Blind spots

Ya know, I'm finding that I have weird blind spots when it comes to GMing. It occurs to me after the fact, that I really should have had the "brain" of the thing be a tough monster instead of defenseless. (They were invading a huge, living plant-hive-thingy to destroy it before its evil plans came to fruition.) But I had this "picture" in my head and didn't think to modify it to deal with the fact that things weren't working the way the picture expected them to.

I also find that while I plan plot threads around characters and their backgrounds, I tend to neglect characters' specific abilities when I plan the low-level details. I had, blindly, never really considered what Fastlane's powers (time manipulation) would allow in the "plant monster dungeon." Funny, considering how much I fretted over Fastlane's powers when trying to figure out how he'd interact with the secret military base… but even with my fretting, I still missed some rather obvious things. I think the problem there is that Fastlane's powers don't quite work the way I "picture" them in my head. I don't think of them as being as flexible as they really are.

My wife, Karen, commented on my indecisiveness as a GM in a follow-up conversation after the game. I find I have two levels of indecision… one is on the small scale, when the mechanics+dice don't make a decision for me and I don't really care about the outcome, and therefor can't make myself choose. But I'm GM-milquetoast, afraid to do anything that looks like, or even smells like, intentional screwing over the players. Blah. That's where I run into the problem of "I want freeform, but I can't seem to do it." I'm too worried about running over the players, and I want mechanics as a go-between and scape-goat. "Hey, man, it wasn't me that maimed your hero, it was the dice. Yeah."

Man, when they planted all the Round-Up bombs™, got clear of the plant hive, and pressed the detonator, only to hear just one of the bombs go off… they all sat and stared at me. I thought I was done for… they had planned and planned this bit, and it had mostly gone off without a hitch until it was time to deliver the payload, and I screwed it all up for them. I had a perfectly good reason for it, but I saw nothing but players who just knew the GM was screwing them over because he could ("railroading!"), and I thought I was going to get lynched. I reveled in the moment, despite the fear of lynching… and I think it was probably the coolest moment of the whole scenario, and not just for me. I can say that now that I know nobody is going to kill me.

The other indecision point is the "big ticket" item… the heros do something very unexpected, and I'm off on the chess-move-analysis rabbit-trail, trying to see as deep into the plot as I can to figure out all the implications of the various responses. "If I let this happen, will it short-circuit the action? But the plot will be boring if I deny it flat out. Will it catch me in an awkward situation, like having to explain why the sewer doesn't drain into the subway tunnel?" Those can paralyze me, because, as in chess, I just can't see very far. (I'm a sucky chess player and take way to long to make the losing moves.) And I'm a perfectionist. I worry about my ability to deal with my screwups further down-stream in the plot, so I bog down the game trying really hard not to screw up at each decision point. This wouldn't be a big deal if it was once or twice a game… all GMs have to deal with this. But I do it constantly, over what looks like little stuff to the players. But I see all these webs of cause-and-effect, and I'm trying to keep the game on the path of the "most interesting and exciting."

I was reading this Treasure Tables [[http://www.treasuretables.org/2005/11/interview-with-luke-crane|interview with Luke Crane]], author of [[http://www.burningwheel.org/|The Burning Wheel]], and thinking how his described gamemastering (minus the profanity) provides a stark contrast to how my games have run lately. He's all energy and goofy voices, and I'm all brooding chess master on the losing end of the match. I'm not a fun gamemaster.

And I realized that a really large part of my problem isn't with the system, it's with my skill as a GM. I'm suck no matter what the system is, and I need to quit dinking with trying to find the "right system" and concentrate on learning to overcome my personal suck.

What's funny is, Luke wrote The Burning Wheel to combat his flaws as a gamemaster… namely being a "dysfunctional railroader." So maybe at one level, using the right system will deal with the first level of indecision, while I have to find a non-system way to resolve my problems with the second level.

What does your FLGS have to offer?

I was listening to the [[http://www.ogrecave.com/audio/index.php?id=4|Ogre Cave Audio Report for 8/1/05]], and at the tail end of the show, they started talking about the changing landscape in which the local game store has to compete. (One of the guys is a game store owner or employee. The other guys are, beyond the Managing Editor and Editor-in-Chief of Ogre Cave.)

One of them said something which I think really sums up the issue (which I'm going to paraphrase):

A game store has to be more than a place where the customer buys a product.

