head games
stefoid:
This is a great thread.
So the summary is, Ben, that if you see players pissing about with (assumption) irrelevant headgames, its because they lack clear direction about else they could/should be doing? Assuming the game is not broken, and this is a temporary hickup, the response should be 'something happens that the players cant ignore and takes obvious priority over the headgames' bang!
Matt Gwinn:
I think Ben hit the problem right on the head
Paul Czege:
Renee's characterization of the game as a pasta flinger rather than a meat grinder is dead on. The promise to the players isn't that they can go anywhere and do anything, but that they can have an impact on situations created by the GM, and that they can switch into different situations fairly readily if they want.
And I think it's also that they can be a protagonist if they want to. If you believe the definition of drama as tension over time about the when and how and outcomes of certain expected events, they don't start the game as protagonists, but more as proto-protagonists. Matt's character in particular has been across the landscape of the game and back, across numerous situations. The point at which he chooses to create some expectations, that's when he'll be a protagonist. There's no way that when Matt makes his purpose clear, that certain future events don't become installed by the social contract as inevitabilities.
Paul
Ben Lehman:
How would a player go about having a real impact on a situation (mission) created by the GM? Use the dead-lover-magic-seed mission as an example? What does actual engagement look like?
yrs--
--Ben
Matt Gwinn:
Paul,
My character's primary focus since the beginning of the campaign has been his relationship with with the NPC Kaya. From his very first scene in fact. Yet over and over he is confronted with NPC after NPC that have continually led him away from that story. I kind of agree with Ben and Renee about the situations placed before our characters. Many times they are distractions or obstacles that clutter up our story, yet we feel compelled to participate in them, especially since we know how much effort you have put into creating those story arcs.
The one time I made a concerted effort to ignore one of those obstacles the system kicked me back and I was forced to waste a scene on it. Which by the way are huge resources to us. With 4 players who usually do not share scenes we only get a few scenes per session, sometimes only 1, so what we do in those scenes HAS to matter to us.
I have hoped that ultimately all of the different story arcs placed before my character would lead him back to the Kaya storyline, that they somehow all tied together, but either they're not or they're taking too long. I've been saying it for weeks that there are too many NPCs to keep track of and that's a result of adding more and more story arcs that seem to be cluttering things up and preventing us from grasping on to a single goal to focus on. I think the new feature that we recently added about our goals might help curtail this kind of thing and more clearly alert you to what we find compelling. I now find myself forcing the issue trying to get back to the story which has clearly been at my character's core.
Going back to the scene with the seed, my character's actions were in part influenced by his desire to return to that original storyline with Kaya. While impersonating the dead woman he took the opportunity to convince his employer that he (the employer) needed to find some kind of quest to give him fulfillment. I knew full well that I'd be offering up that very opportunity once the scene reached a conclusion. That quest was to help my character find the woman he loves. And since his employer is indeed accompanying him on that quest, I consider the scene to have been a success. The fact that you forgot that he was even with my character the next session highlights that we clearly see different aspects of the campaign interesting.
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