In this thread , the recommendation for a budding game designer is to "imagine the scene in your head and play it out as a game but without mechanics".

Another way to do things would be to tinker with game mechanisms until one has found something that works(that is makes an interesting sub-game, for instance) and then think of a theme that fits with it.

That's apparently the way "German games" designers work. Is that really inappropriate for a RPG ?

I have this vague sense that it won't work. It might be predicated on an irrational association that you've pointed out with GAGs (German Abstract Games). They don't evoke their subject matter much at all, and as such, I can't see them working to create Exploration.

Basically, all RPG rules are built around what's being Explored. In selecting to have a combat system, for instance, you instantly say that the game is about combat. So you really can't avoid chosing the subject matter as you design. I think...

I mean, isn't this how you make a Generic game? Won't that be what you get?

But, heck, give it a try. What can it hurt? :-)

Mike

Mike Holmes wrote: Basically, all RPG rules are built around what's being Explored. In selecting to have a combat system, for instance, you instantly say that the game is about combat. So you really can't avoid chosing the subject matter as you design. I think...

Mike Holmes wrote: I mean, isn't this how you make a Generic game? Won't that be what you get?

John Kim wrote: The key to this approach is that you work on only the actual mechanics, not the meaning of it.

I have this vague sense that it won't work. It might be predicated on an irrational association that you've pointed out with GAGs (German Abstract Games). They don't evoke their subject matter much at all, and as such, I can't see them working to create Exploration.

Good points, John. I suppose if you kept all setting material out of the mechanical design you could get somewhere. But then, again, I'm doubting how well it will match anything you decide to say that it's about. Still, I'd like to see an attempt.

I have the same feeling, but I'm not sure why. Indeed German games systems are often loosely linked to their theme, but not everytime, and not more so than, say, the central mechanics of Herowars for instance - to me, at least.

Mike Holmes wrote: I suppose if you kept all setting material out of the mechanical design you could get somewhere. But then, again, I'm doubting how well it will match anything you decide to say that it's about. Still, I'd like to see an attempt.
...
The thing that makes the central mechanic of HW relate strongly to the subject material, is that chargen involves enumerating whatever abilities you like from that setting. In doing so, you tightly link the imagination of the setting in question to the mechanics.

OTOH, the HW system is very generic by itself (and maybe that's what you mean). I can see it being useful for just about any setting; and indeed, I'm using it currently to run the old ICE setting Shadow World. Meaning that if I'd come up with HW as a system first, that it wouldn't have evoked the Gloranthan setting at all, nor any sort of game particularly. Perhaps if you include the chargen related to Cultures. But even that I see as fairly universal.

I think it is very difficult to seperate mechanics and setting. Basicly, as soon as you have defined the mechanics, you have partially defined the setting, as the mechanics define the range of possible results. By saying that there are six attributes you restrict the granularity of the setting, i.e. you arn't going to have 3 mental attributes, 3 attributes that define bodily motion, and 3 that describe physical charitaristics. This influences the setting, because the mechanic must be able to model what you want. I.e. if you wanted, say detailed magic, with many possible outcomes, you would not want a mechanic with only 4 possible results. There are way's around this, by making a tree of results, but this implies that this part of the system is important, becasue it has this involved mechanic. (i.e. Mikes Combat Systems Rant).
As soon as you start defineing ranges of possible outcomes, you are influencing the setting.


My point is a mechanic doesn't really suggest a setting, it just makes some settings harder to do.
If you started with a mechanic and madeup a setting, vs starting with a setting and making up a mechanic, I think you'd get the same setting either way (What the game designer wanted) but a different mechanic.

damion wrote: I think it is very difficult to seperate mechanics and setting. Basicly, as soon as you have defined the mechanics, you have partially defined the setting, as the mechanics define the range of possible results. By saying that there are six attributes you restrict the granularity of the setting, i.e. you arn't going to have 3 mental attributes, 3 attributes that define bodily motion, and 3 that describe physical charitaristics.

damion wrote: My point is a mechanic doesn't really suggest a setting, it just makes some settings harder to do. If you started with a mechanic and madeup a setting, vs starting with a setting and making up a mechanic, I think you'd get the same setting either way (What the game designer wanted) but a different mechanic.

