A Discussion in Game Design: The 15 minute work day.
I love to talk about game design, and I haven’t written a good article in a while, so I figured I would kill two birds with one stone and post this.
If it generates good discussion, I might even make a series of it.
Note I have also attached a word version of this that's easier to read for those who like that.
So without further ado, lets get started.
Defining the Subject: Do we have a problem?
What is the 15 minute workday? Everyone has their own personal version of the concept, but to generate a good discussion we need to define the concept specifically.
The 15 minute workday occurs when characters engage in an adventuring activity that drains them of resources in some way. This could be loss of health, expending of abilities, etc. Instead of continuing said activity, the character chooses to refrain from the activity in order to recover the lost resources. Done to an extreme, the character is said to only engage in adventuring activities for “15 minutes a day”.
Now the first question, is this actually a problem? If we question specific gaming groups, this varies quite a bit. Some groups may only have one combat or “adventuring activity” per day, per week, etc. To them this isn’t an issue at all. Some gaming groups have entire sections of campaign take place over the course of a few days, to them it can seem like quite a problem.
Ultimately to me, what defines this as a problem is the fact that a game system at its core, is designed to model archetypes. Since Dnd is traditionally a Tolkeinesque fantasy archetype, let’s consider it from that perspective. In many fantasy stories, the Hero will face countless challenges. Commonly, the hero will face one challenge after another. He doesn’t rest or stop, he keeps on fighting. He may face hoards of minions only to face his great nemesis immediately afterwards. Yet while realism would tell us the Hero at this point would be utterly exhausted and barely capable of fighting, often in the story he fights the villain with an even greater strength not yet seen.
A character that chooses to face danger again and again makes for a great story, and for many is a staple of the fantasy archetype. If the 15 minute workday is commonly occurring, that flies in the face of that archetype. That makes it a problem, or at the very least, a concern that should be looked at.
The Problem is Incentive
Note that in the section above I bolded the fact that the player is choosing to cause the 15 minute workday, this is not some high decree from the DM.
When it comes to choices, incentive plays a key role. And since so much of what makes an rpg is the player’s ability to choose his actions…incentive becomes a critical factor in any game design. To that end, this is my personal take on the subject.
Stalker0’s Credos of Good Game Design: A modest gaming system allows the playing of an archetype. A great one provides incentive to do so.
I applaud anyone who is willing to act in character for no better reason than it is in character. But to me, what is even better is if the system provides the mechanical benefit for acting in character. Now not only does the player feel good because he is playing the spirit of his character (the flavor) but he feels good because he is enjoying tangible rewards (the mechanics).
With this is mind, the real problem with the 15 minute workday is a conflict in Incentives, which is the following.
Incentive 1: I want my character to act bravely and heroically.
VS
Incentive 2: I want my character to be strong and powerful.
The first incentive encourages a player to fight, and then bravely face the next challenge even if he is wounded, drained of resources, etc.
The second incentive encourages a player away from adventuring. Players want to feel powerful, and for many games, dnd included, the character is at its strongest right at the beginning of the day. Adventuring actually drains a character’s resources (making it weaker) while resting replenishes resources (making it stronger).
Within every player this conflict arises to its own degree. A player may choose one incentive over the other, but there is always that small inner hesitation and regret at having to give up one to have the other. And hence, the problem is born.
4th Edition: Handling the Problem
While I’ve played in several gaming systems now, since most of us are dnd players or have experience with it I will use it as a baseline for the discussion.
The designers of 4th edition recognized the issue with the 15 minute work day, and built mechanics into their system to correct it.
The major points:
1) Always on abilities (at-will powers)
2) Encounter based recovery of abilities (encounter powers)
3) Encounter based recovery of wounds (healing surges).
These three points are designed straight at incentive 2. In each fight a character loses resources. However, at the end of the fight, he gets some or all of those resources back. Furthermore, at will powers ensure that no matter how many encounters a character has, he will always have some “cool abilities” to fall back on.
Overall, this is a move in the right direction as far as rebalancing the incentives go. However, it only goes so far. The system is fixing the issue by “removing the stick”. A player is still getting weaker by adventuring (losing surges, losing dailies) just not as much. So the system isn’t encouraging the player to adventure more heroically…its just not punishing him as much.
That’s good….but it could be even better.
Finding the Perfect Answer
In the last section we talked about stick incentives. 4th edition has eased up on a stick somewhat in order to prevent the 15 minute adventuring day.
So what if we go even further…how about no stick at all? What if we made it so that a character was fully recovered after every encounter. Now a character is always at its maximum power no matter how many fights he goes through. We no longer have to worry about appeasing incentive 2, a player can act as heroically as he wants and never feel that his character is getting weaker. Problem solved right?
