HERO System: Does Riddle of Steel

Well, it's Friday and I'd normally comment about something I saw on other blogs this week. But nothing there really inspired a rant or expansion even if I enjoyed some of them. Top ten monsters and the like, and here's a shout out to a good set of RPG Theory Links at Mad Brew Labs.

So instead let's do something else fun, playing with HERO System which in my opinion isn't used fully even by the owners of the game line themselves.

During some rather nice exchanges over Personality Mechanics this week (I'm not done with those, more to come next week), one example that came up was The Riddle of Steel and it's ability to give bonuses when a character encounters pre-defined conditions.

To use the example given me, a character may have: Love of Queen, and thus gain in-game mechanical bonuses to roll when defending the Queen, attempting to do something in the Queen's name, etc. Whatever the group feels fits.

Here's the same thing in HERO System:

• Love of the Queen: +2 Overall Skill, No Conscious Control, GM determines when the condition applies, how the bonus will be used, and if all the bonus will be used (-2). Real Cost: 20, Active Point Cost 7.

The limit for No Conscious Control is normally a -2 reflecting not only the lack of control, but a rather rare firing of the power. This could be reduced if the character in question was one of the Queen's guards, agents, or lover- perhaps only to a -1 (giving a final Active Cost of 10 points).

I actually do this sort of thing for characters from time to time. It's not a Personality Mechanic as such since as it's not something every character gets. But is instead something specific that the character does because that's who he is. Buying it instead of it being a required feature of the setting makes a world of difference.

Not that a GM couldn't require or provide some of these 'SAs'. That's the joy of HERO.

So stuff it TRoS, you're not that special. Been doing this sort of thing long before you appeared on the scene :)

Personality Mechanics: Excuses

James V pointed out something in the comments for the last article that I feel needs mention, although it more a case of how some players approach Personality Mechanics rather than the PMs themselves. They use them as excuses for the worst possible behavior.

Doing something because "that's what the character would do" has been around forever, and certainly happens in games with no PMs at all. Indeed, Alignment (it's own kind of PM, if a Meta-Game level one) has provided this excuse since day one.

PMs however take it a step further by providing an in-game mechanical excuse. Games like Poison'd that I've mentioned before show the extreme to which this can be taken. There is something about an actual rule that causes a subset of players to go where they wouldn't normally go, and indeed isn't that the whole idea behind such mechanics in the first place?

This simple fact is reason IMO to view any call for PMs with skepticism- some supporters are more interested in what they can get away with using mechanical backing, than they are with anything else.

Overall, I feel that players are completely responsible for what they bring to the table. And that breaking the group's social contract is grounds for being expelled no matter the excuse, PM inspired or not.

Personality Mechanics: Mechanical Bribes

Looking over the comments for the Personality Mechanics article, it seems I overlooked a newer modification of the concept. Rather than a forced decision, the player gets a bribe to do something in accord with a 'disadvantage', and he can if he wishes refuse the reward and the action. Rewards are things like bonuses for rolls in the game, Fate Points, XP, etc.

Basically you're bribing the player to do what he's there to do- play the character.

Of course, that's not really true. If he was there to play the character, he wouldn't need a bribe now would he? No, what's really going on here is that the system is bribing the player to act out of character for a moment. Or it's bribing players to give the illusion of role-playing to the GM when the player's actual interest lies elsewhere.

If anything I react worse to this than I do the old school methods. In old school, I'm just forced to do something that may or may not be out of character. In this method I have to decide to play my character poorly either strategically (by refusing advantages offered by the bribe), or to role-play him poorly by accepting those bribes.

It's a no win, and thus a no go. Carrot or stick, the best simulator for a person is still a person.

Personality Mechanics

Personality Mechanics (PMs) was a term I first saw used back in the r.g.f.a days, they are basically any mechanical method for determining character decisions or actions. Virtues in Pendragon are a good example, as is the insanity mechanic from Call of Cthulhu.

In practice, there are basically two reactions players have to such systems.

1. They treat it as a clue in much the same way an improv actor would treat a suggestion. A jumping off point for the immediate and future decisions.
2. They treat it as a break of their internal model of the character, often counter to how he would or would not react under the given conditions.

I'm firmly in the second camp myself. As Warren Drew once said, "The best simulator of a person is a person". I find the forced and limited nature of PMs character destroying, and highly unrealistic. Confronted with such in a set of rules, I'd either remove them or not play the game at all.

There is however something of a gray area in disadvantages such as those found in GURPs and HERO. Here you're getting points for (ahead of time) restricting your character behavior to something you're already intending to do anyway. They should as a result be played by the owning character, and if the GM is needing to point them out there is likely a serious disconnect that needs to be resolved.

For those in the first group, good luck and fun. Way too alien for me to deal with.

Game Design Questing Beasts- Individual Tactical Combat

The Questing Beast has a couple of interesting meanings. The one most people know is that of an endless and fruitless search, and it's in that thought that I titled this article. Various long sought after and likely unreachable game design goals.

Of these a truly tactical individual vs. individual melee combat system must rank highly as an example. Reviewing the definition of Tactical I given before, we know that such a system would be based around Resource Management, Dissimilar Assets and Maneuver.

The problem with respect to the individual vs. individual combat is that Dissimilar Assets by definition don't apply (the combatants are set as they enter melee), and Maneuver is contrained because melee combat has already been joined.

That leaves Resource Management. But for the individual battle, having that as the only determinate results in the winner is generally known before the battle begins- i.e. whoever has the most resources. Not a very interesting encounter.

Many games have taken their shots at this beast. Riddle of Steel for example attempted it with the selection of attack and defense options, backed up with a dice pool assignment (Resource Management) and an Attack/Defense die drop.

The problem with that approach is that two of the three options weren't Tactical, but were instead Strategic. The attack/defense and die drop are both Near Game Layer mechanics. In addition to being something other than our goal of tactical combat- it's also for many people too meta-game. And thus too far removed from the character's abilities (as opposed to the player's ability to guess at the opposing player's choices).

Even Riddle of Steel's Resource Management part (the die pool assignment) was also in the end Strategic as the primary advantage was gained in guessing how one's opponent assigned their die pool and adjusting yours accordingly. So in th end, nothing tactical was left.

