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Hello All,

I had an experience I thought I would share.

So, my weeknight group is playing Spycraft.  Now, I consider Spycraft to be a fairly Gamist facilitating game.  From the game mechanics it is pretty clear that the purpose of play is to have the players achieve their mission objective while the GM acts as an impartial referee.  It's very much the easily recognizable Gamist set up of Players vs. Scenario, GM Refs.

Side Note: If the whole Director Stance does not equal Narrativism discussion ever comes up again, Spycraft is a good game to point to because it contains a lot of (controlled) Director Stance manchanics that are structured clearly for Gamist priorities.  

Anyway, I'm GMing this thing and to make my life easier I'm running a prewritten adventure available off the Spycraft Website called Back To Basics.  Now when I was reading this scenario I was, very, very impressed by something.  In this scenario there is what amounts to several relationship maps and a boat load of personal conflicts between NPCs that have absolutely nothing to do with the mission objectives or the built in combat/action sequences or at least seem to make the action sequences about more than just "do we survive."

What I saw while studying the scenario was ample opportunity for one or more players to shift their focus on the game if they wanted to.  If suddenly a player decided they wanted to express their character dealing with blowing their cover to help this NPC keep their job the space was there.  It didn't really happen with my group but something DID happen that I found very interesting.

In the scenario the players are sent in to investigate the theft of some rocket fuel at a nearly forgotten reseach installation in Spain.  They are given a list of important NPCs who work at the installation: The Chief Officer, The European Union Contact, The Lead Technician, Two Technitions, The Head of Security, and Three Guards.  Now here's the relationship map plus the conflicts that threaten it:

Technition A and Technition B are in love and having an affair.  The Lead Technition is jealous, hates Technition A and is trying to move in on Technition B.  Technition A is the brother of Guard A.  The Head of Security is convinced that the theft was an inside job and that Guard A is responsible since it was his key card that was used to access the lab.

That leaves The Chief Officer, The European Union Contact, and Guard B and Guard C outside of this little sub drama.  The interesting thing is that Guard B is the inside man on the fuel robbery.  He does have one MINOR connection in that he drugged Guard A to steal his access card.

Now here's what happened that I found so interesting: The players got instantly and so completely sucked up into the first group of NPCs that they almost immediately ruled out the second set of NPCs without even talking to them.  I know they didn't ever interacted with Guard B or C AT ALL.  Now the NPC - PC interaction never went beyond, "extract information to advance the scenario" style play but they kept going around and around and around that first set of NPCs trying to figure out what they missed.  Finally, they had to resort to the Spycraft Inspiration Check mechanics to get a hint from me.

I found this highly interesting and goes to show that even when the game isn't focused on Narrativist style ethical and moral choices the relationship map technique is powerful enough to completely derail an adventure designed with different goals.

As an aside I also found it interesting that the adventure awards a 25 XP bonus for "Helping Guard A keep his job."

Hope that was interesting.

Jesse

QuoteAs an aside I also found it interesting that the adventure awards a 25 XP bonus for "Helping Guard A keep his job."

Yeah, you occasionally used to see this in tornament play at cons. Players were awarded for doing something that was "in character" or heroic. Often at odds with the other goals of play, and rarely accomplished because of this. Even amongst verteran players who knew that these sorts of rewards were in there, however, the result is still gamist play. "Hey, lets ensure that the guard keeps his job because I think there might be a reward in it for us." Supposedly a reward for "Role-playing", these sorts of things certainly don't produce the sort of Actor mode play that perhaps the designers think it will. Instead it just makes for a different sort of gamist challenge (figuring out what the designers think that players should be doing).

Mike

Being, of course, a player in Jesse's game I can honestly say that helping the gaurd keep his job was done completely in Actor stance.

The gaurd in question was assaulted and drugged by an invisible assailant the night several thousand pounds of rocket fuel was stolen from this facility.  Seeking to discover how exactly this happened (we were sent to investigate, after all) I first checked the gaurd's body for puncture wounds thinking possibly he had been hit with a tranquilizer dart.  Not finding any, I used a chemical analyizer I picked up during the "gearing up phase" originally for the purposes of tracking the rocket fuel.  After sampling a bit of the gaurd's saliva it was discovered that the man had, in fact, been drugged with chloroform.  Thus, he was not a willing accomplice in the theft and should (the adventure isn't over yet) keep his job... providing he survives the impending firefight implicated by last Monday's cliffhanger.

