The Great Social Shakedown
B4GD:
I've been reading Heroic Worlds from Lawrence Schick for some projects unrelated to playing games. Insomuch that i've spent a large portion of my life devoted to studying society in a variety of ways, I constantly think about connecting the role we all want to play, the role we make for games and the player of that game. I bring up Schick's work because it tells an important story:
Quote
"At first, the player characters were deemed to be the players themselves who had been sucked through time warp, but some of the players weren't comfortable with this. Further, they found that the game's dramatic impact was limited, as there was no danger. Arneson would threatn but never kill characters that represented the actual players" (18).
I have read this bet several times. It is a really fascinating idea and one that I think has not been really developed. This was in the early 70s. Since this time, there has been dozens of socially intense gaming experiences; a myriad of potent, awkward situations that games put people in; and a general but noticeable trend within society to connect all of our little details to other people's little details.
Is it time for us to play ourselves? A long time ago when I was still involved withe Gaming Outpost, I had really tried to get some folks together to try it out. I think it's something that people need to do with people they know...sort of well. But you can justify it in different ways.
So, the character creation i was thinking about involves secrets.
Each person rolls 1d4 and keeps this roll on a piece of paper. These are your secrets
Next, each person in the game judges you for a standard set of criteria:
Strength
Grace (Agility)
Stamina
Willpower
Intelligence
Charisma
Each player writes down a corresponding number to the maximum of the die you will all use. For example, a group could have nothing but d6's so it'd be a rank of 6 or less. d20s would be on a scale of 1-20.
Average all players inputs on all characters for each stat. 5 players using d20s mark my strength as around 10,12,9,11,14 = 58/5=11.6 round up=12. So, my strength in game would be 12. Do this for each stat.
Next, each player takes their secrets and writes a sentence about themselves on a piece of paper. This sentence should be relevant to one of those scores and in the context of the world they will play in. For example, if I am in a world of dinosaurs, I could say that my dad used to take me hunting every Sunday. So, for each roll involving hunting, especially with guns, I have an advantage.
So, each player basically knows each other. We know how brave they are, how aggressive, how crazy.
Each time a player takes an action, the other players have the ability to let them perform the action, stop them, help them, or question that character.
When this happens, the players discuss what they as characters would do in this situation and why. they must also explain this to the Game Master.
To add more depth to the social aspect of this game. The Game Master is a (Good/Bad/Vengence/Pious) person. The GameMaster should be a person the game masters don't know very well, if at all.
Depth, Danger, and excitement then, take on the form of having to live up to this not so hidden pantopticon of judges in our lives.
I think this is a good start. Anything catch anyone's critical eye?
Nick
5niper9:
Hi Nick,
three things come to my mind.
Once upon a time, when I was a teenager in a small group of friends who not only met for roleplaying, there was a Vampire game. Part of the group was a girl I fancied, a confident, but not bossy guy, another girl and me. We were all of approximately the same age. Usually the group was even bigger, but for this instance of the game there were just the four of us.
So we get the idea of playing ourselfes, all through the process of becoming a vampire and the other guy says he would play the GM, if nobody minded. We were okay with that.
I think adjusting points for oneself is not a problem, but as you may know several of the vampire families in the game have different flaws. As we played as humans in the first place, the GM should choose the kind of vampire family we would be adopted to and thus chose our flaw. As it happened he gave the flaw of feeding restriction to me, which meant, that I had to choose a subgroup of people which would be the only kind of people the character could drink from. As I was humming and hawing he said: "Just tell us what kind of girls you like and we'll restrict to that." And suddenly this activity had turned from an escapist roleplaying to Thruth and Dare without dare. I was not comfortable, but teenage me would not lose a word about that. So I said something and we played along for maybe an hour. But all through a tension or uncomfortableness was lingering between us. So much for my experience with this kind of game.
Next point is this:
Quote from: B4GD on April 08, 2011, 10:30:28 PM
Next, each person in the game judges you for a standard set of criteria:
Strength
Grace (Agility)
Stamina
Willpower
Intelligence
Charisma
I think this is unsafe and will lead to unpleasant situations. Judging them without anything to point to for reference seems to me like a really bad idea. I would prefer something like roll 9D[die-size] for each friend at the table and distribute six dice from each set of nine dice to the characteristics named above. Then take the average for each player as stated above. In that way when someone gets pissed because his/her Intelligence [or whatever] is too low, the person giving the dice can cede responsibility to the dice. Furthermore, people do not have to invent a scale, but just need to a an ordered relation between the characteristics of the person to be judged.
Third point is that I do not understand what you want to express here:
Quote from: B4GD on April 08, 2011, 10:30:28 PM
To add more depth to the social aspect of this game. The Game Master is a (Good/Bad/Vengence/Pious) person. The GameMaster should be a person the game masters don't know very well, if at all.
Hope this helps.
Best,
René
Callan S.:
Hello Nick,
Quote
Depth, Danger, and excitement then, take on the form of having to live up to this not so hidden pantopticon of judges in our lives.
