What Does Sharing Narrative Control Show?
stefoid:
Hi Cliff.
I reckon the difference between the gag cracking players and the 'serious' players is that you gave them some control, which is a bit like them becoming a stakeholder in the game -- its not your game anymore its our game. Sorry to say I think the gag cracking and so on is the players getting whatever fun they can out of a game which is otherwise boring them or frustrating them.
The insane level of opposition they came up with is because they want to play characters that CAN deal with that. In their imaginations, their PCs can chop their way through hordes of mooks to get to the big bosses, manga/chinese martial arts style, and after a climatic battle, emerge triumphant -- in other words they want a dramatic style of combat rather than a mechanical cause and effect style that will leave most of them dead or whatever after two whole sessions of play.
Callan S.:
Cliff, I'm assuming that so far they have enjoyed it, despite the PC body count/damage? Like they are leaning forward in seats during play? I mean, on fails they say dammit then get back to business pronto, compared to before with the fail song? Are they responding to the PC body count as if the whole point of the activity has failed? Or are they responding in a way that...well, they just wanna play it out and still try and win this thing? It doesn't sound like they think the point of the activity has been failed.
I'd say everyone wants to play characters that can wade through guys and emerge triumphant. But to them the activity hasn't failed if that doesn't occur the first time through?
stefoid:
Callan, theres two reasons why the players might want to get 'serious' - one is that they are really into the game and the other is that they defined the opposition and help play it out, so they have to treat their own input seriously. either would be an improvement, while both would be fantastic.
Paul Czege:
My gut tells me that their up-front knowledge of the full scope of the opposition is a factor in their newfound seriousness.
Paul
Cliff H:
Quote from: Callan S. on January 30, 2011, 04:12:42 PM
Cliff, I'm assuming that so far they have enjoyed it, despite the PC body count/damage? Like they are leaning forward in seats during play?
They certainly seem to be into it. Everyone half expected the first guy to go down, but when the second character got captured, that was unexpected (until he refused to leave, then one of the players whispered to him: "Just so you know, you've officially crossed the line from brave to stupid. Carry on."). When that didn't go well, there was a serious question as to how viable the second half of the mission, which relied on the team coming together, but that was still two solo missions away, and they wanted to see those things played out. When they went just as badly, I must have gotten a look on my face, because one of the players started pointing at me and yelling. "This is not over yet, and you are not ending this campaign! We are going to pull this out, even if a particular person at this table needs to get The Hand of Fate involved. You hear me?"
So yeah, they seem to want to keep going with it, and apparently they've taken the planning offline to work out in between the sessions. Attitude like that speaks to them liking it. If they weren't enjoying themselves, this would be the perfect opportunity to say it wasn't working out and walk.
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I mean, on fails they say dammit then get back to business pronto, compared to before with the fail song? Are they responding to the PC body count as if the whole point of the activity has failed? Or are they responding in a way that...well, they just wanna play it out and still try and win this thing? It doesn't sound like they think the point of the activity has been failed.
The mission has certainly been failed. Even if they do everything else right, they've screwed the pooch pretty badly here. But the point of the game is what's got me posting here. Just like I never sat down with my players and worked out a mutually agreed upon tone for a game, I have never sat down and asked them what they're looking for, and really pressed it. I've asked, but I usually get "I just wanna play and have fun," and it's gone nowhere from there. However, since encountering the analyses of play approaches found here, I'm looking at my groups behavior (which strikes me as more indicative of what they're after than anything they say) and attempting to identify their drivers from there.
What I see is one player who, when confronted with brutes (which drop easily), is never content to leave one standing, no matter the circumstance. There's 20 of them and he said he'll buy time for the rest of the group to run from the tavern? He will, but that doesn't mean he'll leave. That means he'll fight all 20 himself. Oh, they're on an island surrounded by 30 angry natives? It's go time. This last time saw him up against 35 well trained guards (in two waves, and they were still brutes). He could have run, but he instead charged away from the exit to chase them down, and ultimately got overwhelmed.
I've got another player who is all about fabulous hair, being suave, and being a ladykiller. Rather than play that from a character angle, though, I'm beginning to think it's gamist. How many women can he bed in a day? Can he use his charm to create an opening in this particular organization? Can he seduce the wife of the local trade baron and his sworn enemy? When we played a FATE-like game once, he grabbed an aspect called "I'm cooler than you." All his actions look like they're pointing to getting one over the various characters, mostly NPCs.
I've always looked at role-playing as an opportunity to create and explore a character that I expect, or at least hope, will be pushed to grow in interesting ways. This initially myopic view left me thinking that situations like the ones described above were because people weren't "doing it right." Now, I'm just trying to get a handle on how to run games that speak to that play style. I myself don't naturally think along those lines, and would likely default to something like deeper dungeons and bigger monsters, which sounds interminably boring to me.
And let me hasten to add, I don't see this stuff as a problem. I'm not looking to "fix" my players. I'm trying to understand them and ascertain if I'm properly identifying gamist behavior. Once I have that, I can look to create a game experience that better suits their mentality, and hopefully gives me a little something too.
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I'd say everyone wants to play characters that can wade through guys and emerge triumphant. But to them the activity hasn't failed if that doesn't occur the first time through?
They've all got their arenas in which they want to shine; they're not all combat monsters. But in general, yes, it does seem that way. The failures of the individual missions has left them in terrible positions, and it could spell the end of the campaign as they know it, but no one seems to want to see that happen, and as I noted earlier, I've already been hit with vociferous pre-emptive arguments against just that. So while they acknowledge their missions didn't go well, there is a clear line between failure of mission and failure of game.
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