Author Topic: Food for Thought, Basic: Sticking feathers up your butt  (Read 8473 times)

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Halloween

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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #20 on: March 05, 2009, 11:27:15 PM »
While I agree with the fundamental assumption (feathers + ass != chicken), what is your stance on games with crappy, but existing, secondary mechanics.

D&D is a good example of this kind of game. In it's 4th edition it is primarily a miniatures combat game, it does however have a very simple skill system which covers everything that is NOT combat.

Thus if you want to run a detective game you can run one as a game (by using the skill challenge rules) but these rules are vestigial at best. They are not the focus of the design, and are inferior to the games finely tuned combat mechanics.

Their existence complicates your equation. In the event that you want to run a detective game in D&D you can, and you can run it with the rules as written, but those rules are not very good. Another game, one designed to portray the genre of murder mystery could do a much better job.

I would argue that if your goal in a game is to play murder mysteries then switching to a more focused game makes sense. The better mechanics will (all else being equal) create a better play experience. Unfortunately, the effort necessary to convert systems can be significant.

Consider the following example:

Assume you are part of a dungeons and dragons game. You are four months into an ongoing, long-running campaign. You are genuinely enjoying yourself and would like to continue to play this game. Up until this point you and your group have been dutifully tramping through dungeons and slaying dragons, as Adventurers do, but your GM decides that this is getting a bit stale. He decides to run a murder mystery within this same game.

He has two options:

1. He can use the existing rules of dungeons and dragons to run the murder mystery.
2. He can run the murder mystery using a separate system.

Note: For the purposes of this example we will assume that the GM intends to run a murder mystery, he does not intend to use the murder mystery as a mechanism for creating combat encounters (as in the goblin semen example).

Objectively, the rules for the "better" system are (by definition) superior, but the effort necessary to convert to a new system may not be greater then the degree of improvement offered by the superior system.

You face a hurdle.

Changing a system, for a group of role-players, is not an easy proposition. For the person(s) attempting to enact the change, it is hard work. One must convince everyone in the group that it is a good idea. Then the group must either start a new game OR recreate all of their custom content (characters etc.) in the new system. Even after this is accomplished there is still a period of adjustment when rules do not flow as efficiently as they did in the old system. This often leads to resentment and cries of "This sucks! Lets go back to <previous game>, it was better." The challenges faced under the new system often rose-tint the experience under the old system. Completing this process is a significant investment.

In short, changing the system in an ongoing game (or with an established group) is only the better option when the difficulty and effort required to switch systems is exceeded by the amount of overall benefit the change will cause.

Josh

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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #21 on: March 06, 2009, 06:23:17 AM »

Or maybe it's the kind of design we should be looking at.


There is a laundry list of games you should look at.
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Cam_Banks

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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #22 on: March 06, 2009, 11:23:30 AM »
There is a laundry list of games you should look at.

Be nice. I was using the collective "we." There aren't a lot of games I haven't looked at.

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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #23 on: March 06, 2009, 11:58:47 AM »
stuff

That brings something to mind, what about games that are primarily 1 genre, but crosses over into others. Taking that D&D game for example, what about an Action Adventure, that dabbles in Mystery/Intrigue between killing monsters and taking their stuff? It works fine up to the point where you try to have a real social interaction, and then it's house rules territory. Can't exactly switch systems just to handle that and then switch back when it's back to mauling monsters.

Toolkit games though, seem like a category of their own, they take a good bit of setup and adhocing, but can probably cover a loose genre if they are decent.
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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #24 on: March 06, 2009, 01:14:29 PM »
While I agree with the fundamental assumption (feathers + ass != chicken), what is your stance on games with crappy, but existing, secondary mechanics.

D&D is a good example of this kind of game. In it's 4th edition it is primarily a miniatures combat game, it does however have a very simple skill system which covers everything that is NOT combat.

Actually the skills system just covers skills.  It does not cover psychology, insanity or any number of other things.  Nor does it handle complex social issues.

The other issue is that skills are pass/fail.  You find a clue or fail.  And if you just keep trying until you pass, why bother rolling at all?  Conversely if you are asked to roll stealth until you fail, why bother rolling at all?

The two games where you can genuinely play detective address these issues (Gumshoe and burning wheel).  But you can also use a murder to frame(setup) the adventure in DnD or SW or others



Quote
Consider the following example:

Assume you are part of a dungeons and dragons game. You are four months into an ongoing, long-running campaign. You are genuinely enjoying yourself and would like to continue to play this game. Up until this point you and your group have been dutifully tramping through dungeons and slaying dragons, as Adventurers do, but your GM decides that this is getting a bit stale. He decides to run a murder mystery within this same game.