Worst, such meta-game focused mechanics become unwieldy at best as the number of combatants increase.

IME a game can successfully focus on the Tactical only when the number of combatants (PC and NPC) is more than two. Further its Tactical favor and demands increases as the number rises further. Given that rpgs are typically about groups of PCs, this is more than acceptable.

Thus my advice is that anyone wishing a Tactical RPG experience should focus on team level design and abandon it at the one-on-one level. You'll chase it forever, and never catch it.

Moral Relativism in RPGs

Fridays seem to be dull days in the Blogging world. So with that in mind I've decided to use that day to comment on things I've seen on other blogs.

So this week, what caught my eye was found at StupidRanger including another post referenced within that article from the same source. The articles drip with Moral Relativism with statements like this:

"I submit that no character (or action) is ever truly Good(tm) or Evil(tm), and it is best simply to figure out how your character would react given the circumstances, his personality and ethics, and his past experiences. "- Vanir

I could speak to the weaknesses and self-destructive ends of the whole concept of Moral Relativism, but this isn't a political blog so I'll pass on that.

Instead, I'd like to examine for a second the disconnect this mindset has with itself and how it relates to rpgs. Why would a Moral Relativist even worry for a second if his character was doing Good or Evil in an adventure. He already knows that it's just a matter of personal opinion. The thought shouldn't have occurred in the first place and dropping alignments from D&D should have been his first house rule.

Indeed, at the end that's exactly where Vanir ends up. So I have to wonder why he even made the trip. Perhaps just to post a blog entry? Maybe to champion the cause of Moral Relativism itself and how it can be used to justify any desired action in an RPG?

Beyond Vanir's own specific case, I often see a related disconnect online: Role-players insisting on inflicting their own Moral Relativism upon characters and settings where it doesn't fit. They worry about the Paladin killing orcs, which at its core is a complete failure to role-play a Paladin who certainly neither believes in nor exists in a world of Moral Relativism.

Besides, if it's up to the individual to decide Good and Evil- how could you condemn the Paladin in any case. It's not as if it's objectively wrong for him to be killing orcs. That's just your opinion you're forcing upon him.

Interesting enough, I've never enountered people so willing to jump to moral judgments as Moral Relativists. And the lines they draw are never so clear as they are in RPGs...

Chrome in RPGs

In wargaming there is a concept called Chrome. Chrome was very specific rules that normally didn't apply to every unit in the game, but were added to highlight details or reflect the theme.

Thus nearly every unit may have a movement rating, strength rating, have to deal with terrain, use the same rules for combat resolution, etc. One with Chrome however would something additional- either a modifier for the standard actions or even in some case completely new rules. SPI's Air War for example had (solely for fun in an otherwise serious simulation) Dragons and UFO rules, representing the ultimate extent of Chrome- shiny additions.

In a sense, RPGs with their focus on individual characters would naturally expand the use of the Chrome. Original D&D gave elves a bonus for finding secret doors, and that certainly looks like Chrome. Indeed, the whole fantasy section added on to Chainmail (one of the kicking off points for RPGs) was entirely Chrome.

As the 70s and 80s arrived in the RPG world, game design made a lot of what was Chrome part of the core rules, a reasonable decision since modeling characters is core to the RPG concept. HERO System is one of the best examples of this IMO with it's 'build anything' effects based approach.

However the last decade has seen a return to Chrome in spades. Be it Feats in D&D and Star Wars Saga, or Traits in Dark Heresy- there has been a significant and growing return to 'specific rules covering exceptions from the core mechanics'.

So significant in fact, that one could assert that they overshadow the core rules in importance- that characters in such games use and depend more upon feats than the core mechanics.

There are three serious issues with such designs:

Rule growth. Once you enter this path, you'll have significant pressure to continue it. Every new supplement has to have yet more Feats or Traits. And there is a tendency for them to grow in power in order to add even more 'shine'. This can quickly become unmanageable as players sort through books looking over all their options, and can reach the point where it becomes nearly impossible to understand the effects of all the options in combination.

Thus one gets 'killer builds' and other game breaking results that can best be dealt with by refusing to use the very supplements the authors create for the game.

Confusion. Such Chrome seriously hampers one's ability to look at a character stat block and understand what he can do. The core values may not be as important as the Feats, and if you don't immediately know what "Deadly Swing" does- you'll have to look it up in the rules.

Boring Core Mechanics. Previously games had to stand on how fun and engaging their core mechanics were. By shifting the focus to Chrome- those core mechanics lose their importance. And that may mean that the core game itself is unbalanced or boring. Chrome can hide this for a while, but unless it completely replaces it- gamers will discover it over time and lose interest in the game.

At the end of the day, I wonder if today's designers are shooting themselves in the foot. Afterall, do you know of any car designer who released a model 100% Chrome? No?

There's likely a reason for that don't you think?

Tactics & Strategy in Game Design- Looking Back

Looking back, the original articles are Tactics and Strategy have held up rather well. I'm happier with this updated three-part series than I was the original two-part one. It flows better and I think stating the definitions I was using up front is an improvement.

While the concepts haven't changed in 6 years, the examples I used have to a degree. D&D 4E in particular made a number of significant design changes that I feel merits note.

Amoung these changes was reducing its Resource Management (gone are spell slots and from the designer statements there's a reduction in expendable magic support) and increasing its Maneuver through a number of movement and position related abilities. Additionally an attempt to make its Pace of Decision more constant across the levels of character advancement was made.

As the articles should make clear, such changes should seriously altered the play of the game. And the online reaction has reflected the reality of this. The move towards Maneuver has increased the importance of battlemaps and minis, something I consider an improvement but others online have reacted with dismay. The reduction of the game's Resource Management to 'at will', 'per encounter' and 'once per day' abilities also has received a mixed reaction.

One could spend quite a bit of time on these and other changes, something perhaps I'll take up in the future. But for now, I'll simple note them as examples of how exploring the concepts I presented here can be used to examine actual game designs.

Note that I've collected the T&S series into a collected article offsite. The link is to the right with the others.

Tactics & Strategy in Game Design- Part III: Strategy

In part I we defined Tactics and Strategy, part II discussed key concepts of game design that resulted in tactical play. Now let’s turn our attention towards Strategy.

