Narrative Control

Welcome back to Narrative Control. As season two winds down Fattig and I are doing our last standard show (66 will be a bloopers and a discussion of the future).  This episode we’re talking about unconventional conflicts, like chases, heists, and escapes.  How to make those kick ass in RPGs as much as they do in fiction.

Hosts: Sean Nittner and Eric Fattig

Length 45:56

Show Notes

[00:30] Intro to the Show: Unconventional Conflicts.[01:04] In a movie unconventional conflicts are awesome, but many RPGs don’t do it well.[01:49] Inspired by a recent episode of Sharkbone, episode 48 with Leonard Balsera.

Examples of awesome conflicts to bring into your game.

[04:52] Escape – Running out of the collapsing temple[06:19] Heist – Steeling the scroll of Anuba[07:13] Environmental – Surviving the Fire Swamp[08:49] Chase Scene – The Fugitive fleeing from the law.[10:56] Fighting the Unbeatable Monster – Fighting the T-Rex or the Zombie Apocalypse

Why don’t these unconventional conflicts work in RPGs

[13:04] Poor mechanical support for non-fight conflicts[16:52] When the table doesn’t agree on what the conflict really is[19:39] The challenge that only engages one of the player characters

Systems, components and Idea that help to bring the awesome…and how they work

[22:16] System: FATE/Dresden – Unified Conflict System[25:33] System: Mouse Guard – Conflict System with changing skill sets and teamwork[26:31] Setting: Mouse Guard – The environment is the enemy![28:19] System: Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition – Skill Challenges [30:19] System: Smallville – Stress in many forms (anger, exhaustion, etc) and raising tension.[33:27] System: Wushu – Principle of Narrative Truth and constant threats.

Principles to derive from these games.

[36:39] Teamwork – Making every player an integral part of the conflict.[37:35] A Hit Point system – Given every conflict a granular win/lose condition.[39:50] Both sides must threaten each other – The lock is messing with you![40:58] Offering Variety – changing up the conflict and changing the mechanics to suit.[42:11] Cool losing conditions - Sean’s tribute to an actor who is great a losing conflicts.

[44:06] Last regular episode of Season 2. Bloopers up next.

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Welcome to a little Narrative Control experiment.  Three very short episodes on very small topics all released in short order.  This show is the Lennisode.  Two great ideas I ripped off from Leonard Balsera.Hosts: Sean Nittner and Eric FattigLength: 16:24Show Notes[00:25] Intro to the show.  Three minisodes.[01:00] Greetings Lenny? Leonard? The Lennisode, not the Jennisode (www.jennisode.com)[01:36] Based off two bits of advice Lenny gave out. Hack away.[02:20] The 15 Minute prep for games. Frame three scenes with punch![03:35] Example of trying this out: Dresden without prep.[09:01] Reward players for making decisions that have bad consequences either way.  From his LJ[14:14] Players will be more engaged in a choice they make.Continue the conversation…Here

Welcome to a little Narrative Control experiment.  Three very short episodes on very small topics all released in short order.  This show Fattig and I are talking about getting your players excited about the NPCs, places and things in your game.Hosts: Sean Nittner and Eric FattigLength: 15:59Show Notes[00:25] Intro to the show.  Three minisodes.[00:55] Situation: Players don’t care about the thing the GM created.[02:22] The point of the players caring is to give you ways to motivate the PCs.

What are four possible ways that you can draw them in?

[03:20] Make the thing actionable.  The players can make a difference.[06:08] Giving the players a compelling reason to care about the place or person. [07:44] Tying locations to the PCs.  Make them mirror the PCs.[12:38] Think in terms of terrain vs. background. Create assets that players can fight over.[15:24] Setting they can punch in the face!Continue the Converastion…Here.

