I played Dresden Files on a convention the other day. It was my first real FATE game. I did like it quite well, temporary aspects were nice and consequences are my favorite part of the rules. We had seven players plus GM at the table and one player fascinated me, because she seemed to play her own game with no mind as to whether she contributed in any meaningful way to the group's experience, and also, because (almost) everything she did seemed entirely pointless to me.
She wasn't inactive, though. She was quite enthusiastic and actively tried to get the attention of the GM and the other players. She played a Half-Japanese exchange student werecat. She explicitly wanted to turn into a small house cat when shapeshifting, even though the GM indicated that a large cat might be more useful in a fight.
First scene: All characters are meeting in a pub to discuss the trouble at hand (as it were, Wehrmacht soldiers from 1945 showing up in 2011 Berlin and acting as if the Russians were at the gates). So, the point of the scene is to talk. Werecat makes a point of stating that she is in cat form, thus she cannot talk.
Second scene: We are trying to get into an abandoned building in East Berlin guarded by a bunch of skinheads. For once little kitty's inconspicuous form would be useful to sneak ahead. Instead, she auto-compells her aspect "afraid of heights" and, for one lousy FATE point, traps herself on a tree the entire scene (the player spent the rest of that scene literally meowing).
Third scene: We are fighting the boss monster, a Black Court Vampire though we don't know yet. Kitty does something useful for the first time, transforming back to (stark naked) human form and trying to get the bad guy's attention, even succeeding in placing a "distracted" aspect on him. As my emo kid wizard character takes a moderate consequence the same turn, I make it an "attracted to werecat", trying to somehow build on that. But as soon as the bad guy has escaped and I am getting ready to portray some teenage awkwardness, she blocks it by turning back into cat form and speeding away.
So what's up there? She was obviously into her character, but in every scene (there were other examples), she strictly blocked any attempt by GM or other players to get into any sort of meaningful interaction with her, or impose any sort of consequences on her character. I wonder, what would she find rewarding in the game? What would her expectation toward other players be? How would a group of players just like her work? What kind of game would they be playing? I find myself at something of a loss. I would suspect something messy but then, she seemed to be perfectly happy... it just seems weird to me. She's not the first player of the sort whom I've met, either.
- Frank
P.S.: She also seemed to be a huge fan of the Dresden Files novel and enjoyed a little insider chat about Dresdenverse marginalia if she could get the chance.
Seems an aimless character to me, not interested in the goals of the party and having nothing better to do herself. Ask her to set a main goal for her character and get the GM to spotlight her when she actively pursues it.
What were her High Concept and Trouble?
Stefoid, I don't think she'd be interested in such a thing. At any rate, the scenario was a pretty bog-standard "villain of the week" scenario and with seven players at the table and a four hour slot, personal goals were not supposed to play any major role.
James, her High Concept was something like "Werecat Exchange Student" and her trouble was "Afraid of Heights", I think.
- Frank
I'd kind of look at the idea of imposing a consequence, rather than proposing them. I'd think her blocking reaction is a possibly ingrained overreaction to impositions in her past games. Ie, she loosens up, lets down her defences and someone imposes on her - so she keeps her defences up and autoblocks, prefering the semi solo play she gets to the other result.
Callan, yeah, that was kind of what I was getting at with my "messy" suspicion. But then, she didn't just block anything that might have affected her character. She also deliberately maneuvered herself out of the action several times. Maybe so she did not have to make any decisions that could lead to trouble and/or expectations by other players? Again, she seemed to be perfectly happy with the game.
I forgot one important thing. There was another scene were she suddenly seized the opportunity to make an impact. We had defeated the villain and the slot was also finished, so the GM was just wrapping things up, explaining that a dying old man with a strong but undeveloped magic talent had been dreaming up his WWII trauma, which was responsible for the manifestations and had been tapped into by the Black Court Vampire. The players were already packing up when werecat jumped into action, narrating how she transformed into human form, grabbed some sheet to wrap herself into, took the old man's hand, said something like, "I am an angel, come to take you to the other side", and turned off the heart-lung machine. Another player interjected "no you don't" and the GM commented that the old man was in a coma and would not see anything, but she ignored them. Again, my impression was that she played her own game, with no mind to what the other players said or did.
It just seems weird to me.
- Frank
Quote from: Callan S. on June 06, 2011, 06:22:54 AM
I'd kind of look at the idea of imposing a consequence, rather than proposing them. I'd think her blocking reaction is a possibly ingrained overreaction to impositions in her past games. Ie, she loosens up, lets down her defences and someone imposes on her - so she keeps her defences up and autoblocks, prefering the semi solo play she gets to the other result.
Yeah, to get some vinegar and pepper into your Dresden games impose the consequence. If the player really balks, they can buy it off.
Quotewerecat jumped into action, narrating how she transformed into human form, grabbed some sheet to wrap herself into, took the old man's hand, said something like, "I am an angel, come to take you to the other side", and turned off the heart-lung machine. Another player interjected "no you don't" and the GM commented that the old man was in a coma and would not see anything, but she ignored them. Again, my impression was that she played her own game, with no mind to what the other players said or did.
