How Morality is Portrayed in RPGs: part ii

World of Darkness: Morality

The morality system of the World of Darkness could be broken down in several interesting ways. One way: the psychological link between loss of morality (compassion) and how this causes manifestations of derangements is interesting but not relevant to this post. I recognize this as more of a psychological issue, and only mention it because the multi-faceted nature of this morality system is worth noting. WoD morality exists on a scale of 1 to 10. Characters at level 10 represent the moral exemplars made manifest while those at 1 are capable and likely to commit mass murder. The average person (and starting character unless otherwise stated) starts at 7. There is a hierarchy of moral acts, and each level between one and ten lists what someone at the level might do without rolling to see if they take a step down. Morality is regained by spending experience points and acting out a desire to redeem oneself.

This hierarchy of morality is similar to Ross' deontology. One criticism made against Kantian deontology is that it does not account for how we ought to proceed when two or more moral duties come into conflict. I'm sure there are answers Kantians have to this, but I'm unaware of them. I do know that under Ross' system we have what he calls prime facie duties that exist in a hierarchy: lying is wrong, but it is not as bad as murder. By placing duties in a hierarchy they do not come into conflict. This system does rely upon intuitionism however, and when two or more people have different intuitions about what is morally worse than something else then they have no principled way of resolving these disputes (if they are merely appealing to their intuitions). Intuitively, the WoD morality hierarchy probably works well enough for most players, but in specific cases with the Werewolf hierarchy I remember running into problems (this will be discussed in another post) when another player and I's intuitions did not match the intuitions of the Werewolf writers. This is less of a problem in a game though because we can simply create house rules to deal with such problems. I've never met a philosopher who resolved philosophical disputes by declaring house rules. I'd love to see someone do this in the middle of an argument.

So we might say that the flaw of the WoD morality system is that it is founded on intuitionism, but we might also say that the WoD developers did utilize one of the morality systems (prime facie duties) that best captures folk morality. Whether this was done on purpose or not, I have no idea, but I'm impressed either way. In the next post I'll continue discussing the core World of Darkness book with their use of virtues and vices.

Special note: Many deontological theories are strongly based on reason instead of compassion (Hume saw the basis of morality as compassion, Kant saw it as reason). The WoD book associates morality with compassion however, and this might make it more of a sentimental theory. This might be explored later (if I brush up on my Kant and Hume).

How Morality is Portrayed in RPGs: part i

There are three major divisions of moral theory that are typically recognized in philosophy. I would like to discuss these, some other moral based ideas, and their relation to how morality in rpgs has been handled. First I will outline the three major divisions so the reader can be familiar with them. After this I plan on examining the morality system that is in the World of Darkness core book, the use of virtues and vices in WoD, and then some of variations of that system in other core books such as Vampire, Werewolf, and Promethean. I will also discuss the alignments found within Dungeons and Dragons. I will likely go over other games as well, but I will focus on World of Darkness and Dungeons and Dragons because they are both popular and they both utilize different approaches to morality. 

I guess I'll share some background information as well: Nearly a third of all the philosophy courses I took in college were related to morality. Courses on classic moral theory, contemporary, metaethics, issues of collectivity. My senior thesis was on the metaethical issue of internal v. external motivation within statements such as "X is right." It was this that first led me to examine motivation in rpgs and breaking them down into internally driven v. externally (this was one of my firsts writings on games, and partially inspired me to start this blog). It comes as no surprise then that the way that various games portray morality in their systems is of great interest to me. I would now like to explore that over the course of several posts. 

Three Models of Moral Theory: 

Virtue Ethics: Historically virtue ethics goes back to Plato and Aristotle. It was also immensely popular during the medieval period, less so during the Enlightenment, but became popular again in the middle of the 20th century. Virtue ethics emphasizes character above behavior. The vitreous person holds the dispositions that lead to human flourishing. Examples of virtues are: courage, wisdom, justice, and prudence. It's interesting that virtue ethics is linked to human flourishing. In this way it can be understood as an inter-subjective theory, and not necessarily making a claim about objective morality. This system will be of special interest when looking at the World of Darkness as the virtues are explicitly written into their system. 

Deontology: The most famous of deontological theories was that developed by Immanual Kant. Kant's theory is absolutist - there are some actions that are wrong, always, and some good, always. Kant cared more about intentions than outcomes in many cases. Imagine two shopkeepers: A boy walks into the store to buy candy. The boy mistakes the price of candy to be far more expensive than it is, but gives the shopkeeper all this money. The first shopkeeper wants to give the boy his money back because if the rest of the town found out he cheated the boy they would not shop from him again. The second shopkeeper doesn't want to cheat the boy because this is wrong. The first shopkeeper can be said to be performing the right action, but for a selfish reason. Kant might label this amoral or immoral. With the second shopkeeper however, he is performing the right action and for the right reason. This is then moral, according to Kant. The method to determine right from wrong is formalized in Kant's Categorical Imperative: Act only on that maxim that you would also will it to become a universal law. 

Consequentialism: The ends justify the means. That platitude, in a way, sums up consequentialism. Consequentialists deny absolute right and wrong. Lying is permissible, or obligatory, in some cases. Killing is as well, or even in the most horrible of thought experiments so is raping children. Consequentialism is unintuitive to many in such cases. The consequentialist is committed to outcomes always being of the highest value: greater than personal integrity, responsibility, everything. The most famous example of consequentialism comes from John Stuart Mill in the form of utilitarianism. Utilitarianism values happiness above all else, and equates happiness with maximizing pleasure while lowering pain in the greatest number of beings capable of feeling pleasure and pain. This theory is often unfairly criticized for being hedonistic, but Mill recognizes intellectual pleasures as a higher sort than base pleasures. Whether he argues this well is questionable. 

In short, those are the three major moral theories. I'll also likely bring up issues of egoism and the role of intuitions in moral thinking, divine command theory, cultural relativism, as well when discussing specific treatments of morality in games. Tomorrow I'll post an analysis of the World of Darkness core book's morality system and their use of virtues and vices.

