Where We Aren't

Hi, long time no see!

This is a brief update on what I haven't been doing.

After grokking Lumpley's Fruitful Void, I had an epiphany. This was exactly what genre-expectation-specific experience dice rules are supposed to aim for. (Vincent Baker based this post on some of Ron Edwards comments.)

What I've been struggling with is how I can 1) make the genre expectation mechanix aim everything at each games' fruitful void, but also 2) how to offer how to construct your own genre expectation that does so. Furthermore, I want to do it so that the consumer doesn't even know that they're doing it (or what a fruitful void is).

I'm also struggling with how much being a LARP is central to the Unseen's sine qua non. I can't seem to bring myself to work on it unless it is a LARP and I couldn't possibly run a LARP right now. Maybe I'll look into a different Scattershot Game. Dunno.

I really like what I believe is the central concept of The Unseen. "That which makes us human." Because the game will quietly push you to make characters who are either monsters with consciences or humans that are inhumane. Further the way I see it, in the process of seeking your chara's goals, you are forced to contend with your dichotomy; but instead of creating a 'death spiral' towards one extreme or the other, forces will pressure you back onto the fence.

In order to make this a 'fruitful void' I will need to complete avoid mentioning or mechanizing 'humanity.' And yet I will need to coerce you into constantly thinking about it. One of the waste concepts in Vampire the Masquerade first edition was the inability to 'act human' all the time. (They ruin it by mechanizing 'humanity' and turning it into a death spiral; the more inhuman you are the harder to act human it is and the more likely you are to cause yourself to lose even more 'humanity.') I think something like that could be used here.

On the 'act like a human' side, there could be mechanical consequences for 'behaving badly,' but no mention of what is specifically 'bad.' Thus the players are at once mechanically compelled to 'act badly' and want to avoid it through role-playing.

On the 'avoid becoming a monster' side, there would be mechanical benefits of behaving 'monstrously,' but I can't think of what to pressure the players to act humanely.

Let's see. If you give 'monster players' tangible human-world assets that can degrade due to the behaviour problems forced by the dice, it might work. The mirror-darkly of that would be giving the human players tangible objectives to be had by 'monstrous behaviour' that degrade when not being human? An example of that might be someone employing black magic to gain a political position, but losing credibility in it due to further 'bad behaviour.' Hmm....

It does seem properly symmetrical. Both sides can have these 'human world'-based rewards which are degraded by naughtiness. The difference is that one group, the 'monsters,' would start off with them and the other, the 'humans,' would start off with the powers to get them. For a 'human' player, you would gain these prizes by becoming a monster; for the 'monster' players you could keep these rewards by ignoring your monstrousness. The ultimate fruition would be a human becoming a monster (like vampirism) and a monster being 'cured.' If you make both conditions non-permanent, it would become a pendulum.

A human, striving for temporal power, would employ darker and darker means to the point of becoming a monster. Then this monster would likely regret these choices because they take these 'prizes' away from them, prompting them to overcoming their monstrousness. And vice versa.

If I focus all the rules on power structures and collecting resources, people will strive for that. The pendulum effect would constantly face them with the question of 'what is it to be human?' without having a humanity stat.

I could create recursive mechanics that link power / resource gain to parallel 'monstrousness' gain. With them there would be mechanics that force the revelation of 'monstrousness' and subsequent loss of power / resources. In character generation, you are either choosing temporal powers or innate (monstrous) powers, never getting either.

There should be some kind of gain over the course of the feedback loop, though. If you swing back and forth and don't get anything for it, why keep playing? Such rewards would have to follow two principles, 1) they would be something other than power / resources and 2) they drive home the point of the game: it is better to be human. What I don't want is the opposite of the death spiral; I don't want to put all players on a treadmill towards rewarded humanity. For it to be a fruitful void, they must be pressed towards the middle all the time, forced to sit on the fence, so that they will subconsciously compare that life to their own real lives.

But how to reward that? Experience Dice alone aren't enough. It should also have a social significance as LARPs are social games. Further, it might be a good idea to make the most tragic flip-flops spotlight time for the who audience. The 'brighter lights' would therefore teach by example.

Finally, the most important point in this presentation is the 'hidden agenda.' The fact that tension must always increase. Each chara must rise up epically perched on their fence until the point where they have a tragic, highly dramatic and very public fall. If that doesn't satisfy them enough to make another chara, they will be able to 'start over.'

Now, I know that Scattershot is capable of this without any additional rules. I could probably write it up in just a few months (plus the results of playtesting). But that isn't good enough for me. Each core book must 1) allow its major feature (in one case here, LARPing) must be modular enough to pull out and stick into a game with a different core book, 2) must contain brief explanations of how to bring in elements from other core books, 3) stand as exemplars of how to pull the knobs and dials into a fine gaming structure and 4) be simple and easy for a novice to pick up and play.

I certainly don't set the bar low, do I?

Fang Langford