Anyway, my point is that Gamist play had nothing whatsoever to do with aiding the gaurd to keep his job and what I did I did completely within Actor stance.  We were sent to investigate and that's what I did.  The thought of an XP award was the furthest thing from my mind.  What the XP award did was reinforce that Spycraft is not just about sweeping in and shooting up places with advanced weaponry.  It's also about subtlety, roleplay and attention to NPCs.  I expect this will, in fact, trigger the sort of Actor mode the designers hope it will because the mechanics support it and Jesse is a competent enough GM to realize when he's got an opportunity for some good storytelling.

For me, the player (a Gamist, in fact), it didn't set up "Gamist challenge" so much as indicate that good roleplaying and investigation of relationship maps will be supported and awarded (with plot reprocussions, changes in said relationsip map and interesting character development in addition to XP awards).

Even as a Gamist, good roleplaying and well-developed characters are worth more than XP.  Discovering the chloroform in the gaurd's spit with a device I picked up for something totally different is what sticks to my ribs, not 25 measly XP.[/i]

Oh yeah, one more thing.  Jesse says that the adventure got "derailed" by our investigation of the well constructed relationship map.  As a player I didn't feel anything getting derailed at all.  We had a lot of fun delving in to the rich background provided by the scenerio and when we had enough of that we used the mechanics to move things forward.  It was brilliant.

I'd also like to clarify that from my perspective the "extract information to advance the scenario" style of play Jesse talks about was actually just us playing our characters... a bunch of secret agents with a cover story sent to investigate a fuel theft.  In my mind I was in Actor stance pretty much the whole time, hopping into Author from time to time to color my character a little but mostly just wrapping myself in the game's Premise (will you figure out who the bad guys are and kick their ass?).  So um... yeah.  I wasn't playing so much form a "advance the scenerio" place as a "what the hell is going on and how do I figure out who dunnit" kind of place.

There was one scene in which the Faceman of the group (a woman, acutally) did, in fact attempt to insinuate herself into the personal lives of the NPCs but it didn't really get anywhere.

Anyway, Jesse was all:

QuoteI found this highly interesting and goes to show that even when the game isn't focused on Narrativist style ethical and moral choices the relationship map technique is powerful enough to completely derail an adventure designed with different goals.

I don't feel the adventure was designed with diffent goals at all.  What's the point of having a detailed character map unless the writer thought it'd be fun for the PCs to ride around on it?  I think we capitalized on fun stuff the author meant for us to have fun with.

Being, of course, a player in Jesse's game I can honestly say that helping the gaurd keep his job was done completely in Actor stance.

The gaurd in question was assaulted and drugged by an invisible assailant the night several thousand pounds of rocket fuel was stolen from this facility.  Seeking to discover how exactly this happened (we were sent to investigate, after all) I first checked the gaurd's body for puncture wounds thinking possibly he had been hit with a tranquilizer dart.  Not finding any, I used a chemical analyizer I picked up during the "gearing up phase" originally for the purposes of tracking the rocket fuel.  After sampling a bit of the gaurd's saliva it was discovered that the man had, in fact, been drugged with chloroform.  Thus, he was not a willing accomplice in the theft and should (the adventure isn't over yet) keep his job... providing he survives the impending firefight implicated by last Monday's cliffhanger.

Anyway, my point is that Gamist play had nothing whatsoever to do with aiding the gaurd to keep his job and what I did I did completely within Actor stance.  We were sent to investigate and that's what I did.  The thought of an XP award was the furthest thing from my mind.  What the XP award did was reinforce that Spycraft is not just about sweeping in and shooting up places with advanced weaponry.  It's also about subtlety, roleplay and attention to NPCs.  I expect this will, in fact, trigger the sort of Actor mode the designers hope it will because the mechanics support it and Jesse is a competent enough GM to realize when he's got an opportunity for some good storytelling.

For me, the player (a Gamist, in fact), it didn't set up "Gamist challenge" so much as indicate that good roleplaying and investigation of relationship maps will be supported and awarded (with plot reprocussions, changes in said relationsip map and interesting character development in addition to XP awards).