This reminds me a lot of an overstaffed Exalted game I played in college. I kind of did my own thing, not really enjoying where stuff was going or being particularly drawn in by it. I kept feeling like the plot wasn't exploring things I found interesting, so I made my own fun - scheming with the other Abyssal in the party, trying to find a way to slip the leash of my Deathlord... it culminated in me switching sides and joining up with a band of Solars.
It does sound different from what you're describing, though, in that other players did try to engage her socially (that didn't happen to me in my example). I would have guessed she was just having fun being a cat, pure and simple, until that last scene where she demonstrates some emotional connection.
I'm kind of more interested in the "why does she play like that", than in the "how to make her play differently". I guess it's possible that she simply did not find the plot engaging. Hm...
With that many players on the table, perhaps she felt more like playing a sort of chaotic NPC instead of being another member of the party. I haven't read much of the Dresden files novels but, how large are the teams formed by main characters in the fiction? How many times do they get to be al together in more than one or two scenes of the book? Seems to me she wanted to recreate a bit more of the feeling of the novels in the game, so she added herself as this strange character that keeps appearing in the fiction on and off, without doing anything important and then it appears again at the end to give the story a final twist, just to surprise the readers.
The way she made it makes for a pretty good story, but I agree with you she kind of ruined the game for the rest of the players. Perhaps if the players were told in advance she's there to act as another NPC, that would help a lot in order to keep the social pact intact.
Based on what you've said, it sounds to me more-or-less like the player-side version of railroading. I might guess that she, as a fan of Dresden, has already written a number of fanfics starring her character. It's non-collaborative roleplaying.
There's a thing with some amateur writers in which they avoid putting their characters into any sort of real danger; I think it's a related phenomenon.
The underlying issue, in my opinion, is a problematically deep emotional investment in the character. It's sort of interesting that the character's Trouble is "fear", as that is, indeed, the trouble here.
Cheers,
Roger
Whoops; forgot to answer the question of the subject of the thread. This is Mary Sue play.
I think you (meaning her critics generally) are being way too hard on the werecat girl. Yes, she sounds annoying, but both the real world and stories are full of annoying people.
You are, in effect, claiming that she broke the Social Contract by her style of play, but did the Social Contract at a "bog-standard 'villain of the week' scenario and with seven players at the table and a four hour slot" really make it clear that only "Fabulist/Collaborative Storytelling" and not "Immersionist/Virtual Experience (to use John Kim's terms) type of play was permitted?
Worse, you imply that she is a bad person merely because she chooses a different style of gaming than you choose.
The young lady chose to play an apparently neurotic, insecure character who had little to offer the group -- is that forbidden? Did she have some duty to change her character concept in order to make you happy? She also seems to have focused on immersion in her own character -- is that not a valid style of play? Declining to pick up on your openings is not railroading.
Unless you really did have an explicit Social Contract that allowed only "Fabulist" play, you're only complaint was that her tastes are different than yours. That's no reason to trash her. How is what you are doing to werecat girl different from Simulationists telling Narrativists that the Narrativists are doing it wrong?
I dont see what sim/nar has to do with it. The GM and six other people were engaging in a particular story and each other, and she wasnt. So why bother turning up? She could imagine what its like to be a cat stuck up a tree on her own time.
Frank is OK with it, just wants to know what makes her tick. Sounds like daydreaming with an audience.
Wholeridge, I think there's some pidgeon holing, but even if mary sue play (as an example) is inside the social contract, it's still mary sue play. So it's not trashing anyone (as in saying they are a SC breaker) to suggest that. Not that I'm lending extra support to the Mary sue hypothesis - I'm still going with my own, that she's been burned in the past by imposed consequencs and so she's figured out how to game what system there is to basically do solo play. No negative connotation in 'game the system' either - we are playing games, after all.
I think your post does raise the interesting question of why is it a matter of "Why does she play that way?" when in terms of what mutual agreements/system there is, the way she plays is completely valid/within what mutual agreement there was? Aught this turn to look at the system instead and ask "Why does this play this way?", rather than the player who's play seemingly fitted quite well within the system?
Wholeridge, I think you are reading too much judgment into this thread. My posts are not about complaining that she ruined my fun (which she didn't, by the way). I am simply stating my perceptions, including the fact that her way of playing seemed pointless and weird to me. The reason for that is not that Half-Japanese Werecat girls are not my type of cheesy. The reason is that I understand role-playing, fundamentally, as a group activity. And the Werecat player seemed so disconnected from the group.
Roger, you make some interesting points. I had a slightly different understanding of Mary Sue play, but I'm not sure whether that's a material point or just a matter of definition. I thought Mary Sue play to be some sort of omnipotent, uber-cool NPC outshining the PCs by way of GM force. Or, in the rare case of a Mary Sue player character, by way of min-maxing / rules-fudging and application of social pressure by the player toward the GM in particular. This was not really what the Werecat player did, instead, she deliberately made her character ineffective.
Now, I've done that myself, had my character make bad choices, or deliberately built a character with a weakness. But she repeatedly did it in a way that would take her out of whatever the group was doing, and I think she did it on purpose. I gather from Roger's and Callan's replies that one explanation might be she did not want anyone to mess with her character.
