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Post by chronovore on Jan 13, 2018 16:16:41 GMT -8
I came into being broadcast late, will have to catch the first part of the show when the podcast drops, provided no-one hacks the FTP server again. Why were we we trying to be nice to Probie Tim , again? I really enjoyed the latter conversation over playing characters and having our own characters surprise us. The next question that needs to be asked is, as a GM have you ever been surprised by what your NPCs have done?
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Post by Probie Tim on Jan 13, 2018 17:11:23 GMT -8
Because I'm damned awesome, that's why. But seriously, I was chatting with a bunch of geeks earlier in the day on Slack; I mentioned I was gonna be on the show and Tyler said, “I’m totally gonna be in the chat to eff with Tim.” I replied, “How come it’s never ‘I’m totally gonna be in the chat to support my good friend Tim?’” Now we know why.
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Post by lowkeyoh on Jan 13, 2018 18:32:44 GMT -8
WE ARE HERE TO SUPPORT TIM.
TIM I THINK YOU DID A GOOD JOB ON THE PODCAST. KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK.
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Post by lowkeyoh on Jan 13, 2018 18:33:50 GMT -8
I think stork made a really interesting point about playing characters that do things that you as a player don't want to do. It's something that's been on my mind because I had a cleric that almost ended a campaign based on who he was. It's been rolling around my brain for the last day
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on Jan 13, 2018 19:55:53 GMT -8
I think stork made a really interesting point about playing characters that do things that you as a player don't want to do. It's something that's been on my mind because I had a cleric that almost ended a campaign based on who he was. It's been rolling around my brain for the last day Was that the cleric who was objecting to the party using something that'd killed an agent of his god? I couldn't remember if that was the story and if I'd seen it on here. Haven't listened to the podcast yet - I save it for Monday (or Tuesdays, in the case of a Monday holiday) for Hellday to listen to. There are things that a character or NPC will do that might surprise you as a player or GM. I think you have moments where the roleplay cements a detail so solidly that that becomes the character's One Thing. But there is also the danger of someone using 'being true to their character' as a way to derail a campaign. It's a fine line, I think.
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Post by chronovore on Jan 14, 2018 15:46:14 GMT -8
What ARE those d20 logos that appeared during the Twitch stream? Those were very distracting.
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Post by chronovore on Jan 14, 2018 18:01:13 GMT -8
As the conversation about player agency continued into this episode, I'm going to continue speaking about it here. Admittedly, I couldn't find the other thread about it in 2 minutes, and I'm feeling lazy. gina said "We have to assume good intent." I think that's core to the argument for agency, and it's not always a given. One of the biggest things I have realized my current group is just how much trust is involved. Our game succeeds on the basis of that trust, and I've had other games with other groups where it has failed because the GM assumes the antagonism of the players. Those GMs break players. It's sad — the matter of player agency is derived from the relationship with the GM and the other players. Just as Probie Tim seemed completely comfortable with denying the GM's proposal, "NOTHING HERE REMINDS ME OF HOME, it reminds me of a crab shack…" there's something about that that speaks to the degree of entitlement enjoyed by that player, that he can Just Say No. The argument could be made that Tim enjoys enough agency in his day to day existence, but that players who don't have that feeling of agency, who would benefit the most from agency in roleplaying, are the ones most likely to be unable to speak up about it in a game session — especially if they have an overbearing, transgressionist GM. Per Gina's observation, that may be every one of us at different times, some of us more than others.
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HyveMynd
Supporter
Dirty hippie, PbtA, Fate, & Cortex Prime <3er
Posts: 2,273
Preferred Game Systems: PbtA, Cortex Plus, Fate, Ubiquity
Currently Playing: Monsterhearts 2
Currently Running: The Sprawl
Favorite Species of Monkey: None
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Post by HyveMynd on Jan 14, 2018 18:10:23 GMT -8
Thanks very much for reading my email with such gravitas, Probie Tim . I especially appreciated the hand on stork 's shoulder during the apology. Classy. I think stork made a really interesting point about playing characters that do things that you as a player don't want to do. Girl howdy did this ever happen to me in our last Monsterhearts 2e session. I made a decision because it fit the character, despite me not wanting it to happen a player. I'll keep the background brief this time.