Even as a Gamist, good roleplaying and well-developed characters are worth more than XP.  Discovering the chloroform in the gaurd's spit with a device I picked up for something totally different is what sticks to my ribs, not 25 measly XP.[/i]

TW,

You're making some odd points. For example, did you know that the 25 EXP bonus was available? I'm assuming not, and that it therefore had no effect at all on the play in question. My point had nothing to do with your session, but the impact of such designs on play in general. That is that amongst player who have been canalized to play a given Gamist game in a Gamist manner, that such Gamist players, knowing that such rewards exist will trat tham in a gamist manner. I'm not theorizing, I've seen it happen in a number of cases.

As for your other claims, you say that you're a Gamist, but that you stayed in Actor mode the whole time, only coming out into Author mode to create color. That sounds very Simulationist to me. Your decisions seem to soley be based on "what would the character do" or "what would such a character do in this sort of game". That's Simulationism. At waht point did you decide to do things just to beat the scenario? That would be Gamist play. You even point out how you weren't interested in the success metric provided by the game, EXP as much as playing the character correctly. To a Gamist EXP are worth more than "good role playing and well-developed characters". That is exactly what Gamism is. (note that the phrase "good roleplaying" is useless in this instance because to a Gamist playing OOC might be considered "good roleplaying" as an example) Gamism is prioritizing success over "well-develloped characters" and stuff like "story".

Jesse's point was not that the Relationship Map did something wrong, just that it provided a direction to play that was counter to that with the otherwise Gamist rules (I'll have to trust him on this, I haven't read them closely) would have provided. Which seems to make sense. He's simply speaking to the strength of that particular design method to produce a particular sort of play. Which you seem to be agreeing with.

You seem to be disagreeing with something, but I'm not sure what.

Mike

Quote from: Mike Holmes
You seem to be disagreeing with something, but I'm not sure what.

Two things.  One was Jesse's use of the word "derailed".  I don't really think the scenerio (or the game for that matter) was "derailed".  Two was you saying, regarding the 25 XP: "Supposedly a reward for 'Role-playing', these sorts of things certainly don't produce the sort of Actor mode play that perhaps the designers think it will."

I disagree... I think it does and it will.  Mostly, though, I'm not really making any points at all.  I'm just kinda trying to provide a red lens you can toss up next to Jesse's blue one to get a more three dimensional view of the situation.  Maybe that's why my points seemed "odd".

Just as a quick side note:  I've run this adventure and barely anybody noticed the relationship map.  

And another thing: the module says, and there's a way for the players to find out, that "Guard A" is a narcoleptic.  The moment the players heard that, they immediately wanted to make sure he *didn't* keep his job, for obvious reasons.

Quote from: TrizzlWizzlTwo things.  One was Jesse's use of the word "derailed".  I don't really think the scenerio (or the game for that matter) was "derailed".  

I see. But all he was saying was that much of the printed material didn't get addressed. The players were taken off the Gamist rails of the rest of the adventure, and routed into the Relationship Map. Not a bad thing, just probably not what the designers intended. Else why put in the other stuff?

QuoteTwo was you saying, regarding the 25 XP: "Supposedly a reward for 'Role-playing', these sorts of things certainly don't produce the sort of Actor mode play that perhaps the designers think it will."

I stand by that. I think that you're just a Simmy player, and Jesse is a Narr GM. No surprise that the Gamist portion got lost. So, you are correct in that it was partly Jesse's "fault" that the game went the way it did. If he had presented it in a more Gamist fashion, it may have occured that the play would have been more Gamist (but, who knows; Contrary to Fact, Conditional to Error).

Again, I'm speaking in general terms of Gamist design. You are an individual, and therefor will not necessarily respond the way I predict. Given your Sim seeming leanings, I am actually not surprised at all.

QuoteI'm just kinda trying to provide a red lens you can toss up next to Jesse's blue one to get a more three dimensional view of the situation.

Gotcha. Cool. Thanks.

Mike

Quote from: Mike HolmesBut all he was saying was that much of the printed material didn't get addressed. The players were taken off the Gamist rails of the rest of the adventure, and routed into the Relationship Map. Not a bad thing, just probably not what the designers intended. Else why put in the other stuff?