This reminds me of the Immersion (http://www.jeepen.org/dict/#immersion) and Play for Show (http://www.jeepen.org/dict/#play_for_show) definitions of the Jeepers. Essentially, everything the Big Model covers is Play for Show according to those definitions. You interact with others, you play together, that's what role-playing is about. Immersion as defined by the Jeepers is essentially something you do by yourself. Thus I wonder, why would you do that while you are sitting at a table with other people who also do it? In our group, we only had one player who acted like that, but what happens when all of the players do it? I'm afraid I don't really get it.
- Frank
Hi guys,
to the TO: I think that what you saw was a symptome of Abused Gamer Syndrome (http://bankuei.wordpress.com/2009/12/11/abused-gamer-syndrome/), in particular (I quote from my link):
Quote
a. Come up with as colorful a concept as possible, preferably somewhat irrational, so that you can carry out the following safety-measures from "in character" and blame the character for "making" you role-play in this way.
...which, by the way, is pretty close to what Callan stated in his first post here.
However, I think that Abused gamer syndrome and Mary Sue play aren't mutually exclusive: playing a MS, at the player's side, is (also) about "protecting" your character from unexpected input at the social level, and from unexpected events at the fictional level... So it
could be a symptome of Abused gamer syndrome.
Quote from: Frank Tarcikowski on June 08, 2011, 03:50:54 AM
You interact with others, you play together, that's what role-playing is about. Immersion as defined by the Jeepers is essentially something you do by yourself. Thus I wonder, why would you do that while you are sitting at a table with other people who also do it? In our group, we only had one player who acted like that, but what happens when all of the players do it? I'm afraid I don't really get it.
I think that I do get it, which is why I feel called to defend the girl. I don't know the "Jeepers" (I'm struggling enough trying to get a handle on GNS and its predecessors without a whole new set of definitions to argue about) but immersion is not something you can do by yourself. If you are by yourself, you have to be the whole world, which prevents you from immersing yourself in your character. An immersion needs others to be the "not my character" parts of the world. I imagine that the other characters were important to werecat girl's experience, even she didn't make her character important to you. Think of "why did her character act that way?" as a story which never got explored. I'm imagining that she is exploring that story over many episodes of play (probably with similar rather than identical characters), and you only saw a small, incomprehensible slice of her exploration. I further imagine that this is one of the main limitations of immersionist play: it plays best over a long campaign (similar to a novel in which one comes to deeply identify with one or more characters) and is much less satisfying in a single encounter with strangers (which is more like a short story).
What if all of the players do it? That depends on how the characters interact. With the right characters and situation I think it can work very will, generating novel-quality stories, rather than merely short-story quality stories. But it is more difficult, and it might take more time to come together. A player with the ability to work in multiple modes might be well advised not to try too much immersion in a one-time game with strangers, but not every player is a master of multiple modes. Of course, the girl might just be a jerk, but based on the information provided I see a possibility that she was engaged in serious exploration of a very troubled character.
- Frank
No, she wasn't being a jerk, she seemed to be enjoying what she did and did not seem mindful of any reservations the other players might have had toward her style of play. I was just wondering about her motives and expectations. Frank, you make some interesting points.
Have you ever been to a Goth party? I think what you are saying is that the sort of "immersive play" you are describing is like Goths dancing: Very immersed in the music and their own motion, dancing all by themselves, but still it makes a difference that the other people are there, also dancing, also doing their thing. That would make the GM something of a DJ, in charge of playing the right music at the right time.
Whereas in the Dresden Files game, the other players were dancing together, sometimes touching, sometimes posing, singing along loudly, and frequently requesting songs from the DJ.
Does any of that make sense?
- Frank
Sorry about the confusion, but I'm Dan. That "-Frank" was a part of quoting you that I forgot to delete.
I haven't been to a Goth party, but one thing about that analogy seems to me not to fit. I don't see the werecat girl character as wanting to be separate so much as struggling against separation. When I read your description of her behavior, I imagine a backstory of betrayal and alienation that has burdened her with dysfunctional patterns of behavior. In a sense, she is a character who has wandered in from a different -- and darker -- story. She (the character) doesn't enjoy the freedom and adaptability that the other (healthier, more well adjusted) characters display. She doesn't respond to your overtures because she is too broken to respond. I would hope that the player is exploring how such brokenness might be overcome, what sacrifices are necessary to overcome it, and whether the result is worth the cost. To a great extent those answers depend on the outside ("not my character") world, but immersive play is a first-person viewpoint which experiences that world as impacts on the character. She needs you to portray the world which her character struggles to embrace. (I do not believe that the player needs to have consciously formulated this understanding; most humans operate far more on emotion than on intellect.)
"Immersive", as I understand it, is about the submersion of the player in the character. It doesn't require lonely, alienated characters like werecat girl. One can just as well immerse oneself in an outgoing character. My guess would be that with more experience this player will become more adaptable to different types of characters and different degrees of immersion. Right now she is fascinated with the power of heavy immersion in a very neurotic character -- but didn't most of us start playing because we sensed some possibility which fascinated us in a similar (if, perhaps, not so annoying) way?
Dan Holdgreiwe
Hey Dan, to be clear, my analogy was meant to describe the players, not the characters.