Vivian (a PC) and Xavier (another PC) walk in to the room just as Donna (me) turns down Tim's (an NPC) advances. In classic melodrama style though, Vivian thinks something happened between Tim and her girlfriend, and confronts Donna about it. Donna tries to explain, but Vivian knocks her hand away. Donna is shocked; she "owns" Vivian, and your property isn't supposed to disobey you, let alone hit you. Before she can do anything though, Xavier grabs Donna and goes in for a kiss. His player activates a mechanic and says "I'll give you an XP if Donna kisses Xavier right in front of Vivian." As an audience member I'm thinking "Oh no! This could ruin the adorable relationship between Donna and Vivian!" As a player I'm thinking "That XP is like one fifth of a level. Tempting." As Donna I'm thinking "I need to punish my property for her transgression." Donna gives in and kisses Xavier. This results in Vivian open hand slapping Donna across the face and calling her a bitch. In another "this is what the character would do despite me not wanting it to happen" moment, I have Donna reciprocate with violence, laying open Vivian's face with her nails. She screams "That's not how this relationship works! You're my property. I hit you, you don't hit me!" A fight ensues, other people get involved, and the scene ends with Donna sprawled on the floor crying her eyes out as she watches Vivian walk off with another PC, the two of them almost certainly going to hook up.
That damn near broke my heart. Donna and Vivian are so cute together that, as a player, I want everything between them to be OK. But sometimes you have to play your characters as real people, even if it means they do things you're unhappy with.
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Post by akavidar on Jan 15, 2018 6:16:59 GMT -8
What ARE those d20 logos that appeared during the Twitch stream? Those were very distracting. I think they were from a group of people on a "Raid" that stopped by the channel to boost the viewer numbers. They apparently have a custom d20 icon for their channel, like Happy Jacks has a "Good News" custom icon.
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Post by Probie Tim on Jan 15, 2018 6:53:05 GMT -8
Thanks very much for reading my email with such gravitas, Probie Tim . I especially appreciated the hand on stork 's shoulder during the apology. Classy. I do so try. And while some of it was certainly me hamming it up for the cameras/viewers/listeners, it did seem genuine and deserving of something more than just "reading a listener email". And now, completely unrelated to Hyvie's post, I'm going to probably stick my foot into my mouth, here. I've been gaming a long time ("git off my lawn, you kids!") and I've seen some AWESOME advancements in the hobby - both in systems as well as player and GM skills and attitudes - but I wonder if sometimes we don't take things a little bit too far. Like, for instance, with "player agency". Especially at the expense of what I've called "GM agency". Take this hypothetical situation: You're playing someone on a Caribbean cruise. Halfway through, there's a huge earthquake; the boat pitches and yaws, huge waves are cresting and crashing against the side of the cruise liner, people are getting tossed onto their asses on the deck, dogs and cats are living together, mass hysteria. As the earthquake rumbles to a stop, the captain's eyes widen as he stares off into the distance past the bow of the ship; the quake caused an island to rise from the deep just a few football fields ahead of the ship. You can all see buildings on the island which don't conform to any earthly geometry or dimensions; trying to trace the outline of the buildings with your eyes almost gives you a headache and makes you feel queasy. Suddenly, a giant set of doors on the front (or is it side? you're not quite sure) of the tallest building slowly swings open and you are buffeted with a foul smelling, damp, heavy wind. A blackish, greenish, slimy... monstrosity pulls itself out of the building; the part which looks most like the being's head is bigger than the ship is long, and it doesn't quite seem possible that the entire thing fit in the building from which it's coming. As it stands up to its massive height, you're completely unsure what it is, but it has strong suggestions of octopoid, reptilian, and man-like qualities. The smell of death and fish and ozone and rot and unwholesomeness is overwhelming. It is, without doubt, the most frightening thing you've ever seen. Did I just impinge on your agency? According to some of the conversations which have happened here, on these forums, and on the show, yes. I told you that the smell was overwhelming and that it is the most frightening thing you've ever seen. But personally, I think that's going way too far. As a GM, I have to be able to tell you when things are frightening or overwhelming, especially in cases like that where - because of the completely alien and unknowable nature of the situation - I'm unable to impress upon you the exact effect seeing such a cosmic horror has on the human psyche. That's "GM agency". Note I never once said "the smell is so bad that you puke your guts up" or "it's so frightening that you dive off the side of the boat and start swimming home"; how your player reacts to the situation is completely your own deal... excepting, of course, if you're playing a game which has some sort of sanity or fear mechanic which would apply. But as the GM, I feel that I have to be able to tell the player things like, "yeah, you're scared; this is a really frightening situation for you". The argument could be made that Tim enjoys enough agency in his day to day existence, but that players who don't have that feeling of agency, who would benefit the most from agency in roleplaying, are the ones most likely to be unable to speak up about it in a game session I'm not quite sure how to respond to this, because it's getting into areas I have no business speaking about; I'm a software developer, not a therapist, heh. To me, though, it boils down to this one question: is the player - the one who doesn't have that feeling of agency - having fun in the game? If so, that level of agency obviously isn't that important to them, or at least it isn't as important as the fun they're having playing the game. Or maybe that's the only way they've ever played RPGs and player agency isn't really a "thing" in their group, and they're totally fine with that. God knows that's what D&D was to me for many years as I was coming up. But this is why I say that no one can take your agency who you don't don't give permission to take it; no one is forcing you to play the game. If you're playing a game where the GM is an "overbearing, transgressionist" GM and you don't say anything and you continue playing, you're endorsing his or her behavior. We've talked about having "adult conversations" for years on the show; if someone is impinging on your agency, and you're not OK with it, you need to have an "adult conversation". Any... therapeutic concerns behind or beyond that are WAY beyond where I'm comfortable treading.