Strategic play takes place at the Near Game, Near Meta-Game or even the Meta-Game Layer of Design. Here the focus isn't directly on immediate concrete concerns, but rather on estimates of how one's opponent is going to move and react. Thus to repeat the phrase I used before- Strategy is not playing the board, but rather playing the man.

As we did before, let’s consider the primary elements of Strategy under this definition. Although they are greatly interrelated, almost like dance partners, they can be broken down as follows:

Prediction
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.” Sun Tzu, The Art of War.

This element covers predicting the decisions of your opponent and your own performance. Some examples: Knowing that Joe tends to put his most powerful units in the center or realizing that Sara loses effectiveness in chess if her queen is exchanged. Knowing that your heavy fighters can hold the line long enough to complete the flanking maneuver you have planned. Etc.

Deception
“Hence, when able to attack, you must seem unable, when using your tools, you must seem inactive. When we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away, when far away, we must make him believe we are near.” Sun Tzu, The Art of War.

This element represents the flipside of Prediction, the ability to conceal your intentions and decisions from your opponent or even convince him that you are following a different course from your actual one. If he has positioned himself to protect from a strong center attack at the moment your Calvary hits him on the right flank- your chances for victory is enhanced.

Causality
"In war everything is simple, but it’s the simple things that are difficult.” General Carl Von Clausewitz.

This is the causal chain required to implement strategic decisions. If one decides to use your Calvary to flank your opponent on the left while tying down his main body with your infantry- the causal chain is all the steps (and time) needed to properly position your troops in order to reach that objective.

A very important characteristic of the causal chain is its length- how many actions are needed over how much time. If the chain is too short, strategic decision itself will become trivial as the other elements become irrelevant. As the chain lengthens the difficulty and importance of the strategic decision increases. Prediction must look further ahead into increasingly fuzzy ground while deception must be prolonged. Failure on either point can result in catastrophe.

As a result, the length of the causal chain is perhaps the most important of the elements of Strategy as it determines the impact of the others.


Given these definitions and moving from theory to more practical (if still abstract) concerns- what design concepts are important to consider in creating or evaluating a game's strategic environment?

Tactical Elements

A strong tactical game will by nature normally produce a strong strategic one.

Chess is again an excellent example of this case, as it needs nothing but its tactical design to present strategic challenges worthy of centuries of play. Between players of near equal tactical skill the causal chain is long and complex enough that essentially limitless Strategies become available and defeating your foe’s perception of the game is nearly as (if not more) important than mastering its reality.

So for strategic groundwork first look to the tactical elements: Resource Management, Dissimilar Assets, Maneuver and Pace of Decision. It will be these elements that define the causal chain and it will be these elements that frame the strategic environment.



A game design however can increase its strategic depth beyond that provide by its tactical environment in a number of ways. This can be used to make a moderately tactical game into something considerably more challenging- or turn an already demanding environment into any commander’s nightmare.

Rock-Scissors-Paper
Many game designs seek to employ both Prediction and Deception, but do so in a single step mechanic.

Examples include Top Secret were melee combatants would select an attack and defense stance that would thereafter be cross-referenced on a table to determine the result. Riddle of Steel would have opposing players drop a blue or red die simultaneously to declare that they focusing on attack or defense that round. Some LARPs actually use Rock-Scissors-Paper as their conflict resolution mechanic to determine the victor in one step.

All these are Strategic methods; however the causal chain is exceedingly short. Thus they are best used as part of a whole (as in the Riddle of Steel example) rather than the entire result. Even here, many such as myself find them so deep in the Meta-Game Layer that they directly drag your opposing player (rather than his character) into the conflict breaking character modeling and immersion.

Hidden Decisions
By hiding decisions made by a player from his opponent(s), the need to judge the intent of your foe and predict his actions is greatly increased. Resources that are to be used against you are not in sight. Where could they be? Where would your opponent likely place them?

Hidden Movement is perhaps the most common example of this method in wargames and even in RPGs although the latter seldom emphasizes the subject in the rules directly. D20 for example includes rules for sight range under specific lightning conditions without much comment. My own Age of Heroes takes line of sight limits for granted- a matter for GM judgment based upon the map.

Adding this to any system is easily done to great effect. Most often all it takes is using a battle map with terrain and line of sight rules.

Beyond the simple fact of hidden movement are active measures taken to hide (invisibility spells, smoke, etc.) or deceive (decoy troops carrying the banners of important units, riders trailing branches to raise dust, etc). All can be given to a player as a toolset to expand his strategic options.

Reconnaissance
If some attempt to hide things, others will always develop methods of investigation to reveal them.

Adding resources and methods to allow for such in a game adds yet another layer to the strategic environment, especially if by their use other resources are limited or spent. A classic example here are the divination spells from older versions of D&D. Information about one’s opponent can be had- at the price of losing a spell slot that could have been used for combat magic. Outside of magic, even the use of scouts in almost any system means that resources (which could have been of use in a main force) are diverted to a recon and/or harassment role.

Like the three elements of strategy above, Hidden Decisions and Reconnaissance are each part of a dance- play benefiting from both having their impact. When balanced to a fine degree, one may well discover part of a foe’s casual chain and thus act to interrupt it- but interpreting scattered clues to determine the correct causal chain should be left in large part to the Prediction skills of the player instead of being given as simply stated fact. Otherwise you risk reducing Strategic play inside of enchancing it.



"So in war, the way is to avoid what is strong and to strike at what is weak. Water shapes its course according to the nature of the ground over which it flows; the soldier works out his victory in relation to the foe whom he is facing." Sun Tzu, The Art of War.

One of the easiest end of day tests for good Strategic game design is to see if the classic wisdoms of war apply to the end results. The quotes from Sun Tzu and Clausewitz above for example. If characters in your game can make use of such concepts, you’ve at least got a good start. If they can’t gain victory without constantly using such concepts, you’ve achieved it.

Note: the above is an edited and updated version of this 2003 article.

Tactics & Strategy in Game Design- Part II: Tactics

Now that we’ve defined the differences between Tactics and Strategy, how does a game’s design enhance such play? We’ll start with Tactical game play, which at its simplest has three major elements.