He has two options:

1. He can use the existing rules of dungeons and dragons to run the murder mystery.
2. He can run the murder mystery using a separate system.

Note: For the purposes of this example we will assume that the GM intends to run a murder mystery, he does not intend to use the murder mystery as a mechanism for creating combat encounters (as in the goblin semen example).

Objectively, the rules for the "better" system are (by definition) superior, but the effort necessary to convert to a new system may not be greater then the degree of improvement offered by the superior system.

You face a hurdle.

Changing a system, for a group of role-players, is not an easy proposition. For the person(s) attempting to enact the change, it is hard work. One must convince everyone in the group that it is a good idea. Then the group must either start a new game OR recreate all of their custom content (characters etc.) in the new system. Even after this is accomplished there is still a period of adjustment when rules do not flow as efficiently as they did in the old system. This often leads to resentment and cries of "This sucks! Lets go back to <previous game>, it was better." The challenges faced under the new system often rose-tint the experience under the old system. Completing this process is a significant investment.

In short, changing the system in an ongoing game (or with an established group) is only the better option when the difficulty and effort required to switch systems is exceeded by the amount of overall benefit the change will cause.


Is this, whatever this is, genuinely what your players (and you) prefer?   Then great.  My other note is, play the game, if it works do it, if it does not, don't.

There is a laundry list of games you should look at.

Be nice. I was using the collective "we." There aren't a lot of games I haven't looked at.
I'm sorry I meant "learn from" not "looked at."

stuff

That brings something to mind, what about games that are primarily 1 genre, but crosses over into others. Taking that D&D game for example, what about an Action Adventure, that dabbles in Mystery/Intrigue between killing monsters and taking their stuff? It works fine up to the point where you try to have a real social interaction, and then it's house rules territory. Can't exactly switch systems just to handle that and then switch back when it's back to mauling monsters.
Why not switch systems?  But this is what I talk about with framing.  A mystery can frame an adventure. 

Quote
Toolkit games though, seem like a category of their own, they take a good bit of setup and adhocing, but can probably cover a loose genre if they are decent.
essentially, you are correct.  The issue is that there are no good toolkits that do not mean executing basic design.  And like I point out they still don't work over much of a range.
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Halloween

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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #25 on: March 06, 2009, 03:38:35 PM »
Quote
Actually the skills system just covers skills.  It does not cover psychology, insanity or any number of other things.  Nor does it handle complex social issues.

The other issue is that skills are pass/fail.  You find a clue or fail.  And if you just keep trying until you pass, why bother rolling at all?  Conversely if you are asked to roll stealth until you fail, why bother rolling at all?

The two games where you can genuinely play detective address these issues (Gumshoe and burning wheel).  But you can also use a murder to frame(setup) the adventure in DnD or SW or others

You are correct. D&D does not handle psychology, insanity, or any number of other things.

It's skill system is limited and crappy. I'm not arguing that.

I'm saying that it DOES have rules that let you play non-action oriented stories in a non-optimal way (Roll your perception to find a clue!).

It is bad at this... but you CAN do it.

My point was that, in many games, there is one specific focus that is done very well and then subsidiary systems done very poorly.

Using those inferior subsidiary systems, while not optimal, can be the better option when the cost of changing systems is higher then the benefit provided.

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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #26 on: March 06, 2009, 04:24:11 PM »
Quote
Actually the skills system just covers skills.  It does not cover psychology, insanity or any number of other things.  Nor does it handle complex social issues.

The other issue is that skills are pass/fail.  You find a clue or fail.  And if you just keep trying until you pass, why bother rolling at all?  Conversely if you are asked to roll stealth until you fail, why bother rolling at all?

The two games where you can genuinely play detective address these issues (Gumshoe and burning wheel).  But you can also use a murder to frame(setup) the adventure in DnD or SW or others

You are correct. D&D does not handle psychology, insanity, or any number of other things.

It's skill system is limited and crappy. I'm not arguing that.

I'm saying that it DOES have rules that let you play non-action oriented stories in a non-optimal way (Roll your perception to find a clue!).

It is bad at this... but you CAN do it.

My point was that, in many games, there is one specific focus that is done very well and then subsidiary systems done very poorly.

Using those inferior subsidiary systems, while not optimal, can be the better option when the cost of changing systems is higher then the benefit provided.

OK how? 

You can do mystery by framing or fiat or even poor actual play.  Is there any other you can do?   
You can do drama by framing or fiat, but not actual play without fiat resolution doing most of the work.

My point is, skills is what you need to do enough mystery for it to work.  So I think the answer is more "you can do mystery" than other genres.

Let me explain.

