Humanity and Society
Ron Edwards:
Hi Frank,
That's about right, although the risks I was thinking of were a little simpler, I think. I'm referring to a lot of modern 'historical' Hollywood dramas in which the protagonists' viewpoints are all too obviously thoroughly middle-class American or otherwise extremely modern. I'm also thinking about a medieval dragon-killing fantasy novel from the 1980s in which the hero openly talked about how a father-son conflict (two other characters) was composed of love twisted into dominance. As a reader, I lost touch with the book at that point.
I'm thinking about the barbaric, primal, fantastic setting, not much more than a step up from the unrealistic-but-fun caveman stereotype, that we briefly utilized in our game in Berlin. From [Sorcerer & Sword] Dinosaurs and Zebra Women:
Quote
... my concept for Humanity in that game would be, in English, "the rule of law," meaning that a society's members are subject to a system of judgment, and principles-based laws with some flexibility built in, rather than merely the rule of the fist at any given moment. As I saw it, the tribes were mainly run by might and deception, and thus true law was just struggling into existence for our story.
No one in the setting itself had to understand a word about that. In fact, I think we did quite well at seeing Humanity as a principle in action strictly as an imposed thematic mechanic from players-to-fiction, and I also think we would have done spectacularly if we'd turned that game into an ongoing long-term game. When I'm talking about risks, I'm talking about not trusting ourselves as authors and not imposing the mechanical consequences of Humanity unless the characters somehow "agree," which would necessitate one of our characters becoming somehow able to articulate Humanity as stated above. Which I think would be annoying at best, and more likely outright stupid-bad.
Best, Ron
edited to fix the link title - RE
Judd:
When a player fails a roll, definitely do not make it just a wiff where they can safely try again. Once they fail, something happens and it should be concrete, dramatic and change the context of the entire situation.
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