Element 1: Resource Management

One of the bedrock concepts of tactical play is to make the most gain with the least expenditure. After all if you have unlimited resources and no reason to avoid using them, you can do anything. And being able to do anything hardly makes for good tactical play, instead of working towards of a goal with clever play- you just do it.

The exact nature of resources can vary greatly in RPG design. The number of spells you can cast in a day. The amount of ammo you can carry. The number of Hit Points you have and the number of healing potions you have to restore them. At the most basic, there’s the number of characters in play and the number of actions each can take in a turn.

Earlier D&D editions have always been a masterful example of a game design heavily built on resource management- limited charges on items, limited number of potions, only so many pre-selected spells per day, etc. D&D forces its players to decide how to best spend resources at almost every turn. Even in 4th edition, once-a-day and once-an-encounter abilities represent resource management although at a weaker level.

As a general rule, increasing the number and types of resources you have to manage increases the tactical play of the game.

Element 2: Dissimilar Assets

To study tactical battle one must study combine arms (the concept, not the modern military use although that’s fun as well). Combine arms is nothing but the use of Dissimilar Assets to achieve a goal.

To use a modern warfare as a model: Artillery is powerful and long ranged- but vulnerability to almost any attack. Armor combines protection, firepower and mobility into one package- but encounters major problems in certain infantry defended terrain. Infantry is slow and light on weapons- but can make maximum use of terrain. Name an asset and you name both strength and weakness in a single word.

Combining Dissimilar Assets into a functional and dangerous whole takes skill and knowledge. Failure to do so (like France’s failure in WWII) can be disastrous in the extreme.

Early game designs had Dissimilar Assets and thus Combine Arms as a core feature. D&D with its classes- Wizards are very different than Fighters who in turn are used differently than Clerics. Even later games still maintain this to some extent. Vampire has its clans. Deadlands its gunslingers, hucksters, and blessed. These games are designed such that each character becomes its own niche, its own type of Dissimilar Asset that enhances tactical play when viewed from within its own group of players.

Other games however consider such stark limits as unrealistic and seek to reduce all the characters to common terms.

As a system weakens character niche, it reduces tactical play. Universal Resolution systems, lack of character differences, sole dominating weapon selections, all these things combine to create a tactically bland experience where the answer to any problem is obvious and unchanging. Even though such reduction is often done from the standpoint of realism, a simple look at real world combat would show that it is in fact a failure from even that perspective- there are no single dominate weapon, no one solution to every threat, no plan that survives contact with a foe.

Element 3: Maneuver

Managing resources is the bedrock of tactical play. Controlling Dissimilar Assets each with their own resources is the first step to being a tactician instead of an accountant. It is however with Maneuver that one masters the subject. Sadly it is in Maneuver that most RPG design perform worse.

At its most basic, Maneuver is getting the right resources into the right position at the right time in order to maximize your chance of success while protecting against the same from your opponent.

Of course for Maneuver to matter, you have to be able to maneuver. Many designs forgo the use of a map completely and either ignore movement or abstract it out of the realm of character decision.

A design that focuses on tactical movement will include rules for facing (and flank and rear attacks), multiple opponent rules, the effects of range, the impact of terrain and other factors that can (when properly used) allow a force to defeat unskillfully played opponents with greater resources.

Pace of Decision

The three elements above, added to the rule system in use determine something I call Pace of Decision. Pace of Decision is at its most simple how fast can the player lose. It’s a measure of the importance of each decision and movement.

While a number of factors determine a game's Pace of Decision, how lethal a system is may be the most important.

For example: D&D provides Resource Management by having Hit Points. However these same Hit Points reduce the game's Pace of Decision since they act as a buffer to bad tactical choices. You can lose a few hit points by moving to an inferior position, but it’s easy enough to move again afterwards and use a healing spell or potion and thus carry on the battle. In other games, that single bad decision could result in a disabled or dead character. Hence the Pace of Decision can be said to be Low (D&D like systems where many hits are needed to kill) or High (one hit means a dead character).

If Pace of Decision is too low, any tactical error can be forgiven since its impact is minor at best. The winner is almost solely determined by who had the greater resources. On the other hand if it is too high, the battle is over before it started with initial deployment likely determining the winner.

The ideal position between these two extremes is one of personal taste.Indeed, the combination of the elements above that work best is a question that can only be answered by each individual. Everyone has his or her own tastes and the possible range of answers here is immense. And this explains more than anything else, why there is room for more tactical games.

An Observation

If one reads between the lines above, you’d find an interesting common thought. The core of tactics is providing options (resources, different assets, movement options)- but its framework is one of limits.

A resource once spent is lost for an important period of time. A dissimilar asset can’t do everything. Requiring maneuver means that you can’t be everywhere. Etc.

The heart of tactics is bringing the best assets and resources to bear at the correct point at the correct time. The theme of tactics is overcoming limits. Consider that the next time you look at a game that promises to let you do anything.

Note: the above is an edited and slightly updated version of this 2002 article.

Tactics & Strategy in Game Design- Part I: Introduction

In the old wargame era, games were divided into Tactical, Operational and Strategic scales matching the rough military use of the terms. By scale, we mean the size of the individual maneuver element be it man, squad, company, division, etc. Strategy (in addition to scale) also tended to add in production, diplomacy, and the other factors of war.

These definitions have little meaning when examining RPGs since by definiton RPGs default to the individual scale. However Tactics & Strategy have meanings outside those of scale, and those are much more useful to us here.

• Tactics- 1b: the art or skill of employing available means to accomplish an end
• Strategy- 2b the art of devising or employing plans or stratagems toward a goal

We'll also need the definition of Stratagem- 1b: a cleverly contrived trick or scheme for gaining an end.

To put this in game terms, let’s use examine chess using with these definitions (instead of its more common one focused on long range vs. short term goals).

Here Tactics can be referred to as playing the board, i.e. the proper moving of one’s pieces towards the end of winning the game. This would include attacking the opponent's pieces, guarding your own, attacking and pinning the enemy, etc.