And I strongly agree. If I just want to simply buy a product, the Internet does a much better job than my FLGS (Friendly Local Game Store). The selection is much larger, the prices are cheaper, and I can get it delivered to my door in a week or less. The prices are often low enough, and today's games costly enough, that even if my FLGS has a copy in stock (unlikely, because I don't buy many main-stream games), I can still save ten dollars or more by going mail order on a high-priced hardback. (Case in point… the new Serenity RPG, which I'm interested in. It's $36 at my FLGS after an unadvertised 10% discount. I can get it for $26.39 and free shipping from Amazon.com.)

The FLGS can't afford to compete on selection or price. The Internet's got that all wrapped up. You could say that the FLGS is more convenient than the Internet, because you can browse stuff and buy it on the spot, but that only counts for the stuff they have in stock, and that comes back to the "can't compete on selection" problem. And special orders? Don't tell me about your great special order program, because that's what the Internet is all about… no way to compete with that. (And that assumes that you do special orders well… my experience with multiple game stores is that they suck at special ordering, failing to order, losing orders, putting the order on the shelf and selling it before I pick it up. And if they don't do any of those things, it still takes twice as long for the order to arrive compared to mail order.)

So, how does a FLGS compete? That's a really tough question, because the things by which you can benefit the customer don't translate into something you can directly sell them. You have to give them a reason to frequent your store that isn't a product, in the hopes that, being in the store, they'll buy some of the product you have on the shelf. Build enough customer loyalty through such benefits, and they'll buy stuff off the shelf knowing that they can get it for 35% from Amazon.com.

Obviously, even if you can't directly compete with the Internet, you're still going to have to have a reasonable amount of inventory, because getting them into the store isn't going to do any good if you don't have anything on the shelf that they want. I'm not a typical customer, so I can't help you there. The stuff I'm buying now days is rarely heard of by local gamers, let alone seen on the shelves of my FLGS. But maybe that's part of the problem… if you never have what I want, you're going to have to get some of it before luring me into the store. And you don't carry what I want because you can't seem to sell it when you have it, because I don't come to your store. Lather, rinse, repeat. You're going to have to break that cycle.

To justify carrying the kinds of games I want, you're going to have to have more customers for the kinds of games I want. And the way you're going to do that is to create demand. I think that's the number one place where my FLGS' go wrong… they don't seem to think that it's their responsibility to sell their products. I don't mean ring them up at the cash register, I mean sell, like in promote and generate interest in.

One of the things said in the Ogre Cave report went like this: Back in the eighties and early nineties, these games basically sold themselves. You just put them on the shelf and people bought them. Today, that's not true. Video games and the Internet are really big right now, and they're sucking up your audience. If you're going to sell an RPG or board game, you're going to have to get people interested in it.

Take this exchange, which I more or less had with one of my FLGS employees…

Me: So, this Pirates of the Spanish Main… you selling much of it?

Him: A little, but not anything to get excited about.

Me: So if I bought a few packs, do you know anybody I could play the game with?

Him: There are some guys that come in here and play it once in awhile.

And that was about it. No "we have demos on such-and-such weekend" or "we have a group that plays every Sunday afternoon." There was no attempt to hook me up with said group, and there was no notice board or other social organizer that helped me find these guys.

With a game like this, were I the store manager, I think it would be my responsibility to make sure that someone is demoing this game in my store regularly. Especially if it's from WizKids and it's hot out on the coasts, but is only mediocre here ("here" being Wichita, KS). It's also my duty to know it's hot out on the coasts… pay attention to the Internet, or at least develop a good working relationship with reliable customers that do. Not just the collectible games, but the roleplaying games as well. Those copies of Now Playing on your shelf might sell faster if someone demoed the game in your store.

Of course, you need to have some good space to play and demo these games. Not a couple tables half-covered in unshelved comic books, pushed so close to the gaming display shelves that browsing customers can't get to them or even see half the product. And if you've got a wall covered in roleplaying games that you're trying to move, you need to leave space for RPGs at the demo tables… don't cram the schedule full of collectible games.

When you've got stuff happening, customers need to know when things are happening. A notice board to announce your own schedules and allow customers to put up their own flyers to look for players. Allowing people to tape stuff to the wall is alright, but it looks very tacky and it's not as inviting as a corkboard with pins. Give your customers a clear place to communicate.

Start a newsletter for your customers… tell them what's coming out soon, what the demo schedule looks like, that kind of thing. Set and meet a regular schedule… quarterly and on-time is better than hit-or-miss monthly. Find volunteers to help with it if you have to.

If you're losing business to the Internet (and believe me, if you aren't providing value beyond making the sale, you are), you need to have a strong Internet presence of your own. Not for mail order sales, but to serve the purpose of the corkboard and newsletter online. Keep your schedules up to date… find some software that allows you to delegate upkeep to your volunteers. Don't think of your web page as a big ad for your store… think of it as a customer support tool. Good customer support is a better advertisement for your store than anything you could write about it.

