How Visible To players Should The Rules Be?

[pemerton]

Thank you for the detailed response. One of these days I need to pick up a copy of a BW game (probably in the form of Torchbearer).

But I still don't understand how this "scene as a basic unit of play" mechanism removes the kind of GM author stance you seem in your posts to be so opposed to.

I don't know what "GM author stance" means. Can you please explain?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

because of player-PC identity

No, but because of rule-fiction identity.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Thank you for the detailed response. One of these days I need to pick up a copy of a BW game (probably in the form of Torchbearer).

But I still don't understand how this "scene as a basic unit of play" mechanism removes the kind of GM author stance you seem in your posts to be so opposed to.

It really doesn't.

 

[Reynard]

I don't know what "GM author stance" means. Can you please explain?

You seem to take issue with the GM deciding stuff. But by your definition of scene framing, the GM decides that. How do you square those? Or am I misunderstanding you on some level?

 

[Lanefan]

If information is common knowledge in the fiction, and so "freely given" by the GM, then that should conform to the agreed setting/genre.

But if information is being "gated" behind a check, then that suggests that something is at stake in knowing it, or being ignorant of it. And this is where the play of the game is to be found. Hence why I prefer that it be something that the player actively engages with - the player should be playing the game.

And what's at stake might be no more than the simple fact of knowing or not knowing whatever it is, for later reference.

The issue with "pixel hunting" seems to me to be a different one. That is a result of the GM hiding the stakes - for instance, adopting the approach that @Lanefan has advocated in this thread of framing low-stakes or no-stakes scenes, of foregrounding low- or no-stakes information, etc. I gave the example upthread, from my own game, or the red-painted idol of a muscular, long-tongued humanoid. The player who found that idol did choose to make a Theologian test to see if their PC recognised it, but failed the test - in the fiction, the PC picked up the idol but then her gaze was caught by a Corpse Candle, floating up from the pond in the cavern below.

Curious: before the player failed that test, had you already narrated the Corpse Candle (or the pond, or the cavern below) as being part of the scene?

If the test had succeeded, she would have recognised it as a carving of a demon from the Outer Dark, which would have given them a warning as to the demon imprisoned in the caverns they were about to enter, and also a chance to do further research in the library at the Wizard's Tower.

In an earlier session, I had rolled a result of indecipherable notes when determining, via the random roll method for Torchbearer 2e, what was in the pockets of a defeated bandit. The same player, playing the same PC, had her act on her Instinct to read every word. The test succeeded, and so I was obliged to have the notes be something worthy of having taken a chance on: they were directions, written in a wizard's cypher that the PC was able to break, telling how to get from Stoink (the nearest city) to the Tower of Stars (where the bandits had been defeated).

The general principle here is that, if every test/check is one that has stakes that are known to the players, or that they can be confident will immediately reveal themselves, then the notion of "pixel hunting" evaporates.

Assuming one wants the notion of pixel-hunting to evaporate, that is. I'd far prefer their having to check too many things than my leading them by the nose through only describing the one relevant thing in a scene.

Sometimes the stakes are a long way from the here-and-now and-or might never become known. In your example of the red-painted idol just above, maybe recognizing it as a demon serves no purpose at the moment; its relevance won't appear until later when they start seeing that same motif painted in red on some walls and to pass those walls to get through to the demon realm requires them to have the idol. And if the PCs for some reason never reach those walls, then whatever stakes the idol involved will forever remain a mystery.

 

[aramis erak]

I have a legitimate question: is Burning Wheel a Play To Find Out Game? If so, how does it do Scene Framing in a satisfying way, since neither the scene nor the framing can be known beforehand. If not, what separates it from other RPGs where the GM tells you (the group) where you are and what's happening.

Pemerton's description is pretty spot on...

The key things about BW resolution are IMO:

• The player must state both the method and the result
• the GM must clarify if either method or result is unclear before setting stakes
• The player and GM must agree on the failure stakes.
  • If they can't the action can be aborted.
• The ability to back down does NOT solve whatever the action was premised upon, but avoids rolling for unacceptable stakes.
• The GM is not there to impart his/her story, but to facilitate the players' stories...
• The Rule Zero of BW is "Don't be a dick." This should guide all the above.

It's possible to use scene resolution or individual problem resolution, whichever is suitable to the scene and group. (Bloody Versus is essentially a fight scene resolved in one roll.)

The GM is supposed to be responsive to player narrations...
It's a play to find out what the story will be. Much like AW is purported to be.
It's not the Cosmic Patrol style "Play to find out how."

 

[Reynard]

Pemerton's description is pretty spot on...

