[3:16] the betrayal of planet Girlfriend
Paul Czege:
Graham Walmsley and I came to some insights about 3:16 in conversation via IM yesterday. He's seen it played well more than I have. Here's a summary:
When you see 3:16 played well, there's lots of character play between missions, and between encounters. If you're not understanding 3:16, this looks like players and the GM simply characterizing their characters. It looks a lot like the fun you see players bring to trad convention games, a quick facility at portraying their characters for the entertainment of the group. It looks like frivolous fun making. But in 3:16 it is more than what it looks like.
The character play in 3:16 concerns itself with the interpersonal dysfunctions of military operations. When you see 3:16 played well, what looks like mostly free-form character play is actually players who've bought into the game's military context engaging in very important back-and-forth defining and building of that context.
So for 3:16 to work, you need two things, both of which I didn't have when I ran it:
1. Players need to buy in to the shared defining of the military context as an important part of the game.
2. The GM needs to understand and be creative with the bait he has at his disposal, and the orders he gives the players within the military context.
When I ran the game I failed to recognize the importance of player buy-in to shared defining of the military context.
I saw what Eero, John, and the crew in the game at Gen Con were doing merely as fun character play. Graham thinks the Reputations are a key driver here. When you put Reputations like Loyal, Drunkard, Coward, and Bloodthirsty together with player buy-in to the military context, you can't help but begin the shared building and defining of the military context. So, I might have succeeded if I'd been able to drive some character play via my own understanding of dysfunctional military personalities, some shared defining of the military context could have happened as an effect of the character play. But, as I wrote above, my ability to do dysfunctional military personalities is undeveloped.
And I failed understand the workings of bait and inter-mission scenes and orders.
I don't know whether Simon is accurate that failing an NFA roll against a superior officer is like failing to resist a Command in My Life with Master, as my 3:16 book is loaned out. But I did read it carefully, and that wasn't my impression. Still, it doesn't matter one way or the other. Lots of folks have made suggestions on this thread about the bait the GM has at his disposal. Graham suggested in our conversation that an officer might offer a trooper a weapon upgrade. It's clear that when some folks read the game text they just know how all the in-game bits of weapons and rank and orders can work for the GM as incentives and pressures to drive the progressive defining of the military context. I didn't get this when I read the text. But with players who're bought into the shared defining of the military context, it's this stuff that's the fuel. (And this thread's a great resource, so thanks.)
So yeah, I'm the perfect storm of bad for 3:16. But y'know, that's now clearly why the game has my attention. It's an opportunity for me to develop as a gamer.
Maybe it's time to rent Full Metal Jacket...
Paul
Valamir:
Paul, I don't have quite as much 3:16 experience as some, but yes. I can confirm all of the above in the sessions I've played as well.
Reputations are extremely important and its important that everyone knows what they are.
Here's an example from a GenCon session where Alexander N. really set the tone for the upcoming interactions. He barked out each step in the character creation process like a Drill Sergeant ("And now you have an FA, FA is Fighting Ability, do not make me explain what Fighting Ability means, if you do not understand the Ability to Fight you are too stupid to be a Marine" that sort of thing). When he got to Reputations: "You each have a Reputation, when I call on you, you will give it to me and it will be added to your file..." When he got to me, I didn't have a Reputation picked out yet (cuz I was trying to be all clever and he gave us like no time) he said "Very Well, your Reputation is that you're Stupid Git, because you are, in fact, a stupid git...any questions? There better not be".
That sort of thing.
And yes...learn to talk like R Lee Ermey in Full Metal Jacket and you'll know how to talk to your 3:16 players as GM...and the end of that movie will show you exactly why this leads to the kind of Conflict you're currently lacking.
Lance D. Allen:
Ohhhh yes... In-character character-creation is a must. The game begins immediately once you sit them down in front of their character sheets. I wasn't the barking Drill Instructor, though. I was the bored lieutenant, processing in his new troopers.
"Write down a name. I don't even care if it's your real name, just write it down, so we know what to call you."
"Alright, I want you to tell me, in very general terms, how good you are at fight compared to how good you are at everything else. Just, I don't know, divide 10 points up between the two, and write it down. No, I don't care about the details. Just write it down. No, obviously you can't have a 1 in either one, because that would mean you're too stupid to breathe or too incompetent to be in the TEF."
Pelgrane:
Quote from: Paul Czege on December 19, 2008, 12:49:23 PM
I don't know whether Simon is accurate that failing an NFA roll against a superior officer is like failing to resist a Command in My Life with Master, as my 3:16 book is loaned out.
Paul
The rules reference is on page 46 "the winner can impose an order on the loser", and this applies equally to superior PC and NPC ranks. We found this rule rather useful, as it appears to give officers power over troopers, but really just makes them resentful and try to twist the orders.
Simon
matthijs:
Paul, I think you're absolutely right with regards to the military context. To me, the status play within the strict boundaries of rank order etc are at least as important as the mission play within the boundaries of the conflict system. They're two different games that feed into each other.
I've only played this game once, but it was a very good session. I think we all intuitively (or by blind luck) grabbed onto the military status game straight away. As GM, I gave the first mission briefing in-character as a nervous officer who clearly had little or no information about the mission, showing one dysfunction. A higher-ranking NPC later went into "sly politician" mode, trying to hose the players when the orders he gave them backfired. Two of the players got into a very intense in-character fight between missions, which almost ended badly due to some physical play.
All these things happened between missions; the players went into the missions knowing they were part of a fucked up system, and with some potential authority problems just below the surface waiting to explode.
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