Role-playing Theory

[InzeladunMaster]

I recently read an interesting article on role-playing theory.

It starts out thus: "My straightforward observation of the activity of role-playing is that many participants do not enjoy it very much. Most role-players I encounter are tired, bitter, and frustrated. My goal in this writing is to provide vocabulary and perspective that enable people to articulate what they want and like out of the activity, and to understand what to look for both in other people and in game design to achieve their goals."

Here is the Article.

 

[thormagni]

(Moved this from the Tolkien/Howard/Lovecraft thread, since it probably belongs here more properly)

I think a system that does away with class and level would be very interesting. I could see just a big book of things you could choose from via spending EXP or something to that degree. I think Rolemaster might play like that somewhat...

Yessiree, that is almost exactly the way it works in the classless and levelless games I am familiar with. They usually use a point-buy system during character generation. You pick and choose what abilities and skills you want. Later, as you earn XP, those translate in one way or another back into character building points, where you select other abilities and skills you want to add or improve. The general idea is that characters made with the same number of points are roughly equivalent in overall usefulness in the game.

It is really only after you explore a classless and levelless system that you realize how narrow and confining systems like D20 really are. I mean, your choices on your character development are so narrow. Every fighter at Level x, has roughly the same skill points, roughly the same hit points, roughly the same to hit bonus, roughly the same number of feats. Every wizard at level x has roughly the same number of spells of the same power level.

To make up for that narrowness, D20 has allowed all this multiclassing and a near-infinite number of prestige classes. But each of those other classes are equally confining. And they force you to take things you may or may not want, in an order that you may or may not want them.

And that doesn't even get into the game mechanics of the system. Each of which brings an entirely different feel to the game itself. In some, combat is dark and gritty, with a high chance you will die every time you engage in a fight, so everyone is tense and wary in battle. With others, combat is heroic and loose and you have bonuses for doing things flashy and cool. Some use a lot of tactical, wargaming manuevers with detailed measurements. Others are entirely games of the mind, where drama and description are more important.

 

[thormagni]

I recently read an interesting article on role-playing theory.

Umm. Wow. I'm not sure my brain can handle that much analysis of games. That is really an overwhelming amount of dissection in a very stentorian academic writing style. And the author's initial deflection of criticism by outlining who and what types of criticism he will take is just distasteful.

 

[thormagni]

OK. I got through most of it. My first thought is that he went an awful long way to say that he thought that AD&D and Champions were failed role-playing systems.

My second thought is that I disagree with him completely on the idea that trying to tell stories through RPG is a moronic goal for playing. I concede that I am possibly the moron he is talking about, but I very much think that role-playing games are at heart a joint story-telling enterprise. The GM and players agree upon a setting and some ground rules of genre (used here as a description of the conventions and mores of the joint game world.) Then the GM sets a plot in motion, detailing the goals, motivations and schemes of the various non-player characters and points of conflict between the NPCs and the PCs. The PCs are then introduced to the plot and the "game" is all about deciding jointly how the two groups of characters interact and how those interactions affect the plot.

Rather than thinking this is stupid, I think this is the heart of what I enjoy about role-playing. It is a joint enterprise, requiring a give and take between the players and the GM to develop a plot and story. I mean, he ridicules the entire idea of this sort of give and take.

I can't believe he found hundreds of disaffected players who just sit on their hands saying "My character does nothing."

 

[thormagni]

The sources of my ire:

All of these games are based on The Great Impossible Thing to Believe Before Breakfast: that the GM may be defined as the author of the ongoing story, and, simultaneously, the players may determine the actions of the characters as the story's protagonists. This is impossible. It's even absurd. However, game after game, introduction after introduction, and discussion after discussion, it is repeated.

I'm just not getting it. This seems to me to be the standard mode of play. Some GMs make their story more rigid, some more fluid. But the GM sets the plot and then reacts to how the players alter the plot through their action. There certainly is a give and take.

I have met dozens, perhaps over a hundred, very experienced role-players with this profile: a limited repertoire of games behind him and extremely defensive and turtle-like play tactics. Ask for a character background, and he resists, or if he gives you one, he never makes use of it or responds to cues about it. Ask for actions - he hunkers down and does nothing unless there's a totally unambiguous lead to follow or a foe to fight. His universal responses include "My guy doesn't want to," and, "I say nothing."

Again. I don't know that in my time role-playing that I can think of ANY player that I have had who has ever reacted this way.