The problem is solved…but the answer creates its own set of problems. First of all, it cuts down on variety. If my character is literally reset every fight then things can get very repetitive. Second, we have to remember that for many people allowing their character to “nova” (using a lot of expendable resources in short order) is a way to feel that strength and power that is Incentive 2. And let’s not forget that another heroic archetype is when the hero “gives it all he’s got”. It’s hard to do that when you get everything you just gave right back 5 minutes later”
So stick isn’t the answer, lets turn to the carrot. How do we get our two incentives to work together instead of against each other. The general answer is the following:
A character should gain strength and power over multiple encounters.
Written like that, the answer seems pretty simple. If my character actually GAINS power from multiple fights and encounters, then suddenly my two incentives reinforce each other. On the one side, I get to act like a hero, playing out all the fantasy stories I’ve read and heard about. On the other, now I get play a character whose always powerful, in fact, may even be more powerful the more heroic I am!
Suddenly resting becomes the enemy, and adventuring the cure. With this concept, a DM no longer has to encourage his players to act in a heroic manner, now the system takes care of that.
However, we don’t want to take this concept too much to the extreme either. For our more realist gamers out there, having a character who is straight up more powerful after three grueling fights doesn’t make a lot of sense either.
So how do we put this concept into practice? We will look at 4th edition again to apply our new concept.
What’s interesting is, 4th edition has already created this concept…they just didn’t use it very much. The concept is the milestone.
The milestone itself doesn’t do anything, however, it is the things that are based on it. Action Points are the first things to come to mind, but they are not a good example. You gain an action point every milestone…but you always get 1 for resting. So again less stick, but no real carrot. However, there are some magic items that are based on milestones.
My favorite one is an armor that gets +1 AC every milestone. So lets take a fighter that has accomplished a grueling 6 combats in a single day. He’s low on dailies, low on healing surges, and definitely has a good incentive to rest. However, he now has this special +3 to AC that he couldn’t get anywhere else. He may in fact now have the highest AC he has ever had…which will go away once he takes a full rest. The fighter has lost power in one way, but gained it in another.
The problem in my opinion is that 4th edition doesn’t really use this wonderful concept for all its worth. What if more things were based on milestones? What if certain powers or feats got better with milestones…or paragon path abilities? What if certain really cool abilities could only be used after you had obtained a milestone?
If we increased the number of power sources for characters that were based on milestones, it would allow a character to compensate for their loss of power in new and interesting ways. A player would lose some resources by adventuring but gain new ones. Overall the player can choose to play his character with the flavor he wants, and the system is behind him, not against him.
Finale
I hoped you enjoyed the article and that it generates some good discussion.
I love to talk about game design, and I haven’t written a good article in a while, so I figured I would kill two birds with one stone and post this.
If it generates good discussion, I might even make a series of it.
Note I have also attached a word version of this that's easier to read for those who like that.
So without further ado, lets get started.
Defining the Subject: Do we have a problem?
What is the 15 minute workday? Everyone has their own personal version of the concept, but to generate a good discussion we need to define the concept specifically.
The 15 minute workday occurs when characters engage in an adventuring activity that drains them of resources in some way. This could be loss of health, expending of abilities, etc. Instead of continuing said activity, the character chooses to refrain from the activity in order to recover the lost resources. Done to an extreme, the character is said to only engage in adventuring activities for “15 minutes a day”.
Now the first question, is this actually a problem? If we question specific gaming groups, this varies quite a bit. Some groups may only have one combat or “adventuring activity” per day, per week, etc. To them this isn’t an issue at all. Some gaming groups have entire sections of campaign take place over the course of a few days, to them it can seem like quite a problem.
Ultimately to me, what defines this as a problem is the fact that a game system at its core, is designed to model archetypes. Since Dnd is traditionally a Tolkeinesque fantasy archetype, let’s consider it from that perspective. In many fantasy stories, the Hero will face countless challenges. Commonly, the hero will face one challenge after another. He doesn’t rest or stop, he keeps on fighting. He may face hoards of minions only to face his great nemesis immediately afterwards. Yet while realism would tell us the Hero at this point would be utterly exhausted and barely capable of fighting, often in the story he fights the villain with an even greater strength not yet seen.
A character that chooses to face danger again and again makes for a great story, and for many is a staple of the fantasy archetype. If the 15 minute workday is commonly occurring, that flies in the face of that archetype. That makes it a problem, or at the very least, a concern that should be looked at.
The Problem is Incentive
Note that in the section above I bolded the fact that the player is choosing to cause the 15 minute workday, this is not some high decree from the DM.
When it comes to choices, incentive plays a key role. And since so much of what makes an rpg is the player’s ability to choose his actions…incentive becomes a critical factor in any game design. To that end, this is my personal take on the subject.
Stalker0’s Credos of Good Game Design: A modest gaming system allows the playing of an archetype. A great one provides incentive to do so.
I applaud anyone who is willing to act in character for no better reason than it is in character. But to me, what is even better is if the system provides the mechanical benefit for acting in character. Now not only does the player feel good because he is playing the spirit of his character (the flavor) but he feels good because he is enjoying tangible rewards (the mechanics).
