Over the last few months I have been holding forth over Skype and AIM about what I demand of the lucky people who get to play in RPGs I run. Some of my interlocutors in these pontifications have asked that I commit my opinions in these matters to text, so that they can ignore me at reading speed rather than having to wait through my glacial drawl. So here goes.
Note well that I have taken part in numerous bitter arguments about the nature of RPGS over the InterNet, including disputes on the UseNet group <rec.game.frp.advocacy> and with such towering luminaries of RPG as Sandy Petersen (designer of several "levels" for Quake). I am therefore aware that other people prefer to do things somewhat differently, and that those people are complete idiots. In the screed to come I shall occasionally make statements of how things are or ought to be in the form of unqualified declarative sentences. In no case is any such statement simply my opinion. I only ever make statements of unarguable fact, except occasionally when I express someone else's opinion. In no case should you take it I am expressing my own opinion, that I recognise that other people might prefer to do things differently, or they anyone has a right to do things differently if they prefer. Is that clear?
I see RPGs as collaborative, participative, extemporary, story-telling games. This statement raises five points, which I will address in reverse order just to be annoying.
My view of the nature of RPG
Games
In the article "I Have No Words and I Must Design" ([http://www.costik.com/nowords.html]), Greg Costikyan defined games thus: "a game is a form of art in which participants, termed players, make decisions in order to manage resources through game tokens in the pursuit of a goal". I have suffered bitter arguments over this, particularly with Sandy Petersen. Because if you take it as correct then soccer, tennis, hacky-sack (circle kicking), and "spin the bottle" aren't games, and neither are the RPGs I run (though the RPGs I run may have games within them, as for example combat systems and chase systems). From an even greater eminence John von Neumann defined games as competitions in which participants choose "moves" attempting to maximise their payoff, which is specified. Again, soccer, spin the bottle, and RPGs are excluded. Let these eminences use whatever definitions they find convenient as terms of art. I mean "game" in the sense of something that people play.
RPGs are like hacky-sack, except that the players narrate instead of kicking a ball.
Story-telling
Note soccer is a running-around-and-ball-kicking game, inasmuch as playing soccer consists of running around and kicking the ball. That is not to say that kicking the ball is the object of the game. In terms of the game itself, the object of soccer is that your team score more goals than the opposing team. Different people on different occasions play soccer for different reasons: to get physical exercise, to exercise the faculties of chasing and striking small prey with which we are equipped by evolution but which our modern life does not provide sufficient exercise for, to display to the desirable sex, or to earn obscene gobs of fame and money. But though neither running nor kicking is the object of soccer, running and kicking are the essence of soccer. You play soccer *by* running around and kicking the ball. In the same way, the essence of RPGs is storytelling. Even if your goals are not narrativist (whatever than means these days), you play by recounting things that characters do. That's storytelling.
I'm not going to go into the classification of RPGs and players' appreciation of RPGs into narrativist, gamist, and simulationist in this screed, except to say that I think these things ought to be integrated, not separated, and to point out that there is a similar or even wider diversity in the appreciation of stories, and different sorts or genres of stories dedicated to pursuing different aesthetics. Mystery stories have a gamist element, for instance.
Anyway, the game is not a story, but the game consists of telling a story. Temporary responsibility for the story is passed from player to player like a football (or, considering the absence of an opposing team, perhaps more like a hacky-sack), and the player with the "story football" tells a little bit of story before passing the "football" on to someone else [whose character is] in a better position to carry on. That's how you play an RPG whether your aesthetic is narrativist, gamist, simulationist, or whatever. An RPG is a sort of story-telling jam session.
Is the goal of an RPG to tell a "good" story? The answer of course depends on what you answer to "good for what?". The kind of story that is good for telling in a participative, collaborative, extemporary, story-telling games is different from the kind of story that is good for writing in a mystery novel, or for telling to little children at bedtime: but those are different from each other anyway. There is no universal standard for good stories across all audiences, media, and genres. The ephemeral, participative, collaborative, extemporary nature of RPG storytelling means that good RPG stories require qualities that not shared by good novels or good movies or good bedtime stories. The goal of RPG is not to tell stories that are like novels or movies in every respect. A good story from another medium can be bad for RPG, a good story the is good for RPG can be bad for any other medium.