Welcome to a little Narrative Control experiment.  Three very short episodes on very small topics all released in short order.  This show Fattig and I are talking about how to implement a Retcon in your game.  How to turn back the clock.Hosts: Sean Nittner and Eric FattigLength: 17:06Show Notes[00:25] Intro to the show.  Three minisodes. [00:55] The Recton. How to get a game back from over the edge.[01:16] Suggestion given to use by Alan Smithee[01:20] Example: Werewolf: The un-huntering.[05:09] When should you retcon? Your choice. We’re not telling you when to do this.[06:14] Alan’s suggestion on how to retcon.  Zoom back into a frame.[07:00] There is ALWAYS a frame in place, because we’re playing a game.[08:04] Returning back to the example: we got it wrong[08:36] Example: Three guys in a bar retelling a story.[09:23] Example: Ocean’s 11.  You see one thing, but it’s an illusion, then you see the “real” version.[10:07] Example: Film edition, cut out the junk[10:44] Example: XXXXtreme Street Luge. The game is played as a retelling of the action.  [12:47] Example: The Committee for the Exploration of Mysteries [13:18] We do this all the time as gamers. “Oh remember that time…”[13:30] Merlin movie. Told by very old Merlin. Some things can be fudged. [14:38] Players need to believe at the end of the day that what they do cannot be unwritten.[15:04] The retcon should be told in the style of the game.  Keep the story close to the original.[16:15] Thanks Alan for this idea.  Showing us how to save our bacon.Continue the converstaion...Here

Hi and welcome back to Narrative Control.  This week’s episode was inspired by this blog post by Karen Twelves http://twelves.wordpress.com/2010/12/21/dead-of-winter-2010/.  It’s kind of the analog to Episode 36 – Dare to be Stupid.  That episode assumes we’re all shooting for a heroic end, what if you’re shooting for tragedy?Length: 42:08Hosts: Sean Nittner and Karen TwelvesShow Notes:[00:24] Intro to the show. Something wasn’t quite right after Dead of Winter[00:50] Reading from the post:  http://twelves.wordpress.com/2010/12/21/dead-of-winter-2010/[01:23] Hello from Karen. Her blog and soon to be appearance on 2d6 Feet in a Random Direction[02:05] How this is going to sound like Episode 36 – Dare to Be Stupid. And how it’s different.[03:11] Playing one-off (one shot?) games. No investment in them surviving the game.[03:36] I didn’t get all my character can do if I didn’t destroy them by the end.[04:30] But…but…it may not be the game everyone is playing. Is this what everyone wants?[06:21] Emo porn is its own reward.[07:19] Bringing your own experience of loss or suffering to the game.[07:57] The other side of the spectrum of playing power fantasy games.[08:28] Characters are real when they have suffered. [09:17] If you know things are going to go badly, it’s a different mode of play.[09:37] But what about my agency?[10:27] The game needs enough elasticity to continue play even after horrible things happen.[10:59] Example: A character died in the first scene of Dread. [12:11] There are great games for exploring power fantasies as well.[13:37] How to do it? Make it fun to pursue doom for you and the others. [14:14] Add to your failures.  Complicate them.[14:55] Collaborate with the other players to find the best “worst” idea possible.[16:11] Spend all those Fate chips. Make sure you can’t refuse a compel. Another way to collaborate.[19:01] Looking at the Dread tower, it’s a perpetual sword over your head.  Pull those blocks![19:51] Working to sabotage your own efforts.  In Fiasco, keep trying to put the gun in your mouth.[20:36] In Cthulhu when the professor finds the alien texts, OF COURSE you will try to translate it![21:15] In a one off game, you don’t have time to make a conservative or stoic character interesting. Put on the ring.[22:48] A bit of proof.  Three examples of game that Karen was in where emo porn was awesome.[21:11] Carl’s Smallville Game – Breakfast League: Angsty teenagers with powers. [27:59] Ryan Macklin’s Dresden Game – Emissary of the Dragon making all the wrong moves.[31:07] Sean’s Apocalypse World Game – Heart of Darkness. A healer who had to decide who lives and who dies. [40:47] Wrap up. What it’s all about.