I'll ask why though? As I'm reading you, your just creating this circumstance. I mean, one reason why that comes to my preferences is to reflect on the judgementalism. But here your just recreating only - there is no reflection stage built into the activity? I mean, right now maybe your not realising that right now your seeing it from the outside. And that's what's interesting. But you start doing it - you'll be too busy doing X to see X from the outside.
And if not for reflection, what for? It's like a prisoner making a tiny diorama of his cell and then playing out a little prisoner inside it?
B4GD:
Hi, thanks for the comments! Thinking about this type of game has always been useful to me.
Quote from: 5niper9 on April 08, 2011, 11:46:55 PM
And suddenly this activity had turned from an escapist roleplaying to Thruth and Dare without dare. I was not comfortable, but teenage me would not lose a word about that. So I said something and we played along for maybe an hour. But all through a tension or uncomfortableness was lingering between us. So much for my experience with this kind of game.
I think this type of game is more common than we'd all probably like to admit. I think most of the groups I have been in that played longer than a session or two ended because of sexual tensions and discomfort. I think that by making it a conscious part of the game rather than unconscious, it will lose some power. That said, a caveat for this type of game will require a modicum of self-understanding and a larger degree of humility. These days, we could all use that.
Quote from: B4GD on April 08, 2011, 10:30:28 PM
Next, each person in the game judges you for a standard set of criteria:
Quote from: 5niper9 on April 08, 2011, 11:46:55 PM
Strength
Grace (Agility)
Stamina
Willpower
Intelligence
Charisma
I think this is unsafe and will lead to unpleasant situations. Judging them without anything to point to for reference seems to me like a really bad idea. I would prefer something like roll 9D[die-size] for each friend at the table and distribute six dice from each set of nine dice to the characteristics named above. Then take the average for each player as stated above. In that way when someone gets pissed because his/her Intelligence [or whatever] is too low, the person giving the dice can cede responsibility to the dice. Furthermore, people do not have to invent a scale, but just need to a an ordered relation between the characteristics of the person to be judged.
The point of reference here is how we judge ourselves versus how others judge us. It is uncomfortable to see this in play but it is that discomfort that interests me. The order of the scale is a predefined (by the players) one because each group is different and the power of the scale in each step should be a consideration in the setup of the game. A scale of 4 will not tell you as much about yourself as a scale of 20 would, for instance. The details are important to some folks, not important to others.
Quote from: 5niper9 on April 08, 2011, 11:46:55 PM
Third point is that I do not understand what you want to express here:
Quote from: B4GD on April 08, 2011, 10:30:28 PM
To add more depth to the social aspect of this game. The Game Master is a (Good/Bad/Vengence/Pious) person. The GameMaster should be a person the game masters don't know very well, if at all.
This is something in relation to the power of the person outside the group. If you are playing yourself, you need to have a reason to do so. Dream sequences, time travel, or even an explosion of alien or zombie activity in the town you are in. The personality type of the GM is pre-determined by the GM. They write it down and set it aside. A Good Game master will run a story that allows everyone to experience hardship and perhaps overcome it. A Bad game master would challenge a group and perhaps use weaknesses of the group against them. A vengeful GM will perhaps wait and lay traps for the group because they are someone from their past.
The danger then, is based on a pre-set condition and it'll be up to the players to figure out how to cope with it.
In the end, most of the games i've made over time are better used in a social science course lab than the game table. I'd imagine this is one of those but it would be a great one to see outside the class.
B4GD:
Quote from: Callan S. on April 09, 2011, 04:04:18 AM
Hello Nick,
Quote
Depth, Danger, and excitement then, take on the form of having to live up to this not so hidden pantopticon of judges in our lives.
I'll ask why though? As I'm reading you, you're just creating this circumstance. I mean, one reason why that comes to my preferences is to reflect on the judgementalism. But here you're just recreating only - there is no reflection stage built into the activity? I mean, right now maybe your not realising that right now your seeing it from the outside. And that's what's interesting. But you start doing it - you'll be too busy doing X to see X from the outside.
And if not for reflection, what for? It's like a prisoner making a tiny diorama of his cell and then playing out a little prisoner inside it?
There are a variety of reasons to do this sort of thing.
How would you react to circumstance when your reactions are based on those around you rather than just yourself? It gets into the things we pull from when role-playing and is a wholly exploratory activity as a group. Essentially, you are not so much playing yourself as you are all playing each other in some fashion. The actions we all have control over are those things that have no impact on the group of people.
Quote
I swing my sword at the ogre becomes,
Player 1 - "I think he'd swing his sword."
Player 2 - "I think he'd pause from fear."
Player 3 - "He's quite wise and he's in danger, he'd swing."
GM - Alright, you swing your sword at the ogre. Damage is ______.
Role-playing by committee.
I am interested in making conscious a lot of the unspoken things we do at the role-playing table.
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