Which is not to say that recognising the storytelling nature of RPGs is useless. Even if trial and error were the only way to tell for sure whether a technique were useful in RPG were to try it and see, literary theory would still be useful in suggesting things to try. In practice affairs are even better than that: some of the things that are recommended to novellists and screenwriters are obviously not even possible in RPGs (for example, dashing off a rough draft and then re-writing, polishing dialogue); some of the things that you read about in how-to-write books are obviously and immediately useful in RPGs (eg. designing characters steadfast to a core motivation, establishing, the status quo, avoiding jumping conflict, using a crucible).
Finally on the subject of storytelling: you don't necessarily need to study writing to be a good roleplayer. You don't even have to study it to be a good writer. There have been natural storytellers who wrote great books without having a stepsheet or being conscious of their theme, and there are natural roleplayers who are great fun to play with without analysing their play in the least. But I wasn't one of them.
Extemporary
My greatest shortcoming as a writer is paralysing perfectionism. I never get anything finished because I sidetrack myself into repairing the defects before the first draft is done, and keep re-writing and re-writing until I get disgusted with the work and all progress halts. This may be why I prefer GMing to writing. You can't revise GMing. Your first draft is either good enough or it isn't, but the only thing to do is to go on with the story. I'm not seduced into premature polishing because polishing is impossible. Perfectionism becoming impossible, my paralysis goes away. This may be the reason that I like extemporising in my GM more than you (in the Newcastle Mob) seem to be used to.
A lot of other GMs seem to go into GMing with a much clearer and more detailed idea of what the story is going to be than I prefer. They decide in advance what the general course of events is going to be, and don't extemporise much, or extemporise only superficial details. I have three objections to this way of doing things:
1. Mistakes in preparation are likely to be critical. If there is a weakness anywhere in the plot, if any required action of any PC is insufficiently motivated, a character is likely to take an unexpected action. Then, unless the GM produces a diabolus ex machina to coerce the PCs into the planned course of action, the prepared plot doesn't work out. When I am a character-player I hate diaboli ex machinae.
2. A linear story plan robs the character-players of any chance to make a substantial contribution. (See "collaborative", below). Branching story-lines are hell to prepare in any detail.
3. I find it dull to go over the story twice, once in prep and again in play. I don't like GMing as much when I know what is going to happen. I don't feel than my faculties have been exercised by the game unless I use them in the game. I find it boring to run a prepared scenario with predicted actions and potted speeches.
So my approach to designing an RP scenario is this. I decide the premiss, and then I establish the status quo and recount the initiating incident. And then I jam. Nothing, or very little more of the story is planned. That's not entirely the result of laziness. I put quite a bit of effort into my games, devising and describing background, maintaining NPCs etc. I prefer making up the story as I go to making it up during prep and telling it to a receptive audience during play. I like storytelling jam sessions miles better than recitations.
It seems to me that in the Newcastle Mob you are used to the GM doing a lot more prep on the plot than I do. You seem to expect that there is a correct or expected course of action, and when it isn't clear to you what it is you sit still rather than rock the boat. You wait for the correct course to become clear. I'd rather you picked up the football and ran with it. I don't have a plot in mind, there is no correct course. I expect to extemporise.
Participative
I don't think the term "game-master" is apt. "Story-teller" is worse. I don't like constructions (such as "player-character") that suggest that the players are a category that excludes the GM. I disagree that the GM is an entertainer and the character-players an audience, or that it is the GM's sole duty to make the game fun for the character-players. The GM has more to do, it is true, but RP in my opinion is participative, and every player is called upon to amuse and entertain all the others. We have to take turns because it's no good for everyone to talk at once. We all spend most of the time listening to others, not talking. But the essence is taking part, not observing, playing with others, not being entertained by a performance. The GM is one of the players.