Where some of the confusion lies, John, is that I think that James is assuming (and I definitely am) that the idea is that the mechanics will suggest an entirely new setting and other details. That is, you get done with the "pure mechanics" and then look at them, and see a world that will fit them.

With Hero Wars, had I created them, I'd have looked at them and seen that they support any world, not one specific world. This seems generic to me.

Thierry said:

Another way to do things would be to tinker with game mechanisms until one has found something that works(that is makes an interesting sub-game, for instance) and then think of a theme that fits with it.

Mike Holmes wrote: Where some of the confusion lies, John, is that I think that James is assuming (and I definitely am) that the idea is that the mechanics will suggest an entirely new setting and other details. That is, you get done with the "pure mechanics" and then look at them, and see a world that will fit them.

Mike Holmes wrote: With Hero Wars, had I created them, I'd have looked at them and seen that they support any world, not one specific world. This seems generic to me.

John Kim wrote: Are you saying that system doesn't matter?

Mike Holmes wrote: So are you goint to try it out, Thierry? :-)

I've approached this thought rather differently. It seems to me that a mechanic has "feel" to it that goes beyond what specific outcomes are or how likely they are. We have a tendency to be a bit phobic of breakpoints but I think that where the breakpoints (or other limits that arise purely as artifacts of the sysytem) fall is part of the, umm, experience of the mechanic.

Therefore I think it is possible to identify in a setting a locus of tension (where was that thread on tension in the game space) to which a mechanical limit or breakpoint is to be located for setting-evocative effect; or conversely develop a mechanic which has an array of breaks and limits and then layer a setting on top of that in whch points of tension correspond with the mechanical architecture.

Hmm. I'm struggling to say what I mean.

Mike Holmes wrote: Just that Generic systems tend to by their nature not be better for one setting than another. That's their nature, and are in fact designed that way. A generic system will do a better or worse job at being generic.

Mike Holmes wrote: My point here has been that one could come up with FUDGE using the "create the mechanics first" approach. But to get to MLWM, as soon as you've created the love mechanics, you're on the road to a very specific game, and no longer creating "pure" mechanics. Think about Call of Cthulhu. As soon as you create the Sanity mechanic, which is not a special application of the general rules but has details all it's own, you've gotten away from "pure" mechanics.

You then say "This doesn't work well for all settings. So what settings does it work best for."

I think all systems (generic or not) have tendencies which make them better for some sorts of play than for others. That tendency is independent of setting, and maybe independent of theme. The way the mechanics work suggest attitudes toward play and may contribute to the tone of the game world. I think generic systems are expressions of the designer's desired tendency. D6 suggests high adventure and lots of action where JAGS suggests lots of detail and high verisimilitude. Any generic game can (must?) be tweaked to a specific setting. In the process, it becomes a customized game that may include the sort of interlocked chargen that Mike was talking about earlier.

For example, I might have a generic system of resolution that lends itself to over-the-top combat action. I would consider using it for mecha or any other high-powered fantasy where I want cinematic outcome with lots of special effects. I wouldn't consider it for a low-powered setting, or for a game devoid of combat. Those latter circumstances don't match the tendencies of my design.

I should add that a single mechanic all by itself may not suggest anything. It's the aggregate of mechanics, the evaluation of those mechanics, and the overall thrust of the rules that supply the tendency.

Edit: Typo

Hunter Logan wrote: I should add that a single mechanic all by itself may not suggest anything. It's the aggregate of mechanics, the evaluation of those mechanics, and the overall thrust of the rules that supply the tendency.

Mike Holmes wrote:

Hunter Logan wrote: I should add that a single mechanic all by itself may not suggest anything. It's the aggregate of mechanics, the evaluation of those mechanics, and the overall thrust of the rules that supply the tendency.

Good point. My test may have been unfair (though I could claim that the example was my only mechanic). How about this. Take BRP again, and add my mechanic. That's the totality of the mechanics of the game. Now what do you get?

Actually, I picked BRP because Sanity is not linked to anything else in BRP. So I thought that if the Sanity mechanics could be appended thusly, so could this mechanic.