Mystery is set up like any adventure except you learn the next "room" to go to by clues in the previous.  It avoids being railroady by letting the players choose how exactally to solve the problem. 
Drama on the other hand, does not have a structure.  While you can use a drama to direct an adventure.  "the king sends you on missions."  you are not doing the drama.  Except via fiat resolution.
 
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Halloween

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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #27 on: March 06, 2009, 06:08:42 PM »
Quote
My point is, skills is what you need to do enough mystery for it to work.  So I think the answer is more "you can do mystery" than other genres.

For D&D? Sure. It does mystery "better" then it does drama (though it does both poorly)/

You're missing my larger point.

Let me rephrase using a different example. Take say... our perennial favorite: Vampire.

Vampire CAN be used to tell stories of personal a personal decent into horror and darkness. It's got a humanity trait. It has horribly crappy mechanics to use that trait.

It's not a good game to tell this kind of story in, but you can use their horrible mechanics to do it WITHOUT FIAT RESOLUTION. The rules are there. They are poorly made, obnoxious, and difficult to use, but they do exist.

This is similar to using D&D to tell a mystery. You -can- do it, you can even do it without fiat-ing anything, it's just not optimal. Other games do it better.

Our disagreement here appears to be that you believe that poorly done, or poorly fitting mechanics don't count AS mechanics when used in sub-optimal ways. In D&D you can achieve the same resolution of dramatic situations as Burning Wheel's duel of wits through the use of contested Persuasion rolls. You find out who persuades whom through die-rolls.

Does it do compromise? No.
Does it decide everything through one die roll? Yes.
Does D&D lack the "let it ride" rule making multiple rolls until you "get it right" annoyingly probable? Sure.

It's a sub-optimal alternative, but the mechanics exist to support it. They count. They are not fiat.

You might not like them (I don't), but they do exist, and their existence complicates the chicken+buttocks equation. Sometimes fake chickens are better then real chickens because they are so much less expensive. Sometimes using a sub-optimal resolution system for a specific task is better then spending the energy necessary to convert to a more optimal system.

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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #28 on: March 06, 2009, 06:28:28 PM »
Quote
My point is, skills is what you need to do enough mystery for it to work.  So I think the answer is more "you can do mystery" than other genres.

For D&D? Sure. It does mystery "better" then it does drama (though it does both poorly)/

You're missing my larger point.

Let me rephrase using a different example. Take say... our perennial favorite: Vampire.

Vampire CAN be used to tell stories of personal a personal decent into horror and darkness. It's got a humanity trait. It has horribly crappy mechanics to use that trait.

It's not a good game to tell this kind of story in, but you can use their horrible mechanics to do it WITHOUT FIAT RESOLUTION. The rules are there. They are poorly made, obnoxious, and difficult to use, but they do exist.

Oh I apologize, this concept is compounded with Awesome + Better or Different + Best.  Cuts down on noise. 



Quote
This is similar to using D&D to tell a mystery. You -can- do it, you can even do it without fiat-ing anything, it's just not optimal. Other games do it better.

Our disagreement here appears to be that you believe that poorly done, or poorly fitting mechanics don't count AS mechanics when used in sub-optimal ways. In D&D you can achieve the same resolution of dramatic situations as Burning Wheel's duel of wits through the use of contested Persuasion rolls. You find out who persuades whom through die-rolls.

You can change the rules yes.

In principal I think you are correct.  Crappy mechanics are still mechanics, you did not know I was conflating the two ideas.

I'll put that in. 

On that note is there a good reason not to do so?  Anyone?
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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #29 on: March 06, 2009, 06:36:07 PM »
... when the effort required to change systems is greater then the resulting benefit?

Josh

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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #30 on: March 06, 2009, 10:14:07 PM »
... when the effort required to change systems is greater then the resulting benefit?

I meant is there a reason to include discussion of games in genre already eliminated from consideration?
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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #31 on: March 06, 2009, 11:09:13 PM »
Quote
I meant is there a reason to include discussion of games in genre already eliminated from consideration?

I'm... trying, but I don't really know what you're asking here.

We're eliminating genre's of games from consideration?

We were considering things?

We were talking about genre's?

I don't understand. Could you rephrase?

Josh

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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #32 on: March 06, 2009, 11:21:33 PM »
Quote
I meant is there a reason to include discussion of games in genre already eliminated from consideration?

I'm... trying, but I don't really know what you're asking here.

We're eliminating genre's of games from consideration?

We were considering things?

We were talking about genre's?

I don't understand. Could you rephrase?

In the post  Food for Thought: Awesome + Better or Different + Best we establish some ground rules.  Those considerations are included here. 