RPGs are literary forms: A reply to Pat Harrigan

Awhile ago I wrote a mini-review of Things We Think About Games, and in it I said I'd like to explore the 109th thought in that book: RPGs are not literary forms. This comes from Pat Harrigan who's other tidbits in Things We Think were some of the best. In fact, I think I partially agree with him, but I'd like to explore this issue further.

Harrigan paraphrases a line about great books not being able to be read, but only reread. Great literature has a quality in its depth that might only reveal itself on further examination. So far I'm not in disagreement with him.

RPGs though - or the scenarios we play out in games - are only played once. No examination, only further movement.

First, I want to challenge this point on making our sole criteria of literary quality the reread-ability of great works. There are many classics of literature that have thematic depth, subtext, and other qualities that are noticeable on first reading - especially to intelligent and enthusiastic readers (I'm not accusing Harrigan of lacking these traits, I'm just saying I think he forgot about further literary qualities).

RPGs are capable - and often greatly encouraged - to develop a theme woven into stories and chronicles. I believe White Wolf's World of Darkness line does an excellent job of this. Both in the first chapters and storyteller chapters of their books they discuss the use of theme in games. This is one way that RPGs can have literary quality.

RPGs could - in theory - have subtext woven into them too, but I believe this would be more difficult. It's the same with improv theater. In theory an improv scene can have subtext in it, but this is not the primary goal and the group would either have to go out of their way to introduce the subtext or it would have to come out by accident. So, this is a possibility, but less so than theme.

In RPGs characters can develop, change, and reach great depth as chronicles progress. I believe this is another way RPGs can have something approaching literary quality. This becomes a more collaborative effort though on both the game master and players part, and there is an element of luck in characters surviving and characters engaging in the right kinds of situations that would give them depth - this isn't entirely luck, not by far - but it seems like luck would play a greater role in these instances than in the development of a novel.

Finally, on reexamination - why couldn't we replay certain campaigns and re-explore issues further? Granted, this isn't often likely done, but replaying the same scenario to explore a certain issue of character or theme might give RPGs something more like the literary quality that Harrigan says they lack.

It's Getting Mighty Crowded: World of Darkness

The World of Darkness setting contains large groups of vampires, mages, changelings, and other supernatural oddities. Many others in fact. When I first starting playing Vampire: The Requiem there were no other specific supernatural core books released, and our vampires lived in isolation. They didn't just have the whole city of Chicago to themselves, but the entire World of Darkness*. 

Now there's many core books out featuring various supernatural beings - as well as supernatural antagonists (Demons in the new Hunter book) - and it feels like every other house contains a supernatural of some kind, and every other shady downtown building is the clubhouse for some grand secret society of monsters. 

Personally, I like playing more isolated games: games where the other supernatural don't exist, per se. There might be glowing eyes that stare out at you from the darkness, but I like to leave it at that. I've found player's too often will fill in details in ways that pigeon hold story characters: A player's character investigates the glowing eyes that stare at him from the woods. They learn it's a werewolf, and after this the player (not character) states that it's a New Moon, Boneshadow. 

This as a GM (Storyteller) frustrates me. 1. I probably am not using the Werewolf book, and 2. I very much believe that the unknown is scary. Even if players are wrong about specifics, the fact that they're forming images in their heads using specifics takes some of the fright away (and also misleads them). 

Having secret societies of monsters works well towards running long chronicles, but taking knowledge of these societies into other games depletes the level of horror. Players of Vampire who know (whether it's true or not in your specific chronicle) that Werewolves are guardians of the Shadow and its borders makes them come across more noble, or altruistic and less savage beasts. 

Other than Hunter, which depends on there being supernaturals to take down, I'm at the point where I want to discard all of the World of Darkness that doesn't pertain to the specific game I'm running. I might make up monsters that aren't part of that group, but I'll try to make them seem too much like other supernaturals that are already detailed in other books so player's can be kept somewhat in the dark about these beings, and thus (hopefully) run a more frightening World of Darkness game. 

Has anyone had similar issues arise? How have you dealt with them? 

Oh, and fellow RPG Blogger Stargazer put up a post recently full of advice on how to promote better horror atmosphere in games. Check it out if this interests you. 

*Not entirely true. There are ghosts detailed in the WoD core book, but we largely ignored ghosts in our Vampire chronicle. 

postscript: Also I want to thank typhinius for making me the awesome header that's now at the top of the blog. He also gave me an avatar and banner. Thanks again. 

Racial Traits in Games... is this racism?

"All Asians are good at math and know martial arts," is a racist statement. 

"All Gnomes are good at engineering and are intelligent," is a statement about Gnomes in World of Warcraft. Is it equally racist? 

I've been wrestling back and forth on this, and at first I thought it is racist but in a benign way... but then when I think of "What do I mean by benign?" I usually mean something like, "It's not meant to be offensive," but neither is the statement about Asian people. 

Does the fact that the first statement is false and the second statement is true determine whether or not these statements are racist? This might be an out for racial traits in games. 

If I say that all black people have dark skin, or safer still, have darker skin than white people, then this could just be an observation that holds true in all cases. In fact, it could be seen as an analytical truth (true by definition) if we define "white people" and "black people" in the right way. We could treat racial traits as a part of race in games in a similar way. A gnome's ability to engineer is just part of the definition of "Gnome" in World of Warcraft. 

However, this could still be seen as racist because it takes a more significant claim about people's inherent ability and makes it be a truth claim about an entire race. Isn't this exactly what racists do? They take generalizations (often ignorantly made) and claim they are true of all or most of that race. 

If this is racist, should racial traits be taken out of games?

I don't know. I'm still stuck on this. Your thoughts? 

Being Heroic in a Morally Ambiguous Setting

Heroism in many settings typically implies a strict division between good and evil. Why is it meaningful if a group of adventurers stops the big bad, if they themselves are also big bads? I often run into problems like this when I think of what kind of setting I want to portray in games. I want moral ambiguity because I find it realistic, but I also want to give the players' characters a chance to shine and be heroes. 

