[Primetime Adventures] Political comedy for the new year
GreatWolf:
Hey, Filip.
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Now, that was also the very first time I've seen Magda pushing her goals in the story via means different than her character's direct actions. I can't deny that it was the strongest choice she took during the few months we've been playing together. But at the same time, in that particular context, I consider it a failure at successful play.
Could you expand on this? How was this a failure?
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Either way, I'm a bit sceptical about your statement. I think a lot depends on how the group decides to use the game. It may not have an in-built competitive edge, but at the same time, I don't think there's anything that effectively blocks competitive behavior. It's like saying D&D can't be used in a non-competitive way, while thousands of people across the world play it that way.
I wonder to what extent your position is affected by cultural influences. You're obviously immersed in the whole Story Gamey culture of awesome, and as such, you're heavily soaked with those awesome memes. Now, here, on the other side of the ocean, we're effectively outside this whole awesome bubble. Furthermore, the culture of our country generaly promotes passive-aggressive behavior, so go figure. The accounts of people's experiences with PTA I've seen here in Poland, however rare they are, vary widely from what I usually read on foreign forums.
That may be. I don't mean that dismissively; my observations on PTA are mostly limited to American play, so that's what I have to work with. I'd be curious to hear from other people about their PTA experiences. Anyone have an analogous situation to Filip and Magda's?
GreatWolf:
I've thought about it a bit, and I'm going to modify my position a bit, to wit: PTA does not require competition as a core function of the game. I'll still point at the various items I mentioned above as reasons why this is.
Filip Luszczyk:
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Could you expand on this? How was this a failure?
It's in this:
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Magda's decision made me wonder whether we've been playing the same game for that whole time, actually.
Up to that point the game was, or at least seemed to be, totally collaborative. Then, a sudden backstab in a very crucial moment. Then, myself, I insisted on another scene (even though everyone but suggested closing the episode), as some Budget got replenished in the conflict and I wanted a second chance with my Issue (chances were still against my character, and the overall outcome didn't change in the end - but I got my choice and addressed the Issue in a generally satisfying manner).
It all felt totally out of place to me - I suppose we should have stopped to discuss it, but it didn't occur to anyone at that moment.
We discussed it after the game, but we didn't manage to determine for sure whether it was a totally accidental SNAFU or just the first time an inconsistency that was there in our assumptions from the beginning surfaced. I suspect it could have been the latter.
Now, Magda's motive, I believe, was her noticeable fixation on ruining her character's rival life. She seemed quite serious about it at that time, to the point that it seemed nearly personal, and definitely very emotional. Up to that point, she seemed to avoid affecting fiction via means different than her character's direct actions. However, the tools for it were lying in front of her openly for the whole time, and this was probably the first time she actively reached for them, breaking from her standard play patterns. So, the situation had a very strong impact on her, I think.
However, this is not how the rest of us had been using these tools from the very beginning. It's just, Magda shouldn't get fixed on destroying the NPC in the first place, as it made completely no sense in the context of that game. Had she grasped it, she'd have used the rivalry for her purposes as a player (i.e. technically, nothing but our possible lack of agreement could stop her from just "winning" with the NPC - her attempts were like trying to fight with thin air). So, she misunderstood the way we've been using NPCs in the game, and we didn't identify the problem and didn't do anything to improve her understanding early enough.
Also, since Magda didn't try to veto the potential outcome she wasn't fine with during stakes setting, it's possible she was accepting such stakes in the previous conflicts, and we didn't notice. Which would mean that the whole collaborativeness of the game was undermined all the time.
This is why I think that event could have been an indication of our failure at successful play as a group.
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