The point I am trying to make is, ideally you are not going to be playing a crappy game of X genre so it hardly matters if if can clumsily be genre Y. 
« Last Edit: March 08, 2009, 11:02:16 PM by Josh »
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Josh

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Re: Food for Thought: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #33 on: March 09, 2009, 12:00:00 AM »
Updated topic, comments?
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Re: Food for Thought, Basic: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #34 on: March 18, 2009, 11:26:31 PM »
I think your "framing" term is interesting but not necessarily useful in it's current form. (though I haven't read all your posts (and probably won't ever manage that but anyway)).

Lets say that I have a murder mystery in a DnD game. The PCs run around and play the game (fighting different creatures, making skill checks to find clues, etc). Lets say that they "solve" the mystery by collecting enough clues and deducing the identity of the killer.

They might not have solved the mystery, either by missing clues, or just not figuring it out. At which point they would have wound up following a different path in the story.

I see that you could argue that the mystery is a "frame" in which you play little mini-games (fights, skill checks) but I'm not sure how that is useful. The players felt they were playing a game that included a murder mystery component (where they collected clues and came to conclusions about them) and the DM orchestrated it.

I would just tend to see it as a different layer of abstraction. An individual attack action occurs within the "frame" of a combat. A combat occurs as an encounter in an adventure, and adventure is a segment of a campaign.

How do you think that defining one part of the adventure as the "frame" and the other as the "game" helps either players or DMs have a better time (or be more efficient, or communicate better, or what have you).

It sounds to me like you're just saying "some games are better at supporting certain styles of play".

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Re: Food for Thought, Basic: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #35 on: March 18, 2009, 11:46:58 PM »
Josh, you framed this as an aside, and I don't wish to drag your thread off topic.  Let me know if you'd like me to open a separate thread instead of answering this here:

Re: murder mystery in D&D -
Quote
Is this fiat?  Oh god yes.  You made up the adventure and the in game reason the PCs would go.  Yes it is fiat
I am unfamiliar with any way of creating a murder mystery without the DM knowing 'whodunnit' so as to provide the clues, aside from 'making it up as you go along' which is still the DM making up the adventure and the in-game reason the PCs would go, just with more illusion of choice (if every choice the players makes leads them to solve the mystery, then their choices are, in fact, irrelevant).  If there is some other method, I'm fascinated to hear it, truly, especially given previously stated conclusions that fiat is always bad.
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Josh

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Re: Food for Thought, Basic: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #36 on: March 19, 2009, 12:01:05 AM »
I think your "framing" term is interesting but not necessarily useful in it's current form. (though I haven't read all your posts (and probably won't ever manage that but anyway)).

Lets say that I have a murder mystery in a DnD game. The PCs run around and play the game (fighting different creatures, making skill checks to find clues, etc). Lets say that they "solve" the mystery by collecting enough clues and deducing the identity of the killer.

They might not have solved the mystery, either by missing clues, or just not figuring it out. At which point they would have wound up following a different path in the story.

I see that you could argue that the mystery is a "frame" in which you play little mini-games (fights, skill checks) but I'm not sure how that is useful. The players felt they were playing a game that included a murder mystery component (where they collected clues and came to conclusions about them) and the DM orchestrated it.

I would just tend to see it as a different layer of abstraction. An individual attack action occurs within the "frame" of a combat. A combat occurs as an encounter in an adventure, and adventure is a segment of a campaign.

How do you think that defining one part of the adventure as the "frame" and the other as the "game" helps either players or DMs have a better time (or be more efficient, or communicate better, or what have you).

It sounds to me like you're just saying "some games are better at supporting certain styles of play".

DnD is a game where the 'game' is the fighting adventuring part.  The excuse to do that can be a king giving missions or it could be some narrative story or it could be a mystery.

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Josh

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Re: Food for Thought, Basic: Sticking feathers up your butt
« Reply #37 on: March 19, 2009, 12:05:26 AM »
Josh, you framed this as an aside, and I don't wish to drag your thread off topic.  Let me know if you'd like me to open a separate thread instead of answering this here:

Re: murder mystery in D&D -
Quote
Is this fiat?  Oh god yes.  You made up the adventure and the in game reason the PCs would go.  Yes it is fiat
I am unfamiliar with any way of creating a murder mystery without the DM knowing 'whodunnit' so as to provide the clues, aside from 'making it up as you go along' which is still the DM making up the adventure and the in-game reason the PCs would go, just with more illusion of choice (if every choice the players makes leads them to solve the mystery, then their choices are, in fact, irrelevant).  If there is some other method, I'm fascinated to hear it, truly, especially given previously stated conclusions that fiat is always bad.

Framing is something that is coming up. 

And there are a number of games that handle the who dunnit differently.  None handle it very well.  But that topic will also come up under genre.
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