This is what puts the spice in RPG for me, what makes it so much more absorbing and satisfying than making up a bed-time story for a six-year-old. Other players participate, they take a share not only of telling the story but of making it up, and the unpredictable content of their extemporisations challenges me to extemporise, to improvise, to think on my feet, to adapt. It's like a jam session: far more exhilarating than either playing or listening to a recital. So as GM I don't think of myself as putting on a virtuoso improv for the other players. I think of myself participating in a storytelling jam session.
As GM I don't tell the story. I don't provide the scenario and leave the other players to improvise routine detail. We get together and improvise a story together. The role of the GM is larger than that of a character-player because of the way narrative responsibility happens to be divided up, but we are all contributing to the course of the plot. We are not (perhaps sadly) equal participants, but we are all participating, all of us have at least partial control, and all of us bear at least partial responsibility for the story outcome.
It seems to me with the Newcastle Mob that when the GM passes the "story footsack" to another player that other player doesn't often do very much with it. He usually passes it straight back in an easy and predictable lob. That's a good way to avoid upsetting a prepared plot, and it is a good way to leave the game-master in control of the game. It's a good habit for a less participative style of game, especially one in which the GM runs prepared plots. But I improvise my plots anyway, so I don't depend on the expected. That enables me to hand over [some] freedom and control to you. You can take a larger part in my games, and I urge you to do so, not least because I have a lot more fun with player input to improvise off.
Collaborative
Okay, I'm asking not to be fed a boring sequence of easy lobs. But that means I want interesting input to work with, not difficulty for the sake of difficulty. I'm asking you to work with me, not to try to beat me. I like character-players to take on some of the power and freedom of the author, but with that there goes doing more of the work of the author. We'll work on it together, or collaborate. That means that when I GM I give the character players some authorial responsibility, but that I want them to use it to do some of the work of the author. Ideally, we'll all be extemporising a story together, each improvising our own part, enjoying the challenge as we go, and sharing the appreciation of a surprising conclusion. Ideally.
An elegant bridge from principles to practice
At this point, or earlier, I often find that my readers have formed on of the following impressions.
1. That I have a story to tell in each adventure, and the character-players are mere audience.
This is not the case. I start my adventures with an idea of the premiss and the core conflict, but plot and theme arise during play out of the mutual efforts of all the players, character-players and GM together.
2. That I ask character players to compromise what they think or feel their characters would do in the interests of "good story".
I don't ask that players do that. In fact, I think that to do so is *impossible*. It is one of the well-accepted principles of writing that incident must arise out of the collision between character and circumstance, and that a plot that depends on a character taking an unrealistic, inadequately-motivated action has "failed the 'would he really' test". I ask character-players first to design suitable characters, and then to play them acting at their maximum capacity, steadfast to their core motivations *so that* a good story will result.
3. That a storytelling game cannot involve challenges to the players.
I don't think that's right. It is even possible for a written story to involve challenges to the readers: think for example of mystery stories. Can you solve the crime before Ellery Queen? In the case of an extemporary participative story we can make the challenge a even more central than that: the characters and not just the audience can face a real challenge, because the outcome of the story is indeterminate. Even the authors face a challenge! Can we recover from an unexpected success or defeat? Because the story is extemporary we get to find out!
In short, I don't mean to say that RPGs are storytelling games in a sense that makes the gamist aesthetic misconceived, nor in a sense that makes the simulationist aesthetic misconceived, nor in a way that exalts the narrativist aesthetic above the others. Consistency of setting and character are vital to a good story; conflict and steadfast characters acting at maximum capacity are essential to a good story: therefore gamism, simulationism, and narrativism are the legs of a tripod in a collaborative, extemporary story. Because RP is participative, the conflict has to involve real striving. Because several collaborators have to keep the setting consistent and predict the actions of characters those have to be extrapolated, not made up at whim.
Most especially I don't mean to suggest that there is a correct plot to one of my games with a correct course of events. In fact, it is very much the opposite. I know at the start of one of my stories who the antagonist is, and what the conflict is, and what the initiating incident will be. I don't know the rest, and I don't want to know what will happen until it does happen. I want to discover the story along with the other players, and to tell it along with the other players: to share the parts of author and audience in an extemporary collaboration.
What is to be done?