Meanwhile Strategy can be referred to as playing the man, i.e. attempting to deceive the opposing player as to your goals or playing upon a weakness of his individual style of play. He may really like using his Knights, take them away in an early exchange. Or move such that he expects a King-side attack, then switch to an Queen-side one after he’s committed his pieces.

Moving these concepts to rpgs, the same principles apply.

Thus tactically one uses the abilities of the character (as defined by the rules) to reach a desired end. Typically this is winning in combat although other means are possible. Questions here involve where you move, which attack to use, etc.

Strategically however you’re interested in exploiting your foe by tricking him or playing upon his weaknesses. In a rpg a foe can be the GM who’s running your opponents, other players, or even NPCs/PCs if the person running them is role-playing a different set of knowledge and weaknesses other than his own.

Referencing Layers of Design, it’s rather clear from this that Tactics are a Game Layer consideration. They are concerned completely with the actual state of the board and what moves can be made. Meanwhile Strategy is a Near-Game or a Near Meta-Game Layer consideration. It's concerned with what your opponent is or is not thinking.

From this break down it should be clear that one would use different mechanics from Game Design PoV to enhance Tactics than one would use to enhance Strategy.

Next: Elements of Design- Tactics

Timeline of RPG Theory

Now for a summary post of the history of RPG Theory that I've covered over the last couple of weeks. Here's a rough timeline of what's gone down:

1980: Blacow's Four Aspects
1988: Allston's Types
1996: Bartle's Player Suits
1997: Threefold
1999: GNS, 2001 -2005: Swine Wars, Fading of GNS
2001: GEN
2002: Robins Laws Player Types
2002: Elements of Design
2009: International Journal of Role-Playing

This of course doesn't cover everything. I've excluded LARPs and for the most part CRPGs as my focus is table-top. Even there I've skipped some, touching on those that made at least some (IMO) impact.

The Better Side of RPG Theory- Part VII: The Future?

The beginning of this year saw the publication of the first academic style journal covering role-playing titled the International Journal of Role-Playing.

Until now the world of RPG Theory has been of, by, and for the hobbyist (except for that one WotC Study). This now offers the chance for a more formal approach. And yet the Journal is open not just to academia, but to industry and the arts (that means us).

The first issue was the laying of ground work for the most part. A definition of what a RPG is, how they can be examined, and of course some computer rpg related material. Yes, the journal takes a very open view of what an rpg is and that includes computer based ones.

Where this will go is completely up in the air. We'll have to see how it plays out.

IMO I expect the computer and LARP side of things to be dominate. The first due to the money involved and the fact that computer systems can be more readily analyzed than table-top. The latter because many of the people involve are from nations where LARP makes up the body of RPG Theory already.

There is a great chance that the whole thing will remain academic (as in- useless) in the view of the hobby as a whole. There are those who will reject serious study as counter to the hobby itself, and RPG Theory has already been devalued in the opinion of many.

Even so, I'm hopeful that something useful will come of this. In that line I'll be keeping on eye on the journal, perhaps even 'reviewing' some of the papers published.

The Better Side of RPG Theory- Part VI: Elements of Design

I was original going to skip on covering these for rather obvious reasons. But decided that since I'll be doing a 'Time Line of RPG Theory Post', I may as well include them.

From the last part of 2002 until early 2003, I wrote a column for RPGnet entitled Elements of Gaming.

This was something of a break with the previous models in that it wasn't concerned with defining player types and goals. Rather it was about rpg games themselves, how one could examine them or what should be considered when designing them.

Although well received by some, they made little impact at the time. They didn't lend themselves to that major driver for online fame- flame wars. Further they were of course created from the PoV of tactical rpgs, and that seems to be a minority taste online.

Despite this I do see occasional positive comments on them, and have received requests to publish more in that line. And so we have this Blog, and that's exactly the purpose I'll be putting it to. In the coming weeks I'll be republishing (and updating when need) the original articles and of course adding more. In addition I'll examine specific mechanics in various games, and even game lines with respect to design.

The above link (or link to the right that points to my own archive of those articles as well) can serve as hint of what's to come here. Likely boring, and not that well connected to the current state of the hobby. But that's because I think the current state of the hobby is less than ideal.

The Better Side of RPG Theory- Part V: GEN

The year 2001 saw many online forums deep in GNS flamewars. One poster with the handle of Scarlet Jester determined that he would present a new option, called GEN. Rather than being built from the ground up, GEN was instead created on the foundation of the original Threefold (GDS) and elements of GNS mixed together with a few other odds and ends.

It basically went nowhere and was quickly forgotten. I’ll be interested if anyone notes they remember it in the comments below. Even at the time, I was barely aware of it and give it little attention. I almost skipped covering it for that reason. However I think it reflects one of the few attempts to counter the growing influence of GNS with a different theory and deserves mention as a result.

Part of the reason for attracting little attention was due to it being built the Threefold and GNS. It was just too easy to off load any discussion onto those models. Why would one do this? Because GEN is much more complex than those models, and yet relies upon them for some of its definitions. Under such conditions people will pick at the familiar, i.e. those older theories it was trying to stand on.

The model was further weakened in that it was developed at The Gaming Outpost, a message forum that had died in every way save the fact that it was still there. Once a rather thriving group, by the time of GEN it was a weak shadow that offered little exposure. The natural place for development of this theory would have been the Forge, but it refused discussion on any non-Edwards driven model. GEN was in an even worse position than most given that it stated that GNS was incorrect in a number of points.

The last problem facing GEN was that by this time people were already getting tired RPG Theory. The bad Rep had set in, and the mood to look at new ideas just wasn't there.


I note two interesting things about this model.

First that it redefined GNS to a single axis: the conflict between Simulation and Narrativism. His argument for doing so is compelling given the nature of GNS.

Second is his claim (different from most) is that goals didn’t conflict in rpgs, only techniques did. However this assertion falls upon the same rocky shore that GNS did- the WotC study doesn’t support it.

The Better Side of RPG Theory- Part IV: Robin Laws

In 2002 at about the same GNS was muddling up RPG Theory, Robin Laws would publish a short book (all of 32 pages) titled Robin's Laws of Good Game Mastering. Here (in a method very similar to Balcow and Allston before him), he’d define a number of Player Types.