The mechanic that I've described is a mix of the Civilization boardgame trading mechanic and the poker game "poop on your neighbor". Well regarded mechanics. Hardly inane. Further it's not all that random. There's a lot of strategy involved. For example, if you see a lot of a certain card going around, you may decide that other's aren't collecting that, and to start yourself. High value cards are very sought, but that also makes them less likely to be traded, meaning that making runs of them is hard. Lower cards are easier to collect, and could add up faster. And the number of players playing are key to different strategies. Very like Gin in a number of ways.

I'm trying to play by the rules, here. I picked these at random, yes, but I picked them because I like the mechanics in question. As I said, if I wanted to make a mechanic that couldn't be related to something, I'm sure I could.

Interestingly, I'm starting to actually see your side of the argument through this experiment. I've been trying myself to come up with something that uses this mechanic, and I've made some headway I think.

Ironic, eh? Anyhow, I agree with your assessments that it has to be linked in some way to play. I was thinking that "rounds" could be played around chunks of role-play in which something about the card played would have to be acted out. Perhaps giving clues (GM monitored, I think). So I was thinking about court intrigue or somesuch. Anyhow, this would combat the "tediousness" of the overall mechanic, I think, in that it's use would develop a lot of role-play.

See, I think that my earlier objection about the German Abstract Games was off. Because what I think they do is just make their mechanics and then just tack on a "look"; they aren't interested in being more precise. But you wouldn't stop there with an RPG. You'd tinker with the rules after you'd decided what it looked like.

So, once you've seen what you think the "pure mechanic" might be good for, you'll start to tinker with it. But I'm starting to think that it's not a bad place to start. Why not? I've heard of more bizzare ways to get inspired.

Mike

Mike Holmes wrote:
I'm trying to play by the rules, here. I picked these at random, yes, but I picked them because I like the mechanics in question. As I said, if I wanted to make a mechanic that couldn't be related to something, I'm sure I could.

Mike Holmes wrote: Interestingly, I'm starting to actually see your side of the argument through this experiment. I've been trying myself to come up with something that uses this mechanic, and I've made some headway I think.

Hi Mike,

Your example mechanism is tricky for RPG use because it involves so many simultaneous "moving parts" which is not typical of RPG mechanics. How many RPGs involve simultaneous competition among all the players determining a single winner?

German abstract games have a wider latitude, which allows them to propose concrete interpretations on game tokens. No matter how abstract the game overall, individual tokens on a board are almost always designated as "soldiers" or "bureaucrats" or "ships" or "cities" or "bridges" or "farms" or something equally concrete, and individual cards likewise represent people, commodities, or events. (Note that this is almost directly opposite RPG mechanics, in which the play overall is usually not abstract, being representational of in-game-world events, but the individual elements -- currency points, the numbers rolled on the dice, the dice themselves -- usually are abstractions.)

So I can easily take your suggested mechanism and turn it into:

SOMERVILLE
The Game Of Rents and Roommates

Somerville is a town in transition. It started as a bedroom community for blue-collar workers commuting from nearby Boston. Builders lined the streets with sturdy three-decker apartments, large houses divided into three separately rentable floors. When the local colleges expanded, and the skyrocketing rents in Boston and Cambridge sent students venturing into brave new Zip codes looking for affordable housing, Somerville became a college town. And as some of those students stayed on in town to pursue professional carreers and home businesses, upscale services and yuppie tenants became part of the scene.

As the landlord of a three-decker, your task is to collect a set of tenants capable of paying their rent on time. Each of the three floors of your triple-decker can hold up to four tenants. Tenants, represented by cards, range from Part Time Rock Musicians Expecting Their Big Break Any Day Now to the coveted Obsessively Neat Confirmed Bachelor Tenured Literature Professors.