I'm Extemporising. Don't be Afraid to Do the Unexpected
Now, it has been pretty clear when I have GMed for the Newcastle Mob before now that you are used to a different way of doing things. That has also been apparent when I have played a character in adventure that one of you GMs. You seem to be used to a style of play in which there is a prepared plot, a correct course of action. As players, you seem to be used to there being an unique right thing to do, or a small class of right things to do. When it is apparent to you what action on the part of your characters will propel the plot forward in the direction the GM has in mind, you take that action. But if it isn't clear, you wait for more information, for more-specific motivations. That's a helpful habit in a game in which the GM chooses the course of the plot: if you can't discern the correct course of action, at least you don't force the wrong one. But in my games it results in the plot never really getting going on any course. I pass the initiative to you and offer a genuine, significant choice. But your habit is to avoid any significant choice. Rather than choose any course, you do nothing. And thus my initiating incident fails to initiate anything.
So the basic, most important thing I am asking you to do is to be bolder. Get stuck in. Have a go. When I present you with a choice, for God's sake choose *something*. Ideally it should be something that raises conflict without jumping, that reveals character, that discovers information, that continues momentum, that is unexpected but in retrospect the only possibility. But not every move can be brilliant. If you can't see a brilliant move, choose a workmanlike one. The only thing that isn't telling a story of any kind is doing nothing. When I pass you the story football, grab hold and run. If you know the perfect course to run, good. But if you don't run vaguely in the direction of your try line and hope for the best.
On a related note, I find you generally reluctant to undertake actions of which the outcome is uncertain, especially when it is up to chance or the game system rather than a GM's choice. One manifestation is that you seem to be a little reluctant to use abilities at which your character has less than a high chance of success. Be bolder! I am willing and indeed keen to tell a story either about a success or about a failure.
This is Storytelling. Strive To Amuse
It often happens that for a while one character-player becomes involved in a dialogue with the GM, and that the other players do not get to participate for a little while. When that happens, be aware that the other character-players have been forced temporarily into the role of mere audience. RP always involves taking turns, but it changes when the gaps between ones turns become over-long. If your turn gets to be long, think of the audience, and try to make your time in the spotlight interesting and fun *for the audience*. When you are the only character-player participating, you have to do more than participate, you have to entertain. This can require that you improvise sharp, fresh, indirect dialogue (to the best of your ability). It can require that you make action intriguing and exciting. It always requires that you be succinct and decisive, and that you keep things moving and do not repeat. Dialogue and action may be somewhat stylised, and as soon as the point is clear you must cut to the chase. Don't re-try, don't re-phrase. Don't waste time on the routine. Don't waste time gaming out the details of the obvious. Cut to the chase, especially in solo passages. Brevity is the soul of wit.
Ideally, the scenes in which one or two character-players are interacting with the GM ought to be so entertaining that the other players' attention doesn't wander, that they don't start reading or chatting or surfing the Net. When the game is thus engaging it will become possible to have different characters go off at times to do different things: players will be sufficiently amused to pay attention even when their characters do not face an immediate prospect of having to react to what is going on.
I would consider it a significant marker of progress if we all concentrated more on the game and less on reading and our computers, and another if your characters split up a little more freely without players being afraid that they are going to be left out. That is perhaps ambitious. We'll work up to it.
We're Collaborating. It Is Okay for You to Contribute
Suppose that for some reason you would like your character to get in touch with a fence. You could ask as character-player to GM "Do I know a fence?" and leave it to me to make up the fence and tell you about him. That's okay, but it's a 'B' move. If you are confident that your character would know a gangster, you can move the adventure on a little faster by assuming that my answer will be reasonable, and saying "I'll go and see the shadiest fence I know. That's a 'B+' move. If you are quite sure your character would know a fence, the 'A' move is "I'll go and see Fingers Hulligan at Blue Chalk Chan's Pool Parlour". So long as you are not trying to pull a fast one on me, I will follow your lead.
The trick here is to make sure that your lead is clear. If you say something like "I'll go to see Pete Peters" I am not given the hint of how to play him. Genre conventions, even, sometimes, clichés, are your friends.
