In this post HERE I brought up the question of elitism in gaming. The example I used degenerated the thread into a discussion on keeping secrets from other players. I thought it would be a good idea to start a new thread on the subject.

On the whole I dislike people keeping secrets from me and not just in gaming either. I like being in the loop on everything. It's just a personality thing. Anyway, I think this has given me a different view on roleplaying.

When I play in a game I like to look at what is happening from a wide angle. I like to watch every character's story. When another player won't reveal something about their character, I can't do that. My D&D group say that I play from a DM's perspective. I guess that is why I usually DM rather than play.

I compare it to Law & Oder vs Law & Order: Criminal Intent. L&O doesn't reveal the villain to the audiance until the cops discover it. L&O:CI reveals it right off the bat and follows their story along with the cops.

Am I the only one that plays like this? Do any of you dislike it when you're kept in the dark about a particular aspect of another player's character?

We talk a lot on the Forge about play style and GNS, but I don't see much about people honestly exploring their own personal style outside of GNS. I think if we did we would discover there is far more to dysfunction than differences in GNS preferences.

,Matt Gwinn

I play this way all the time. The technique is related to the "stances."

There's a common school of roleplay that says the players should only make decisions based on what their character knows, thinks, and feels. A decision made here is made from Actor stance.

Often such players are highly resistant to players knowing anything their character does not. Of course, this completely ignores the fact that players DO know more than their characters, just as the fantasy construct called their character should also know more in some areas than the player.

Other stances exist. From Ron's essay on GNS:

* In Author stance, a person determines a character's decisions and actions based on the real person's priorities, then retroactively "motivates" the character to perform them.

* In Director stance, a person determines aspects of the environment relative to the character in some fashion, entirely separately from the character's knowledge or ability to influence events. Therefore the player has not only determined the character's actions, but the context, timing, and spatial circumstances of those actions, or even features of the world separate from the characters.

There's also the audience factor - a player can be audience to things his character doesn't know and greatly enjoy it - it may even increase his appreciation of events his character does know about.

However, in a gamist style of play, there are times when players should be ignorant - part of the challenge may originate from certain secrets.

Do you want your GMs to show you scenes of the villains doing things while you (the stars) do your thing?

For me the most important thing isn't knowing the other character's secrets, exactly, but is more the idea of group cooperation. When I play I find it as much my job to make the game fun for the other players as I do when I GM. In order to do this I like to know enough about the other characters to spin riffs that move our protagonists stories together in interesting ways.

In order to do this I need some basic information about the goals and ideals of the other players. If one of them is a prince of a lost and fallen country, I’d like to know that basic idea. I don’t need to know what country, or why it was lost, but I would like to be able to get enough information to take on an author stance and build interactions between our characters that allow us both to play with the ideas of his background.

Recently I had a discussion, after watching Cowboy Bebop, about why the characters in that series were great for anime, but would have been lousy for Rping. The characters all had interesting backstories, and their stories came together in the kind of cool jazz linking of theme and tone – but they only did so because all the writers were fully aware of the stories and the thematic links they wanted to create, the characters themselves had no clue. I contended that you could play a game like that, and have it be fun, but you would need to keep the players informed and talking with each other. Characters can be ignorant of character, but if players don’t have a clue then forming links becomes vastly difficult. The result of that style of play is often that you have a group of strangers who have no links, connections, or protagonist roll.

Now, all that said, I do like it when someone surprises me with something unexpected or especially cool about her character. I think that a lot of players want to maintain an aura of mystery for that reason. However the problem is that, speaking generally, a surprise needs to be contextualized in order to be meaningful. Someone popping out of the blue with something completely unexpected doesn’t tend to impress me, it tends to confuse me and move me away from the very surprise they were trying to create. Things need to grow out of the world, and out of the interaction of characters, or else they feel forced and false.

I suppose, btw, that its ironic that I would far rather play in the Criminal Intent style game, but would far rather watch the original Law and Order. Things that work in drama don’t always work as well in game.

