OK, OK, I'll stop calling it that.

Anyway, in my introductory thread, Jimbob posed some interesting questions that I thought merited a whole thread, so it seems I already have a first topic for my new theory endeavor!

Quote from: JimBobOzWhy is it not the best thing to try to accomodate everyone's preferences in a sort of stew?

In principle, it seems like the result could be a bit crapy and bland, and that we'd just end up with each player impatiently waiting for the other player to finish having their fun, so the next player can have a go. "I put up with you being a combat wombat, and you put up with me being a thespian."

In practice, there's a thing that used to be called "sympathy", not the modern sense of the word, of just feeling their suffering, but the old sense - of feeling all their feelings, that human fellow-feeling. So even if I'm not a combat wombat, when I see Jim woop and cheer when she rolls a critical success on a head shot, or even if I'm not a thespian, when I see Bob smile happily as his character is faced with the choice of which child to give up to the Nazis, even though I don't share their tastes, I share their joy - it makes me happy to see the people in my game group happy.

Compromise doesn't look so bad when you enjoy seeing other people happy. And most of us do.

So I don't see why it's a bad thing to try to accomodate the different tastes of different people in the group. I can see that it's sometimes a hard thing to do - easier if everyone likes the same thing - but I can't see why it's inherently bad.

I see what you're saying, Jim, I read your "sympathy" post from awhile back with some interest. This is a good example, though, of why I want to stir all these elements and approaches into one big Gumbo. I think Adam Smith's sympathy (heh, I almost typed Adam West) gets at something important for gaming groups, but I don't know if it's the whole story. Everyone in a group operating in full Sympathy with one another is the ideal, but there are factors that can undermine it. For instance, if someone introduces an element into the game that is really jarring or distasteful for me, it can cause strain on our otherwise smooth sympathy. (Like, we're all mutually cool on Ninjas and Pirates and Robots, but, say, Stripperninjas really blow things for me.) So we need to look at how to iron that out, either eliminating elements that unduly strain sympathy or finding a way that we can all be cool with the element.

Or (and I think this is fairly common), there can be an Illusion of Sympathy at the outset because we figure we all mean the same things by "roleplaying," "fantasy," "dark," "fun," etc. So when something breaks that sympathy ("What, my character Ripdeathkillclaw is dark! You said dark!") it's both unexpected and awkward, causing either argument or unspoken dissatisfaction/eyerolling. So, it's good to have preferences and play goals above board and on the table, to avoid these jarring moments and minimize their impact when they do inevitably appear.

Here's where I feel it's useful to examine multiple perspectives together, since working out what people want out of their gaming and why can inform your examination of Sympathy, and figure out what to do about a Sympathy-irritant, by examinging, for a start, where it comes from.

The ideal solution for a given group may be accommodating everyone's preferences. Or it may involve some sort of compromise. Or it may mean one or more members leaving> Or a whole lot of other possibilities.

I don't have a lot of answers yet, but I'm not willing to rule out any of these possibilities so far.

Thoughts?

Peace,
-Joel

First up, great thread title

Quote from: MelinglorThe ideal solution for a given group may be accommodating everyone's preferences. Or it may involve some sort of compromise. Or it may mean one or more members leaving> Or a whole lot of other possibilities.

I think you need to clarify in your mind what you mean by "compromise".

I'm using it in a pretty broad sense. "Compromise" is not merely "tolerance", "Okay, I promise to sit quietly and put up with you being a combat wombat if you promise to sit quietly and put up with me going all thespy-angsty over our party killing someone." For me, "compromise" tied with the concept that "sympathy", that fellow-feeling gives us instead, "okay, though I'm not interested in being a combat wombat myself, I see that it really makes you happy and I like to see you bouncing around happy. But if I can, I'd like to tie that into my thespy-angsty tastes. So how about we don't just attack random people, but really have a good reason to hate some NPC, then I get to have the thespy-angsty while we lead up to smacking him over, and when you do smack him over, I can be thespy-angsty again over his corpse."

Of course, no-one is ever going to put it all out there so bluntly. A lot of this is unspoken, a sort of back-and-forth in a good game group. If the players are all actively listening to one another, then one or two comments about your tastes should be enough.

As I see it, the job of the GM is to take these different play style preferences and mash 'em together. Take things which could clash, and make them complement. So rather than the combat wombat and the thespy-angsty one having that negotiation I wrote up above, the GM organises it. The GM sees that the combat wombat would like to smash stuff, and that the thespy-angsty guy would like to have drama, and conflicts with deep meaning. So the GM sets up a game world or situation where the PCs have reason to be rivals to or hate some NPC, but also reasons to like that NPC. That gives thespy-angsty their hard choices to make, and lets the combat wombat have their fight.

But the players have to be open to it. Accomodating and sympathetic, not merely tolerating. I honestly get that impression sometimes, that when people are complaining about the play styles of their fellow players, and talking about a whole bunch of categories of play styles, and how we should select payers who fit in well with that - I get the impression that there's no accomodation, only toleration. That's the impression I'm getting from Melinglor's post, too - when he talks about surprising differences being a "sympathy-irritant" - differences pushing people apart - that tells me he's more along the lines of toleration than accomodation.

