RPG Evolution: When Gaming Bleeds

Monte Cook Games recently released Consent in Gaming, a sensitive topic that addresses subjects that make some players uncomfortable. Central to the understanding of why there's a debate at all involves the concept of "bleed" in role-play.

Picture courtesy of Pixabay.​

Bleed Basics​

Courtney Kraft explains bleed:

It’s a phenomenon where the emotions from a character affect the player out of the game and vice versa. Part of the joy of roleplay comes from diving into the fantasy of being something we’re not. When we play a character for a long time, it’s easy to get swept up in the highs of victorious battle and the lows of character death. When these feelings persist after the game is over, that’s when bleed occurs.

Bleed isn't inherently bad. Like actors in a movie, players sometimes draw on experiences to fuel their role-playing, consciously or subconsciously, and this bleed can happen organically. What's of concern in gaming is when bleed has detrimental consequences to the player.

Consent in Gaming explains the risks of negative bleed:

There’s nothing wrong with bleed—in fact, it’s part of the reason we play games. We want to be excited when our character is excited, to feel the loss when our characters do. However, bleed can cause negative experiences if not handled carefully. For example, maybe a character acted in a way that your character didn’t like, and it made you angry at the player too. Or maybe your character is flirting with another character, and you’re worried that it’s also making you have feelings for the player. It’s important to talk about these distinctions between characters and players early and often, before things take an unexpected turn.

There are several aspects that create bleed, and it's central to understanding why someone would need consent in a game at all. Bleed is a result of immersion, and the level of immersion dictates the social contract of how the game is played. This isn't limited to rules alone, but rests as much on the other players as it is on the subject matter.

One of the experiences that create bleed is a player's association with the game's subject matter. For some players, less realistic games (like Dungeons & Dragons) have a lower chance of the game's experiences bleeding into real life, because it's fantasy and not analogous to real life. Modern games might have the opposite effect, mirroring real life situations a player has experience with. There are plenty of players who feel otherwise of course, particularly those deeply involved in role-playing their characters for some time -- I've experienced bleed role-playing a character on a spaceship just as easily as a modern game.

The other element that can affect bleed is how the game is played. Storytelling games often encourage deeper emotional involvement from a player, while more gamist tabletop games create a situational remove from the character by their nature -- miniatures, tactical combat, and other logistics that are less about role-playing and more about tactics. Live Action Role-Playing games (LARPs) have the player physically inhabit their role and are thus provide more opportunities for bleed. Conversely, Massive Multi-Player Online Role-Playing Games (MMORPGs) might seem like they make bleed unlikely because the player is at a computer, experiencing the game through a virtual avatar -- and yet it can still happen. Players who play a game for a long time can experience more bleed than someone who just joined a game.

Dungeons & Dragons is a particular flashpoint for discussions of bleed, because while it is a fantasy game that can easily be played with disposable characters navigating a dungeon, it can also have surprisingly emotional depth and complexity -- as many live streams of tabletop play have demonstrated.

These two factors determine the "magic circle," where the reality of the world is replaced by the structure of another reality. The magic circle is not a magic wall -- it's porous, and players can easily have discussions about what's happening in the real world, make jokes derived from popular culture their characters would never know, or even just be influenced by their real life surroundings.

The deeper a player engages in the magic circle, the more immersed that player becomes. Governing the player's social contract within the magic circle is something Nordic LARP calls this "the alibi," in which the player accepts the premise that their actions don't reflect on them but rather their character:

Rather than playing a character who is very much like you (“close to home”), deliberately make character choices that separates the character from you and provides some differentiation. If your character has a very similar job to your ideal or actual job, find a reason for your character to change jobs. If your character has a very similar personality to you, find aspects of their personality that are different from yours to play up and focus on. Or play an alternate character that is deliberately “further from home”.

Bleeding Out​

Where things get sticky is when real life circumstances apply to imaginary concepts. Bleed exists within the mind of each player but is influenced by the other players. It is fungible and can be highly personal. Additionally, what constitutes bleed can be an unconscious process. This isn't necessarily a problem -- after all, the rush of playing an awesome superhero can be a positive influence for someone who doesn't feel empowered in real life -- unless the bleed touches on negative subjects that makes the player uncomfortable. These psychological triggers are a form of "bleed-in," in which the player's psychology affects the character experience. Not all bleed moments are triggers, but they can be significantly distressing for players who have suffered some form of abuse or trauma.

Consent in Gaming attempts to address these issues by using a variety of tools to define the social contract. For players who are friends, those social contracts have likely been established over years through both in- and out-of-game experiences. But for players who are new to each other, social contracts can be difficult to determine up front, and tools like x-cards can go a long way in preventing misunderstandings and hurt feelings.