Other stances exist. From Ron's essay on GNS:

Interestingly, I think I prefer the L&O presentation over the CI presentation. And I'd agree it relates to the simulationist urge in me.

Lxndr wrote: Do you want your GMs to show you scenes of the villains doing things while you (the stars) do your thing?

Matt Gwinn wrote: When I play in a game I like to look at what is happening from a wide angle. I like to watch every character's story. When another player won't reveal something about their character, I can't do that. My D&D group say that I play from a DM's perspective. I guess that is why I usually DM rather than play.
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Am I the only one that plays like this? Do any of you dislike it when you're kept in the dark about a particular aspect of another player's character?

John Kim wrote: A bunch of immersive players work fine together.

Am I the only one that plays like this? Do any of you dislike it when you're kept in the dark about a particular aspect of another player's character?

Mike Holmes wrote: This is a very important point. I hope nobody gets the idea that secrets can't be used functionally and even profitably. I have to admit that I like them a lot myself. Revelation to the players is just so very dramatic.

I tend to try and play a character (the Sim in me coming out) and run things as a GM from this standpoint: Whatever my character would tell you about him or one of my NPCs would tell you about themselves is what everyone knows. I admit no problem laying down my stats for all to say IF its in the contect of curiosity and general conversation. However, and this may be a bit of abused player coming out, I do not want people turning my sheet and notes into bathroom reading for the purpose of telling me how to play. I just think thats rude.

Playing in a game where Character Secrets are in the open for players and having another Player make a positive suggestion of some sort would be a new experience for me but not something I would nay say. Indeed, I think both styles can be valid and fun as long as everyone is on the same boat.

I know running Sorcerer was a good experience, everything was in the open from day 1 and everything went very smoothly.

I also have seen examples like Jack's of the player who is so paranoid about their character that you barely know their name. My perception has been they tend to be paranoid in any event or they think that if you iew their sheet you will steal their character's soul.

Sean

Jack Spencer Jr. wrote: I'm the sort who will read the last paragraph of a book. Ever do that? Often the last paragraph makes absolutely no sense until you had read the entire book. The last sentence of Taran Wanderer by Lloyd Alexander was "Taran galloped to them." Not the same as reading the end of the book to see how it ends.

Hey,

I think this is an incredibly honest and salient comment from John Kim:

However, I do see behavior differ. Sometimes it is just subconsious cues, that don't make much difference but are a little distracting to me. Sometimes it is actually conscious, though, like coloring actions in an attempt to draw the secret into interesting play. Some people view this as a good thing. In practice, I find I generally dislike it. The plots that come out of trying to draw on the secret this way seem thin to me, because they are based on only a shallow view of my PC (compared to my own conception).

Thanks John. This is totally where it's at with a lot of folks, I think. The vision they have for their character is spoiled by the efforts of others to engage with it.

The narrativist solution to this is to encourage OOC conversation, so that players entertain suggestions from each other during gameplay. And this results in a dynamic where players are actually 'playing' each other. That is, players quickly learn that some entertaining of suggestions from others can be 'played' to create enthusiasm for their character in the minds of the other players.

With only IC conversation and character actions to rely upon, the result is what John describes. It's like cold-calling a girl you like to ask her to the homecoming dance, without having tested the waters by talking with her friends first. More often than not, you're going to be disappointed by what happens from taking an action that's uninformed by substantive insight into the situation.

Paul

Matt Gwinn wrote: How does this relate to this thread? Well, by knowing more about each character (such as his secrets) a player can better understand the character's actions and possibly gain an emotional attachment to him. Frankly, I think games are more successful when they successfuly elicit an emotional responce from the players.
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(example of interesting character development)
Now, if no one in the group knew the character's background or that he was even evil, would that scene mean anything to anyone but the one player and the DM? I don't think so.