The key things about BW resolution are IMO:

• The player must state both the method and the result
• the GM must clarify if either method or result is unclear before setting stakes
• The player and GM must agree on the failure stakes.
  • If they can't the action can be aborted.
• The ability to back down does NOT solve whatever the action was premised upon, but avoids rolling for unacceptable stakes.
• The GM is not there to impart his/her story, but to facilitate the players' stories...
• The Rule Zero of BW is "Don't be a dick." This should guide all the above.

It's possible to use scene resolution or individual problem resolution, whichever is suitable to the scene and group. (Bloody Versus is essentially a fight scene resolved in one roll.)

The GM is supposed to be responsive to player narrations...
It's a play to find out what the story will be. Much like AW is purported to be.
It's not the Cosmic Patrol style "Play to find out how."

My question was more about who decides what scene is framed, specifically because there seems to be an issue about GM authorship here.

 

[Lanefan]

"To succeed without even trying" is a figure of speech. It's hard to take it literally, given that success implies an attempt, and "attempting" and "trying" are pretty close to synonyms.

I disagree (perhaps obviously), in that the way I see it achieving success doesn't need an overt attempt. One can in fact succeed without trying (or attempting; I agree they're synonymous), and probably does so a thousand times a day without even realizing it.

But in any event, we are talking about a particular activity: the play of a game.

You seem to be conflating stuff in the fiction - does the PC recognise a bird or a banana - with stuff at the table - does the player succeed in their action.

Given that one is in theory intended to reflect the other, IMO that conflation is valid.

That, and while you see it as the player succeeding, all the player and GM have done is successfully spoken some words and (most likely) understood what each other is saying. In the fiction is where success or failure occurs, and that in-the-fiction perspective is the one I care about.

In having raised this notion of the GM declaring that a player auto-succeeds before the player even gets to declare an action, I am talking about the play of the game. What happens at the table.

If the GM decides to tell the player something before the player had even made a move or declared an action, that is not the player auto-succeeding.

No, it's the character auto-succeeding.

If, when a character looks into a room, I mention among other things that there's an over-ripe banana on the table, that implies a number of trivial-scale auto-successes on the character's part:
--- she noticed the banana
--- she recognized it as a banana
--- she knows enough about bananas to tell when one is over-ripe
This all happens without her player having to waste time telling me "I look for bananas and check the ripeness of any I find" as part of the "I look into the room" declaration, and also happens without my having to get the player to determine the character's knowledge of bananas.

Now this might be different if, say, the PC is from a culture and-or part of the game world where bananas are nigh unheard-of; in that case I'd narrate the colour-size-shape of it and then get the player to roll to determine whether the PC in fact knows what it is and-or what it is for. No real stakes to the roll, though; it's purely informative.

 

[Lanefan]

Sure, the setting matters in how I handle this stuff. But as I said… we live in a world where such runic circles aren’t used and yet we’re aware of them. Folklore and myth are powerful sources of information. Especially in worlds without other means of communication.

With this I agree.

However, folklore and myth aren't necessarily consistent from one place/culture to another; meaning that what one culture's folklore and myth (and even current knowledge!) says about such circles might be very different to what another's says.

Thus, a faux-Roman might look at such a circle and scoff at the childish scribbles on an otherwise nice clean floor; a Dwarf might look at the same circle and see it as a demon ward; and an Elf might look at it and wonder where its teleport leads to.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I’m reasonably sure it was about how those games function differently, and how familiarizing one’s self with them would likely help with understanding how differently games can function.

Because many folks lack understanding of those games but don’t show any hesitation in asserting things that such understanding might prevent.



How do you move from scene to scene in a game?

Some ways are obvious… you move to the next door and open it, and we have a scene dealing with whatever’s inside.

But outside such a structure as a dungeon crawl provides to play, how do you handle it? Let’s say the PCs are back in town after their most recent expedition.

Do you prompt them? “Anyone got anything they want to sell? You know the market is open until sundown.”

Do you ask in an open ended manner. “Does anyone have anything they want to do in town?”

You don’t roleplay every moment of the PCs’ existence, so you must have some means of skipping things. Some way of deciding what to skip and when. What is it?

Whatever it is, once it’s determined, the next thing you do is scene framing.

“You arrive in the outdoor market with just a few minutes of sunlight left. Some of the merchants are already packing up their wares for the evening.”

Or…
“Okay, Finn wants to check with his contact in the thieves’ guild to see if they know anything about the missing magistrate. Holgar says he wants to go carousing at the tavern. Let’s handle Finn first. You’re on the rooftop that serves as a meeting place for the Moon Runners….”

This is just scene framing. It’s present in every RPG. Call it whatever you like, you do it all the time. I’d think having a two word phrase to sum it up would be convenient.

I prompt them in a naturalistic way. What I never do is ask, "so are you guys ready for the next scene?"