The key to such character-player additions is to make them story offers, not forcing plays that shoot down a GM's plot elements. A gambit of this sort should leave the GM with the choice of whether to turn it into the story of how the player characters circumvented a seemingly-insurmountable obstacle or to turn it into an establishing sequence that shows that the obstacle is even wider than previously thought. The introduction of a new element by a character-player should, in short, open up possibilities for the GM, not short-circuit adventures.
It is poor form to use this technique to add implausible detail to your character. The things you add should be in keeping with the world, and inasmuch as your characters have special knowledge of them or connections to them this should always be a natural consequence of the character's established nature and background. Do not use this technique to add extraneities. When in doubt, make the B move.
Participating: the Weakness of Good Plans
There is a lot to be said for the | Indiana Jones Gambit. The reason is that making detailed plans and then gaming them out is repetitious, and therefore dull. Other forms of storytelling can conceal the planning stage, but RPGs are participative, so the authors can't make a plan and show only the execution to the audience. The planning part of the session is usually dull because nothing is actually happening: there's no interaction of the PCs with the world and NPCs. And the execution part is dull (unless the wheels come off completely) because we know what is going to happen. So if a plan is made on-screen, it must fail.
For this reason I try to make adventures so dynamic that the players can't plan too far ahead. You don't know what you're going to do once you get on the truck, or on the submarine, or where-ever. All you know is that if you don't get on you will have no way of doing anything. So Do the clear and obvious immediate thing, and make up the rest when you have more information. In one of my adventures you don't have enough information in the early stages to work out what to do. But it is vitally important that you not sit about theorising, planning, and asking questions out-of-character. Get on the bloody truck!
Preparation: Designing Parties and Characters
I wrote somewhere up the page that I expect players to play their part in making up good stories, but that I am strongly averse to their compromising their character's motivations to do so. How is it possible to satisfy such a demanding GM? The answer is that you have to design the right sorts of characters to begin with, the sorts of characters who will produce good stories by behaving true to their motivations. Such characters are quite well-described by literary theory, and they are called /Homo fictus/. /Homo fictus/ as different from real people. They are simpler, and they are more consistent. Each /Homo fictus/ is steadfast to a core motivation, and acts always at maximum capacity. (That is not to say that he is never tired or distracted, only that when his capacity is reduced by fatigue etc. he acts to the maximum of that reduced capacity.)
/Homo fictus/ is also *fathomable*. In other forms of storytelling the audience has to be able to see that causes give rise to their effects, and inasmuch as incident arises out of character the audience therefore needs to be able to understand character. In extemporary collaboration it is doubly important: fellow-players have to be aware of other player's natures so that they can play up to them. You can't jam with someone if you have absolutely no idea what they are going to play next.
The touchstone for portraying characters is "show, don't tell". You have to portray your character through what he does and says. And it is generally safe to do so, because I do not expect you to find a "correct" action in any scene that propels my plot forward. You would miss the "right" action by doing what your character would really do, because doing what your character would really do *is* the right action. "Would he really?" is good storytelling.
When character-players are asked to design a party, they tend to think in terms of choosing complementary capabilities. There is a certain need for that: if a party is supposed to be a team of co-operating specialists in some line of work it would be silly for them not to master, among them, all the capabilities necessary for that line of work. But that isn't the aspect of party design that I am intent on seeing done. Rather, I am concerned that in designing your characters players give due attention to making sure that their characters will engage in amusing interactions among themselves, that that they will define one another by mutual contrast. Please give some thought to designing characters so that they will riff off one another, and so that they will act a mutual foils. A strong guy is seen as strong when he lifts something that someone else has failed to lift. A cynic is seen as cynical when he doubts goodwill that someone else has trusted. Holmes is seen as perceptive because he notices things that Watson overlooks. And these contrasts are better and more consistently provided by fellow-PCs than by bit-part NPCs. The four central characters of "The Three Musketeers" are my favourite example of an adventuring party. Their skill sets are nearly identical. But by their speech and behaviour each throws the others into sharp relief.
Now doubt there's more, but I'm tired and I can't think of it right now. Question, comment, disagree, qualify, explain, correct. More may come to me as we discuss.