Yeah, well the X-card idea was first published in 2013, iirc. The breakthrough there may have been less the X-card itself, and more than we really ought to think about this stuff, and maybe have tools on hand for it.
Have You Used The X Card Or Seen It Used In Person?
- Thread starter Reynard
- Start date
Yeah, well the X-card idea was first published in 2013, iirc. The breakthrough there may have been less the X-card itself, and more than we really ought to think about this stuff, and maybe have tools on hand for it.
Reynard
aka Ian Eller
People don't often think of them this way, but TTRPGs are a remarkably intimate form of play. Even when playing casually, you are inviting someone else into your fantasies. Inevitably, some people will overstep lines, intentionally or not.
A breakthrough? Before 2013, I assumed most groups were like mine and used verbal communication tools successfully when ill at ease like the "no, can we just stop?" tool, the "no, naming the BBEG after your stepmother isn't nice, be more mature" tool or the "well, let's fade to black or fast forward, guys?" tool (when they were not preemptively avoided with the "hey, let's talk about next game" tool (the ancestor of session 0). The fact that it took the community as a whole as late as 2013 to start thinking about everyone having fun and be comfortable at the gaming table means that, well... that's why X-cards are needed.
Old Fezziwig
hell yes bro
Lines and veils go back to at least Sex and Sorcery by Ron Edwards, which was published in either 2003 or 2004, but despite the fact that I had heard about Sorcerer back then, I don't think I heard about lines and veils until 2010ish or so, which is kind of bananas. Having tech that explicitly considered talking about this stuff, or (rather, since it existed) knowing about it and using it, would have been a good thing. I was a player in a group playing a Midnight game in the mid/late 00s where one of the other players (thankfully not the GM) was very enthusiastic about whatever the undead fetus was from the Midnight monster book. It came up in idle conversation after a session -- I think we were two or three games in before he brought it up. I remember the group shutting down the conversation quickly, which was nice, and he was booted for that and some other things shortly thereafter. But it would've been great to not have had that conversation at all.
This conversation reminds me of an older safety tool - deciding not to play with someone again.
That only came up once for me. I was the DM and it was in the first session of an
AD&D 1e game in 1996.
The group was my college gaming buddy (we had both played a ton of AD&D but not in about 6 years), his wife who had never played an RPG before, and his buddy from a different game.
The guy I didn’t know (playing a Halfling) decided to kill some orc prisoners. I said OOC, they are considered POW’s and traded for human prisoners in this campaign, are you sure?My old friend was playing a Paladin and said “no”. Their characters came to blows and the Halfling died in the fight. We didn’t invite the player again.
That only came up once for me. I was the DM and it was in the first session of an
AD&D 1e game in 1996.
The group was my college gaming buddy (we had both played a ton of AD&D but not in about 6 years), his wife who had never played an RPG before, and his buddy from a different game.
The guy I didn’t know (playing a Halfling) decided to kill some orc prisoners. I said OOC, they are considered POW’s and traded for human prisoners in this campaign, are you sure?My old friend was playing a Paladin and said “no”. Their characters came to blows and the Halfling died in the fight. We didn’t invite the player again.
MGibster
Legend
I don't consider RPGs to be an intimate form of play. Not any more intimate than most other social activities.
I remember this tool! It was notably used in 753 BC by Romulus who booted Remus out of his homebrew Kingmaker LARP.
Sorry about the sad story, especially when new players are involved. But I don't think any kind of tool would have stopped him. If he was insisting on killing prisonners despite verbal communication, he obviously wouldn't have changed his behaviour even if you had made insistent eye contact with him while tapping the center of your support flower.
As another poster mentionned, they are not safety tools, they don't increase your safety. They allow identifying a problem, not solving it. Booting an abusive player is still what you do after having used a safety tool (talking) to let him know you aren't OK.
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Reynard
aka Ian Eller
Ok. So, when you are at some friend of your kids' birthday party, do you look at the Das you are having small talk with and say, "It is really important to me that I get to stop this injustice against elves because it reminds me of what my grandfather went through"?
The Firebird
Commoner
I wonder if this may be one of the key divides in the conversation. It probably isn't a coincidence that the first safety tools (apparently?) were designed by Ron Edwards for more narrative-first games, nor that the X-card has grown in popularity with the advent of more narrative heavy games.
Personally, I find little use for the X card, but most of the public games I run are PG-13, AL based, standard fare. They are meant to be laid back and low stakes. Then I like OSR games which emphasize puzzle solving and interacting with the environment moreso than connecting emotionally with the characters. As such, the emotional state you describe isn't one I've encountered in my gaming, nor is it common among my players. Might that be true for other people who find it an odd addition to their games? Hypothesizing more so than describing here.
Reynard
aka Ian Eller
The intimacy I am talking about doesn't have to be explicit or intentional. I am saying that the mere act of sharing fantasies -- even dumb power fantasies -- is an intimate act.
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