me. If I am playing a highly violent character, then I will probably end up using a lot of combat traits. That doesn't mean that I'm not illuminating the question of what drives people to violence.

Hey Jason,

That's cute. I like it. Stripped so bare as this, you can really see how little is actually going on in it.

So what do you think would happen if everyone designed characters of different types? Would the group tend to Drift into coherence, building up and changing descriptors, or would there just be general play incoherence?

Anyone else want to comment on this?

clehrich wrote: That's cute. I like it. Stripped so bare as this, you can really see how little is actually going on in it.

So what do you think would happen if everyone designed characters of different types? Would the group tend to Drift into coherence, building up and changing descriptors, or would there just be general play incoherence?

A game I've been piecing together, working title is 'Doppelganger', seems to be somewhat relevant to the discussion. The basic idea is that there is one character amongst the group and each player has control of a different 'persona' of that core character. Each 'persona' is linked to different color elements (one 'persona' might be anchored to a 'medieval fantasy' world and another to a 'cyberpunk' world, etc.). The players spend currency to gain control of 'the ball' and have their 'persona' take over. When a 'persona' shift takes place the new 'persona' starts where the previous one left off. The color elements change but the situation stays essentially the same (example: what is an ancient stone crypt for one persona may be a cryogenic storage facility for another).

One element I'm going to incorporate is a ranking system for each player to communicate the importance of a particular type of play organized along GNS guidelines. Rewards for each player will be based partly along those guidelines. A player who ranks Gamist concerns highest will recieve a greater reward for Gamist challenges, and so on. There will be a method in place for shifting those rankings should a player wish to do so.

I'm going to use a basically Sim design (my current thoughts are to use something similar to the careers system in Simon Washbourne's Barbarians of Lemuria) and let each player concentrate on what elements of play they enjoy most and be rewarded for it.

As M. J. pointed out the result will be the penalization of the lower ranked modes (in the form of lesser rewards) but I want the players to be aware of the different modes to some degree. Hey, it beats sticking rats in a maze. :)

I just might reconsider some of what I had in mind due to Jason's Wacky Little System posts.

-Chris

I'm going to chime in with John here. I think that GNS has a lot less to do with character design and a lot more to do with progress of play. I've seen players' gamist tendencies push against the narrativist concepts of Legends of Alyria (and it seems to contain them pretty well); the design of the character may facilitate one sort of play or another, but it certainly doesn't dictate it. Far more springs from the mechanics of play, and more yet from the attitudes of the players.

This is why so many games drift: the greatest influence to GNS is what the players (corporately) want to do. Play mechanics then step in and guide that one direction or another, but players with strongly gamist preferences who are in agreement are going to wind up turning Sorcerer into a contest. A game plays to one agenda only to the degree that the players allow themselves to be guided that direction. Character creation is an important part of that guidance, but as John observes it's not the only part, and it's quite possible to use any particular character generation method as the starting point for any form of play. A player could see it as a great challenge to win the game despite taking a character geared for telling stories. You don't get there that way.

That doesn't mean having such a flexible character creation system isn't a good start; but you've got to build from there into how the game responds to that. Jason did some of that; but then, what's still missing is how the game prevents players from forcing each other into their mold.

Let's suppose we're creating a group using that system which is going to be set as an American infantry squad in Viet Nam. This is a wonderful setting for sim, gamist, and narrativist play--there's all kinds of stuff you can get out of it. Explore what it's like to be a soldier in such a difficult environment. Beat the enemy. Feel the conflicts of having been drafted to fight in a war you don't know is right with the knowledge that there's a tremendous backlash around it back home (as your protestor friend sends you letters talking about their efforts to force an end to the war).

Now, as a group, what are we going to do?

That's where the conflict arises.

The reason it doesn't arrive in Multiverser is because there is no "group". "As a group" we are each free to say, have fun stormin' the castle, and do whatever it is we want to do. Sure, maybe if the gamist player asks the narrativist player to help him capture Phnom Pen (that's probably not spelled correctly--it's been too many years) he'll go along and play the gamist's game for a while; and maybe the simulationist will help, too. But if the game requires the players to work on the same tasks, it inherently requires them to agree on GNS goals or accept that the other members of the group may be working against that which they're hoping to achieve.

What you need to find is a way to make three modes of play cooperative. That's the rub.

--M. J. Young