I can't really second-guess the backstory or what went on inside the player's head. Your interpretation is interesting in particular looking at the "angelic euthanasia" scene--from the other scenes, I would not have felt anything dark or broken about the character.
- Frank
One thing that the Dresden Files RPG rules do with the refresh/powers chargen economy is promise that any Dresden-appropriate character is playable (I don't think the game delivers on this promise, but I can't blame a player for buying what the game is selling them). The source material says that the most common supernatural humans are the kinds with flavorful-but-useless powers, so it may be that she just got excited about this idea as a way to celebrate the source material, was told by the game that it was a good and workable idea, and just went with it. From a certain POV, being aloof and non-contributing is pretty good characterization for a housecat. Self-compelling to inaction is similar: it is easy to interpret the game as telling you that this is "good play". Since she's a fan of the source material, she may have been deriving enough fun from just experiencing the Dresden story the rest of you were creating that she didn't want to rock the boat and risk "ruining" the story by doing to much to change the direction. The source material also suggests that the forces of darkness are scary and dangerous, so that may also cause risk-averse players to play more conservatively than is ideal for the somewhat action-oriented FATE system.
Without wanting to derail the discussion about the Werecat player, I think that's an interesting tangent about the Dresden Files RPG. Now, I haven't read the RPG and I've only read the first Dresden Files novel, "Storm Front". I've also read FreeFATE and spent some thought on it but only played FATE one and a half time, all DFRPG. Based on that somewhat limited experience, I would view it like this:
1) In the novel, life is just a bitch. Harry Dresden is one unlucky bastard if there ever was one, and life has a habit of kicking him when he's down (so hard, in fact, that I kind of hated the novel for it). But when push comes to shove, Harry somehow, by the skin of his teeth, manages to pull some incredibly kick-ass stunt to save the day. Compelling Aspects, gathering FATE points, and then spending them in large quantities when it really matters, seems to capture that pretty well.
2) The novel is action-packed. Demons get fought and blown to pieces, there is fire and thunder and lightning and some solid scrapping, too. Yeah sure, the forces of darkness are extremely powerful, and no one in their right mind would mess with them, but the point is, the protagonist is one stubborn bastard who just can't seem to bother. FATE handles this kind of action pretty well, temporary Aspects are a Color generation machine, and Consequences make sure that things keep going somewhere.
3) The novel is a hell of a thriller, the likes of which I have rarely seen. The suspense is highly intense, the atmosphere of danger and overwhelming odds masterfully built up. One might fall for the notion that this kind of suspense would best be reflected in a role-playing game by enforcing the danger and overwhelming odds through the rules. But that is a red herring. Such "deadly" rules would only force players into careful, very tactical play in order to not gamble the characters they are invested in. They would punish the players for being stubborn and risk their luck like Harry Dresden.
Conclusion: The atmosphere of danger and overwhelming odds is make-belief and has to be. Rules that really simulate the dangerous and deadly powers of darkness would ruin the game.
To get back to our little Werecat, celebration of source material was most definitely going on. As for seeing deliberately ineffective actions as "good role-playing", well, that's not unheard of. In particular from players who complain about "powergamers" who aren't "real role-players".
- Frank
Paolo, thanks for the link, "My Guy Syndrome" rings a bell and might be sort of fitting, from a more critical perpective.
- Frank
Quote from: Frank Tarcikowski on June 08, 2011, 04:43:38 PM
Hey Dan, to be clear, my analogy was meant to describe the players, not the characters.
I can't really second-guess the backstory or what went on inside the player's head. Your interpretation is interesting in particular looking at the "angelic euthanasia" scene--from the other scenes, I would not have felt anything dark or broken about the character.
- Frank
I pretty much jumped to the conclusion that the player was acting out of fascination with the character, rather than for any reason relating to social contact with other players. When I read of the character's acts of self-sabotage and flight from contact with others, I though about why a real person would act as this character was acting, which led me to view the character as broken even before I came to the part about angelic euthanasia. It never occurred to me to instead ask "why is the player manipulating her game token in this fashion?" which, I suppose, says something about my own creative agenda.
Dan
I think the description of events is vague enough that trying to formulate what's going on involves less diagnosis and more making up your own little story, but I kind of want to make up my own little story so I'll go ahead:
I think most of the players minus cat lady are playing into a very top-down game play structure. GM provides stuff to do, players say how they do it and provide color. Not cat lady, she plays by her own rules.
Is the first scene about talking? NO. Its about me being a cat.
Is the second scene about sneaking around? NO. Its about my cat being up a tree.
Is the third scene about fighting a bad guy? NO. Its about my being naked.
Is the fourth scene about some dude in a coma laying there silently? NO. Its this little poignant thing about being a fake angel.
What's wrong with her play styles? Well, its difficult to interact with the other players, as they're set in this top-down-GM-provides-what-we're-doing play style, so she's largely doing stuff solo. Its also difficult to create interesting conflict, as the play style of the rest of the group only empowers the GM to do that. Also, I think there's a very real power struggle between her and the GM, evidenced in people moving to shut down her little coma contribution (That honestly seemed a bit nasty to me.)