What I'm moving toward is that the FLGS needs to become the social center of gaming in your community. Not necessarily where everyone comes to play all their games, but where gamers come to meet other gamers, test drive new games, and find out what's going on in town. You, the game store employee, don't necessarily have to create all that value yourself, but you have to manage it… make sure the fans are doing it, and when your Pirates… fanatic quits doing demos and you think your sales would benefit from demos, seek out another fan and recruit them. Don't wait for the fans to come to you, seek them out, cultivate relationships, and create an army of volunteers willing to work for the betterment of the gaming community and maybe a little discount or free product.

What is this going to do for you?

Create more customers. Am I so totally wrong, or is it not totally obvious that this is going to get people buying more games ("I'd buy it if I knew someone to play it with."), which is going to generate more interest for the games outside the usual customer circles. It's going to grow the hobby, it's going to bring more people into your store. And those people are, we hope, going to be buying stuff from you.

And that's the bottom line. Obviously, if you aren't getting more sales, then there isn't any point. The bottom line is the bottom line, and there are bills to pay and mouths to feed. But you can't sell more games without getting more people into the store, and you can't get more people into the store unless you have something to offer them that they can't get from the Internet or a coffee shop.

Yeah, it's going to take time and money. But, in this customer's opinion, it's an investment you're going to have to make, and which will pay off in the long run. And I think you can minimize some of the time it takes you. Create fans of your store, and then leverage that fandom. If your customers feel that you are contributing to their gaming experience, they will give back to you. But you're never going to create fans if you're just there to make a sale. You need to be more than a place to buy a product, you need to become the social center of the gaming community.

Open communication and what we want from play

Bankuei, on his blog, [[http://bankuei.blogspot.com/|Deep In the Game]], recently posted on GM burnout.

I'm not so concerned about the burnout bit, but he mentions something that can lead to GM burnout, and it's that something I want to discuss…

Even more, add in the usual "Land of Broken Wheels" style of gaming- where no one at the table will openly communicate about what it is they really want out of play. You supposed to read the minds of the players, figure out what they want, and then make sure they're having fun? For months, maybe even years of campaign play? No wonder people burn out.

I don't read The Forge much, but I get the impression that this is a common thread… supposedly, players and GMs don't communicate well enough to convey what it is they really want to do.

I have, more than once, asked my players where they'd like to see our current superhero campaign ("In the Shadow of the Blood-Red King") go. They don't have any answers for me. Either they don't know what they want, they can't put what they want into words, or they don't want to tell me.

I suspect that they have answers… but they may not be fully conscious of them. They assume that what I deliver will be what they want, because they assume, more or less, that we all want the same thing out of the game. Which is exactly what Bankuei is talking about.

In some ways, I see some of the indie games as "training grounds" for learning new ways of playing. I'm sure many of these games' authors' don't see them that way, but I think that's the purpose they may be able to serve for me. A game like Polaris may help players learn to take more ownership in the story, a skill or style of play they can take back to a more traditional game.

I think the thing I want to see in my games here is a more pro-active player, willing to suggest scenes or directions for the game. Players do a certain amount of this inadvertantly… "I bet this guy doesn't even realize that he's being mind-controlled by the pod-people." This wasn't what I had in mind, but it's interesting and I can run with it. Players and GMs do this all the time, where the GM is making things up as he goes, stealing half of the ideas that the players throw out as speculation.

But I'd like to be able to be more deliberate about players helping craft the story at the meta-game level. I don't want rules for it, and I don't think we really need rules for it, but the players do have to change modes and get out of the habit of being relatively passive outside of their characters' direct actions.

In my experience, players often set up some neat things in their character background that hint at a potential story. But they often don't say anything about that potential story. "I'm carrying this mysterious amulet I inherited from my father. I don't know what it does." But this isn't followed up with, "I think it would be neat if the amulet was recognized by the villain of the campaign as belonging to his family." That part seems kind of assumed, and the GM has to guess at what kind of things the player would like the amulet to lead to.

And I think that's what Bankuei is getting at. Players have something they want involved in the game, but telling the GM exactly how and what they want seems somehow to be cheating. I don't want the players to dictate all aspects of the story ("…and while I'm having lunch with the President, an assassin pops out and I dive to save the President, taking the bullet myself. While I'm recovering in the hospital, the President sends me an offer to name any reward I want!"), but I do want the players to suggest scenes and story directions.