The rent you can collect depends on the number of same-type tenants living together on the same floor. (Compatible tenants spend less time arguing and making excuses.) A single tenant is worth the tenant's face value (0 to 120 in increments of 10) in monthly rent. A pair of matched tenants is worth four times the face value of the tenants in the pair (counted once, not twice) so a pair of Ambiguously Gendered Neo-Goth Graphic Designers (50's) would be worth 50 * 4 = $200. A group of three matched tenants is worth nine times their shared face value, and a group of four matched tenants is worth sixteen times their shared face value -- so, for instance, four Second Year Law Students Who Are Never Home (100's) would be worth a whopping $1600.

Each round of play, you decide which one of your current tenants gets fed up with (or kicked out of) their current living arrangements and leaves. This tenant moves into another triple-decker; pass him or her to the player on your left. (...etc...) [I'd also add a draw from the deck option; special event cards playable on other players, such as "messy break-up" that forces part of a mixed-gender group to move out; and rules encouraging public display of some tenants, perhaps to meet an escalating minimum rent figure, something like betting and raising in poker but on a more ongoing basis.]

... But it's not so easy to turn it into an RPG mechanism. [rant](Even harder to turn it into a mechanic, because a mechanic is a person.)[/rant]

I could see using the card matches (perhaps with the same three-way division as in the triple-decker game) as components that establish basic character stats, in a milieu where player-character identity is in flux for some reason. Perhaps something like my 1986 LARP The Great Psionic Feud, in which player-characters are composed of separate random fragments of personality in the aftermath of a psi-war that escalated to the equivalent of nuclear, and players must build more fully-integrated and capable characters by swapping fragments during play.

Is this enough of a start to support the proposition of mechanics-first design? I have no doubt that the German game designers tinker with their game mechanics plenty, both before and after the theme and color of a game has started taking shape.

- Walt

Walt Freitag wrote: ...the proposition of mechanics-first design?

Thierry Michel wrote: The Systemist Manifesto ? The Mechanist Manifesto ?

contracycle wrote:
Quick question - what is it about this mechanic specifically you like? Just to ask what sort of things it may be about THIS mechanic that you think are interesting.

Secondly thers a bunch of stuff missing. Can other players see the cards as they are passed? Are there discards?

Off the cuff, I'd posit something like Guild Wars or Merchants of Amsterdam or something. The cards are strapped to commodities in transit through a local or regionally dominant market, hence their ephemeral nature; the act of acquiring a set corresponds to a good solid exchange or seizure of a micro-monopoly on a particular commodity.

Well, the image I had in mind was of sorta merchants viewing the early stock exchange; so the passing from player to player was not a personal in-game interaction but representative of the trades the previous player didn't take up or stayed away from. (bubbles, cons, spoiled, whatever)

Anyway, it was just in the name of experimentation. I liked Walts idea too. But he is right to say that conventional game modes are usually not portable to RPG - for the life of me I can't imagine an RPG implementation of Draughts. As games, as exchanges between players, ye - but how to articulate them in RPG terms is a bugbear.

That said, though, it occurred to me that Black Fire incorporates a two-stage game in a manner something vaguely like an idea I proposed for Mesopotamia - that there is a game to determine what play is about, and "another" game to determine how it is resolved.

So I feel that re-approaching the relationship between player and mechanism (above rant noted) may be the key. CAN we re-phrase the assumptions of perspective such that a game of merchants is feasible? If we assume that direct interpersonal violence is one of the things that abtsracted out of site and out of mind, can we locate the mechanisms in some other field of competition such that it is still recoignisably RPG?

Gareth, you and Walt have some good points about what "kind" of mechanics make sense for an RPG. I retract my example. It's hard to come up with an alternative, however, that's:

A. Suitable for an RPG, and
B. Not from an actual RPG.

OTOH, if we're just saying that we want to steal our favorite mechanics from extant games, and then try to find a premise that the result supports, then cool. That should be do-able, though I think that you'll tend to see the original games in what you produce. Not necessarily, but that'd be the trend, I'd think.

Mike

Another example, then, for a generic resolution mechanism:

Contests are auctioned, every participant (that includes GM) makes a secret bid, highest bidder wins the outcome but pays the price to loser(s).

Your mission (should you accept it): find an appropriate setting.

Is it RPG-y enough ?

Interesting one. Had a post mortem mechanism thought that arose from looking at it.

