In my previous post (see below) I blamed it all on system. Most systems encourage character investment/building, and have mechanics which don’t lend themselves to single, grand heroic gestures. Timo’s comment got me thinking, though. While that’s all true, this is also about both the players and the GM contributing to a certain kind of story. This has a ring of GNS theory, here.

On some level this can also be broken down to the degree to which you think of what you do as a game vs. a story.

Surely we all think of it as both, but if you’re more on the game side, why SHOULD you risk your character? If you think of it as a story, why SHOULDN’T you? When everyone at the table agrees that the important thing is telling the cool story as opposed to “winning the game” so to speak, why wouldn’t you throw that character in harms way?

I’m not saying the system isn’t important here, just that some of this is an agreement between players and GMs- do we want a cool story or a cool game? You can certainly have both, but a high stakes moment may force you all to come down on one side or another, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

-Todd

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…is by porn stars.

Be ashamed, nerds.

My question: does this site do more to dispel myths about role-players or porn stars?  Either way, get on board.  It’s a sweet blog.

-Todd

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(NOTE: So we’ve been talking about adding some blog content on the Jank Blog here, so this website will now have both the weekly podcast AND various text-only thoughts by the cast members in between podcasts.  Let us know if you hate it.  The content here will be crossed with the content at chicagolandgames.com ).

Tonight we hit up some Apocalypse World (or A-PO-WO, as the cool kids call it, because the cool kids totally abbreviate everything, natch).  I imagine we’ll talk more thoroughly about it on the cast this weekend, but I did want to bring something up: I put my character in some straight up mortal danger, and not like “we’re having a combat” mortal danger but “if I don’t make this roll, I’ll probably be very dead” danger.  Other people went pretty far into putting their characters into the line of fire as well.  The last game I did this in was Dread (the Jenga one), in which I straight up killed my character to do something super-cool.

Both of these systems/settings, I would argue, encourage this.  Here’s how:

1) Dread does it via the mechanic.  If you knock over the tower, you’re taken out but you accomplish whatever you’re trying to do.  Therefore, you are straight up rewarded for doing something which puts yourself in danger.

2) Both games seem designed more for short-term or one-shot play than a D&D style campaign.  There’s not a lot of character advancement in either, and they have gritty systems in which it’s easy to die.  Which leads me to…

3) They have gritty systems in which it’s easy to die.  The corollary of this is that it’s also easy to kill.  I like feeling like I’m putting something on the line with a roll- with this roll I’ll either go out in a blaze of glory or kick some legendary ass.

4) They encourage brutality in settings.  A-PO-WO directly, via it’s “holy shit it’s the apocalypse” setting, and Dread via the kind of settings that you’ll create to go along with the brutal central mechanic.

5) They don’t give you just one way to kick ass.  My A-PO-WO character isn’t particularly tough, but can manipulate people and has a cult of 20 followers ready to do just about anything for him.  If I wind up maimed or blinded or whatever, it’s not like I become useless.  A lot of games just aren’t like this.  When you’re playing a fighter in D&D and someone, say, blinds your character, you might as well stop playing them (unless you play D&D in a really unconventional way that it’s not really designed for).

If you take that altogether, it means that you have little to lose by putting a character on the line and a lot to gain, story-wise.  It’s not like you’ll be risking some character you’ve put too much time and energy to lose into, it’s not like if they get messed up you’ll be useless, and you’re contributing to the brutality of the setting.  Besides the above mentioned games, a game I think does this really well is Dust Devils, where your character’s ultimate end is almost built right into their backstory, and it’s just up to you to figure out what the coolest time and way to do it is.

I think that’s a nice feature in games.  Sure, building up a character is fun, but we all know that building up a character means you have to play at least a little conservative (especially in the early going) if you want them to last.  When your system/setting encourages you, however, to throw it all away for some cool plot moment, I think you can wind up with some pretty awesome story options.

-Todd

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