I think this is doable, but because realism is being asked for in the portrayal of morality then it also must be asked for in the portrayal of psychology. Antagonists who are evil just for evil's sake do not account for the types of evil that exist in our world. Really, "evil" people are either mad - in which case are they morally responsible?- have some awful biological/social deterministic element that causes them to act a certain way - in which case they are tragic - or their values are alien to the values of our cultures - or other cultures - in which case they are simply different. 

On this last point - alien values - a moral realist might argue I'm simply pleading cultural relativism, and I think that is the point I'm making, but I strongly doubt our ability to question our values in an objective manner and then assert their goodness over alien values that are our opposites. This is not meant to defeat moral realism, but merely provide practical skepticism to it. 

I worry I'm rambling and not making myself clear. In a standard Heroic game I would allow evil antagonists to reach cartoonish levels of evil. They'll twist their mustaches and tie women to train tracks just for the sake of doing this activity. 

In a morally ambiguous game I expect an antagonist to have a more relatable goal or something that is self-serving, but in contrast to what the players' characters want. If the antagonist kidnaps one of the PC's girlfriends he doesn't tie her to the train tracks - he does so to get a ransom OR if he does tie her to the train tracks, it's only because the PC killed the antagonist's lover and so he's claiming vengeance. This doesn't make the antagonist's action good, but we can understand their motivation and maybe even empathize with what they feel. 

In future games I'd like to explore morally ambiguous settings with characters who are Heroic. My worry with this though is that Heroic characters would be one dimensional compared to morally ambiguous villains. If villains are relatable in morally ambiguous settings, than heroes need to be too. So Heroes in this setting will need strong self-motivation on why they go out of their way to fight evil. Good for good's sake doesn't seem to hold any more water in this type of setting than evil for evil's sake. In a way, this makes the Heroes selfish in the weak sense, but deeper for the purpose of this kind of setting. 

What are your thoughts on morally ambiguous settings v. Heroic characters? 

postscript: I'll be in Chicago for a few days (probably no update till Wednesday). I have an interview Tuesday, and I'm hoping if that goes well I'll be moving up there soon. 

A Song of Ice and Fire

I'm not a big fantasy reader. I appreciate Tolkien and a few other writers, but over all a lot of common themes in fantasy: a "chosen one" - often young white male - who has to fight the big, ultimate evil with some magic weapon just turns me off. I like mythological elements when they're woven subtly into stories, but I dislike stories with absolute black and white morality. 

A few years ago a friend introduced me to George RR Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series. It's a low magic setting that evokes a War of the Roses medieval family saga focusing on the noble houses of a world called Westeros. There are those who are honorable in the world (but not absolutely good), and there are those who act dastardly (selfish beyond belief, or sadistic), but not evil in the stronger sense. 

Anyway, I bring this book series up because Green Ronin is coming out with an RPG soon. Guardans of Order (now out of business?) produced a game of the world before, and it looked great, but I never bought or played it because 1. It was pricey. 2. It was... really just the expensive price tag I saw on it at Barnes and Noble turned me off. Other than that it looked like a good gritty, low fantasy game focused more on deceptive politics than combat. 

I picked up the free pdf quick start. The system is very basic - d6 based - but I like this because the lack of complication doesn't allow the mechanics to outshine the role playing - which should be essential - in a game like this. I see a lot of potential with playing a single household: one player takes on the role of Lord, one Maester, Sept, some Sers or bannermen, and you have the makings of a potentially good household v. household political drama. There do seem to be some magical objects hidden across the world too, so I don't see why an old fashion dungeon crawl would be out of the question. 

The game comes out in October. I've been anxious to play a fantasy game that takes place in the mythic past. Other than some one session runnings of DRYH and some other indie games I've downloaded lately, I've mostly been playing Changeling, or other WoD products straight for the past three years. I love WoD, but I need more variety in my gaming. --- I do want to go back and play some more Requiem for Rome though. As far as I'm concerned, that was the perfect Vampire setting. 

Openrpg

I'm downloading Openrpg as I type this. I'm told it does what DnD Insider's thing will do, but it doesn't cost anything. 

We'll see. 

Mostly the fact that they made it mac compliant and DnD Insider isn't made me want to try it. And it's free. That too. 

For games like DnD I'm not opposed to maps and miniatures for fights - it helps in games where tactics actually matters - Personally I just don't like the idea of buying all that shit. Having virtual components is much more appealing to me. 

The Amnesia Detective

I've started the rough draft for The Amnesia Detective. To help focus this I did the Power 19 and posted my answers here. For several of the questions I ask for help or suggestions. If you could, please read through and tell me what you think either at The Forge or reply to this post. 

Lacuna The Creation of the Mystery and The Girl from Blue City

I downloaded this last night as well. I take this to be the first attempt. Where can I download the second attempt? Indie Press Revolution only sells stuff if they have a print component as well and they were sold out of the print book. Same with the others sites I've tried. 

The second attempt, I believe, has a revised multiplier system and static. Other than mechanical changes, does it have any content difference? 

I'd like to run this and Roanoke soon.

"A Game For Everyone"

I saw that written on a board game box on my way to the cafe. 

The weird thing is, that's obviously meant to draw all people in to play it. But does it? 

To me that phrase communicates a certain blandness that a game made for specific audience wouldn't possess. To appeal to everyone the game would have to do away with any morbidity, inappropriate humor, or many other forms of color that would appeal to a specific audience, but not everyone. 

That being said, I've played games meant for general audiences (Clue, Monopoly, et cetera), and these can be enjoyable, but still bland to some degree. Can anyone think of a really good example of a game meant for everyone that doesn't sacrifice unique characteristics? 

Roanoke

I just downloaded Roanoke. The premise is just too perfect for a horror game. I'm actually jealous the idea of using Roanoke as a game setting never occurred to me. I'll probably review it after I read and run it. 

