Drifting toward a better Sim
dindenver:
Hi!
Here's my two cents.
First, you have to put the players in a position that has influence over your "plot." Don't turn them into pawns, turn them into players. This does not mean that every char has to be a king or demi-god. But that whatever level the plot is set at (street level, epic level, etc), the players have influence commiserate to that level.
A good example of how this can be done badly is Exalted. This is a great game and I love it. But starting characters still have the new char smell. Sure, compared to normal humans, they rock like gibralter. But, compared to the signature characters, they are less than pawns. so, your choices are: Run a gritty, street-level Exalted campaign with new characters, or 2) grant the characters XP at char gen and bring them in line with where the players want the characters to go (in line with the monks of the immaculate order, the Sidereals or even Mask of Winters).
It sounds like you are almost there, but I wanted to state it in a different way than you have to maybe push you over the edge.
Finally, you have plugged into a valuable idea (player creativity=fun), now you just need to kick it up a notch and let the players pick what decisions are meaningful to them, rather than trying to create meaning in the decisions you have chosen for them. This is not to say you are a bad GM or anything like that. You are making the best of the situation, but moving forward, its OK to just say to player X, "what is important to your character?" and go with it.
Well, it sounds like your campaign is rocking, good luck with the future man!
John Adams:
Dave: That's it in a nutshell. Many potential conflicts will come up during play, the players will ignore or skim over most of them and that's OK. The conflicts they choose to grab will steer the fiction and determine whether we drift into complete vanilla Nar or a stronger, more fulfilling Sim.
Ron: I've been reading the threads about constructive denial and the Sim "package", but I haven't been able to nail down exactly what our cannon is. We take our inspiration from many places, but for this game there is a very strong expectation that I *am* the cannon. If I say it's in, it's in. If I say it doesn't fit, all of the players but one will support that. The game world has been rolling for 15 years now, so we have an instinctive feel for what fits. And there are no world creation rules at play, so what do I use to decide what fits? We just call it "cool". If it doesn't fit my group's general expectations of cool, it's out.
I have a feeling this group has been trying to get at Narrativism for a long time, but we've been banging our heads against tradition and some of the players have basically given up and expect Participationism is the closest they'll ever get. How they respond to the conflicts I mentioned will tell me a lot in the next couple of weeks. I'll follow where they lead and reinforce whatever grabs them.
I'm full of angst over our lack of conflict resolution but rationally I think we'll do OK; I just need practice with the new concepts involved.
Ron Edwards:
That's my impression too, John, from your posts. Your discussion of the new kind of Sim as a goal was rational, but didn't really jibe with what you were driving toward with your tactics, nor especially with that round of Bangs you prepped. I can only go by what you've posted, but I think Narrativism, or what we used to call "Vanilla Narr" sometimes, is being born. I like the steps you're taking and can't think of any advice or criticism.
Best, Ron
Caldis:
I think Ron posted a great example of a nar game that sounds fairly similar to what you are playing in his series of posts on D&D with the neighbors.
I think the 2nd and 3rd threads are probably more relevant but all three are a good read. There's lots of talk there but Ron's first few posts are usually the best to check out, after that they kind of devolve into rules questions for the most part. Here's the links.
http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=19311.0
http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=19690.0
http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=19889.0
You'll notice that Ron has created the plots without any input on the part of the players. He talks about the players deciding the conflicts and what sides they will take.
Ron Edwards:
Hi,
Well, to quibble with phrasing just a little, it's not the plots that I created, but rather, the back-stories: the existing conflicts among the NPCs of the immediate setting. I think of "plot" as describing the outcomes of all our decisions and interactions (them playing the PCs, me playing the NPCs) throughout the process itself - something we generated, not something that was planned.
Best, Ron
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