Thanks to the increasing popularity of tabletop role-playing games, players are coming from more diverse backgrounds with a wide range of experiences. An influx of new players means those experiences will not always be compatible with established social contracts. The recent incident at the UK Gaming Expo, as reported by Darryl is an egregious example of what happens when a game master's expectations of what's appropriate for a "mature" game doesn't match the assumed social contract of players at the table.

This sort of social contract reinforcement can seem intrusive to gamers who have long-suffered from suspicion that they are out of touch with reality, or that if they play an evil character, they are evil (an allegation propagated during the Satanic Panic). This need to perform under a "cover" in their "real" life has made the entire concept of bleed and its associated risks a particularly sensitive topic of discussion.

X-cards and consent discussions may not be for everyone, but as we welcome new players with new experiences into the hobby, those tools will help us all negotiate the social contract that makes every game's magic circle a magical experience.

 

[Lanefan]

the x-card isn't a fast forward button. if someone taps it you can just rearrange what's going on in game, you don't have to remove the party from a difficult encounter because someone used it.

if people are treating it that way then that's abusing it and you can call people out if they're abusing something ("BUT I CAN'T QUESTION PEOPLE WHO USE IT!!!!!" doesn't apply in this scenario).

Ah, but doesn't this violate the rule-of-X; that says such conversations are at best inappropriate and at worst forbidden entirely?

Because as DM, I (quite likely) can't tell the difference. Was the X tapped due to someone being triggered by the blatant sexualization of the Timus Currius monster, or because there's no way in hell the party's going to be able to defeat it when it inevitably tries to kill them.

Thing is, people are people; and should the X-card (or similar) become a widespread tool or utility not all of them are going to use it in the manner in which it is intended. In fact, and rather sadly, I suspect the non-intended uses will come to outnumber the intended uses by such a wide margin as to render the tool useless for its originally-intended function.

 

[Gradine]

Reminder: the argument that "bad players will abuse this to ruin the game" is easily debunked (said players will find other ways to capriciously ruin your games) and is only being pounded into the ground in bad faith to derail this conversation and get the thread shut down for looking too much like the last one.

Which is the point.

Which is to say, it's been addressed and is no longer worth addressing further.

 

[Lanefan]

so then just place a new combat scenario right after that? if player enjoyment somehow equals X number of combat encounters, then you can just add one additional encounter.

again, what if the players did something as innocent as go down the wrong hallway and skip the encounter with Timus Currius entirely? I've had plenty of times where my DM said something like "oh man I had this fight set up for you guys, but you decided to do X instead", this isn't new or weird.

Of course. What's "new or weird" here is that the scene's already laid out and only then a player forces a change, or skip.

minor disruptions happen all the time in con games.

I know; they happen far too often already, and good discussion can and should be had around ways and means of reducing them. This discussion, however, ain't that discussion.

 

[Panda-s1]

Ah, but doesn't this violate the rule-of-X; that says such conversations are at best inappropriate and at worst forbidden entirely?

Because as DM, I (quite likely) can't tell the difference. Was the X tapped due to someone being triggered by the blatant sexualization of the Timus Currius monster, or because there's no way in hell the party's going to be able to defeat it when it inevitably tries to kill them.

given what the x-card is for and how player expectations usually work, the former.

also a given player has no actual idea how you're going to handle someone hitting the x-card. they might get out of that encounter (and just face a different one entirely after that). or they tap it and instead get mauled to death by Barney the Dinosaur.

Thing is, people are people; and should the X-card (or similar) become a widespread tool or utility not all of them are going to use it in the manner in which it is intended. In fact, and rather sadly, I suspect the non-intended uses will come to outnumber the intended uses by such a wide margin as to render the tool useless for its originally-intended function.

yes, the vast majority of people who use disabled parking spots aren't actually disabled. I know this because I saw a news report of some people abusing this system and therefore the vast majority of people are abusing it.

 

[Umbran]

Yes there is, in my case; because I've had players in the past who were more than narcissistic enough to do exactly this - had the option been available - as often as they could get away with it.

"Look at this cool cat toy!"
"Oh, man, my dogs would destroy that in like, 30 seconds. It is a lousy toy! Nobody should get that toy!"

If you are playing with abusive narcissists who would abuse stuff, your problem isn't in the stuff, but in the abusive narcissists. I mean, I know such players exist - I have encountered them myself. But, once identified, they get dis-invited.

Have you considered the possibility that this tool could be a multi-tasker, and help you identify people who you probably don't really want to game with? X-card as talking horse for toxic gamers....