The Virtues of Adventurers

Dungeons and Dragons used to get pegged as something devil worshipers do. I'm not sure if this is still a common view or not, but I know that D&D, and gaming in general, still has the faint smell of geek all over it. People fail to see the virtues that games like D&D promote. Take for example, Tolerance. 

I've gone adventuring as a Changeling through lands in Eberron that are downright hostile to shapeshifters. My party included a warforged, human, and elf. None of us judged each other based on our races or sexes. Really, we let all our differences aside to further the purpose of showing a foreign diplomat around. 

I like the morality that adventure groups promote: they're pragmatic. They don't encourage the group to love one another - My character was a cowardly poison using assassin, why should a warforged respect or love that? However, tolerance of one another is a realistic goal and allowed each of us to live in peace enough and learn to trust each other. 

So when a group starts with, at the very least, tolerance of one another this can lead to further virtues like trust and loyalty. Really, games like Dungeons and Dragons are some of the best tools for teaching basic social virtues. I mean no disrespect to religious people, but reading the bible or having morality preached at you, I'm sure, instructs you what is virtuous and what isn't, but I can say the same of the Superman comics I read as I child (I really did learn to value truth and justice from these), but Dungeons and Dragons is an actual social experience where one must act out these virtues and learn to use them. The fun of the game aside, this is a valuable experience that puts the theory of virtues into practice. 

If I ever have children I'm raising them as gamers. I really believe this won't just bring enjoyment into their lives but teach them valuable lessons. 

(Lack of) Romance in Role Play Games

Role play games typically utilize genres that in literature contain romance. RPGs rarely contain romance. In games that I've participated in - at most - characters list that they have a lover or spouse, but this is seen as equal detail to what color of eyes the character has. I don't write this to encourage more romance in rpgs, but just question why they haven't been present. 

I do not base this on any surveys or empirical data, so this is purely speculative, but I'm assuming that in many cases most pen and paper gaming groups are male so romance would uncomfortably  force homoeroticism onto the group.

Is it a problem that rpgs don't contain much romance? 

No. I don't mean to judge groups that do have some form of romance in their game successfully (and if you do, please share how you go about it) but lets go over how romance in games could work out: 

1. Two same sex players can have characters in love (either both male, both female, or male and female). 

2. Two opposite sex players can have characters in love. 

3. The GM can have an NPC in love with a player's character (male or female). 

One could add further options with polyamorous groups of lovers and the transgendered, but I'll stick with the above three. In 1. I've already mentioned that homoeroticism in gaming could just creep some players out - even if they're fine with homosexuals that doesn't mean they want to pretend to be in a gay relationship. In 2. this could weird one of the players out, or even if it didn't it might make the rest of the gaming group feel awkward - though this isn't necessarily the case. In the third option this meets the same problems as 1 and 2. 

I will say that I do think it's odd though that we very easily will kill vast numbers of fictional beings in games, but acting out something meaningful like a relationship or pleasurable like sex intuitively feels very weird and inappropriate. I take these intuitions are common. Am I wrong? 

However, I will note that this is different than in mmorpgs. I've attended weddings of characters on rp servers for WoW. This seems to be easier online, and I assume it's because we're not connected to other people at the personal level we are with players around a gaming table. Any other thoughts on this? 

Books on this topic: 

Blue Rose offers romance in the more general sense that is often found within the fantasy genre. The game focuses less on combat and more on role play and interacting with others. The kingdom within the game is very sexually open of gay/lesbian/transgender lifestyles as well as causes like environmentalism. 

Book of Erotic Fantasy offers more of a practical guide on how erotic romance can be put into games. The book also covers everything from playing a character who's pregnant to the often overly sexual nature of actual polytheistic belief systems and the absence of this sexual element in the polytheistic systems in most games. 

EDIT: 

Breaking the Ice: Actually looks like a really fun date rpg. In that context, a romance game would be appropriate and probably a great way to get to know one another. 

Things We Think About Games

I recently got a copy of Things We Think About Games. Shortly after I started this blog I went exploring to see what else was out there. I was aware of The Forge, found some indie game makers who put a lot of thought into their games, and then I was happy to run across gameplaywright. I'm sorry to say before reading their blog I was not familiar with Jeff Tidball, but Will Hindmarch was very well known to me - he being the developer behind the first pen and paper rpg I'd ever played: Vampire: The Requiem. 

Getting to the book, my expectations about it were a little off, though I don't blame the authors for this - they did nothing to mislead. I was expecting longer essays on various aspects of games and game design. Instead it's a book, as Robin Laws put it, of "... rampaging gaming koans." If gamers had fortune cookies they ate at the end of play, then I'd hope those fortune cookies had the advice that Hindmarch, Tidball, & company offer in their little book. Saying that though, at times, I also had the opposite feeling that some of their short page statements, observations, advice, et cetera could have been expanded upon and offered as something more substantive. 

One of the more interesting rpg related issues they bring up is their 29th thought: that the GM ultimately decides what sensory facts are present. Players shouldn't be penalized for a misconception or misunderstanding, and GMs need to be aware of possible vagueness in saying something like, "you hear a squeaking sound." I don't recall ever getting into a major dispute over issues like this, but I know little quibbles have constantly occurred over such problems. A role play game is a strange experience. Every player is agreeing that they are participating in the same imaginary world, but because each is a mental construct in the player's mind they no doubt form vastly different views from each other and the GM. A GM who takes her time to clarify can bring those different mental constructs closer to being the same imaginary world. 

The 109th thought states that: "Whatever artistic qualities RPGs may have, they are not literary ones." (from the contributer Pat Harrigan). I don't think this is necessarily the case, but I'll hold off to write a longer post on this issue. 

The book's available at the above linked site. If you're the type of person who actually goes out of their way to read a blog entitled Philosophy of Games then you're likely to also enjoy reading a book entitled Things We Think About Games. 

Is it bad to role play the same character type in every game?