What would a table with only players with her be like? It could be totally sweet! It could be everyone making challenging situations for each other, people jumping on other people's situations because they're genuinely intrigued by them, and developing them further. (I try to rescue the cat from the tree! I call the firemen and its awkward because he's an ex!)
Maybe it would sometimes making little situations that no one else jumps on to. That's okay. That's an expected consequence of an open exchange of situations instead of a closed exchange dependent on a GM.
Hey Sirogit, sure, it's all speculative. Even if I told everything I remember about her to the last detail, it would remain so. I was kind of hoping for others to jump in with some experience of their own to add to the topic because, as I said, I found myself at something of a loss.
From how I perceived it at the table, there was no power struggle between the Werecat player and the GM. She accepted his plot authority, just using what he provided as a backdrop for her "own game". As for the "people moving to shut her down", all the other player characters were around and could have stopped her, and not everyone approves of euthanasia, so there was a bit more to it than just "shutting her down" because she played "wrong".
Would a group of players like that be making challenging situations for each other? I don't know. I tried to bounce something off her "naked" scene and others tried in different scenes, but she blocked literally everything. I had a very strong impression that she was deliberately preventing any sort of consequential interaction with her character.
- Frank
QuoteWould a group of players like that be making challenging situations for each other? I don't know.
Why does this matter to you, Frank? I mean, what they'd be doing in their little group is what they'd be doing. Is your interest beyond the practical concern of how your own game activities go?
Well, mostly I'm just curious. Also, I wonder what I and the other players could have done to make play more rewarding to the Werecat player, if anything.
- Frank
I'm just jumping into this conversation in the middle. PLEASE NOTE, although I'm aware these comments border on bashing Frank's friend (and Anime culture in general).. I don't mean any particular offence to her.
Her behaviour is NOT necessarily indicative of her being any kind of abused gamer. The tip-offs are that first of all she's playing a Japanese exchange student, and secondly a half wereCAT (as opposed to half-something-useful). This is right out of an anime comic.
Anime seems to have this perverted streak in it, an obsessiveness for vomitously cloying cuteness. EVERYTHING has to be cute for no other reason than just to BE cute. That is, in itself, the end goal. It seems to pervade the whole anime culture to the point that even their most supposedly bad-assed characters are ultra-kill-me-now-cute. (Don't bother with counter-examples. I'm speaking in hyperbole, but not by very much!)
sirogit called it a power struggle between her and the GM, but I would claim it has absolutely nothing to do with the GM. In fact I would go so far to say that the GM doesn't even really register on her radar. To answer sirogit's questions from this point of view, I'll answer his questions again:
- Is the first scene about talking? NO. Its about me being cute as a wittle kitty.
- Is the second scene about sneaking around? NO. Its about me being cute as a wittle kitty stuck up a tree.
- Is the third scene about fighting a bad guy? NO. Its about me being cute as a embarrassed wittle Japanese schoolgirl.
- Is the fourth scene about some dude in a coma laying there silently? NO. Its about a dying old man having "a special moment" with the cute wittle Japanese schoolgirl.
UGH!
I don't think the japanese student were-cat is really indicative of anything at all. It's not part of her behaviour, as in body language and semantic interaction with other humans.
The issue of behaviour here is that it is like if the objective was to talk about an imagined cake and decorating it, the GM starts off by saying some sparkles around the base of the cake. Then he throws over the next stage to the girl, passing the ball so to speak, and she...talks about her kitty chasing a mouse in the corner. She does not add decoration to the cake then pass the ball on to the GM or someone else. Repeatedly. It's the mark of someone who's been burned - who's added decoration and then it's been stripped off along with some negative social feedback - indeed you can see the type of person who does that in this account who says "No you don't!" when she goes to euthenase the old man. This is happened to her enough until she's adopted this method of play. This is like sitting down to a jamming session and she just starts playing a song (an anime one) that doesn't link at all with what other people are playing.
However, don't take this as me supporting the notion that "You HAVE to play/work on the same imaginative material together otherwise it's not roleplay!". I support the notion of "It's nice to play together. And that sometimes means you might pass on decorating the cake". Indeed this girl has taken that 'sometimes' and simply extended it to 'always, by default'. This, instead of simply ditching roleplay forever.
Or at the very least, I think I'm accurate in saying that when someone passes the ball to her for the next cake decoration, she drops that ball entirely.
The hard question is has anyone here been burned the way I describe above? I have, a few times over the years I've roleplayed. If I had been burnt enough, I would have either A: Started doing what this girl does or B: Ditched roleplay forever because it was full of bloody minded bullies who treat their own imagination with religious conviction, like it's some sort of global truth. Atleast for myself I can speak perfectly accurately - if enough gamers burnt me, I would take one of those two options.
Daniel, seems she was drawing off anime in addition to the Dresden Files source material, granted. But why did she do it the way she did? That was my question. Please note that I do not know the player, I met her for the first time at that convention.
Callan, I don't know. It's a convenient explanation but it doesn't seem to be the only possible explanation.
- Frank
Honestly, I really do think there's no deeper explanation.
I am of the opinion that your question of "why does she play that way?" is equivalent to asking people at a Renaissance Faire why they enjoy wearing period clothing and speaking in accents. It's just fun.