The essential contradiction here is that if we posit a scenario as simple as a skirmish, the GM wins by bidding high, then pays these tokens/whatever to the players. So the players increase effectiveness (capacity to bid) by LOSING contests. Arguably, by throwing some of them deliberately.

So... that presents a scenario in which the GM bids wads of tokens, the player is simply out bid. This presents a problem as I see no reason that character death should not be a losing condition in a conflict bid. What good is a pile of tokens to a dead character? Aha - they can spend them from the spirit world to aid their companions.

You could have a fairly freaky scenario here in which, sorta like John Constantine's travelling circus of personal ghosts, the game is structured around this idea. You start out with a handful of characters, and over the course of a discrete 'story/adventure/mission' the overt expectation is that these characters will be winnowed until there is only one. (ooh oooh - a highlander mechanism?) As each character dies off - either by graceful concession or by GM malice - they are rewritten as disembodied spirits and the player continues play AS the disembodied spirit. Their stock of tokens - now fixed - can only be spent to assist the remaining characters in the initial group. Wrap this all up in messianic prophecy and we have a structure a lot like a classic heroes quest. The central premise, then, would be "many are called, but few are chosen". Which of the characters is the Chosen One will be determined in play.

Variant: it occurs to me that this mechanism could also be bent to produce the "if you strike me down I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine" thing, becuase of the way losing gains effectiveness. Kenobi's ghostly intervention is very much how I see the tokens being spent from beyond the grave.

Interesting one, could be developed much further I think.

Hm. The way I read that, though, the players are bidding separately, not as a group (as contracycle seems to be suggesting/assuming in his write-up). In other words, Player A, Player B, and GM are all bidding their own SEPARATE tokens for narrative control.

This, to me, lends itself to cooperative intra-party conflict. Player A wants to see X happen. The GM thinks Y might be cool. Player B, on the other hand, has an idea for Z (which might be like X, might be like Y, might be like neither one). Any of these, or none of them, might result in character death. See my discussion on "hit points" below.

Thierry left it pretty open as to who gets paid the price. I'd suggest this particular - the person who bids second-highest gets paid. Everyone else is left in the dust. This encourages people to really put their money where their mouth is - you can't just bid 1 when everyone else is bidding 12 or 13, and then profit for "losing." You have to take a chance.

I would also be tempted to add a rule of some sort for collecting these tokens outside of contests. In addition, they act as "hit points." If someone wins a contest against you, they can declare you lose as many "hit points" as their bid (or less) through appropriate narration. This includes the GM. I like this because it gives an additional reason to bid high if you're the target; someone else might choose to hurt you, and you need a buffer. You can't be killed until you reach zero tokens, and you can't be killed in the same contest that gave you zero tokens (thus giving your character a chance to collect tokens).

But maybe I'm tweaking rules too much for the purposes of the discussion.

I'm imagining a high-intrigue social setting, one in which the players are encouraged to visit complications upon each other's characters. Using tokens as hit points, above, could represent social slights and political setbacks as well as physical damage (in fact, likely more the first). The maneuvering and dealing would happen on both the game and metagame levels...

Hmmm... without access to the rulebook itself here, but ISTR there being an optional rule for the SAGA Marvel superheroes game that used pretty much this mechanic for teamwork by superheroes...

Again, going from swiss-cheese memory here, I think it allowed communication between players about what they had in their hand, which this mechanic would deny.

In a competetive game (a la rune) it could work very well: in a co-operative game like MSHAG, the communication could lead to a lack of dramatic tension, as each round of conflict becomes an open trading session between players, and the individual hands melt into a "card pool" held in common between the players.

I'm trying to get my head around enforcing a HW/HQ style "justify your enhancement" to get a better feel to it: While the idea of using this mechanic to support, say, the X-Men speedball (brick throws martial artist into combat) appeals to me, probably aesthetically more than anything else, I want it to support, say, Mr Fantastic telling the Thing where to punch the Skrull SuperDroid for maximum effect.

But I confess, when I saw the card mechanic, I thought of Superhero teamwork, and only before posting did I realise that Steve Kenson has already done it...

Lxndr wrote:
But maybe I'm tweaking rules too much for the purposes of the discussion.