This topic is related to character playing as wish fulfillment, but it's different enough to deserve a separate post. Last night one of my friends told me he always plays a rogue who's usually a more asshole-ish version of himself. He was unapologetic about this, so he was not asking, "Is it bad to role play the same character type in every game?"

However, the question did strike me as something that a player who does this might ask themselves. We might think of the way this could be bad in two different ways: bad towards the self, and bad towards the group. 

Bad Towards the Self: 

Variety and experimentation allow us to discover more about ourselves as well as lead us to new passions. Playing the same character type over and over might allow us to act out a strong wish fulfillment we possess, but it does not lead to growth. 

However if you already know yourself well, you know you hate playing a warrior or detective, but love playing the amoral mage, then by all means play that mage. 

Bad Towards the Group: 

This complaint was also listed in the post on wish fulfillment, but if you play a character that doesn't fit into the particular game you're playing: You want to play the asskicker in a game of subtle investigation, then both GM and the other players might easily grow sick of your character. Constantly insisting on playing the same character type, especially in stories that really don't support that character, can become annoying and might alienate you from a group of gamers unless they plan on playing a game that would fit in with the character you always want to play. 

However if you're willing to make small changes to that basic character you find yourself playing you might find the group appreciates what you bring: You like playing an asskicker. BUT in a game of investigators it might help playing a highly perceptive asskicker. That way you contribute to the group's larger goal, but still have a talent that others in the group may not possess. 

Role play games offer us the chance to explore ourselves or pretend to be people we're not. You might enjoy constantly trying something new or playing the same character type frequently. In either case it's good to be aware of the benefits and drawbacks of how this can affect the game and group. 

Don't Rest Your Head: A review, rant, and personal exploration

In a few previous posts I've mentioned Don't Rest Your Head. I've wanted to write a review for the game, and this is what came out. The game does several things exceptionally well, and it has altered my perceptions entirely on what we can do with role play games. In a lot of ways this review will be very personal and explore my own assumptions going into the game, but I hope my thinking process and these assumptions are applicable to many others who also have had little to no experience with role play games outside of those published by White Wolf or are D20 based. 

The premise of the game is this: Your character is an insomniac. You've snapped and awoken to the Mad City - a place full of Nightmares that can do horrible things to you. Every 13th hour the Mad City closes, and you cannot escape back to The City Slumbering. From there it's up to you to decide what happens: Do you sell away those traits that make you human in the bizarre bazaar, or attempt to win favor with the Wax King? You must avoid falling asleep - or the Nightmares will get you, and you must avoid going mad - or you will become a Nightmare yourself. 

I'll start with some assumptions I had about role play games. I wasn't aware I thought these until DRYH bent or broke these assumptions:

1. Character sheets need a health bar of some kind. 

2. A game should be (in theory) sustainable for many sessions or not go out of its way to try and kill a character off. 

3. Game Masters decide the story and need to prepare this in advance. 

4. A game needs a meta-goal that determines what the players are trying to accomplish. 

On 1., DRYH has simultaneously one of the most bare bones but interesting character sheets I've run across. The game asks the player several questions, and these ought to be very relevant for the specific story-game that character goes through. An Example: What's Just Happened To You? and What's Your Path? are my favorite questions. The player has complete control to determine how the game begins, the level of tension they want the game to open with, and ultimately - if the Mad City doesn't fuck them over too much - where they're going. In a previous post I mentioned internal character motivation, and DRYH is the perfect example of the game that creates character driven stories that are intense and require little advance planning on the GM's part. 

Specifically in 1. I mentioned the lack of health bar. I've never liked having  x  number of health points in a game. It's too mathematical - not in a I have to think about numbers!? way, but in a way that abstracts an element of being human that doesn't make sense to me: If my character is shot in the arm and a major vein was hit, then I don't need to be told this takes 4 health points away - I'm aware I'm a fucking dead man if I don't get away quick, or have a potion, et cetera. 

Anyway, replacing health is the possibility of going mad or succumbing to exhaustion and being eaten by the Nightmares. This is inserted into the system in a way where characters can decide to add madness or exhaustion dice to each roll. Each can easily help the character gain more successes, however the accumulation of more exhaustion is likely to cause a character to crash or too much madness can cause a character to snap, and if this happens too many times till they become a Nightmare. This mechanic adds a high level of tension into dice rolls and deciding what a dice pool should be. It also forces GMs to make sure they're only having players make rolls when it's absolutely necessary - too many bad rolls in a row can easily mean the end of the game. 

2. Technically, DRYH is sustainable for many sessions (and even has one of the best ways of handling experience that I've seen), but I've mostly been running it as a one session game with only one other player at a time. The game too easily allows death, exhaustion, madness, et cetera - though the game has ways to help the player ward these off. However, the game just doesn't feel like a long term single game to me - The Mad City is at its scariest when it's being encountered for the first time. For one shots, it has been perfect. Players have gone in knowing their character may die, or at least not meet a good end, and this has allowed them to have fun attitudes that don't force meta-level player decisions based on survivability to ruin the fun of dangerous situations. 

The mechanic I casually mentioned for longer games: These are called scars. When something memorable (tragic, in many cases) happens to a character they can write these down as scars, and then they can associate new situations they're in that remind them of this scar to gain a bonus. I much prefer this to exp that allows players to buy or level up. Although both buying new shit and leveling up to get new shit is useful, it doesn't reflect the causal nature of the story as well as scars do. I've liked this mechanic so much I've thought about adding it into other games I run. 

3. I'm a control freak with a God complex. Also, I like storytelling. That's part of what lead me into GMing. The first time I ran DRYH I didn't know what to do. I felt so powerless to decide what should happen, and I just wasn't sure how things were going to work out. But then I realized I improv a lot of story elements anyway, and all DRYH really does in addition to this is allow the player to have some control as well as give helpful hints on where the story should go by how the player answered the questions for their character. The fact that DRYH can be played, and played well, so spontaneously has lead me to run many sessions of it over a short period of time. So far all of them have been fun. They all have had many strange middle parts where lots of doors are opened that never lead to anything, but in hindsight we simply label those subplots and talk about the parts of the story that ended up being important and how much fun we had. 