You'd be right if that's all we did in the adventure, but it's not over yet.  All we did last session is investigate the Rel. Map... the "Gamist rails" are yet to come, but what I'm saying is it feels like the designers fully intended for the players to take plenty of time having fun with the complex interrelationships of the people the PCs were sent to investigate.  The "other stuff", i.e. the impending firefight (at least, I hope a firefight is impending ;)) and whatever else is to come will, I have no doubt, support the more action/adventure tendancies of the system.

As long as we're talking about the system itself and whether or not I personally am a simulationist or a gamist, I'd like to put forth the idea that Spycraft is far more a genre simulationist system than gamist.  Which is maybe why I like it so much... it does a great job facilitating the feel of the spy thriller genre.  With it's Budget Point system, Action Die mechanic and obvious encouragement of "non-Gamist" exploration of the setting (I know "exploration of the setting" is like a GNS term or something, but I'm using Webster's definition here, not Edwards), I don't really see how it can be considered "Gamist".  One could, of course, approach it with a Gamist mindset and still be content with the rules, but not as much as with say 3E.

QuoteI think that you're just a Simmy player, and Jesse is a Narr GM. No surprise that the Gamist portion got lost. So, you are correct in that it was partly Jesse's "fault" that the game went the way it did. If he had presented it in a more Gamist fashion, it may have occured that the play would have been more Gamist (but, who knows; Contrary to Fact, Conditional to Error).

No argument there except to say that, from experience, I find Jesse to be far more a genre simulationist than narrativist in a GM capacity.  Hoping that Jesse doesn't mind me talking about him and with all respect due, I think Jesse is quite interested in the theory of what "Narrativism" means and implies but in terms of running Spycraft he's running it just the way I think the designers wanted it run, which is in a manner that simulates the genre.  Which I think is rad.  'Cause... it's been a kewl game so far.

I don't know where you get the word "fault" from... "fault" indicates a mistake of some kind.  So far I haven't seen any mistakes from Jesse's game.

Anyway, I don't know where I fit in the Sim/Gamist axis.  I think I'm certainly a little of both, but as far as Sim goes I'm definately more of a genre simmy than a "I can't believe a H&K SOCOM only does 1d12 points of damage what were they thinking" kind of simmy.  I'm definately gamist in terms of how I like my rules (I like them to cover what I can or can't do and what I can objectivly expect from the setting), but I never really feel a need to "get more stuff", "advance another level" or "beat the DM".

At any rate, Jesse's game has been fun.  I don't think we've deviated too far from what the designers had intended and I think the way we're playing is consistant with both the genre and the system.  So far the game has included something for everybody, which is how I like my games... everybody getting a lil' sumthin' for themselves.

TW,

Thanks for providing input.  Actually, I think that "derail" was a bit harsh and in fact almost immediately rethought the use of that word after I put up the post.

Mainly I was observing how those NPCs involved in real everyday human conflict immediately grabed the groups attention while those not, litterally became side characters rather quickly and naturally.  In this thread:

Relationship-map Issues

Ron talks about how we're basically biologically hardwired for this kind of thing.  The first time I used an explicit relationship map in a game (a Deadlands game I was running) over the course of three or four sessions the number of significant NPCs had been pared down to just the immediate members of one particular family.  Again, this happened rather naturally.

I was just commenting on how powerful a tool it is, for ANY style of play since everytime I've encountered a game that used one in any shape or form it immediately grabbed the players attention in some way.

Jesse[/url]

Quote from: TrizzlWizzl... I'd like to put forth the idea that Spycraft is far more a genre simulationist system than gamist.  Which is maybe why I like it so much... it does a great job facilitating the feel of the spy thriller genre.  With it's Budget Point system, Action Die mechanic and obvious encouragement of "non-Gamist" exploration of the setting (I know "exploration of the setting" is like a GNS term or something, but I'm using Webster's definition here, not Edwards), I don't really see how it can be considered "Gamist".  One could, of course, approach it with a Gamist mindset and still be content with the rules, but not as much as with say 3E.

Well, then maybe Jesse's Gamist assessment is incorrect. :-) As I said, I was trusting his analysis there.

QuoteNo argument there except to say that, from experience, I find Jesse to be far more a genre simulationist than narrativist in a GM capacity.  Hoping that Jesse doesn't mind me talking about him and with all respect due, I think Jesse is quite interested in the theory of what "Narrativism" means and implies but in terms of running Spycraft he's running it just the way I think the designers wanted it run, which is in a manner that simulates the genre.  Which I think is rad.  'Cause... it's been a kewl game so far.