I expect the Anime angle is just a different sort of fun.
But why not, say, explore the anime angle in a way that involves interaction with the other players? That's the question.
- Frank
Or the way I'd put it, it's like the anime bit is beer and the interacting is like chips - you can enjoy beer and chips together (and I'd say they even compliment each other). When did she go off chips? Or are some people never a big fan of chips to begin with?
Did you get an impression of if she was an experienced roleplayer or not? Meaning, did she seem comfortable with dice, terminology and the type of interaction that typically goes on around a gaming table?
It seems you brought your own characters to the game. Is that correct?
One reason I'm asking is that she may just have been used to a different form of play. For example, she might have played one-on-one, or in another very small group. Or (and this might be a bit prejudiced) she might have been a hanger-on with her boyfriend's playgroup where the others were okay with this type of play because it kept her "out of the way" while still being in the game.
She wants to be a cute girl who turns into a cat.
She turned into a little kitty during the "talking" scene. Did anyone pet the kitty? No. They ignored her kittiness.
She got stuck in a tree. Did anyone rush to her rescue? Did anyone capitalize on the potential comedy? No.
She's a schoolgirl who turns into a cat. Then she was naked. Did anyone respond to her embarrassment? No. Instead she was treated as a sex object.
She showed a hidden, more serious side, taking the part of a literal angel of death. It wasn't important that the comatose guy see her; she was giving him last rites. Was she taken seriously? Apparently not.
It sounds to me like she had a concept, and some kind of plan, but no one tuned into the things she was interested in, and no one was interested in the hooks she offered. It's not some weird, mutant style of play. It's an awkward person being rejected by a group that doesn't get her. I think she really tried, but the group was all earnestly talking, and earnestly tactical, and earnest about some comatose dude. The group didn't really offer a lot of space for an innocent, non-professional kind of character. The group expected River Tam; she brought Mathilda from Leon the Professional. So she got brushed off.
I think apart from the sex object notion (which seems hyperbole), that's an interesting point.
QuoteThe group didn't really offer a lot of space for an innocent, non-professional kind of character.
But equally, what space was she offering them in what she did? It didn't seem especially wide either? It was kinda 'Stop! Kitty time!'
I'd almost propose two groups not offering the other that space - even if one of the groups was only comprised of one person. But then again I've not soley focused on her throughtout this thread as if the only off kilter things could be to do with her.
Anyway, that 'space' is an interesting idea. I kind of imagine it as a window, presented by either party - with the size of the window the amount of 'space' given and whether one participants window overlaps another participants windown to some or a large degree. The area they overlap in is the area they can work in together. But I think players with a strong sim basis tend to offer very narrow windows, with the narrowness indicative of "see, we don't just allow any old thing in, thus we must be doing this right!". When from my perspective there is no right to be had, just a very narrow window. Two narrow windows here in the AP, with no real chance of overlap?
Quote from: Callan S. on July 05, 2011, 03:21:34 AM
I think apart from the sex object notion (which seems hyperbole), that's an interesting point.
I wasn't trying to be hyperbolic. Rather, I was speculating about a mismatch in expectations. Even a small mismatch in this case would lead to a recoiling reaction.
Quote
QuoteThe group didn't really offer a lot of space for an innocent, non-professional kind of character.
But equally, what space was she offering them in what she did? It didn't seem especially wide either? It was kinda 'Stop! Kitty time!'
I'd almost propose two groups not offering the other that space - even if one of the groups was only comprised of one person. But then again I've not soley focused on her throughtout this thread as if the only off kilter things could be to do with her.
Anyway, that 'space' is an interesting idea. I kind of imagine it as a window, presented by either party - with the size of the window the amount of 'space' given and whether one participants window overlaps another participants windown to some or a large degree. The area they overlap in is the area they can work in together. But I think players with a strong sim basis tend to offer very narrow windows, with the narrowness indicative of "see, we don't just allow any old thing in, thus we must be doing this right!". When from my perspective there is no right to be had, just a very narrow window. Two narrow windows here in the AP, with no real chance of overlap?
This actually reminds me of an eerily analogous experience I had. A long time ago, I started dating a woman who had an existing gaming group. Because they let her bring her young child to the session, she was pretty grateful for the opportunity and had been loyal to the group for some time. I got brought along, basically as a date. The game was Hero System, and I impressed the group with my math skills and my ability to whip up a character basically on the spot. I was a long-haired punk, but I wanted to explore something different, so I created a conservative, divorced, ex-Marine with a drinking problem and a buzz cut, who had become an armored vigilante and was trying to study Aikido in order to deal with his personal demons. He had growing bonsai as a hobby.