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Welcome to the LOST EPISODE.  The one that should have come before, but didn’t. Because sometimes there are things lost between the GM and Player.  We’re talking about that communication.Hosts: Sean Nittner and Joe HarneyLength: 32:38Show Notes[00:24] Welcome Joe Harney.  The Lost Episode[00:45] When things are lost between the players and GMs.[01:13] GM as the window to the world. [1:40] You walk into a cargo bay.  What image in evoked?[01:58] The cargo bay of Serenity.[02:30] Value of a license setting. Establishes setting, tropes, situations,etc.[02:58] Challenge: License settings are great… assuming you know them! [03:28] Licensed settings require that you get everyone to a baseline understanding. [03:45] The Battletech universe. Over 100 books. Outside our normal scope of understanding.[04:20] Medieval Fantasy – more commonly understood setting and topes.[05:08] Using a setting with reflexive knowledge.[05:54] The strength of the World of Darkness settings.[06:25] The Tolkien Syndrome – Detailed descriptions that bore the players.[07:14] And effort to “show not tell”.[07:48] Focus on what the scene is about.[08:12] The opening scene from CSI – Displaying a lot of information.[09:00] Announce what a scene is about.  You enter the scene to do X.[09:37] Players trusting the GM to give them the information they need.  GMs trusting players to take information and push forward in with it, not…[10:02] “I attack the gazebo”[10:34] We’re not all looking to tell the same story, but we want our stories to be compatible.[11:12] Discrepancies about what is actually happening in a game.[11:42] Be willing to back up a step, if necessary.[12:35] All the work GMs put in to their games, sad if it doesn’t come to fruition.[13:16] Benefit of not planning a game.  Nothing holding you to a plan if things change.[13:40] Middle ground: Planning a game based off flags presented by the players.[14:09] Discrepancy in expectations of consequences.  A bugbear to untangle[15:25] GMing Seminar with Robin Laws and John Wick on what happens when GM and Players have different expectations of consequences.[16:41] Easier to undo a calamity before it happens.[17:10] The mood of the game can also shift into a different space if not held in check[18:04] This isn’t the game I thought I was playing.[18:18] Inspiration for this episode: A LiveJournal post.  Stakes not agreed upon in advance.  [19:15] Sacred cow turned into sacred-cow-burger[19:42] Why are we here? What is this game about.   Are we playing to tell a cool story? Are we playing to win?[20:46] Are those goals tied to game styles (traditional – narrative games)?[21:43] Games that have specific mechanics to add story elements: Fiasco plot twists.[22:36] Joe does some brain surgery.[22:54] Win conditions, however, are easier to mechanize[23:20]Agree about what the game is focused on.  Can I trust the GM to make mistakes.[24:35] Secrets.  Do you trust the GM to expose them?  Burned players.[25:28] They downward spiral of mistrust.[26:01] GM afraid to offer up game elements that the players will “break”.[27:46] The Superman metaphor[28:18] Tangingting… again.  Player fulfilling power fantasies.[29:32] Know where you are on the spectrum of “do you want win?”[30:41] Hording the cool.  Afraid that the cool will be lost if you spend it.[31:15] Wrap up.  Thanks Joe!The conversation continues... Here!

Welcome to episode 59.  Fattig and I are talking about Player versus Player awesomeness in games.  We’ve got fears, trepidations and we talk about how we’ve overcome then and the amazing stories we’ve seen come out of doing so.

Hosts: Sean Nittner and Eric Fattig

Length: 54:58 (yep, sorry another long one, but it is worth it)

Show Notes

[00:22] I stab your character in the back… Well I stab YOU in the face![01:17] Intro to the show: Player vs. Player [01:26] Player vs. Player baggage.  Lots of bad experiences.[04:11] But… pvp can make for the most awesome experiences in the game.

Examples of great PVP.

[05:06] Example the one: L5R – Al-Saleen and Tso Lou discuss balancing love on the edge of a blade.[09:02] Example the two: L5R – Rei and Tso Lou opposite sides of empire building.

Why player versus player is awesome.

[14:26] Knowing that players are your antagonists raises the stakes and the tension at the table.  Players are more alert and attentive throughout.[15:59] Players can do more when they have meaningful interactions between the other PCs because they aren’t limited to the GMs bandwidth.[17:06] PVP gives the GM a chance to step back from center stage and manage the game.  Gives the GM a chance to see the bigger picture.[19:03] It is more fun for the GM if he or she doesn’t have to be the only source of antagonism.[19:24] Players make the BEST antagonists! NPCs take a lot of work to portray and players can easily dismiss them.

