Let's talk about "plot", "story", and "play to find out."

[zakael19]

The circular argument here seems to be that "because I'm aware I'm playing a game I can't stop being aware I'm playing a game?"

And I just want to reiterate: when you frame things as "FICTION BADNESS HAPPENING, characterX what do you do?" and then the character goes "I do cool awesome thing!" then we go "hell yeah that's awesome! so like, trying to do Y?" and they're like "yup, so that Z" and then we go "ok, so that's Risky but Limited, because you know..." it all seems to feel pretty fiction->mechanics.

Another benefit of most Special Abilities is that they're couched as "when you do COOL FICTIONAL THING you get to do..." and I've never had issues with players then going "ok so like as the barrage of sparkfire comes in you see Sol dive forward and clasp his bracer and a massive energy bubble appears - I'm going to spend 2 stress and use Charmguard to stop this while yelling 'I'll hold them, you guys stop him from getting away!'"

idk it just works for me, and because they don't have to ask permission they can narrate that awesome fiction with a defined cost and we see it play out.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Yes, of course you think it was clear. You stated it. But I don't think it was clear because you said "do you stop..." so I asked specifically what you mean. Do I stop what?

You didn't actually answer that, you just pointed out to me that the question was in fact clear.

OK, fair enough.

Now, you did elaborate a bit aside from what you meant by "stop". I generally decide based on what I think my character would do. Sometimes, yes, that is the obviously better choice for them. But often it isn't... because people very often act against their own interests. We see it all the time in the real world and all the time in fiction. I don't think RPGs should be any different.

I certainly agree.

My characters can be all sorts of people. So what they would do or not will vary. But in almost all cases, I'm making decisions with the character as the primary consideration. Not all decisions require this as much... I mean, using Special Armor or not if it's available is a pretty simple choice... I use it when it first comes up. Because I don't know if it will come up again in the Score. That's a pretty gamist decision, but it's also one the character would make... why wouldn't they want to resist a consequence if possible?

Because you can usually also use the special armour for something else, to push yourself, so you might want to save it for that. Or the consequence for that specific thing is something you feel you can deal with and you want to save your special armour in case of something worse. Many reeasons. But I actually agree with you that from "what would the chracter do" perspective it probably makes most sense to use it in the first instance; like dad thing happens, I reflexively try to avoid it. Though of course it is somewhat questionable to what degree the chracter even is aware of such an ability in the first place.

If you approach play with the kind of risk mitigation fostered by early D&D... where eventually, everyone's got ten foot poles and bags of piglets to send into rooms ahead of the party and all that other nonsense... it'll be jarring. So don't play that kind of character.

Yeah, absolutely, that is not something I want to see in any game. And when I talk about playing smart or utilising the rules tactically, this is not what I mean. Characters can and should do stupid and reckless things. But should the player try to use mechanics smartly so that the character has better chances to survive their recklessness?

My previous post asked for clarification that you said was unnecessary. This is what I'm saying... accept what people are telling you. If I don't think a question you've asked is clear and ask for clarification, maybe accept that and answer the request for clarification instead of insisting that the question was clear.

I still don't know what you meant by "So you do not stop to consider the mechanics when you play?"

Sincerely... what do you mean by this? Stop doing what, exactly? I think this may matter quite a bit. I could certainly be wrong, but I think it's at least worth discussing to be sure.

Forget the word "stop." It was really not the relevant part. I merely mean at to what degree you consider the implications of the mechanics when making the decisions in the game. Like Do you consider whether the next resist roll could fill your stress gauge or not when deciding whether to resist? Do you consider how many ticks there already are on the danger clock? Do you consider who can most afford to take stress when deciding a group action? All sort of these gamey things. What impact they have on your decision making?

Now the "stop" part might be relevant in sense that does you group ever spend time discussing these things in midst of a game?

I don't disagree with your take on Hit Points versus the Harm system used in Blades. Hit points are really just a pacing mechanism. Nothing changes at all as they are lost, except that the character in question is closer to unconsciousness and/or death. Harm makes things far more specific, and has consequences as it accumulates.