Thierry Michel wrote: Another example, then, for a generic resolution mechanism:

Contests are auctioned, every participant (that includes GM) makes a secret bid, highest bidder wins the outcome but pays the price to loser(s).

Your mission (should you accept it): find an appropriate setting.
Is it RPG-y enough ?

Here's one I've been kicking around in my head for a while:

Whenever a character needs to perform an action, everyone at the table votes secretly, "Succeed" or "Fail." If more votes are for "Succeed", or there's an equality, the action goes off successfully, and anyone who voted "Fail" gets a bonus. If more votes are for "Fail," nobody gets anything at all.

The better a person is at a particular action/trait/skill, the more votes they can cast when "activating it." If opposing another character, that character can activate a trait for extra votes too. If opposing the GM, then the GM decides the "difficulty."

Yes, this means you can vote a Failure for yourself. Heck, you can vote a Failure for yourself and still succeed.

+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

But now that I've posted that, I wonder if we're maneuvering off the topic somewhat. We've gone from "is it possible to create mechanics in a vacuum, and then come up with a setting that those mechanics encourage or support?" to "hey, here's an example!"

Lxndr wrote: We've gone from "is it possible to create mechanics in a vacuum, and then come up with a setting that those mechanics encourage or support?" to "hey, here's an example!"

I think that's safe.

OTOH, I still think that we're getting a little weird in terms of results. That is, if you want the premise to be grabby, I think you can't do this method alone. I'm reminded of the GAG Maharaja, in which you don't ever feel at all like the game is at all about India, or anything interesting in India.

OTOH, used in combination with working from the other end I think would be highly useful and effective.

Mike

Yeah, well, they are very abstract and context free, so the odd results are not too much of a worry. Now what to do with it.

My holy grail of game design, not being a very creative person myself, is a library of mechanical devices that could be compared against a selected topic. Although pie on the sly at the moment, I could see a point at which we have both vocabulary and a model sufficient to go from concept to implementation; that is, if you had a hankering to do a game on topic X, you could identify a set of crunch points in your topic that need mechanical representaiton, and then run through a cllection of abstract mechanical models looking for one that synchronises with your topical concept.

To do this we would need to develop a theory and language for both game structures and thematic crises. But I think it could be done.

Thwacking an idea from programming, we could look at a library of design patterns, but I'm sure that's been suggested before...

Just a quick description for each component, and it's design consequences...

Frex, from my own floating ideas...

HAND OF DICE:

In a game which relies on rolling dice for results, the player rolls a set of results at the outset of the session (the "hand"), say enough to generate an average of five results (this is less easy to determine in games that use dice pools).

When a result needs to be determined in game, the player selects one of his results to apply to the situation, removes it form the "hand" of results available and generates a new result for the hand.

Consequences: allows players a greater degree of control over random situational results, allowing greater tactical range. Slows down start of game. Abuses possible include frivoulous actions to use up bad results.

Possible developments: number of results in hand can represent damage, fatigue, general situational advantage, and can vary according to tactical or strategic success.

Notes: Inspired by the additional player control demonstrated in WotC SAGA system games.

CORRUPTING MAGIC (mind, body and soul)

In a fantasy game, use of magic runs the risk of changing the character in either Mind, Body or Soul. The damage can be in the form of Atrophy, Hypertrophy or Corruption. The nine possible combinations of these can be further marked down by degree (three degrees?), with freeform description by player or GM.

Consequences: magic becomes personally risky and "dark." Experienced magic users tend to the grotesque and inhuman. Parts of consequences easily modelled in most game systems (especially Tri-Stat!). Implies that "normal" humanity is the peak of perfection. Abuses possible if changes provide apparent game advantages without sufficiently balancing limitations.

Necessary developments: Are the changes purely the result of "botches", or can a character trade magical power for personal corruption? The first choice leads to a "slide into inhumanity" feel to me, while the second leads to more faustian stories.

---------------

The trouble is that, for example, these two design elements are quite different forms of design (one purely mechanical, the other a partly mechanical expression of a dramatic theme), so the taxonomy would have to be fairly wide...