4. This was already talked about in my post on character motivation. Many games have external plot devices built into them, and this is the simplest way to rally a group of characters to work together. However, DRYH works great just as a one on one game with GM and Player, so an external goal isn't needed for these, but if you are running a DRYH game with multiple players the book offers several suggestions on what these goals might be (page 64) if you need them. 

In Conclusion: 

Don't Rest Your Head creates one of the best suspense/horror atmospheres in role playing games that I've experienced. The setting is scary, interesting, and unique enough to draw players in. Several of the game mechanics are innovative and add to this level of suspense. One player of mine did sum up some problems we were having in saying that DRYH's dice system is, "Simple but not intuitive." It took awhile for me to explain how dice pools worked for the game, but once we got passed this every time I've run the game the players and I have had an enjoyable experience. If you're looking for a different kind of gaming experience that is full of suspense and spontaneity, I highly recommend Don't Rest Your Head. 

Post Script: I haven't looked at it yet, but Evil Hat Productions has just released a supplement for DRYH called Don't Lose Your Mind. I also recommend Spirit of the Century, which is also by Evil Hat Productions. I haven't run the game yet, but I've read it and gone through a character creation (which is a game in itself). It's a great pulp adventure game that's also innovative and fun. After I get a chance to run it I'll write a review.

Character Playing As Wish Fulfillment

Let's face it: many role play gamers enjoy playing characters for the purpose of wish fulfillment. This might be an idealized version of ourselves who says the things we always wish we'd say or has some career we idolize, or it might be something that isn't a part of us at all, but we admire it anyway. 

This isn't categorically bad, but should be recognized in ourselves. Also, it might tell you something about yourself: Do you frequently play a character who's an author, but you don't write? Maybe you should. Of course, this isn't true in all cases: If you frequently play a warlock who goes around slaughtering whole villages... well you get it. 

When you're playing with a group though, try to not let your wish fulfillment fantasies come at odds with what the rest of the group wants. Example: A lone warrior in a group of thieves shouldn't force the group to get into fights they aren't prepared for and they don't want to be in. Related: in character creation this should also be kept in mind. If the GM communicates he wants to run a game about a thieves guild, then a loud, challenging warrior looking for epic fights probably isn't a good character for that chronicle (unless the group always needs someone to serve as a distraction). In some cases the GM might run a balanced game so everyone can play the character they want, but this is a hard balancing act, and still might bore players when it's not their time to shine. 

Again, it's not bad to play characters types that you idolize - hell, you'll probably have more fun this way - but don't let this interfere with other aspects of the game, and try to be self-aware of your own wish fulfillment desires so they don't hinder enjoyment. 

Why "Philosophy" of Games?

I already wrote an introduction for the blog, and I don't wish to be redundant in this post, but I realized I could have written more on why this blog is called The Philosophy of Games. 

Why not Advice for Gamers? or How to Game Master? 

Both of those will be covered in this blog, so they wouldn't be bad titles. 

But they don't fully capture what I'd like to be doing. 

I believe a body of knowledge, a subject matter, or something equivalent becomes philosophical when those studying or practicing in that field start asking self-aware questions. An example: In the field of biology, biologists classify various organisms into different categories of family, kingdom, et cetera. However, a biologists might ask, What do we mean by organism? or What do we mean by species? Does the world cleanly divide into organisms or do humans impose these categorizations onto the world? 

When questions like this arise biology turns into the philosophy of biology. We can say this about any of the sciences, mathematics, or even fields like art and literature. Nothing is safe from clever people asking meta-level questions about the field that they love. 

People don't need to be the specialist in a certain field to be philosophers of that field though. It certainly helps a great deal to have in-depth knowledge of subject matter, but someone can be a philosopher of science and not ever perform a scientific experiment. Many professional philosophers write and research about the various logical inferences that can be made from fields they themselves do not practice in. 

On a different note, the first definition of philosophy that I heard in my 101 class was the love of wisdom. Usually when someone asks me, "So what is philosophy anyway?" and I don't have enough time to explain asking self-aware questions in other fields I give the quick "love of wisdom" answer. It's a functional definition, but people often comment on how impractical learning an ancient study like philosophy is if I want to find work (they couldn't be more wrong). The love of wisdom still holds true for philosophers of this day. 

The philosophers I've had the pleasure to study under and argue with are people who clearly want to know the truth of things, the reasons behind all that we see (or don't see, in some cases), and are willing to follow anything to their logical conclusions or at least admit when something absurd is at the very least a logical possibility. 

Related to the love of wisdom, especially in ancient philosophers like Aristotle, is the offering of practical advice. As I said at the beginning of this post, that is also a goal of this blog, and also philosophical. 

I hope I've given a better understanding of what I mean when I say that this blog is about the philosophy of games. 

Post script: One of my friends was kind enough to pick up a copy of Things We Think About Games for me at gencon. I still have no idea of what any specific chapters are about, but you better believe I plan on writing about that book. I'll also post a review of Don't Rest Your Head soon, since it's lesser known than games like Dungeons and Dragons, but deserves a great deal of attention. 

Character Motivation That Matches The Story

Internal stories for rpgs focus on the character's backstory and use this directly to create a story about that character in particular (or group of characters). Example: Recently a friend and I played Don't Rest Your Head a strange game about insomniacs who wake up to a nightmare city. The game's character creation strongly favors an internal story. The character sheet lets the character decide what just happened to them, what's there path, in addition to more typical questions like their overall character concept. This was somewhat refreshing and also strange because I couldn't prepare a lot for the game (I was GMing it). The player had decided his character was a sleazy Vegas guy who's just married a stripper who turned into a monster in front of him. From there we added that she'd ripped out his happiness (a hexagon jewel) and fled out of their hotel room into a nightmare world he'd never seen before. From what the player gave on his character sheet, how the game began was decided. We added a bit of extra motivation or plot goal (get happiness back), but the player gave the setting and primary antagonist, and from there had much control over how he went about this, and what could be found within the Mad City (this setting is a great combination of Neverwhere and Dark City). It was interesting because neither of us knew where this story would go, and compared to the more external based stories I'm used to telling, his character had great personal investment in this particular tale.