Yes. And I think clocks and the stress gauge in Blades are rather similar.

But I think there's more abstraction involved in the process in Blades. Like in D&D, we know what causes Hit Point loss. If you're hit by an attack or by a spell, you will lose X number of HP, based on the weapon, attacker, and/or the spell (and whether you save or not). The process defines this, and the dice then tell us if HP are lost and how many.


In Blades, Harm is one of many consequences that a PC could face, depending on the circumstances. The process itself is less clear... it's up to the GM to determine an appropriate consequence. Sometimes, that's very easy. What do we do? We look to the fiction first. What's the situation the character was in? Is there a very obvious consequence? Are there more than one likely consequence?

This is where the GM goals and principles come into play. All of the following would play a part in this:

• Convey the fictional world honestly
• Telegraph trouble before it strikes
• Follow through
• Let everything flow from the fiction
• Bring the elements of the game system to life on the screen
• Advocate for the interests and capabilities of the NPCs

If the GM is doing all these things, he likely has an idea of what makes sense as a consequence. He'll use what's already been established in play, what the NPC wants to accomplish (if applicable), and then follow through accordingly.

All of these bullet point items can be found and elaborated upon in the book on pages 187 to 200. This is what fiction first means... you always look to the fiction first for guidance on what to do, or what happens, or what's next.

Yes, sure. It was not about that though. My point is that like in D&D abstracted things like hit points and turn order may lead people thinking foremost in the terms of rules, similar abstracted thing in the Blades lead to this as well. That was my point.

And when the thinking gets on this sort of abstract tactical territory, making decisions based on "what my character would do" sorta becomes weird or even impossible. The character is not thinking in those terms to begin with.

And to sidestep arguing over how "meta" mechanics in Blades specifically are, let's just posit a hypothetical mechanic that clearly is meta. The player can spend a plot point to alter a scene, or alter a die result and that sort of things. So then a decision to what how to use this mechanic cannot be made by "what would the character do" metric, as it is not the character making decision about it.

And I think with sufficiently abstract and detached mechanics, we sorta get into similar territory.

I understand it, but I don't often find it to be the case in my games. But instead of worrying about that... do you have an example from play that you can share? Not some whiteboard hypothetical, but an actual example that came up in your game?

Share that and we can look at it and analyze it.

It was not really about problem in our game, it was about some posters saying that making most interesting story was a player goal in the Blades.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Yes, it's all subjective Micah. So what?

Here's my subjective opinion... the reasoning behind the "it takes me out of the fiction" mindset any time game mechanics are brought into things is mindbogglingly silly. We're playing a game... games have rules and procedures. Those will come up whenever we play a game or talk about playing a game.

You are welcome to feel that way, but referring to my feelings on this matter as "mind bogglingly silly" is not the most polite way to make a point.

 

[pemerton]

I've never played BitD, and don't know it super-well, but thought I'd have a look at what the rules say about clocks: Progress Clocks | Blades in the Dark RPG

This seems like it's relevant to the current conversation:

Remember that a clock tracks progress. It reflects the fictional situation, so the group can gauge how they’re doing. A clock is like a speedometer in a car. It shows the speed of the vehicle—it doesn’t determine the speed.​

There is also this:

Generally, the more complex the problem, the more segments in the progress clock.​

But presumably, for clocks that represent a threat/danger rather than progress, the opposite is true: the more pressing the threat/danger, the fewer segments in the clock. As the rules say,

In this case, when a complication occurs, the GM ticks one, two, or three segments on the clock, depending on the consequence level.​

So if the GM starts ticking off a four-segment clock, the players know that the heat is pretty hot! Whereas if it's an eight-segment clock, they know that they have a little bit of breathing room. How do the character's have this knowledge? They're there, in the thick of it, exercising their full cognitive and sensory capabilities.

(Of course there's a degree of contrivance/lampshading there. That's the same as any RPG where the players know that their PCs have some sort of mechanical "buffer" against total devastation at any moment - like hit points in D&D, the "will to live" in the BW family of games, the harm system in Apocalypse World, knowing that one rifle shot can't kill my Traveller character who has 7+ in STR, DEX and END, etc. Clocks don't seem to raise any new issues in this respect.)