Take Magma, aka William F Johnson III, wealthy playboy by day, hot-blooded crimefighter by night. He pretty much lets his multi-billion dollar empire run itself. But say Chris, Magma's player, wanted the responsibilities of his wealth to stir up trouble. He could suggest to me, "I'd like something in my financial empire to cause me grief," and leave it up to me to figure something out. And I could… but would a sub-division of electronics division secretly developing weapons and selling them to criminals be what he was looking for? But if he were to say, "I'd like to have a scene in which I confront the CEO of Johnson Enterprise with evidence of his mismanaging the company for personal gain "? Well, that's totally different than what I came up with, and, since the player suggested it, just what he was wanting.

And if you merge it with the fudge points ideas I put forth the other day (still no comments from my players!), this scene and the sub-plot surrounding it would earn him fudge points. Funny how Bankuei's comment meshes so well with what I've been moving toward.

"About me", Fudge Points, NaNoWriMo

If the "About me" looks kind of "out of the blue," it's there so I can put a link to it from the menu. The easiest way to maintain it is to just make it a blog entry. It's probably too long… feedback is welcome.

No comment on the New Fudge Points?

Nobody's said anything about my recent post on Fudge Points… no opinions at all? Will my players let me thrust this upon them with no comment? Feedback is welcome.

No Nano

I've decided I just don't have time for NaNoWriMo this year. Too much to do with Fudge Factor and game-writing projects, not to mention the Wichita_Roleplayers meetings I organize and the game I run every other week. Lots of committments to other people I can't shrug off.

I'm going to try to focus on a couple writing projects I've started. It won't be a novel, but if I can get back in the habit of doing creative writing again (as opposed to this darn blog), that'll be a good thing.

Who is the Raven?

(Updated November 29, 2007.)

I'm Carl Cravens, and I'm a lot of things.

I'm a regular guy…

I'm a late-thirty-something husband, and father to a seven-year-old boy (who started roleplaying this year!). I'm a software developer by trade. I'm just like a whole lot of other computer and gaming geeks out there, except that I married a gal I met online in 1986, on a computer bulletin board devoted to play-by-email RPGs… the great-grandfather of the internet-based phoenyx.net. We've been happily married for over fifteen years.

I've been roleplaying since the seventh grade… over two-thirds of my life. My play style is rules-light, character-driven, and story-oriented, but I'm constantly exploring what roleplaying is and means to me. That's a lot of what my blog is about… exploring roleplaying.

I don't like the highly Narrativistic approach that takes the player out of the character's head and makes him more of a storyteller than anything else. I think of roleplaying in terms of creating a story, but the player's part is primarily to experience their character's story, not tell it.

I primarily play my own concoction of Fudge. Some of my discussion will be about Fudge, how it does or doesn't work for me, and where I'm going rules-wise.

…and would-be game writer…

I've only got a couple minor publishing credits with Grey Ghost Games, and a few articles on RPGNet and Fudge Factor magazine. I keep trying to write more… editing Fudge Factor got in the way for quite awhile, and I've been having trouble establishing a writing habit again. (UPDATE: And still am… but now I'm having a problem establishing a habit of gaming again.)

• "[[http://www.rpg.net/columns/list-column.phtml?colname=ideafactory|The Idea Factory]]", a short-lived series of columns about idea generation on RPG.net.

• "The Gramarye," a magic system for the roleplaying game
• Fudge, published in A Magical Medley and now available online (link above).

• "Just Fudge It", an article about playing with minimal rules, published in [[http://www.fudgerpg.com/products.html|Fudge RPG, 10th Anniversary Edition]].

• "[[http://www.fudgefactor.org/2004/04/department-13.html|Department 13]]," a mini-setting based loosely on a mash-up of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and SciFi Channel's Invisible Man.

…who runs too many projects…

• I'm the owner of the [[http://fudge.phoenyx.net/guide/bin/view/Guide/FudgeList|Fudge List]], which is dedicated to the Fudge Roleplaying Game.

• I'm the organizer of the Wichita_Roleplayers, a face-to-face roleplaying club based around a Yahoo Group message board. Trying to get the local scene fired up is more of a chore than I expected it to be. (UPDATE: Will always be a chore. I'm about ready to give up.)

• I'm co-owner of The Phoenyx, which is a free discussion forum server for the play-by-messaging roleplaying community. (The Phoenyx is in transition at the moment, so it's kind of quiet, but we're close to a major rebirth.) (UPDATE: Very close… we

…and still tries to find time to game.

I'm a gamer who hasn't gotten to game much in the past few years because of getting a bachelor's degree, having a kid, getting a second bachelors degree, and having trouble putting together a group of people. I was gaming regularly for awhile, but my gaming group fell apart in December of 2007 and somehow all of 2007 has slipped by with my playing a couple one-shot games. This paragraph used to start with, "I'm a dedicated gamer," but I realized I must not be all that dedicated when there wasn't really anything standing in the way of gaming this year except petty excuses. 2008 will have to be different.