My experience with true secrets about a character is that . . . there mostly aren't any. I mean that in two ways - the first is that 90% of the time, the player that THINKS he or she has a secret is actually hiding NOTHING from the other players. They can tell that "something's up," and usually (if they know the secret-keeping player well) could tell you exactly what that something is. I find the "pretending not to know something that we do know" a perfectly good bit of mental gymnastics for a player relating to their character, but not a good thing to do as players relating to other players.

(NOTE: That leaves 10% of the time that the player really is keeping the secret, and not all of those fall under my next point, so - I guess "there mostly aren't any" translates to "this is so rare, and so NOT a key point for me, that it might as well no exist." For someone who that secret-keeping really is a key point - well, I think it's still interesting to look at exactly why that is and/or what about it is important, as maybe it will turn out not to be the literal secret per se that matters. But, like so many things, if that really is a KEY issue for someon - everything else will have to bend to accomodate it.)

The other way in which I mean there are no secrets if that if the secret isn't at least shared with the GM, it functionally does not exist - until it's revealed. Which means, rigorously, it might as well have been invented at the time it's revealed. By some people's definitions, that means it's not really a "secret" at all.

Now, sharing it with the GM and only the GM - that is a potentially valuable and functional role for the GM in one definition of "immersive" play: he or she knows what the character secrets are, and steers play (overtly, subtly, unconciously - standards of what's acceptable vary by play group) to both conceal and illuminate (and usually, eventually, to fully reveal) those secrets. For some people this is more acceptable than sharing with the other players, though I've seen it blow up into dysfunctional "GM and favorite player" situations too often to be entirely comfortable with it.

What I tend to see work well with secrets is this - characters have secrets, and all the players do know something about those secrets, directly communicated amongst all the participants. However, not neccessarily ALL of the secret is known this way, and details are revealed/established during play. I see this as quite similar to the development of a Premise in Nar play - sure, we all know the game is about issues of honor when survival itself is in question, but play itself provides the meaningful commentary on that issue. Similarly, Janet is clearly playing a character deeply touched by evil powers, and the other participants know it's because the Dark One messed with her a while back. But - why did the Dark One choose her (maybe the GM knows that one, but the other players don't)? What role did her parents play in that? And etc.

The long running Dark Sun game I'm currently in is filled with characters with these kinds of secrets - in fact, the one player who didn't have that sort of character eventually morphed (literally, I guess) the character to add something of the sort, because it turned out to be important to the game (for a number of reasons). In this case, the players knew a secret was being "added" that wasn't there before. We as players know much about the secret, as characters we know perhaps a bit less - but at neither level can or do we assume we know all. That seems to work out best for us.

Gordon

Gordon C. Landis wrote: The other way in which I mean there are no secrets if that if the secret isn't at least shared with the GM, it functionally does not exist - until it's revealed. Which means, rigorously, it might as well have been invented at the time it's revealed. By some people's definitions, that means it's not really a "secret" at all.

John Kim wrote: You seem to be defining "function" as being unrelated from the imagination of the player, which makes no sense to me.

I thought "functional" worked ok; or perhaps to rephrase it, a secret that is unkown to the GM (or whatever entity is fulfilling that function) might as well not exist.

The character perhaps has the "secret" that they are a were-wolf. On the night of the full moon, they announce they are growing hairy and befanged. Except this is a total surprise to the GM, who says "no you don't", because the GM canont see any reason whatsoever that this should be occurring.

OTOH, it seems to me this sort of thing would be perfectly workable in games in which the players power over the character extended to directorialism, in which case it might be fine.

My second problem with secrets is that IMO sometimes they are used to "upstage" a game. It may well be that this arises from stylistic clash and is a dysfunctional mode. The scenario I am thinking of is one in which, at some moment of crisis, a player pulls out of the hat some deep dark secret, like being Beelzebubs love-child, which has a really radical impact on a presently unfolding scene. IME, all this does is instantly and severely deprotagonise every other character; the scene that was about everyone has been unilaterally hijacked to being a scene about only one significant character.

