thread: 2006-01-12 : A third kind of me
On 2006-01-14, Charles wrote:
Vincent,
You asked if what I said was equivalent to
RPG rules [are] for gaming groups who [can't] figure out how to work together
No, I don't mean that. I mean that if you want to do confrontational play, where "This happens," "No, it doesn't!" or even "I want this to happen," "I say it fails," are viable interactions, then you are probably going to need some form of resolution mechanics.
So long as you stick to pull interactions, where players follow each others leads and don't disagree, then you you don't need resolution mechanics (that would be the "Say Yes" part of "Say Yes or Roll the Dice," I think).
I think what I'm saying is:
RPG formal resolution mechanics are for gaming groups who have decided that they want other options than always working together on everything.
The failure aspect is this:
As long as the other players either say "yes," or ignore my contribution, play continues. When another player says "No!" then play stops. What happens in the fiction is now undecided or blatantly inconsistent, and we need to resolve the no into someone saying yes to something (the yes may be me saying "yes, my contested contribution doesn't happen"). As long as we can't resolve to a yes, then the game is frozen. If we never resolve to a yes, then the game is done.
Consistent failure to respond to pulls can lead to a game so boring that everyone quits (or talks about tv shows instead), but a single refusal to respond to a pull can't end the game (you have to turn the pull into a push, by saying, "You must add creatively to this," before you can say, "or I leave the game."). A single push can end the game if it is forced implacably and resisted implacably.
I think many mechanics exist to mediate pushes, to ensure that implacable push never meets implacable resistance, because either someone always explicitly has the upper hand, or because a randomizer is used to pick between two implacable choices.
I don't think I'm saying anything radical or original here. You rejected "rules are for players who don't know how to get along," because you realized that there are times when trying to get along won't produce as good of play as not trying to get along. The rules are added to make not getting along fun and productive.
This makes WMW go "This is me grinning."