I'm sure that's accurate. When it comes down to it, sometimes there's little difference in action.

QuoteI don't know where you get the word "fault" from... "fault" indicates a mistake of some kind.  So far I haven't seen any mistakes from Jesse's game.

Which is why I put it in quotes. As in to say, its not really a fault (since the game seems to be going well), just the reason why it went the way it did.

QuoteI'm definately gamist in terms of how I like my rules (I like them to cover what I can or can't do and what I can objectivly expect from the setting), but I never really feel a need to "get more stuff", "advance another level" or "beat the DM".

Well, then that's definitely Sim. In fact that might improve on the current defintion in terms of clarity. "Sim rules should cover what one can objectively expect from the setting." Very cool. Aviods tangling with "realism" nicely. What one expects in a Spy game is probably not "Realistic". Or is Spycraft supposed to be "realistic"? I was assuming that it was more "actiony".

How about it Jesse? Might Spycraft be more Sim: exploration of situation (spy missions) than Gamist? In which case EXP for helping people and such is much more likely to produce Actor stance?

Mike

Quote from: Mike Holmes
Well, then maybe Jesse's Gamist assessment is incorrect. :-) As I said, I was trusting his analysis there.

How about it Jesse? Might Spycraft be more Sim: exploration of situation (spy missions) than Gamist? In which case EXP for helping people and such is much more likely to produce Actor stance?

That is entirely possible.  I will be the first to admit that I readily get confused between Gamism and Exploration of Situation.  This confusion has stemmed mostly from discussions about Call of Cthulhu.  Often Call of Cthulhu is talked about in terms of emphasising Exploration of Situation.  That seemd odd since it seems to put all "mystery" style games where the focus is actually on solving the mystery into Exploration of Situation.

But I've always viewed Call of Cthulhu as a kind of mental Gamism.  Can I figure out what's going on here before my character dies or goes insane?  But then maybe that's because I've always taken a kind of competative approach to the mystery genre especially when I GM.  Can I construct my clue chain in such a way that my players fall for all the red herrings and can I keep them confused and in the dark up until the point when I WANT the tumblers to all fall into place?  Even when I read mystery novels I approach the book from a me vs. the author point of view.  Can I figure out who did it before the author tells me?  And so on.

And thus I was kind of reading Spycraft from the same point of view.  Can I achieve my mission objectives without getting killed?  

But TW has some good points.  I think it's entirely possible that the rules are written from the perspective that the players will "win" as a kind of given.  Especially, in a game where "failure" could mean nuclear winter for your campaign setting.

So yeah, I can buy that Spycraft is much more geared towards Exploration of Situation than Gamism.

Jesse

With Cthulhu, the system does push quite a bit of Gamism.

The question with Spycraft is, are there Hit Point resources? Or is wounding more realistic? Is there a Sanity or other resources? Things that tend to throw you into Pawn mode as you play? Or does it keep you in "I'm a spy" mode, by emphasizing how things work in a consistent, yet non-"balanced" way?

My guess is that it's going to be somewhere in between. Like most D20 where you have that same incoherence. It sounds like the Situation and setting may be tipping the scales in favor of Sim in this case. And given you and your players then that easily drifts to a solid center there.

Makes sense to me with the description so far.

It's interesting that a lot of D20 games coming out are trying hard to drift the system to Sim. I wonder how well d20 CoC does, and if in fact it's more or less Sim than the original.

Mike

Okay, so what's the difference between Exploration of Situation as opposed to Exploration of Setting?

QuoteI was just commenting on how powerful a tool it is, for ANY style of play since everytime I've encountered a game that used one in any shape or form it immediately grabbed the players attention in some way.

Well, that's partially true.  It's powerful when you do it Jess becuase you're good at it, you like it, you're interested by it and it drags the players in.  When I try stuff like that it's not quite as successful... it doesn't totally suck but you somehow find a way to breathe a little more life and color into your NPCs than a lot of other GMs I've played with <ahem>.

What I'm saying is that Rel Maps are indeed powerful tools but like any power tool one has to have a little skill and knowlege to use it right.  Some do, some do not.