When the threat/danger clock is full,

the danger comes to fruition—the guards hunt down the intruders, activate an alarm, release the hounds, etc.​

The relationship between this, and the ticking, seems a little bit like that between the individual action declarations in a Torchbearer 2e extended conflict, and then establishing the final consequences once the conflict is over: the fiction that is narrated with each tick is what then establishes the nature of the consequences when the clock is full.

And it also seems like it would create the context for actions that "untick" the clock: Like, if the clock is "the guards release the hounds", and one of the ticks of the clock (as it approaches full) is "the guards go to release the houndmaster", then (say) locking the houndmaster's door and throwing away the key might be an action that "unticks" the clock.

Those who know the game better than me can of course clear up any error/confusion in the above, but to me it doesn't seem that complicated.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

So I have played maybe one session of Apocalypse World about which I remember basically nothing. But by the rules, I think PbtA is way more fiction first than FitD. I think a player could play PbtA somewhat functionally without knowing any of the rules, merely by just considering the fiction and telling what their character does. I do not think you could really play FitD this way. There are just too many gauges and widgets you need to manage for it to work.

Given that PbtA is a newer game and clearly inspired by PbtA I find this interesting. Certainly someone felt that this extra layer of complexity was beneficial. And from gamist perspective it clearly is; there is a level of mechanical management where there is gameplay that simply is absent in PbtA. But I'm not sure I care for it, and it is exactly those bits that I feel chafe against the stolen cars scoundrel life vibe the game is going for, so it is somewhat perplexing design choice to me.

I really need to play PbtA properly at some point to verify my hypothesis in practice. Maybe something else than the Apocalypse World itself, as I find the edgy and cool writing style somewhat aggravating and somewhat opaque. Can someone recommend me a PbtA game that explains the functioning of the engine plainly and clearly? (I heard Dungeon World is bad for some reason...)

 

[Lanefan]

Mostly from that being of a full character (in the literary sense) and looking at ourselves. We goof up all the time. Sometimes due to stress and pressure, more often due to our foibles or blind spots or traumas, and sometimes just due to a lack of full awareness of the situation in which we find ourselves in. (This last one including the classic player knowledge vs character knowledge, but it's also how like hindsight is 20/20 with the greater perspective.)

OK, fair enough.

There's often no need for any artificial or forced creation of 'drama' because it will come up organically through playing the character (again, in the literary sense, not the "I have a 12 in stealth and a sword that does a d6 damage" sense). And where the mechanics of these types of games come in to encourage this is in both toning down the penalties/consequences for doing it as well as sometimes providing a 'reward' for it (be it XP or a metacurrency or a narrative boon). Other mechanics in the games may also tie the character's values, status/position, foibles, virtues, and other more non-tangible traits as part of the resolution mechanic, either on every test or for in bursts (such as when spending a metacurrency), all working to highlight those non-tangible elements and what makes the character that character (and not someone else who also has a 12 in stealth).

Makes sense except for one thing: for me, the two bolded bits are in direct conflict.

Organically playing the character (which to me implies at least a decent degree of immersion and first-person thinking) ideally shouldn't involve meta-anything, because you're thinking (as best you can) as the character would think; and it doesn't really get much more artificial than the acquisition and spending of metacurrency.

 

[zakael19]

And it also seems like it would create the context for actions that "untick" the clock: Like, if the clock is "the guards release the hounds", and one of the ticks of the clock (as it approaches full) is "the guards go to release the houndmaster", then (say) locking the houndmaster's door and throwing away the key might be an action that "unticks" the clock.

Yeah, especially for a faction or fallout clock type thing which might be ticking away over a longer period - the players might absolutely want to figure out ways to halt or reverse that consequence. We had a “character’s brother possessed by demons” clock and the ghost/demon focused player did some stuff in downtime to tackle that and give them extra breathing room! When they succeeded, we made the result transparent by unticking that clock a bit.