With this is mind, the real problem with the 15 minute workday is a conflict in Incentives, which is the following.
Incentive 1: I want my character to act bravely and heroically.
VS
Incentive 2: I want my character to be strong and powerful.
The first incentive encourages a player to fight, and then bravely face the next challenge even if he is wounded, drained of resources, etc.
The second incentive encourages a player away from adventuring. Players want to feel powerful, and for many games, dnd included, the character is at its strongest right at the beginning of the day. Adventuring actually drains a character’s resources (making it weaker) while resting replenishes resources (making it stronger).
Within every player this conflict arises to its own degree. A player may choose one incentive over the other, but there is always that small inner hesitation and regret at having to give up one to have the other. And hence, the problem is born.
4th Edition: Handling the Problem
While I’ve played in several gaming systems now, since most of us are dnd players or have experience with it I will use it as a baseline for the discussion.
The designers of 4th edition recognized the issue with the 15 minute work day, and built mechanics into their system to correct it.
The major points:
1) Always on abilities (at-will powers)
2) Encounter based recovery of abilities (encounter powers)
3) Encounter based recovery of wounds (healing surges).
These three points are designed straight at incentive 2. In each fight a character loses resources. However, at the end of the fight, he gets some or all of those resources back. Furthermore, at will powers ensure that no matter how many encounters a character has, he will always have some “cool abilities” to fall back on.
Overall, this is a move in the right direction as far as rebalancing the incentives go. However, it only goes so far. The system is fixing the issue by “removing the stick”. A player is still getting weaker by adventuring (losing surges, losing dailies) just not as much. So the system isn’t encouraging the player to adventure more heroically…its just not punishing him as much.
That’s good….but it could be even better.
Finding the Perfect Answer
In the last section we talked about stick incentives. 4th edition has eased up on a stick somewhat in order to prevent the 15 minute adventuring day.
So what if we go even further…how about no stick at all? What if we made it so that a character was fully recovered after every encounter. Now a character is always at its maximum power no matter how many fights he goes through. We no longer have to worry about appeasing incentive 2, a player can act as heroically as he wants and never feel that his character is getting weaker. Problem solved right?
The problem is solved…but the answer creates its own set of problems. First of all, it cuts down on variety. If my character is literally reset every fight then things can get very repetitive. Second, we have to remember that for many people allowing their character to “nova” (using a lot of expendable resources in short order) is a way to feel that strength and power that is Incentive 2. And let’s not forget that another heroic archetype is when the hero “gives it all he’s got”. It’s hard to do that when you get everything you just gave right back 5 minutes later”
So stick isn’t the answer, lets turn to the carrot. How do we get our two incentives to work together instead of against each other. The general answer is the following:
A character should gain strength and power over multiple encounters.
Written like that, the answer seems pretty simple. If my character actually GAINS power from multiple fights and encounters, then suddenly my two incentives reinforce each other. On the one side, I get to act like a hero, playing out all the fantasy stories I’ve read and heard about. On the other, now I get play a character whose always powerful, in fact, may even be more powerful the more heroic I am!
Suddenly resting becomes the enemy, and adventuring the cure. With this concept, a DM no longer has to encourage his players to act in a heroic manner, now the system takes care of that.
However, we don’t want to take this concept too much to the extreme either. For our more realist gamers out there, having a character who is straight up more powerful after three grueling fights doesn’t make a lot of sense either.
So how do we put this concept into practice? We will look at 4th edition again to apply our new concept.
What’s interesting is, 4th edition has already created this concept…they just didn’t use it very much. The concept is the milestone.
The milestone itself doesn’t do anything, however, it is the things that are based on it. Action Points are the first things to come to mind, but they are not a good example. You gain an action point every milestone…but you always get 1 for resting. So again less stick, but no real carrot. However, there are some magic items that are based on milestones.
My favorite one is an armor that gets +1 AC every milestone. So lets take a fighter that has accomplished a grueling 6 combats in a single day. He’s low on dailies, low on healing surges, and definitely has a good incentive to rest. However, he now has this special +3 to AC that he couldn’t get anywhere else. He may in fact now have the highest AC he has ever had…which will go away once he takes a full rest. The fighter has lost power in one way, but gained it in another.
The problem in my opinion is that 4th edition doesn’t really use this wonderful concept for all its worth. What if more things were based on milestones? What if certain powers or feats got better with milestones…or paragon path abilities? What if certain really cool abilities could only be used after you had obtained a milestone?
If we increased the number of power sources for characters that were based on milestones, it would allow a character to compensate for their loss of power in new and interesting ways. A player would lose some resources by adventuring but gain new ones. Overall the player can choose to play his character with the flavor he wants, and the system is behind him, not against him.
Finale
I hoped you enjoyed the article and that it generates some good discussion.
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