The book was very advice focused, intended to give exactly what the title indicates- hints for GMs. This may be why it has a better reputation (both in being known, and in being liked) than nearly any of the other works I’ve covered. It goes for crazy money today, especally considering its 32 page length.

The Player Types break down as follows:

The Power Gamer – power and shiny things for the win
The Butt-Kicker – killing things for the win
The Tactician – wants to deal with complex (often battlefield problems) with an focus on realism
The Specialist – the guy who always runs the same character
The Method Actor – the role-player of the group
The Storyteller – wants a fun narrative that feels like a book or movie.
The Casual Gamer – there for social reasons, not really game ones.

I actually don’t care much for this model. It has no structure to its creation like Bartle’s, and it has too few types compared to Allston’s.

More importantly, Laws lumps too many characteristics into each type. It’s one thing to say that the Tactician wants detailed combat problems that he has to think his way through, but it’s quite another to say that he also rejects playing in-character and wants realism. This was the problem with the Threefold, assigning undesired and possibly untrue traits to a gaming style. If it had been an online theory instead of a printed one- I think it would have suffered much the same fate.

I do however really like the inclusion of the Casual Gamer. This is a player type that is IME very common, and very useful to gaming groups. This is a type of player that is typically forgotten by these models, with Allston being the only other one to cover them (as the Buddy).

In the end I consider this useful work. While it has serious flaws from a theory point of view, that really wasn't it calling. As a set of hints and advice, it more serves as things to consider and try. If they work great, if not go do something else.

The Better Side of RPG Theory- Part III: Bartle’s Player Suits

In 1996 Richard A Bartle, one of the creators of the first MUD (or Mult-User Dungeon) approached the question of player styles*. MUDs of course aren’t traditional PNP role-playing games for a number of reasons, they are however certainly a type of role-playing game. Often by examining something close but different, new insights can be gained. In that line I decided to cover this model.

His basic player types would break down as follows:

Achievers: Those pursuing game related goals
Explorers: Those attempting to find out as much about the Virtual World as possible
Socializer: Those more interested in social interaction with their fellow players
Killers: Those interested in interacting with their fellow players, by killing them

Bartle would come back to these types in his 2003 book Designing Virtual Worlds where he’d consider just how they related (or didn’t) to table top roleplaying games comparing his model with the Threefold.

While Achiver matched nicely to Gamist and Explorer to Simulationist, he noted that there wasn’t a match for Socializer or Killer. This he felt was true because computers can easily multi-task to allow these types. Socializers could act in parallel with whatever else was going on in the world, and Killers could act independently (and secretly) of others. Meanwhile player groups are much more constrained to doing one thing at a time. In the reverse direction, any Story base player type found in table top would directly encounter the lack of ability to create Story variants (either by the system or by the players) and would quickly move on to something else.

IME, I know of exceptions- but they are more of the kind that proves the rule.

Allston’s player type Buddy is a type of Socializer, but is much more limited in scope for the reason Bartle notes- if one is socializing directly, the game isn’t being played. Thus the Buddy may be there for Social reasons, but he isn’t acting on them the same way he could in a MUD.

I’ve certainly seen Killers in table top rpgs, doing what Killers do- killing or otherwise causing problems for other players. This however is an atypical style and is commonly cause for ejection from a group. I’ve also seen accounts online of entire campaigns based around the concept of player conflict including killing each other's PCs. Lastly I see shades of this in Allston’s Mad Slasher. These however seem rare and/or unstable, and generally can’t exist outside a group where everyone buys into the concept.

One other interesting point of difference between MUDs and tabletop is that Bartle asserts that a MUD requires all four player types to be a MUD. Meanwhile Table Top groups typically attempt to remove undesired styles. Again this would seem due to the difference between a mult-tasking computer running for thousands, and the single task focus that a small group of humans bring to the gaming table.

One more interesting element about this model. Like the WotC study, Bartle defined not just the player types- but the axis upon which they related: Player-World, Acting-Interacting. This flushes out the model and allows one to analyze it to a degree not possible in the previous theories I’ve covered.

And for a fun point, there’s an online test to determine the takers own place in this Model. I’m 73% Explorer, 60% Achiver, 40% Socializer, 2% Killer… I would have thought I was more an Achiver, but I just wasn’t that big into bragging about myself.


*I should note that Richard Bartle considers this model out of date. He added a third axis called Implicit-Explicit. The result is a 3D instead of a 2D grid with 8 player types.

The Better Side of RPG Theory- Part II: Allston's Types

In 1988 Aaron Allston would author a supplement for Champions (now HERO System) called Strike Force. Based upon his own personal campaign, it was for the time State of the Art. Not in campaign world design or graphics- but in GM advice for running campaigns.

One section was entitled Types of Champion Players, and was later used in the 4th edition Champions core rule book. Sadly like Blacow's Four Aspects, this was before the web and so is difficult to get hold of today. After some searching I did turn up a Vocabulary by Phil Masters that includes most of the terms. The original gave Advantages and disadvantages for each of the Types and hints for dealing with them in play, although by no means were these equal in either number or attitude.

The link provides the following types (except those marked with an '*'):

1. Builder - wants to have an impact on the world
2. Buddy* - he comes to the game to be with his friend(s)
3. Combat Monster - wants combat, in a reasoned way
4. Copier - is interested in recreating a character from another source
5. Genre Fiend - wants to model everything after genre elements
6. Mad Slasher - kill everything that moves, no reason needed
7. Mad Thinker* - seeks clever solutions to in game problems
8. Plumber - wants intricate characters and exploration thereof
9. Romantic - focuses on relationships
10. Rules Rapist - interested in bending the rules
11. Showoff* - seeks the most spotlight time for his character
12. The Pro from Dover* - desire a character who is the best of his field
13. Tragedian - like tragedy and wants to play it out.

Looking over these we see a highly focused set of labels for what Alston encountered in his own campaign. His advice was based upon that, and it really doesn't appear to me as an attempt to model anything resembling the whole of the hobby.

Still you can see how some of these map onto Blacow's Four Aspects. Combat Monster is roughly equal to Wargamer. Plumber and Romantic are flavors of Role-player, etc. Additional types are added, Rules Rapists for example aren't found in Blacow's model.