A group member was missing, so rather than proceed with the planned adventure, they decided to run a quick "soap operatic" session. First, my character was introduced as a new recruit. Things got off to a bad start when they described my character as having an "enhanced physique" according to their scanner, and after I clarified that I was playing a super normal, they just stared at me like I was speaking Martian. Belatedly I realized that being Batman was still a superpower as far as they were concerned. I sort of rolled with it. Each of the established players had six or more regular players which they played, often switching parts between two or three at a time. My date only had two characters, and only played one at a time. Somehow, the group zeroed in on the idea of "going to Las Vegas" as a way of blowing off steam. At that point, I was like, ok, this is not what I would choose to roleplay, but I can see some possibilities here. Some of the other characters might try to be friendly, there will be alcohol, etc. Well, right off the bat, my character was isolated from my date's character, and I found my staid vigilante being confronted with a bubbly, flirtatious female character played by the male host. Now I can't say with certain that this wasn't just my discomfort, but I got a "vibe" and suddenly I wanted to be just about anywhere else doing just about anything else than roleplaying a flirtation with this player. It was instinctual, and I can't state any explicit reason for my ill-ease, but I didn't want to see him making "flirty" faces, didn't want to know more about how he portrayed women in fiction, and didn't want to have to try to feel out what MPAA rating we were shooting for. I thought about my character and considered that logically, he might find her repellant, so I role-played the brush-off, with a little extra rudeness, for spice. The rest of the session was pretty banal. Ultimately, I felt the truest thing to my character would be to sneak off from the social situation, and get pretty drunk. The other players basically let that happen without interruption, and I spent the last fifteen minutes or so fielding the occasional question about my character's level of consciousness, before finally allowing that he had fallen asleep with a whiskey bottle in his hand. Frankly, it was (I felt) a poignant scene that pointed out the amount of missed potential.
I wanted to interact. I tried to interact. But I found myself backpedalling away from one unwanted interaction, and being ignored in virtually every other area. And I don't remember a damned thing about my date's character. It would not have taken a lot of effort to involve my character more. But somewhere, sometime, I was probably the subject of a post much like the OP in this thread.
Anders, she did seem quite familiar with role-playing per se, if not with FATE. We did not bring our own characters, but made them up in the beginning of the session.
Pawsplay, I can see how you could get that impression from what I have written, but it's not really how it happened.
QuoteShe turned into a little kitty during the "talking" scene. Did anyone pet the kitty? No. They ignored her kittiness.
Actually, she already turned up as a kitty, and it was established how she climbed one of the other player characters (including the use of claws, ouch). Someone might even have said, "Come here, kitty!" I wouldn't have thought much of it (just a bit of character portrayal, which others did as well) but it did seem pretty obvious from how the GM announced the scene that this was the scene in which we would
talk.
QuoteShe got stuck in a tree. Did anyone rush to her rescue? Did anyone capitalize on the potential comedy? No.
Actually, we wanted to get her out of the tree but she had compelled an Aspect and earned a FATE point and it would have been contrary to the rules to just negate her disadvantage, the GM explained. As for capitalizing on the potential comedy, can you give an example of how you would have done it? Because, really, as she kept meowing, I thought,
does she expect us to do anything? But I had no idea what.
QuoteShe's a schoolgirl who turns into a cat. Then she was naked. Did anyone respond to her embarrassment? No. Instead she was treated as a sex object.
Actually, she did not portray her character as being embarrassed. She portrayed her as teasing and shaking her hips.
You are certainly right that the group did not get her, but I'm not so sure about the rest. I think we could have handled a non-professional kind of character, and all characters had their Trouble Aspect anyway, so although I'll grant that we played in a problem-solving mindset, it was expected and encouraged by the FATE system and the source material that characters do sub-optimal things. However, it did not seem to me that the Werecat player
tried to interact with the group in some way and got brushed off. It rather seemed to me that she did not have any interest in interacting with the group at all, which is the thing that puzzles me.
I get your example form that Vegas scene. I've done likewise, disengaging from a game that made me uneasy and positioning my character in-game in such a way that I could reduce interaction to a minimum. (At other times I've made up a polite lie to excuse myself, but I see you couldn't do that on a quasi-date.) In the case of the Werecat player, though, the idea of "she disengaged because the game made her uncomfortable" kind of doesn't seem to fit with that euthanasia scene in the end, and also with the "look I'm naked" scene.
Callan, that window you are talking about, would that be Congruency by big model terms?
- Frank
Quote from: Frank Tarcikowski on July 05, 2011, 05:12:44 AM
Actually, she already turned up as a kitty, and it was established how she climbed one of the other player characters (including the use of claws, ouch). Someone might even have said, "Come here, kitty!" I wouldn't have thought much of it (just a bit of character portrayal, which others did as well) but it did seem pretty obvious from how the GM announced the scene that this was the scene in which we would talk.
So what make it obvious? And is it required that she be on board with the whole talking thing? Is her character one that would logically have a lot to say in the situation? I have lots of questions about how that scene played out. It's entirely possible she was biding her time, waiting for the scene to end, which is still not necessarily total disengagement, just disinterest in the scene.
Quote
Actually, we wanted to get her out of the tree but she had compelled an Aspect and earned a FATE point and it would have been contrary to the rules to just negate her disadvantage, the GM explained. As for capitalizing on the potential comedy, can you give an example of how you would have done it? Because, really, as she kept meowing, I thought, does she expect us to do anything? But I had no idea what.
Like... get her out of the tree? Just a thought I had.
Quote
Actually, she did not portray her character as being embarrassed. She portrayed her as teasing and shaking her hips.
But she ran away as soon as the situation was resolved. I'm guessing her idea was born out of spontaneity and possibly a desire to be outragerous.