Given that PbtA is a newer game and clearly inspired by PbtA I find this interesting. Certainly someone felt that this extra layer of complexity was beneficial. And from gamist perspective it clearly is; there is a level of mechanical management where there is gameplay that simply is absent in PbtA. But I'm not sure I care for it, and it is exactly those bits that I feel chafe against the stolen cars scoundrel life vibe the game is going for, so it is somewhat perplexing design choice to me.

What extra complexity? Have you actually read AW1e or 2e? It's fairly complex! THere's many types of harms, the players need to know their playbook moves and the basic moves so they can actively shift teh fiction towards triggering them to push for their player goals (sounds familiar), you've got all these extra subsystems that come in (cars! gangs! hardholdings! barter! etc) .

Just like Blades is pretty freaking simple at its core and collapses down (Action Roll, Resistance mechanics when you need it), AW can also collapse down if you decide not to engage with it.

But when you play PBTAs like Apocalypse World, the designer always intended players to be active an intentional about building interesting fiction to support the execution of moves, and the moves in turn were designed to force interesting fiction.

 

[Lanefan]

So, I think I see what you are getting at, but you are keeping it so generic as to make it less clear.

Let us take an example that avoids specific rules.

Joe is playing a goblin. Moderate intelligence, not the highest Wisdom. He's on a heist in a wizard's tower, trying to acquire the famous, rune-fletched arrow Beanslicer, rumored to be in the wizard's library.

They've made their way to the laboratory, just next to the library. In the lab, bolted to a large, heavy workbench, there's a finely crafted box, with a little brass plate on the side, inscribed with the words, "Wish Generator". On the top of the box is a Big Red Button^TM. Or alternatively, make it a BigHonkin'^TM Diamond on the table, that might have a magical protection on it.

What are Joe's thought processes in his decision whether or not to push the button or grab the diamond?

Unfortunately, without knowing anything more about Joe's established character history and personality this can't really be answered.

Does Joe have a history and-or characterization of being highly goal-oriented? Or of being greedy? Or of being a bit try-anything gonzo? Or of being cautious to a fault? That's what'll determine the answers to your questions here, assuming of course that Joe's player plays Joe with any degree of medium-term consistency.

 

[Lanefan]

My previous post asked for clarification that you said was unnecessary. This is what I'm saying... accept what people are telling you. If I don't think a question you've asked is clear and ask for clarification, maybe accept that and answer the request for clarification instead of insisting that the question was clear.

I still don't know what you meant by "So you do not stop to consider the mechanics when you play?"

Not @Crimson Longinus but I'll take a guess: the question is whether - in the clocks example - you're looking at the state of the countdown clock on the table and taking that meta-information into consideraton when deciding what your character tries next, even though your character might very well have limited or no idea where such things stand.

Put another way, if the countdown clock was DM-visible only (or even only in her head) and you-as-player never knew its current status, would your play of your character be any different than when the clock is up-front visible to you-as-player.

Sincerely... what do you mean by this? Stop doing what, exactly?

Again a guess: "stop" thinking as your character first-person in favour of meta-thinking about how to stop or beat that clock staring at you across the table.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

What extra complexity? Have you actually read AW1e or 2e? It's fairly complex! THere's many types of harms, the players need to know their playbook moves and the basic moves so they can actively shift teh fiction towards triggering them to push for their player goals (sounds familiar), you've got all these extra subsystems that come in (cars! gangs! hardholdings! barter! etc) .

Just like Blades is pretty freaking simple at its core and collapses down (Action Roll, Resistance mechanics when you need it), AW can also collapse down if you decide not to engage with it.

But when you play PBTAs like Apocalypse World, the designer always intended players to be active an intentional about building interesting fiction to support the execution of moves, and the moves in turn were designed to force interesting fiction.

I have Apocalypse World 2e. I have read properly ages ago, and I've been skimming ti lately. To me it seems simpler. The moves are pretty self contained. Most of your stuff is just moves, and you can just do them and then they say what happens. I think is more straightforward than FitD's action rolls combined with resistance rolls. And there is no stress gauge or anything analogous to it to manage, which makes things a lot simpler and less gamey.