And if in my relatively small sample size of some few dozens I've had 'em, then gawds know how many are out there in the greater community. Either that, or I've just been woefully unlucky......

That's.. not how statistics works. You know that, statistically, that generalization step is extremely flawed, right? The moment you say, "My small sample," alarm buzzers should have gone off in your head. Small samples will almost always be far from the average of a large population in some way or other, unless you have been very, very careful to make sure it was very random.

That's one of the biggest jobs in staticical sampling - making sure your small sample that is supposed to represent actually does. And, no bad on you - but your way of finding a few dozen people over the years was probably focused on getting butts in chairs to play a game, not to get a representative sample of gamers in chairs. Your goal wasn't statistical sampling, so you shouldn't think of it it as if it were a valid sample.

 

[Lanefan]

at that point I can say a moose might come and trample the table, therefore we need more moose prevention at cons.

You've obviously never gone to a con in eastern Canada......

 

[Panda-s1]

Of course. What's "new or weird" here is that the scene's already laid out and only then a player forces a change, or skip.

man I just love the word "forces". you make it sound like the people who need x-cards are malevolent, or are changing the entire nature of the game.

get back to me when someone x-cards their way to getting a +3 flame tongue (or turns your D&D session into a Star Wars game, idk man I'm sure some people will believe either is a likely scenario)

 

[Lanefan]

"Look at this cool cat toy!"
"Oh, man, my dogs would destroy that in like, 30 seconds. It is a lousy toy! Nobody should get that toy!"

If you are playing with abusive narcissists who would abuse stuff, your problem isn't in the stuff, but in the abusive narcissists. I mean, I know such players exist - I have encountered them myself. But, once identified, they get dis-invited.

Have you considered the possibility that this tool could be a multi-tasker, and help you identify people who you probably don't really want to game with? X-card as talking horse for toxic gamers....

In a home game, sure. But at a con where you've only got a short time and probably don't know anyone else at the table, the expectation would be that every X-hit is treated as a serious issue.

That's.. not how statistics works. You know that, statistically, that generalization step is extremely flawed, right? The moment you say, "My small sample," alarm buzzers should have gone off in your head. Small samples will almost always be far from the average of a large population in some way or other

Of course. But as there's no way of knowing in which direction that variance might be, the best one can do is assume the variance odds are also more or less 50-50 (i.e. there's an equal chance of the small-sample variance being higher or lower than the overall population, unless it just happens to match bang-on) and go from there.

That's one of the biggest jobs in staticical sampling - making sure your small sample that is supposed to represent actually does. And, no bad on you - but your way of finding a few dozen people over the years was probably focused on getting butts in chairs to play a game, not to get a representative sample of gamers in chairs. Your goal wasn't statistical sampling, so you shouldn't think of it it as if it were a valid sample.

Regardless of what my goals might have been, the results remain. Yes it's a small sample size and almost certainly biased toward the type of people I tend to hang out with...but it's not the only sample out there. We've got dozens if not hundreds of DMs on this board, and other than those who share a playgroup each will have another small sample to provide; and putting all those small samples together gives a still-not-perfect-but-much-better overview.

 

[Lanefan]

man I just love the word "forces". you make it sound like the people who need x-cards are malevolent, or are changing the entire nature of the game.

The presence or absence of malevolence is irrelevant; the fact is that an X-hit is an attempt to change something about the nature of the game, because that something is disturbing that player beyond the point of being able to deal with it. Depending how intrinsic that something is to the campaign, it could well change things in the game beyond the simple here-and-now situation.

get back to me when someone x-cards their way to getting a +3 flame tongue (or turns your D&D session into a Star Wars game, idk man I'm sure some people will believe either is a likely scenario)

Don't hold yer breath on that.

The X-card idea does, however, assume a certain level of maturity among all involved...a level of maturity that we don't always see. It also assumes that all involved will treat the X-card as seriously as its designers intend; and in some bands of jokers (mine included, at times) where nothing is sacred, this wouldn't be either.

 

[Panda-s1]

The presence or absence of malevolence is irrelevant; the fact is that an X-hit is an attempt to change something about the nature of the game, because that something is disturbing that player beyond the point of being able to deal with it. Depending how intrinsic that something is to the campaign, it could well change things in the game beyond the simple here-and-now situation.

again, if something is that intrinsic to the campaign, then either a) the players probably already knew about it or b) this is a poorly planned campaign.

Don't hold yer breath on that.

The X-card idea does, however, assume a certain level of maturity among all involved...a level of maturity that we don't always see. It also assumes that all involved will treat the X-card as seriously as its designers intend; and in some bands of jokers (mine included, at times) where nothing is sacred, this wouldn't be either.

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