thread: 2015-03-30 : Dirty Tricks in My Games
On 2015-03-30, Gordon wrote:
Wow, so many thoughts - I don't know what it is about these recent posts, but they get my brain churning. So much that I'm not sure which thoughts are actually useful & on-point ... any focus, Vincent?
In any case - I think there's a lot that could be said about not playing the same game. Not knowing you're playing at all (for me, == "not a player", but perhaps to-mae|mah-to). And probably more substantively, not playing (to various degrees) what you think you're playing.
Two things to say that might be useful to Caitie. First, not playing what you think you're playing has been around in RPGs forever. Usually, it's been "the GM knows "real" game, players think something else." An easy example is the "fantasy is actually sci-fi" in TSR's Expedition to the Barrier Peaks (1980), but I'm pretty sure I played games like that even a few years earlier. On the other hand (and my second thing), of course you do need to be sensitive to your social context. I'd like to think that the "don't play this with jerky people" caveat covers most sins, but some text telling the knowing folks "sure you're being deceptive, but don't be jerks" couldn't hurt.
Which makes me want to design a game where who's knowing (about the "real" game being played) shifts around, in some sense unpredictably, and ... madness!
Somehow, this is all reminding me that I think there are just limits to how much the game design/designer can control. Now, a designer can try to use that very fact, but it's a bit of a "ride the tiger" situation. Rather than getting them to play to lose, I'd say that Doomed Pilgrim gets people to play a different game. Once you're on that "different game" tiger, how much control do you have? Less than you want, but maybe also more than you think ... certainly enough to get people to lose the game they're supposedly playing and not care.
And added re: spoiling - it was totally normal to expect that players be able to play Barrier Peaks without player knowledge of the module "unduly" (oh, what a bag-o-snakes dwells there!) influencing character actions. I'm not sure how you decide if keeping players uninformed is needed in a particular game, but I think Vincent is wise to point out that just reminding folks (e.g.) "dammit, the characters think they're adventures, not potential victims!" can sometimes work fine.