On fudge points and player rewards

What is the problem I am trying to solve?

I find myself wandering from the core problem, and I need to re-center and focus on what the original problem was. All the talk about combat models comes back to this…

Karen says (more or less), "Roleplaying is disfunctional storytelling. We hand control of the story to the dice, which don't know how to tell a story."

It's not just that dice can do really, really bad things once in awhile, but that dice routinely produce undramatic results. They fail not just when the heroes really need to beat the bad guy, but when the player simply wants his hero to look competent or flashy. They ruin well-thought-out plans that would make a great story if they succeeded.

Maybe my problem is with the dice. But it goes beyond the dice.

An adjacent problem I am trying to solve is what The Shadow of Yesterday's "Keys" mechanics are aimed at. Getting the players to be pro-active in things outside the main plot. To create their own sub-plots, ala Theatrix, or otherwise get themselves involved in doing something other than just pursuing the big bad. But TSoY rewards players with experience points, which aren't a very effective reward for players who aren't interested in advancing their characters.

This is the secondary problem I'm trying to solve here… needing a reward to encourage the players to be pro-active. And in one way, I'm setting up fudge points to be a required reward. If they don't earn the reward, they'll have a very hard time beating the big bad.

It's purely meta-game, to encourage a certain style of play. So let's look at what I want the system to do…

Requirements:

• Fudge points must be necessary. They are more than simply a patch on a bad die mechanic… if the characters should have to spend a certain amount of them in order to succeed in the climatic scene.
• Lack of fudge points should not force undesirable results. Running out of fudge points shouldn't destroy a scene.
• This implies that players will need to be able to borrow against the future, ideally at some penalty of plot complications and the like.

So, here's my first draft, as much for my players to have something to respond to as anything else.

---

The New Fudge Points

What can I do with them?

• Power "stunts" - power-up your abilities to do out-of-the-ordinary things with them.
• Change any die roll to a result you prefer.
• Eliminate all damage on the highest level on your wound track.
• Dictate elements of the setting.
• [ What else ? ]

Why do I need them?

Without them, your characters will fail to reach their goals. The game will be structured in such a way that you will lose battles, not find important clues, and so on if you don't spend fudge points.

How do I get them?

• By doing things that make the story more interesting or entertaining.
• Good roleplaying. Playing "in character" and really interacting with the player and non-player characters around you. By your character "being himself" outloud, even when it doesn't serve to further the game goals, because it adds color and interest to the story.
• Creative roleplaying. Improvise, improvise, improvise. Suggest scenes that the GM can set up to explore your character and his relationships.
• Good storytelling. Create and drive sub-plots involving your character. Have a "life" outside of being a hero or adventurer, and show us what that life is like. Let your life get in the way and create conflict. Get your character's Faults and personal goals involved in the story. Suggest scenes that make this possible.
• By taking a loss when it's not required.
• By borrowing them. When you've run out of fudge points and you still really need them, you can borrow against future earnings.
• You can borrow as many points as you need
• For every point you borrow, you get a point of "bad karma."
• Not only do you have to pay off the borrowed point, but for every point of bad karma, the GM gets to declare that your character fails at something or otherwise has a bad moment that you cannot spend fudge points to counteract.

Appendix

Suggesting Scenes

This is something useful from the recent innovations in indie games.

So you're thinking, "Wouldn't it be cool if Fastlane and Magma got into an argument about responsibility?" Why keep that to yourself? Suggest it, create the starting parameters with the other players and GM, and then play out the scene. The GM can either work the scene into the main flow of the game, or can let it stand by itself. These don't have to be long, drawn-out scenes… they can be quick little vigenttes that take only a few minutes to play.

Here's an example. In the movie Outbreak, Daniels (Dustin Hoffman), recently divorced, goes by his old place to get some of his stuff. He and his ex get into an argument, of course, and it sets up the relationship for the viewers so they understand the tension later in the movie.

So you're Daniels' player, and you'd like to help define the character by having a conflict with his ex-wife. In a traditional game, you might declare that you go by your old house to get some stuff before leaving town. The GM, says, "Sure, you get your stuff and head to the airport," not picking up on the opportunity for a good scene. So instead of just declaring your character's actions, you explain to the GM what you want to do. That your ex should be there, and the two of you should get into a fight that shows the character's stubbornness, or how unfair his ex is, or whatever it is you want to explore.

---

What think ye? No, it's not all-original newness. It's rather similar to something that I've been mulling over for a few years, and there are various systems that are similar.