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tyler
Journeyman Douchebag
Posts: 226
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Post by tyler on Jan 15, 2018 9:16:10 GMT -8
Take this hypothetical situation: You're playing someone on a Caribbean cruise. Halfway through, there's a huge earthquake; the boat pitches and yaws, huge waves are cresting and crashing against the side of the cruise liner, people are getting tossed onto their asses on the deck, dogs and cats are living together, mass hysteria. As the earthquake rumbles to a stop, the captain's eyes widen as he stares off into the distance past the bow of the ship; the quake caused an island to rise from the deep just a few football fields ahead of the ship. You can all see buildings on the island which don't conform to any earthly geometry or dimensions; trying to trace the outline of the buildings with your eyes almost gives you a headache and makes you feel queasy. Suddenly, a giant set of doors on the front (or is it side? you're not quite sure) of the tallest building slowly swings open and you are buffeted with a foul smelling, damp, heavy wind. A blackish, greenish, slimy... monstrosity pulls itself out of the building; the part which looks most like the being's head is bigger than the ship is long, and it doesn't quite seem possible that the entire thing fit in the building from which it's coming. As it stands up to its massive height, you're completely unsure what it is, but it has strong suggestions of octopoid, reptilian, and man-like qualities. The smell of death and fish and ozone and rot and unwholesomeness is overwhelming. It is, without doubt, the most frightening thing you've ever seen. Did I just impinge on your agency? After many, many conversations with you Tim, I'm really starting to see this from your point of view. No, you haven't removed agency. You haven't told the player what their character is doing in reaction to the frightening thing, only that it is frightening. How the player decides to make their character rect to the frightening thing is still 100% in their hands. Are they going to run to the engine room, take control of the ship, and full steam ahead, ram the scary monster? Are they going to just shit themselves and lie, sobbing, in a puddle of their own feces? Maybe. It's up to them. Because there is literally no player who has a frame of reference for what their character is seeing, you simply state that it is incredibly frightening. You have not dictated any of the characters actions or responses to the stimuli other than "it is frightening". If a GM telling someone "You see a scary looking thing" gets their panties in a twist over losing your agency, I am amazed that person is still invited to games.
