Thanks for the thoughts, Gauntlet cast.
I’m almost caught up!
Originally shared by Robert Bohl
While listening to The Gauntlet podcast this morning, I realized what one of my preferences is in RPGs. Now, to see if I can successfully put it into words.
I love games that make you take the whole group into account. That draw your attention to aspects of other characters you’re not responsible for. Games that forefront the fact that the game is about entertaining and appreciating one another. A quick list:
* Though I haven’t yet played it, on the aforementioned Gauntlet episode, Richard Rogers was talking about playing Quinn Murphy’s Five Fires, the game about hip-hop culture. In this game, you have a secret that only your best friend, another protagonist character, knows. Sounds amazing and I can’t wait to try it.
* Primetime Adventures (by Matt Wilson) is my personal primordial experience of this. The whole game is powered by fan mail, a resource allocated by appreciation for others’ input.
* Meguey Baker’s Psi•Run integrates answering questions about the amnesiacs’ lost lives with those questions being answered, often, by the other protagonists’ players. This is also the pacing mechanic for the game.
* Speaking of pacing mechanics, Epidiah Ravachol’s Swords without Master kinda combines PTA‘s fanmail with Psi•Run‘s pacing stuff, and adds in a layer of incentive for “make up cool and evocative shit.” When someone does something you love, you write it down, and doing that and reincorporating those things later paces the game.
* Joshua A.C. Newman’s shock:social science fiction is intrinsically about this, too. Not only do you play a character who’s entangled with characters portrayed by the people to either side of you, but everyone else playing has a serious power to affect the outcome of any conflicts.
(I’m sure there are examples I’m forgetting.)
This thread is also shot all throughout my games. It’s all over the place in Misspent Youth: all conflicts are group conflicts, most scenes are presumed to have all the YOs in them, most of the time when you win you’re winning on someone else’s traits, and at the start of every episode, you make up something about the friendship between your and another’s characters. (It’s there in my other shit, too, but this is long enough already.)
Further, I feel like this is a relatively rare thing for games to address. It seems to me that the vast majority of games are very happy with people more-or-less siloing into their own spaces. Maybe I’m wrong about that, though.
There’s an interesting thing in Mutant Year Zero, a little thing but it helps. The game feels a little more trad, but with some new ideas added. Each player chooses a “buddy” PC, an NPC to be protective of, and an NPC to hate. The exp checklist at the end of session checks to see if you’ve done those things (“did you risk/sacrifice something to aid your PC buddy?”). It’s an end of session bit, but the players enjoy it and it incentivizes interaction.
There’s an interesting thing in Mutant Year Zero, a little thing but it helps. The game feels a little more trad, but with some new ideas added. Each player chooses a “buddy” PC, an NPC to be protective of, and an NPC to hate. The exp checklist at the end of session checks to see if you’ve done those things (“did you risk/sacrifice something to aid your PC buddy?”). It’s an end of session bit, but the players enjoy it and it incentivizes interaction.
I’m posting the comment I made on the original thread here, too:
Those are really astute observations, Rob. I would also throw in for a group’s play culture being a really important factor here. Even in games that don’t mechanically enforce thinking about other player characters (like the ones you’ve listed here), I’ve found there are certain behaviors that help facilitate that style of play.Phil Vecchione and I codified it into a play style we call the GGG Player (inspired by Dan Savage’s GGG behaviors between sexual partners). Our GGG stands for Geared, Giving, and Game. The important ones for this discussion are Giving & Game, which are all about active behaviors you can incorporate into your play that show consideration for other players and their stories. It’s something we have pretty much internalized as part of the Gauntlet’s play culture, and I think we’re all better for it.
There’s an episode of Misdirected Mark where Phil and I talk about it in more detail: misdirectedmark.com – Bonus Lounge: GGG with Jason Cordova » Misdirected Mark
I’m posting the comment I made on the original thread here, too:
Those are really astute observations, Rob. I would also throw in for a group’s play culture being a really important factor here. Even in games that don’t mechanically enforce thinking about other player characters (like the ones you’ve listed here), I’ve found there are certain behaviors that help facilitate that style of play.Phil Vecchione and I codified it into a play style we call the GGG Player (inspired by Dan Savage’s GGG behaviors between sexual partners). Our GGG stands for Geared, Giving, and Game. The important ones for this discussion are Giving & Game, which are all about active behaviors you can incorporate into your play that show consideration for other players and their stories. It’s something we have pretty much internalized as part of the Gauntlet’s play culture, and I think we’re all better for it.
There’s an episode of Misdirected Mark where Phil and I talk about it in more detail: misdirectedmark.com – Bonus Lounge: GGG with Jason Cordova » Misdirected Mark
I totally missed this Jason Cordova
I totally missed this Jason Cordova
Eadwin Tomlinson My MM appearance? It was fun to do. Phil is a neat guy.
Eadwin Tomlinson My MM appearance? It was fun to do. Phil is a neat guy.
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