In one way Allston work here was a serious improvement on what went before, as he related the Types directly to the game and offered advice for dealing with players matching them (even if that was in a couple of cases- "get rid of them"). What they'd like, tendencies to watch out for, etc. He also noted that individuals could display one or more traits, and even change type over the course of a campaign.

Reduced to its basics, this was another "people play for different reasons" model. The core concept was: find out what your players want, and deal with them on those terms.

On its down side, it was clear to me that he didn’t much care for some of the Types and there wasn’t an even-handed treatment of the various approaches. In many ways he sounded more like Blacow’s disenchanted GM after he determined the cause for the campaign going south, and he wasn’t happy with some of the reasons.

In a way I like the hard pragmatism of this, as it mirrors my own approach for my campaign (i.e. remove those who don’t fit, work with the others until they do). But therein lies it’s greatest failing. This is meant for a certain type of GM who mirrored the author’s tastes. There’s no advice there for other types of groups, say for example a number of Copiers who want to re-imagine the Marvel Universe (like my group for example). The wording and approach would be insulting to such, and the advice close to useless. Thus I must judge this model as a failure.

Despite this, there’s another take away that shouldn't be forgotten. Sometimes general labels hide very specific and important factors. Yes Plumbers and Romantics are each just Role-players, but they aren’t happy with just any role-playing. A factor some models with fewer labels completely forget about.

Allston should be remember for pointing out that no matter your working theory- one still needs to determine the individual desires of your players.

*Thanks to Zweihander for pointing out these which are missing from the provided link

The Better Side of RPG Theory- Part I: Blacow’s Four Aspects

It seems fitting that after providing a summary of the worst gaming theory had to offer, I’d do the same for a few of the best. Or least those that weren’t a complete disaster.

Before the Internet would become the primary location for gaming discussion, there were print magazines. They even had more in them than ads, which I know is difficult to believe now days. In 1980 Different Worlds would publish what to my memory was the first ‘Theory’ article. Glenn Blacow’s Aspect of Adventure Gaming.

John Kim, while something of a failure as a gaming theorist and keeper of FAQs, maintains a wonderful archive of things rpg related, including the text of that original article here. I have a link on the right to Kim's entire website, well worth the trip if you avoid John’s own opinions.

Blacow would divide players of rpgs into four types: Power Gamer, Role-Player, Wargamer, and Story Teller. The meanings were for the most part quite intuitive to any player of the game.

Power Gamer: Interested in power by means of items or character abilities.

Role-Player: Interested in… surprise- role-playing a role and interacting with others doing the same.

Wargamer: Interested in tactical contests

Story Telling: Oh well, it couldn’t last. It doesn’t mean story telling. Rather it’s more related to a living world, i.e. a setting in motion that is independent of the players. Here the PCs are just people (and perhaps not so important ones at that) in that world. I imagine Blacow chose this label because from a player’s point of view, it was like being told a story. Later the Threefold and GNS would lump this under simulation.

So three out the four types were intuitive, not bad given that GNS failed at all three on that count and the Threefold only managed one.

Three things strikes me about this model.

First, is that it is in the end an appeal for people to understand that different players have different needs and goals in their gaming. That should be common sense, but common sense was and is never common. By this measure, the Threefold and GNS theories should never have been advanced- for on their best day, they barely do this well. The single positive outcome of their work had been done for them more than a decade before.

The second striking thing is how extreme his characterization is of the four types. But I think this was due more to his need to present what he saw as points of conflict in the hobby rather than a belief that all players were that extreme. If he done this online, I’m certain he would have started a flame war. Future theorists should be so lucky as to be limited to print. Print however was the model’s downfall. His name is never mentioned, and few credit him as an influence upon their own thought. So that blade certainly cut both ways.

Lastly, notice the absence of what today is considered ‘STORY’. This was before Whitewolf, and it just wasn’t a factor in the larger hobby yet. Rather it was a given, as he notes in the article: “any successful FRP game requires some story telling ability”. Ah such an age of innocence, would that we could return to it.

Later models would build upon this groundwork, and it would start a trend in RPG Theory seldom broken- everyone talks about player types. That begs the question, "must we keep reinventing the wheel?".

Why RPG Theory has a Bad Rep- Part V: Conclusion

And so we’ve reached the end of our five part history lesson. For those late to the series, previous entries can be found here: I, II, III, IV.

We’re currently as of this writing in the shadow years of GNS. No other set of theories have appeared with any noticeable following leaving the online world with fragments of GNS and little else. Most speaking of it today do so with little real knowledge of the theory. Of course that was always the case given its jargon and inconsistencies, but now more so than ever. A very common mistake I see is replacing its concepts with those of the older and (although flawed) much clearer Threefold.

In its wake, anyone discussing theory will hit a major barrier as the reaction by readers is near immediate dismissal. After all, the previous ‘theorists’ failed to produce anything understandable or useful. And they managed to insult nearly the entire hobby along the way. Nor does it help that others coming afterwards tend to build upon GNS or pick something far too similar.

The one bright point is that GNS now has few defenders, and while some do speak up for small parts of the theory- almost no one defends it in its entirety or its creator.

I wanted a example and so I went looking at RPGnet and grabbed the first related thread written today I came across. It shows all the traits mentioned above, but has little else of interest (I haven’t read past page 6, but these things seldom improve as they go).

Thus any new body of theory would have to overcome the resistance created by its predecessors. To manage such a task would require it to be clear and concise, and lacking the biased nature of GNS or the Threefold.

Even if such a reasonable and useful thing could be achieved, the nature of the Internet is such that it will likely be praised- and then forgotten. The simple truth is that most people don’t need RPG Theory anymore than the typical reader of the Time Best Sellers List needs an understanding of the formal schools of literature. Not everyone of course is a typical reader, so it’s not completely a lost cause. But I don’t foresee any successful Theory becoming an internet buzz word.

The prime example of this is found in the WotC's study that undermined the core of GNS. It's just not talked about anymore, although its findings were quite interesting.

Sadly there's always room online for more flamewars. Ron Edwards' one lasting achievement was a blueprint for taking over Theory discussions online. I for one, hope that the next in his footsteps will be a while in coming.