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Post by ayslyn on Jan 15, 2018 10:15:38 GMT -8
Take this hypothetical situation: You're playing someone on a Caribbean cruise. Halfway through, there's a huge earthquake; the boat pitches and yaws, huge waves are cresting and crashing against the side of the cruise liner, people are getting tossed onto their asses on the deck, dogs and cats are living together, mass hysteria. As the earthquake rumbles to a stop, the captain's eyes widen as he stares off into the distance past the bow of the ship; the quake caused an island to rise from the deep just a few football fields ahead of the ship. You can all see buildings on the island which don't conform to any earthly geometry or dimensions; trying to trace the outline of the buildings with your eyes almost gives you a headache and makes you feel queasy. Suddenly, a giant set of doors on the front (or is it side? you're not quite sure) of the tallest building slowly swings open and you are buffeted with a foul smelling, damp, heavy wind. A blackish, greenish, slimy... monstrosity pulls itself out of the building; the part which looks most like the being's head is bigger than the ship is long, and it doesn't quite seem possible that the entire thing fit in the building from which it's coming. As it stands up to its massive height, you're completely unsure what it is, but it has strong suggestions of octopoid, reptilian, and man-like qualities. The smell of death and fish and ozone and rot and unwholesomeness is overwhelming. It is, without doubt, the most frightening thing you've ever seen. Did I just impinge on your agency? According to some of the conversations which have happened here, on these forums, and on the show, yes. I told you that the smell was overwhelming and that it is the most frightening thing you've ever seen. But personally, I think that's going way too far. As a GM, I have to be able to tell you when things are frightening or overwhelming, especially in cases like that where - because of the completely alien and unknowable nature of the situation - I'm unable to impress upon you the exact effect seeing such a cosmic horror has on the human psyche. That's "GM agency". Note I never once said "the smell is so bad that you puke your guts up" or "it's so frightening that you dive off the side of the boat and start swimming home"; how your player reacts to the situation is completely your own deal... excepting, of course, if you're playing a game which has some sort of sanity or fear mechanic which would apply. But as the GM, I feel that I have to be able to tell the player things like, "yeah, you're scared; this is a really frightening situation for you". Bad example. Cthulhu rising up from the ocean is a supernatural event. It's in the same vein as mind control or empathic manipulation. The foul wind being overwhelming is a physical reaction, and not an emotional one, and hence within the purview of the GM to declare (even without the addendum that this would be an, at least, extra-natural event). Now, I can't speak for anyone else, but I have consistently maintained the caveat that extra-natural forces can override a player's agency. The extent of how much, is entirely dependent on the table, and the trust between the GM and their players. As I mentioned in the previous discussion, at my table, the trust level is high enough that my GM can just tell me that I have been mind controlled, and he knows that while I might make a joke, OOC, about trying to twist that into allowing me to act against its source; that when the rubber hits the road, I'll shoot my friends in the face. And that's the ideal. That GM and Player can trust each other enough to do that. But, ideals are rarely reality. Some tables the GM will need to dictate actions in extra-natural events. But, again, that's an extra-natural event. Without that extra-natural impetus, the GM is absolutely out of line to impose emotional reactions on the PCs. You don't get to decide that my character is outraged at the treatment of animals in a slaughterhouse. That's MY purview. You don't get to preemptively decide that I find an inn homey. You can certainly set up a situation where you HOPE for a certain emotional reaction, but that's it. If it pays off, congratulations; if it doesn't, too bad.
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Post by Probie Tim on Jan 15, 2018 10:40:03 GMT -8
The foul wind being overwhelming is a physical reaction, and not an emotional one, and hence within the purview of the GM to declare But "it's the most frightening thing you've ever seen" is an emotional reaction and, I think, still within the agency of the GM to declare. My point being that neither "it's the most frightening thing you've ever seen" nor "what about this inn reminds you of home" impinge on the player's agency; the player can react to both of them however they like. In fact, in the latter case, it's not even invoking "GM agency" because the player is being asked for their input, and the player can specifically say "nothing in this inn reminds me of home". I used to do telemarketing research. We would ask open ended questions, and we were supposed to continue asking "what else?" until the person specifically said "nothing else". Nothing is a perfectly valid answer to that question. As a quick aside, if anyone is curious about the Moment of Truth project I mentioned at the beginning of the show, I decided to post a bit about it here.
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Post by ayslyn on Jan 15, 2018 11:03:09 GMT -8
The foul wind being overwhelming is a physical reaction, and not an emotional one, and hence within the purview of the GM to declare But "it's the most frightening thing you've ever seen" is an emotional reaction and, I think, still within the agency of the GM to declare. .... I do try desperately to avoid this kind of response..... Did you even read what I said?? It's damn frustrating when half of what you say gets consistently ignored. Cthulhu rising up from the depths is an outlier. It's outside of anything that I am talking about, and I have REPEATEDLY acknowledged it's kin as exceptions to my stance. Yet I keep having it thrown in my face, as though I were arguing against it. Seeing Cthulhu rise up is extra-normal. Barring, of course, the campaign where you run into an elder god every other session. Then, I reserve the right to suggest that you no longer get to impose the "It's the most frightening thing you've ever seen." card.... But, I digress. I am exclusively talking about straight up, normal situations. You don't get to decide how my character reacts to a slaughterhouse, to an inn, to seeing a brutal murder, to witnessing a lynch mob, to eating a meal, to ANY normal event, with out external influences.
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Post by ericfromnj on Jan 15, 2018 11:14:42 GMT -8
I am curious what exactly is considered normal in a world of the fantastic like many RPGs.
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