Quote
You are certainly right that the group did not get her, but I'm not so sure about the rest. I think we could have handled a non-professional kind of character, and all characters had their Trouble Aspect anyway, so although I'll grant that we played in a problem-solving mindset, it was expected and encouraged by the FATE system and the source material that characters do sub-optimal things. However, it did not seem to me that the Werecat player tried to interact with the group in some way and got brushed off. It rather seemed to me that she did not have any interest in interacting with the group at all, which is the thing that puzzles me.
I wasn't there, I'll grant you. But it sounds, to me, like she did try to interact with the group. She did attention-getting things. She just wasn't able to communicate clearly what she expected. Maybe she was nervous. Nervous people sometimes do very strange things. :)
QuoteCallan, that window you are talking about, would that be Congruency by big model terms?
Looking up the term, no, that's some creative agenda thing. A straightforward example of the windows I'm talking about is if you only spoke German and I only spoke English - those windows of communication and understanding only barely overlap, and that's only because of body language and pointing at stuff, etc. Here it's the language of the kitteh and language of the serious investigation crew. They just don't overlap.
Paws, I don't think you need to do the internet thing of 'Just a thought I had'. At the forge generally people try to earnestly understand the other dude (atleast at the start, anyway). But on your question it raises some interesting points...
QuoteActually, we wanted to get her out of the tree but she had compelled an Aspect and earned a FATE point and it would have been contrary to the rules to just negate her disadvantage, the GM explained.
Frank, is it really contrary to the rules?
If so, perhaps she didn't realise the power of the rules she was invoking and was thinking 'Aww, I'll just use these to put myself in a tree, then they come save mah kitteh!' when the rules she invoked don't work that way.
Did the GM explain this to her as well? What was her reaction (her real body language)?
How long is the disadvantage supposed to go for, anyway? If the rules don't say and it's up to the GM, then it's one of those points where the GM starts saying the rules are in control when actually the rules have punted control to the GM on the matter. A murky, mollasesy moment...
Quote from: Callan S. on July 05, 2011, 06:56:19 PM
Paws, I don't think you need to do the internet thing of 'Just a thought I had'. At the forge generally people try to earnestly understand the other dude (atleast at the start, anyway). But on your question it raises some interesting points...
I felt I should demure because my knowledge of FATE is pretty soft. My knowledge of Dredsen Files, specifically, is almost non-existent. I don't allow the rules to tyrannize my games. However, I was concerned I might not be understanding the rules. Maybe there is a good reason you can't just rescue the kitty. In most games, when you receive some kind of currency for accepting a complication, the complication itself is played out as a little scene-inside-the-scene. But maybe in this game, if you accept the point, you have foreclosed certain options. I honestly don't know.
But if a thing is a role-playing game, I think it should be possible to rescue the kitty.
I don't have the Dresden Files RPG. The Free FATE text on Compelling Aspects is pretty wide open to interpretation. The actions needs to be "to the character's detriment", that's about all it says. The GM gets to make the call. It's well possible that the player did not expect that consequence.
- Frank
Yeah, just that it's one of those quirky 'The GM gets to make that call, but the GM genuinely believes the rule text gets to make that call' things, so the GM makes his call unconciously (effectively) even though wide awake at the table.
I think I've failed at that myself at times. It's a skill to build up to recognise when the rules have handed you the ball - I wouldn't lay any moral blame on that as much as I wouldn't do so for someone who can't get a basketball through a hoop. Just a skill to develop.
QuoteI don't allow the rules to tyrannize my games.
Terror is the mother of invention.
That said, in alot of traditional games what are stated as the rules by someone is generally the GM stating that. And using the ambiguous wording of rules to apply them at will. So if you mean you don't allow the GM/one person at a table of many people to tyrannize the group activity, I get that - if the means of stopping that is by written rules. Otherwise it becomes you tyrannicizing the game (if tyrannicizing is a word...) instead of the other dude doing it.
Quote from: Callan S. on July 06, 2011, 06:20:16 AM
QuoteI don't allow the rules to tyrannize my games.
Terror is the mother of invention.
"Fear is the mind-killer."
Quote
That said, in alot of traditional games what are stated as the rules by someone is generally the GM stating that. And using the ambiguous wording of rules to apply them at will. So if you mean you don't allow the GM/one person at a table of many people to tyrannize the group activity, I get that - if the means of stopping that is by written rules. Otherwise it becomes you tyrannicizing the game (if tyrannicizing is a word...) instead of the other dude doing it.
What I meant was that the GM should not abdicate their role as the interpreter of the rules. It is asking the rules too much to get them to fully interpret the imaginary world without a human intercessor. I'm not advocating fudging, or play by fiat, or any other scenario where the rules are abandoned. However, the rules are only the rules. If rescuing a cat from a tree is something that cannot even be attempted, I hesitate to call what you are doing a role-playing game.
I guess he just made a not-so-good spot ruling. He was in the middle of moderating an action scene with seven eager players, so I guess that can be forgiven.
Thanks everybody for your contributions. I think we've come about as far as we can in understanding the Werecat player, so I'd suggest we wrap up this thread here.
- Frank