Why RPG Theory has a Bad Rep- Part IV: The Fading of GNS

While GNS gained early success and spread at least a limited version of its concepts far and wide, in the end this was to be about as important as the latest Britney Spears hair cut. Sure it made the news. But to continue without becoming a joke it would need to produce something of worth to the common gamer.

This was the movement’s first failure. While a number of highly focused GNS style small press games were published, none reached any serious level of success. Most in GNS terms actually failed to support Narrativism as a whole, instead focusing on a single Narrativist theme. They were from the ground up designed to do one thing and only one thing. Examples include Life with Master and Dogs in the Vineyards.

Predictably the result of turning away from the wide open range of traditional RPG design was a narrowing of the game’s long term usefulness. Such work resembled more a ‘party game’, something to be played once or twice and then forgotten. And indeed, it was not uncommon to see the Forge crowd move from game to game the way one moves from one Hollywood release to the next.

To compensate for these one-trick-ponies, the Forge crowd attempted to hitch themselves to more traditional designs (Riddle of Steel, Burning Wheel) with a mechanic or two that supported at least in part some goal of Narrativism, but these was a thin and unconvincing dodge at best.

Perhaps the most serious blow would come from WotC, the makers of D&D. They commissioned a study of role-players that covered some of the same ground as GNS, specifically why people play and towards what goals. The results were from a GNS viewpoint back breaking. It seems that as far as goals and styles were concerned, System Didn’t Matter. Be it D&D, VtM or anything else, each game had roughly identical numbers of any specific style.

Thus the core concept behind GNS ‘that the best games would focus on one goal and reject others’ was proven false. Players didn’t care if the mechanics supported their goals. Rather it seems that they’d find them on their own (as Layers of Design would indicate- what isn't found in the Game Layer mechanics can often be found in the meta-game layers).

Faced with such a damning rejection of the core ideas of GNS, as well as not finding their new GNS based games making significant inroads in the market, Ron Edwards would take likely the worse possible response. He’d declare that RPG gamers who displayed such undesired tendencies to find Story anywhere other than GNS style games were in fact suffering Brain Damage.

"More specific to your question, Vincent, I'll say this: that protagonism was so badly injured during the history of role-playing (1970-ish through the present, with the height of the effect being the early 1990s), that participants in that hobby are perhaps the very last people on earth who could be expected to produce *all* the components of a functional story. No, the most functional among them can only be counted on to seize protagonism in their stump-fingered hands and scream protectively. You can tag Sorcerer with this diagnosis, instantly.

[The most damaged participants are too horrible even to look upon, much less to describe. This has nothing to do with geekery. When I say "brain damage," I mean it literally. Their minds have been *harmed.*]" Ron Edwards, 1-24-2006 Lumply.com Blog

Edwards would expand upon these thoughts, and find agreement echoed by much of the Forge membership.

The Internet firestorm was immediate and immense, and even caused former believers to condemn such statements. GNS had turned the corner from oddball theory to a nutcase spewing bile at those who saw the world differently. All that was left was a few more nails in the coffin.

Following on the heels of the Brain Damage claims was a turn by key members of the movement towards games intended to push the edge of acceptable game design- not in mechanics as such, but in what those mechanics were intended to inspire. The best example of this was Vincent Baker’s game Poison’d, which made a splash with an actual play report on rpg.net in 2007(http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=350453, starts at post 11).

By itself, that would have only indicated a rather sick group of players. Except of course GNS is all about the design influencing the players. Something Baker himself would agree with in the same thread. Other threads on other sites (including those by the author) would reinforce this image. Soon many were linking GNS with perverse gaming as well as ineffective theory.

In combination, these factors would doom GNS to the dust bin of the Internet. Now more a joke than a movement, little more remains than a handful of people claiming some worth in some part of the whole. The Forge still exists, and will likely continue to do so for a while yet. But the sun has set on GNS, leaving a long shadow over RPG Theory.

Next- the conclusion.

Parts I, II, III, V

Why RPG Theory has a Bad Rep- Part III: The Swine Wars

One of the other differences GNS had with the preceding Threefold was the desire to spread the word and to influence the hobby as a whole. To this end, believers at the Forge would spread to other message boards both to wax poetically upon the benefits of GNS and most importantly to combat any who attempted to point out problems with the theory.

I say most importantly because the Internet thrives on flamewars and conflicts. Reasoned exchanges soon drop out of sight online and are remember by few. And dropping out of sight was the last thing the GNS movement wanted. To this end they would engage anyone gainsaying their viewpoint anywhere. And if there wasn’t anyone to engage, they would make certain that GNS related topics remained in public view through consistent posting.

To this end they had a number of powerful advantages besides the fanatical core believers.

The first was the sheer mass and jargon of the GNS body of Theory, and its open and implied insults against other game styles. The latter was certain to draw fire while the former allowed a wide range of response and if nothing else, allowed the faithful or unaware to debate the meaning of the model between themselves. Both factors kept GNS in the public eye for years.

The second advantage they enjoyed was the arrival of the Print on Demand era. It was now possible for nearly anyone to publish a RPG for almost nothing up front. The GNS movement took immediate advantage of this by publishing theory focused games using their new ‘author’ status to gain ‘gamer cred’ as someone of some importance. Further these games were new fuel for keeping GNS visible online as each release would renew the debate over the theory and what it was now producing.

Their third advantage was the reaction of some on the net. Perhaps the most noticeable case is found in RPGpundit and his message board. This self declared guardian ‘of the frontier against the swine’ labeled GNS believers ‘Swine’ and used his blog and forum to launch weak diatribes laced with petty profanity against them at every turn. This of course played directly into the hands of the GNS crowd by keeping them front and center. And linked anyone else opposing them with the image of irrationality RPGpundit brought to the debate.

The Swine Wars (to use RPGPundit’s term) was off and running. Ron Edwards and GNS would enjoy all the limited fame the Internet could bring to an extent never seen before in RPG Theory. Their sun had risen high indeed, and their day was bright.

But they were about to be undone by three important factors: the arrival of one of the few serious studies of gaming styles, the highly limited appeal of their games, and their need for public attention and desire to push the edge. Next, the fading of GNS…

Parts I, II, IV, V