External stories in rpgs provide motivation that isn't dependent on any particular character or their background. The character's backstory may factor much less in this, however this has the advantage of allowing a group of characters to hold the same external goal and cooperate better. Example: In Changeling the Lost our motley is the official freehold detectives. Some of the characters were once policemen or investigators before this, but others held jobs unrelated to detective work. With the premise of being the detectives however it offered plausible motivation for a group of characters to work together to solve problems that they had nothing to do with the origination of. - The bulk of our stories were focused on single session mysteries.

In what I've said so far I believe I've touched on some pros and cons of both styles:

Internal Pros:
Character has great control over the story, and their past is very relevant to current events. This can create very character driven stories that are easy to make up on the spot and require less planning. NOTE: Because Internal Pros is shorter than External Pros please do not take it that there are less reasons to play a more internal focused game.

Internal Cons:
Story is limited to solving character's goals, and once this is finished the game is essentially over. This isn't necessarily bad, but it's not good if a game is meant to be self-sustaining for a long period of time. However, a story-driven player (I define as a player who doesn't play a rpg to "win" but to constantly be engaged with story and conflict) or they and the GM might constantly introduce new internal or external conflicts might become internal as time goes on.

External Pros:
It is much simpler to have a larger group of players use an external goal to rally under. The above example of Changeling provides an external goal, but some characters were made as detectives. This implies that a few of the characters have an internal goal to want to investigate and solve citywide puzzles, murders, et cetera. Even further, a player could create a character like Agent Mulder from The X Files: he is a special agent, but this isn't just a job to him. His sister was abducted by aliens and this has driven him his whole life. He attempts to solve all strange cases because they bring him further knowledge that could be truths of his sister's abduction. Having a similar goal in our chronicle of Changeling would take what the GM has specified as the external goal: You'll be the detectives of the freehold, and internalizes it so the character's primary motivation is also the external goal for the whole group. This is not necessary, but it offers a happy medium between external and internal motivation where a character is likely to be useful and driven when working with a group.

External Cons:
If a character isn't driven or interested in the external goals that the group or worse - they by themselves - are meant to be driven or interested in then alienation from the story is likely to occur. This is especially likely if the GM doesn't specify what genre of story the chronicle will focus on or tell other important details like mood or theme (if the GM has explicitly thought these out), or give some other indication to allow players to plan their characters with reasonable expectations.

Avoid the following mistake:
For awhile when I first started GMing I thought that it was better not to let anything out about a campaign or chronicle. The less players knew, the more in suspense I could keep them and the more surprised they'd be. From reading forums, I take this to be a common rookie mistake, but I'd like to state what was wrong with this: If you create a story that is intended as high mystery, low violence, and do not tell your players this, you could easily get a group of bruisers with no interest in solving a mystery so much as beating the crap out of whoever did it. In which case both players and GM become bored or blame the other for not going along with the game that they want. It's important to share if a game is going to be a mystery, political conspiracy, violent, et cetera. You can tell the players that they'll be solving a mystery without giving away the specific details of the mystery they'll be investigating. Writing that out right now, that reads as obvious advice, but I wish someone would have told me that.

In closing:
Most games I've played or run have leaned much more on the external side. As I said before, I believe this is the simplest way to run a game when dealing with a large group, but simplest is not the same as the best. Several game books I've read recently have put forward the idea of having one character or another stand in the limelight and have their turn to be the protagonist. One game in particular, Spirit of the Century, utilizes a mechanic called "Aspects" some of which can be possible plot devices such as "Rival of (Insert NPC)". In such a case, if a player goes out of their way to name and create a rival, then there is very good reason for a GM to include that rival in a scene or build a whole campaign using that npc as an antagonist. As long as the GM doesn't alienate the rest of the group by doing this, a more personal, character driven game can be played. Also, as earlier stated, a happy medium between internal and external goals can be reached as long as the GM is willing to share key information and work with players. Hopefully this creates accurate expectations and characters that not only can meet the conflicts they face, but do so for meaningful reasons.

When ought a GM call for a dice roll?

In role play games that I've participated in both as GM and player I've noticed that how often and for what reasons dice rolls are called for can alter the entire gaming experience. For those unfamiliar, in the majority of pen and paper rpgs rolling dice is the method of determining the outcomes of attempted actions. Some games (Nobilis) move away from this mechanic and instead give a number of points to each player to spend as fuel for various character actions. I believe conflict resolution systems outside of dice rolling are interesting, but the focus of this post will be entirely on dice rolling. Personally, I've had a love/hate relationship with using dice in games, but now embrace them - not for the gamist mechanic they introduce - but for the unexpected narrative element they can be in a well GMed game.

Some GMs will call for a dice roll on any action that has a probability of failure. Most GMs are not this dice crazy. The problem with calling for dice rolls over even trivial tasks is when they DO fail they derail the game, and can make a player's roleplay feel unappreciated because no matter how good they might roleplay or describe their character's actions for trivial tasks, a failed dice roll counters this, and then an attitude of: Why bother RPing if the dice decide everything? can enter their minds. Another related problem is that if a dice roll to gain necessary knowledge or complete a necessary task critically fails is it runs the story into a deadend. In such cases where a failure or dramatic failure occurs a player is aware that a necessary path has been blocked from them because of a bad dice roll, and the options available to the GM in such a case are not great: They can ignore the dice roll or have the player reroll - in either case it implicitly suggests that the dice rolling is irrelevant, and in turn this causes us to ask: then why did a roll need to occur in the first place? Or the GM can try to impromptu introduce a new path, which often may feel like a deus ex machina, though is forgivable if the characters get reinvested in the story and ,preferably, if the ex machina is subtle, or if not that, made fun of for how obvious it is .

