thread: 2006-01-13 : Push and pull aside, co-ownership
On 2006-01-13, Mo wrote:
Levi said: I *also* know players that I think would give it the 1000-yard stare, and walk away in revulsion.
Brand Said: I think that the concept would be hard for a lot of immersive "in the head" players to deal with—as you have to build your head as you go.
For both of these I think the genre/cliche of "pirates" will go a long way in helping. It allows a context to start in.
If you can think of the chronology of the character as a series of elements: ABCDEFGHIJKLM, what the character's starting point is in a trad RPG is AB, or ABCD, or dysfunctionally, ABCDEFGHIJKLM. In the scenario you posit, the character begins with G. Wheras the traditional mode of play would say that you only work forward, your model suggests to me that it works forwards and backwards (which is a neato concept, and one we've played with in our Nar games extemorariously).
A couple of points:
If you're interested (you may or may not be) in engaging those folks who would stare blankly or are "in the head", I think it would be easier to starting with FGH rather than just G. These players need a place to start from: a homunculus to invest in. It instills a sense of assurance that you can know what to do when you get there, no matter how basic, and allows these folks a faster transition to fun, rather than that dread floundering feeling.
Also:
Would there be a scenario where the character in play could be: ***GHL? (I.e. where the flashbacks would happen that chronologically occur between the onset of game and the present of game? I'd assume that would be possible because Ann could pull a flashback scene in which Ben could create:
"After the Excelsior opened fire on the Black Pearl, and Ann had been rolled off her feet by the impact, what actually happened before we saw her again was: on the way down to the drink, she grabbed a rope and let the weight of her body release the dingy that had been hiding the very Queen's Jewels that the Exelsior is looking to recover. Old Sack Jack the first mate has been rowing ever since, so now that the Captain Welsford has taken us over, his men can't find what they're looking for. Er.... Arg."
and also, would there be times when ***GI**L is established and the flashback scene is re-writing "I" rather than inserting "C" or "J" (I.e. the flashback has not inserted a new element in the fiction, it has replaced an existing element already established in the fiction)?
I know that this doesn't sound like I'm getting the way you're stressing the point of co-ownership instead of chronology. I do like the dynamic that you're proposing in that realm, but I'm just trying, (probably badly) to illustrate that lucid play in a co-owned system may become rapidly more difficult when you introduce other socially challenging dynamics in a game at the same time.
This makes MB go "ABC = very clear. Thanks."
This makes RC go "Traveller"
Traveller, one of the most traditional RPGs around, regularly starts its characters at G. In fact, the character might already be dead by then!
This makes SLB go "But Trav goes only forward anyway."