[24:00] How do we do the good and not the bad

[25:50] Ensure there is never a one-sidededness between PCs, they must always have a chance and always have something to lose.[26:50] Creating constraints.  Players need a sandbox that will demonstrate what are appropriate actions and consequences.[29:35] Plenty of external threats to make the player conflicts precious and dangerous. [30:44] Use a system where players can bounce back from defeat.  Apocalypse World: Player vs. Player moves.   Burning Wheel: Explicit stake settings that are negotiated.  Smallville stress just ups the ante and makes the conflicts more intense.  Dogs in the Vineyard relationships can move from problematic (d4) to beneficial (d6+) as the result of fallout. [38:38] Player versus player conflict should not be a zero-sum game.  We can give and take different things that we value differently.[43:29] Examples of games that bring player versus player action.[43:43] The Gift[46:54] Duneville[50:15] So much awesome that can come out of player conflict.  The game doesn’t need to be about PVP, just make a safe space for it to happen and watch the magic.

[51:30] News of the !

[52:17] Dundracon coming up! – You can be a god in my game![52:50] Good Omens 10 year anniversary[53:01] GM Seminar in March at EndGame.[53:33] EndGame Minicon April 9th – 5th anniversary of Minicons

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Welcome back to Narrative Control in 2011.  After a break for the holidays we're back and talking about Social Antagonits.  How to make them work and why the are so awesome.

Hosts: Sean Nittner and Eric Fattig

Length: 54:07

Inspired by Ryan Macklin's article on Making Sypathetic Antagonists

Show Notes

[00:22] Intro to the show.  Happy New Year![00:38] Topic: Social Antagonists

News of the Episode

[00:59] What just happened?  Dead of Winter[02:35] EndGame Minicon[03:19] Pimping Duneville.  Check out Smallville[05:17] Big Bad Con  Book Rooms here: Hilton Oakland Airport[05:59] Gazebo Deathmatch[06:56] RPG Crosstalk – A shared Podcasting Forum [09:04] Finding Ryan Macklin’s post on sympathetic antagonists via twitter.[11:14] A reading from Macklin’ post.  His three reasons for sympathetic antagonists![12:39] Our discussion drifted to Social Antagonists.  People you can’t punch in the face.[13:20] The recurring villain you don’t have to sell.  Conflicts bind the characters together rather than splitting them apart. 

Examples of social antagonists

[14:57] Uther Lightbringer: The moral authority. [15:79] Tsuruchi Nadu. Our lord and commander in L5R.  A terrible leader.

Characteristics of good social antagonists

[24:25] The social antagonist is part of the same rigid organization that the players are (your boss, your lord, your co-worker, your schoolmate, your business partner, your family, etc).[27:07] The social antagonist is not secretly EVIL.[33:31] The social antagonists needs a sympathetic drive.  A reason to exist that is legitimate.[35:13] Social antagonists can do more interesting damage.  Turning you friend against you, steal your money, demote you, attacking your other relationships, etc.[38:09] Social healing is also more interesting.  Repairing from a cut is pretty boring.  Repairing a relationship is fun and makes for more exciting interactions.   One persons’ gain is the others’ loss.[39:44] The conflicts with social antagonists are ones we can relate to.   We’ve all been in conflicts like these.[42:59] Sometimes you work together.  Social antagonist that are “on the same side” or have the same goal that is really important.  [49:56] Social antagonist can escalate conflicts and then de-escalate. [52:24] PCs can fill these roles.  The players can be each others’ social antagonists.[53:26] Go discuss it… on RPG Crosstalk

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This episode I've got Rob Donoghue and Judd Karlman on skype talking about the NewHotSexy Apocalypse World.

Hosts: Sean Nittner, Rob Donoghue and Judd Karlman

Length: 46:35

Show Notes

[00:27] Sean sits down with Judd Karlman and Rob Donoghue to talk about Apocalypse World.  

Continue the Conversation... Here

Length: 38:59

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