Example of critical failure on obtaining necessary knowledge: Private Detective Wright (character) has finally tracked down the hiding place of Julia Moon, his missing femme fatal informant. The door is locked and no one answers, but the GM needs the player to get inside to find Moon's dead body. He has Wright's player make a dice roll to break in... but crit fails. The GM had already indicated that there was no other way in. The crit failure can either be ignored, and rerolled, again (this can be disguised by saying the character can come back the next night), but then why have the roll it in the first place?, or the GM can add a window or extra door that turns out is unlocked after all - again, why was the roll necessary?

In the above, saying the character can come back the next night or adding an extra entrance to the house are not awful options. They can be improved by adding consequences: If the character comes back the next night, the body is further decomposed, or maybe someone else had time to come back between last night and the night before and has left some further clue. If the character breaks into a window that has been added (this, I believe is the worse option, because it simply adds new paths to ignore the seriousness of dice rolls), then the GM might have some new interesting consequence occur like a neighbor calls the police and they come to question Wright for the breaking-and-entry and murder. If you believe dice rolling is essential, especially in moments like the example described, but have a critical failure occur, then these are ways that could get out of having the game meet a dead end for no other reason than a bad dice roll.

Lately, when GMing, I've asked for less and less dice rolling for many tasks. In physical conflicts I'll even sometimes label some antagonists as "throw-aways" or "extras" meaning: easily defeatable, and present not to give chance of failure for the group, but simply there to provide a scenario where characters can engage in cinematic description of action based scenes. I first borrowed the idea from Exalted, and have found similar lines of thinking in games like Spirit of the Century.

From Evil Hat Productions (makers of Don't Rest Your Head, Spirit of the Century) I saw these intuitions and house rules explicitly stated in their games: don't ask for a dice roll every time a lock needs to be picked. Only ask for a dice roll when a lock needs to be picked and there's something horrible on the other side. If a lock is only present on a door because it logically would be, then just have the character be able to pick it. Failing this stops the story for a trivial challenge. They expand this idea further in SotC, and give what I've adopted as a golden rule of dice rolling: For anytime you ask for a dice roll picture what the success will be, picture the failure, are both interesting and move the story forward? If not, then do not ask for the roll.

A nice consequence of this rule is that I try harder to come up with stories that leave out the boring parts. Scenes of inconsequential work that add nothing significant to the story are cut out or briefly described by GM or player and the next scene of significance is immediately gotten to. This might give the impression that I run only games with every scene happening at a break-neck speed and the characters constantly surrounded by insurmountable danger, but this is not the case. Especially when using the World of Darkness setting a slowly built horror feeling is often hoped for. This is not always achieved (inadequacies on my part, or the group can't help but turn anything into a joke), but it is greatly relevant to the genre of game (horror) that we often play in.

A specific form of dice rolling is when it is necessary to gain new knowledge: through research, interviews, academic memory, et cetera. Such rolls have come to feel tedious to me because they are essentially knowledge dumping (I believe I stole this term from SotC). The GM has a bunch of information he's been holding back, a few successful rolls on the players part, and they gain this knowledge. If the roll/s fail then they don't get the knowledge, and the game halts. SotC utilizes one of the most interesting mechanics to do away with this problem: players are allowed to spend fate points declaring facts about the world. I love the idea of this because it makes the story creation far more interactive on the players part and allows them to share this more with the GM instead of simply being told the way the world is. An example: Two monster hunters arrive in a dark castle. One has been here before and is aware that vampires are likely lurking all over the place. He spends a fate point and his character declares: "Holy water? Don't make me laugh. Crosses? Not on your life. The sun? If it were only that simple... These immortal creatures can only be stopped by summoning Death herself to take them from this mortal world. It's not easy. It may mean our own lives, but we must do it."

Obviously such powers could be abused, but this is easily mitigated by a GM who doesn't allow purely self-serving, dull additions to be declared with fate points. There's much more to be said about fate points, and the unique system mechanic of "Aspects" that SotC utilizes, but those move away from dice rolling.

These express my general thoughts on the topic of dice rolling. There are more specific topics related to dice rolling (Making social rolls v. RPing social scenes) that I'll eventually get to. I'm not of the opinion that everyone must play their games exactly as I've outlined, but I hope some of what I said or borrowed from others is useful to you.

Introduction

I've been playing pen and paper role-playing games for the past few years.

I'd also been studying philosophy (I just finished my BA).

Most of the games I played early on were all part of the new World of Darkness. Occasionally I've had the chance to try out other games: Dungeons and Dragons, Star Wars, Exalted, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, D20 Modern, Don't Rest Your Head.

With every game I've played or GMed questions kept coming into my head or other gamers would ask them: Do you need dice to settle conflict resolution? (Turns out, no). When creating a character how important is it to have the character's life goals inline with the game's premise? When ought a GM call for a dice roll? What's more important for social scenes - the dice roll or the role play the player contributes? When designing a game, how important is it that the mechanics highlight or underlie the mood you are trying to create? What properties are necessary for something to be labeled a "game"?

Questions of categorization have also come up, and I was happy to see that these have been addressed by a pretty smart group of guys already. Often I find myself using their terminology, and utilizing some of their views.

This blog will be dedicated to trying to answer those questions I've listed (and likely more) as well as offer advice for both GM and player. Using some of the ideas that get developed here, I plan on releasing some games myself. Occasionally, I'll ask for playtesters. I've included my email address onto this blog if you have any specific question you'd like addressed, or if you would like to playtest. Or, if you disagree with me, please write and say so. Philosophy is dialectic. There will always be different sides and opinions that probably have arguments in their favor. If you believe I'm being unfair or not seriously considering all the possibilities, please state so in the comments, or email me and I'll let you write a guest blog explaining your position. Or, if there's a gaming issue that strikes you as philosophical that I've ignored, and you've thought of quite a bit, then please write it down, and I'd be happy to have you post here.

That's all I have for now.

Up next will be a post entitled, "When ought a GM call for a dice roll?"