Now as I say, this may well be symptomatic of a more profund underlying problem, and not a problem with secrets per se. But I feel the situation is aggravated by not being addressed much in gaming texts; I think a game in which secrets among and between players (I frankly exclude the possibilityy of a secret being kept from a GM-entity) are a normal aspect of play needs to have an explicit discussion about where those secrets are expected to fit and how they can be used to support play.

contracycle wrote: I thought "functional" worked ok; or perhaps to rephrase it, a secret that is unkown to the GM (or whatever entity is fulfilling that function) might as well not exist.

The character perhaps has the "secret" that they are a were-wolf. On the night of the full moon, they announce they are growing hairy and befanged. Except this is a total surprise to the GM, who says "no you don't", because the GM canont see any reason whatsoever that this should be occurring.

OTOH, it seems to me this sort of thing would be perfectly workable in games in which the players power over the character extended to directorialism, in which case it might be fine.

contracycle wrote: My second problem with secrets is that IMO sometimes they are used to "upstage" a game. It may well be that this arises from stylistic clash and is a dysfunctional mode. The scenario I am thinking of is one in which, at some moment of crisis, a player pulls out of the hat some deep dark secret, like being Beelzebubs love-child, which has a really radical impact on a presently unfolding scene. IME, all this does is instantly and severely deprotagonise every other character; the scene that was about everyone has been unilaterally hijacked to being a scene about only one significant character.

contracycle wrote: I thought "functional" worked ok; or perhaps to rephrase it, a secret that is unkown to the GM (or whatever entity is fulfilling that function) might as well not exist.

Jack Spencer Jr wrote: This seems to strike directly at the Lumpley Principle. If the system is the method by which items are entered into the shared imagined space, how can a secret one player is holding from the other players enter this space? Whatever the reasons or specifics of a situation, in the end the other players are not mind readers and to make use of inter-player secrets, there had best be a damn good reason or it is likely to not work.

John Kim wrote: I consider this rather limiting. Another way of phrasing this is "The player's imagination should never extend beyond what is expressed publically at the table." That is, if the player imagines something, but doesn't bring it into play, then it is a secret and doesn't work.

but if something is not being shared, it had best have a darn good reason to not enter it into the shared space.

Jack Spencer Jr wrote:

John Kim wrote: I consider this rather limiting. Another way of phrasing this is "The player's imagination should never extend beyond what is expressed publically at the table." That is, if the player imagines something, but doesn't bring it into play, then it is a secret and doesn't work.

Hrm. This is going into an odd place. A major portion of the activity of roleplaying involves using the shared imagined space. If one were to remain in one's own space, there are other activities that allow for that without having to deal with the shared space.

Jack Spencer Jr wrote: I don't like bringing up the "if you want to write, go write" agruement, but if something is not being shared, it had best have a darn good reason to not enter it into the shared space. "Darn good reason" can be most anything, really. It could be simply the character's emotions or private thoughts or whatever. Nobody else would know that. But if it's something that would effect the shared space somehow, then the hard question here is why is it being held back? And the answer to this, IMO should be a good reason or else you'll run into the "I turn into a werewolf." "No you don't" situation.

John Kim wrote: The question can be put the other way: i.e. if none of the other PCs know that your PC is evil, why should that information be revealed to the players?

Vincent's mini-rant #2, redux.

Calling them secrets and thinking of them as secrets only makes sense in a narrow range of possible social contracts. "Secrets" are actually a kind of plan. They're the kind of plan you make when you're confident that your conception of your character will trump, systemically, the rest of the group's conception of your character.

I don't think it matters, as long as the social contract is chugging happily away. That is, if you're empowered to make your character actually be his sister in disguise, groovy. Call it a secret, call it a plan, who cares? Creative ownership means that being committed to a plan is functionally the same as knowing a secret.

