Token Economy, Generally Considered October 19, 2006
Posted by Ian in Applied, Methodological, Theory.add a comment
I have spent a fait amount of time considering how to work the token economy in 3am, but figured it couldn’t hurt to talk a little about it in general, how I can see using it other designs.
One of the nicest thing about the token economy: it drives thematic play without pushing a lot of content into it. All you need to do is determine the types of tokens, the thematic actions they fuel, and then figure out the ratio you want for your particular game.
To be a little simple–if you want a ‘dark’ game with glimmers of light, make sure that the tokens which fuel ‘dark’ narrations from the players outweigh the ones that fuel ‘light’ narrations. Figure out when and how they can be played, write up a character sheet that faciliatates that. The Iron Mace mini-Game Chef is coming up…maybe I’ll try it out there.
Vincent’s Meme October 19, 2006
Posted by Ian in Personal Reflection, Rambling.add a comment
Okay, Vincent started this over here and it was a tough one to resist.
I began with D&D, 1st edition, watching my older brother and getting him to run a few sessions for me. I must have been like five or six years old. There was a little Star Frontiers and Gamma World thrown in for spice.
I played a number of computer games like Zork and Curse of the Mummy on the old TRS-80, following in the footsteps of my mom and brother. I can still remember using bonafide tapes instead of disks.
I picked up a friend or two through elementary school and we would play D&D. During this time, my brother spent a lot of time babysitting my sister and I, and kept us entertained by what amounted to live-action spy roleplaying, with code names, missions, and sneaking all around the house. I seem to remember a few days where we got to ‘play’ monsters from the Monster Manual II.
I played D&D on and off with friends through elementary school. Right around the time middle school started, I developed a voracious appetite for game books, buying and playing as many as I could on my admittedly limited budget. This tendency only grew through high school.
This was also when I began designing my own games—filling a hefty three-ring binder with my tight, scrawl. I have no idea what happened to that binder, but it must have been filled with dozens of three to five page games. I can remember some were just bizarre D&D clones, but I also dimly remember a swath of others that were about any and every thing that caught my attention.
I have this memory of my brother looking over one of my early efforts and saying “but D&D already does this” and deciding that I would do something D&D didn’t. I would pay money to lay hands on that binder—I’m sure the games are *terrible*, but to get a little window into my childhood head…
D&D remained a staple of early adolescence, but my palate broadened to include Warhammer Fantasy, Morrow Project (dredged from my brother’s stash along with Harn), Marvel Superheroes, DC Heroes, MERP, FASA’s Star Trek and Dr. Who (although I may never have even played a full session of that), and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (none of them more than three sessions).
By high school, I fell in with a couple groups of gamers, mostly college age and older, and played a session or two of games like Call of Cthulhu, Chill, Tales from the Floating Vagabond, more DC Heroes, Champions, Cyberpunk, Teenagers from Outer Space, and the first generation Vampire RPG (I was living just outside of Atlanta at the time, so this was real big news in the local stores).
In general, though, high school was dominated by two long-term campaigns—one Traveller and one TORG. I picked up a certain snobbiness at this time about ‘clunky’ level-based systems like D&D.
We moved my senior year and the social disorientation left me without a group for a couple years. By my sophomore year in college, though, I was back in a couple groups, playing a mixture of White Wolf (mostly Mage and Changeling, but a little Wraith and Werewolf), Call of Cthulhu (just a few sessions), SpaceMaster (maybe a half-dozen sessions), Palladium’s Nightbane (only one session, but really liked the setting’s backstory), GURPS (*maybe* 5 sessions), and a tiny little bit of MUDing. I also played a little D&D, a session or two of Ars Magica, probably a few other things I can’t recall.
Graduate school killed my tabletop gaming for a good four years, but I did play a lot of Myst-style puzzle games—the new versions of games like Zork. Also, now that I think about it, often played simultaneously with my brother and mother again, talking by phone and email—a little family bonding.
I started back up again with D&D 3.0 which I stuck with for a good four or five years before finally getting the bug to do something different after I had homebrewed about as much as the system would stand. Played a few alternate 3.0 one shots like Arcana Unearthed. Somewhere in here, I stumbled into the indie gaming scene. With my 3.5 group, looking to explore a little, I tried some Castles & Crusades, fiddled around with TORG again.
Played a cooperatively GM-ed short campaign arc of 3.5 D&D, stumbled upon indie gaming, played a session of the Shab al-Hiri Roach, went to Gencon and got the indie flavor sampler. Played one session of old-school 1st ed. D&D. Now, I am currently playing in a TSOY game.
[3am] Scene Caps October 19, 2006
Posted by Ian in [3am] Design Log.add a comment
Yes, it has been a little bit since I got to think and fiddle with 3am. This is just a little idea for an optional rule in the game, perhaps ideal in getting acquainted with the game.
Currently, the scene length is controlled largely by the number of tokens players bring to it. Another option is to have each scene come with a cap, a maximum number of tokens that may be spent over its course. This could definitely help players get a feel for how to modulate the length of the game.
It would also require a few modifications to the ante-phase, probably best modified by allowing players to enter a second phase of advancing tokens to the exposed jewel of their crown if the cap had not been met and the current tokens had been used up.
In fact, it might work best if a scene cap rule were an alternative to the ante phase, a way to get a handle on what it means when you ante up a big pile of tokens.
Hmm…just an idea, and the more I fiddle with it, the less attached I feel.
“Say yes or roll the dice” October 17, 2006
Posted by Ian in Applied, Theory.add a comment
“Say yes or roll the dice.”
It’s really good, basic advice, but I want to unpack it. It is not just good advice because it helps break GM’s and players out of an overly GM-centric, railroad-driven play style. It is good advice because it highlights what dice can do best—namely, introduce a degree of surprise and force players to improvise. When you start rolling the dice, the narrative should be at a turning point, capable of going in several different and potentially interesting directions.
You roll the dice because it could be cool to lose the conflict or need another player’s help to succeed.
Of course, dice are by far not the only way to generate more improvisation. You can always improvise in its more pure form—directly responding to what another player has narrated into the story. In many games, it is what other people contribute to the fiction, free of randomizers, that really makes the story. You didn’t have to roll, for example, to insult the Duke’s wife, giving the GM the chance to make her a more dynamic part of the story.
“Say yes or roll the dice” isn’t just about the dice, it’s about making the story more responsive to the contributions of players that are not strictly dice-driven. So, that once it gets to the point that dice need to be rolled, the dice aren’t really being rolled to determine the success of an action in the game, but to adjudicate between conflicting options established by players.
This is, perhaps, the real ‘meat’ of the conflict vs. task resolution debate, one that most explanations elide. The shift lies in the way it makes the players, rather than the characters, primary. However, most forms of conflict resolution still use the characters as the vehicle for the resolution, creating an conceptual tension between the two levels.
More later.