 

[InzeladunMaster]

Not to sound like I agree with the author (after having read it after posting the link, I find myself disagreeing with several points as well), I have met players who "do nothing" unless led by the hand to do something. I have met players (and had a few in my games) who refuse absolutely to accept the plot proffered by the GM and will not go on the prepared adventure, often citing lack of motivation.

I have also played in games where the GM is basically telling his story, and occasionally allows the players to do something, so long as the choices are limited. Basically some GMs master their games like a "Choose Your Own Adventure" book from the 80's. The player is there to listen to the plot arc and there are right and wrong actions - just like in those books. I have even been guilty of it. It is called rail-roading.

The Conan adventure "The Black Stones of Kovag-Re" is this sort of game - if players actually react the way I think they will (immediate violence against the initial captor), that module is over before it begins. The module presumes players will just accept that they are enslaved and must do as they are told. There is no give-and-take in that module. It is a problem I see over and over again when GMs post their "Awesome" introductions to adventures. And, fortunately for me, none of my current players would go for it (you guys are the best!).

But I have had players in the past who would give me nothing and was only interested in what I had to offer.

You are right though - what you identify as our standard mode of play is our standard mode, I think.

 

[Grimhelm]

And I think this was a major problem I sensed with 3rd ed. some time ago. I think that 3E sometimes requires more module like play and stifles the sort of improvisational style I prefer.

In the past two years of DMing, I am constantly amazed at the players and my interaction and how entire plots and history has unfolded just because I was not prepared! I love that about the game, and I think this is really what I loved about the old days of playing. I remember someone asking if you could go back to 1st edition. I think they were onto something. Of course, those rules are very outdated, but the way in which we played is timeless. I would join up again and play if this were the case. Or, I could extend my hand to all, Vince included, and say, 'come and play in Arenaia.' I can then show you how I like to play, without attempting to explain it...

 

[Fyrestryke]

Heck, the last "I don't know how many" adventures for the online game were ran without ANY preperation on my part (I'm sure the guys are reading this). Plus, I was still continuing adventures that IM had started running many moons ago. I actually created some "bad guys" many months ago and just last Sunday was finally able to drop those monsters on them. They are now finally getting to a point where I actually need to be prepared due to my own lack of knowledge on the subject and I won't let them down. Yet, every adventure, off the cuff or not has been a blast for me and the players (or so they tell me ). The online game is a lot more role-playing heavy than most games mainly due to the medium in which it exists (IRC). In my opinion, this actually fosters better role-playing as well as more role-playing. Combat in this medium just tends to slow things down (as was horribly evident last week). Uh-oh, I'm starting to ramble. Better stop.

 

[InzeladunMaster]

See, I prefer action to conversation in a game. To me, what a lot of people call "role-playing" is just a good way to get exposition and plot in the game. The fun parts are the action parts.

Rolling down a mountain, my hands around my enemy's throat, howling in victory at the end or dying while trying my damndest to win is why I role-play. 'To crush the enemy and see them driven before me,' that is what is best in role-play. When I GM, I delight in seeing my players crush the enemy. Frankly, some of the best darned fights I have seen have been in the Conan games. Those games ran red!

Role-playing, to me, is just making character appropriate choices. A character, faced with death and having no weapons, who accepts that death but grapples with his slayer in an attempt to take the enemy with him, made a choice. Another type of character, who fearfully accepts his fate, has made another. If those choices match the character, then it was well-roleplayed - regardless if conversation happened.

Talking in character? That I can take or leave as it happens or not happens. I don't accept the equation, role-playing = talking in character.

I doubt I would enjoy Rolemaster because the I understand the combat is cumbersome. Action and combat are why I role-play. To me, that is what I disliked about 3E DnD - the combat became cumbersome with magic. Character generation does not really matter to me. I tend to create primal, archetypal characters anyway. My question about any given system is - how fast and furious is combat?

If we switch systems for Inzeladun, it will need to have a good, bloody combat system that is unencumbered by magic. One of the things I like about Conan is that almost none of the spells are suitable for combat.

 

[Grimhelm]

And I agree fully. Role playing isn't about three adventurers sitting in a bar having a conversation. It is conversation in-character that drives the plot forward; decision making, planning, and talking about what has already happened and what to make of it all. This is role playing. Action and combat are wonderful and necessary elements of the story too. But these should flow just as well as the plotting and "role playing" that goes on.