(Especially because there are all sorts of sneaky ways to get group assent to your plans, before revealing them in full. Probably Laura from, John, your Thorgerd / Thorfinn example had been dropping subtle hints and gauging everybody's responses all along, setting the whole thing up and making sure that when the time came nobody'd flip out, everybody'd buy it. That's only appropriate when you've got a plan you like and a social contract that supports it. It sounds way cool, frankly.)

It's when "secrets" are contentious that the difference is significant. Then the first best thing you can do is call them what they are, plans, ideas, contingencies. Talk about how you get your ideas accepted by the group, not who has the right to keep what secrets from whom. It can't hurt and it may be a big step toward a solution all by itself, that's what I think.

-Vincent

Gordon C. Landis wrote: This is a matter of taste issue to a large degree, and we're all probably highly influenced by personal experience. I've seen FAR more annoyance and dysfunction result from charcater secrets than I have enjoyable "a-ha!" revelations, and thus tend to avoid pure secrets. John finds something very satisfying about allowing a personally-held secret to color his character decisions, and (best as I can tell) doesn't even neccessarily need to reveal that secret, ever. As long as there's no "nudge-nudge, wink-wink, I-know-something-you-don't" going on, that's fine by me - but usually what I see happen is one of the other players has his PC confront the secret-holding PC, because this unknown secret is just dominating play too much for it to be enjoyable for the other players.

Gordon C. Landis wrote:

John Kim wrote: The question can be put the other way: i.e. if none of the other PCs know that your PC is evil, why should that information be revealed to the players?

Because if you don't tell them, all the other players will get disgusted and walk away from the game when you do reveal it? Or before, if it's coloring things and confusing people in ways they don't like? Whereas if you tell them, they can WORK with it and actually help you explore whatever it is you found interesting about having a secretly-evil character in this game?

Vincent raises a very good point. A point I meant with 'darn good reason,' but didn't approach it very well. In keeping something hidden from the other players, you are doing so for a particular effect, either to have the big reveal later at the appropriate time or to keep it hidden always because there is no way or reason for the others to know it or a variety of other possible plans.

Remember, in the original post, the player was trying to keep "I'm evil" a secret from the GM as well. Is keeping that sort of secret from the GM qualitatively different from keeping it from non-GM players?

Hi, Alexander.

To answer your question, I would have to say that it depends on way too many factors. In some games/groups, keeping anything from the GM is pointless because the GM is the first and final authority. In others it is much more possible.

I would like to modify my own comments somewhat.

Firstly, I deliberateloy specified "GM-entity" to generalise from a specific 1-person GM; in the case where the "diagetic gateway" is distrbuted, it would be perfectly valid for a single player to make such an intervention.

In this secnario, the secret has by my definition not beek kept FROM the GM-entity; the player is empowered as a GM-entity and knows the secret, even if not all players/GM-entities know the secret.

In the circumstance when the player is not so empowered, then they cannot keep a secret from the GM-entity AND have that secret have any consequences on the publicly shared game space. [Incidentally, I feel there is great virtue in seeing the game space as public].

Say for example, werewolf-ism were contagious, and the vector is saliva. Thus, it is not only the case that when the secret is revealed, it changes the current situation, but also that it implies things about What Has Gone Before, which the GM was unable to take into account due to ignorance. Lets assume that two weeks previously, our werewolf had given mouth to mouth resuscitation (I'm reaching I know) to another character, does that mean that this other character is now also going to become a werewolf? Should the GM have perhaps been giving descriptions to the effect that over the last few days they have been drawn to the moon?

So this is my criteria. A secret which is significant only to the player, or to PERCEPTIONS of the character, are perfectly viable to keep as private secrets. But anything that is going to have an impact on the shared, public game space, cannot be kept from the person/entity who is responsible for tracking and legitimising cause and effect in that public space. In effect, abny newly introduced information changes the Situation in which all are engaged.