The rhetorical question is, do you just put up with other people having fun, or do you like it when they have fun? Is someone else's fun an end in itself, or is their fun just what happens while you're waiting their turn?

That "tolerance", it's why we get this idea that if you have three Alphaist players, three Betaist players, and three Gammaist players, what you should do is have an Alphaist group, a Betaist group, and a Gammaist group, and then you'll automatically have a wonderful game - no-one will have to tolerate  anyone, everyone will get along fine because they're all the same.

I don't think that. I think the Alphas, Betas and Gammas should avoid each-other, and deliberately seek out different players. Firstly because no two players are ever exactly alike, two Alphaists will each have varying side amounts of Betaism and Gammaism. So whatever you do, there's going to be some amount of difference you have to accomodate or tolerate. If the players think they're the same, they'll be horribly disappointed when they find out they've actually differences - and those tiny differences will suddenly seem hugely important. That's what Melinglor was talking about with his "illusion of sympathy" and "sympathy-irritant", above.

You deal with the "illusion of sympathy" by seeking out players who are different - by seeking out and embracing the differences. That is, by actually having "symathy". If the players know they're very different to begin with, they'll approach things with the right attitude - "let's try to make our differences complement, not clash."

So the ideal group is one where the players are different, have an attitude of accomodation, take joy in each-other's joy, and where the GM acts as mediator, bringing the different wishes together to complement and not clash.

Go back and look over my examples again, because I want to emphasise - "sympathy" is not "tolerance." A successful game session comes not from everyone being the same, but from everyone getting something of what they want, and being happy that others are getting what they want, too. I get this mental image of Melinglor sitting there at the game table while others whoop and holler over rolling a critical success, while he just stares at his character sheet, tapping his foot and waiting his turn impatiently. Why not cheer with them?

I want to emphasise that if the GM gets it right, the "compromise" is a complementary one. Fulfilling the different desires of the players isn't just a matter of giving Jim what he wants for twenty minutes, then Bob what he wants for twenty minutes, then back to Jim, and so on. It's a matter of giving them both what they want at the same time. So that the combat wombat's great moment of striking down an enemy, is at the same time a great moment for the thesy-angsty player. Cashing desires can only be tolerated; complementary desires can be brought together. It's the GM's job to try to act as a mediator, and find ways that apparently clashing things can actually complement; it's the player's job to be open-minded about it all, and be thrilled for others when they're having fun.

Ummm...yeah...

What part do you think expectations play in this? How is it I can go to a con (liek I'll be in less than 24 hours, yay!) and have a fine time, but have trouble with a group of people I know? Or even have variation from table to table?

Don't my expectations, and those of the others at the table, play a large roll in how this sympathy plays out?

Just a thought.

"Sympathy" takes time to develop.

Things with cons is, they're like the first couple of sessions with a new group. That's the "forming" stage of group development I've talked about. Everyone's new to each-other, no-one really expresses strong preferences for anything, everyone tries not to step on anyone's toes.

That situation, doesn't really matter what anyone wants - they're not going to express it, so whether they get it or not, it's a crap shoot. That's why con experiences are so up and down. A regular game group will be pretty consistently good or bad for you - a con, just roll the dice, who knows how it'll turn out.

Quote from: JimBobOz"Sympathy" takes time to develop.

Things with cons is, they're like the first couple of sessions with a new group. That's the "forming" stage of group development I've talked about. Everyone's new to each-other, no-one really expresses strong preferences for anything, everyone tries not to step on anyone's toes.

That situation, doesn't really matter what anyone wants - they're not going to express it, so whether they get it or not, it's a crap shoot. That's why con experiences are so up and down. A regular game group will be pretty consistently good or bad for you - a con, just roll the dice, who knows how it'll turn out.

OK, maybe bringing up cons was a bad idea.

How do expectations influence the development of sympathy?

Is that cleaner?

Quote from: James J SkachHow do expectations influence the development of sympathy?

It depends what you mean by "expectations."

If you mean, "preconceived ideas" - of what the game'll be about - then those are an obstacle, yes. Because the person thinks, "Well, I already know what everyone wants - we all signed on for a game with X, Y and Z, so we must all want X, Y and Z." So that's an obstacle to really understanding one another. Still, if you do stick it out past that "forming" stage, weather the "storm", then you'll figure each-other out and come to a real understanding of one another. But even without that, there's a degree of "sympathy", because it's simply human fellow-feeling - like the way we wince when we see a guy kicked in the groin, or smile when we see people meeting at the airport.

So I guess there's two kinds of "sympathy" - the normal human kind you have for everyone, and the informed kind you have when you know someone. "Oh shit, he won't like that", or "cool, she'll love this". Expectations, in that "preconceived idea" sense, are a bit of an obstacle to becoming informed.

On the other hand, if by "expectations" you mean, "what each player wants from the game" - what they hope for, rather than what they expect - well that's a different thing again. Then you'd be saying, "is what each person wants an obstacle to what each other person wants?" And I'd say, "who the fuck knows?" You have to look at each bunch of wants and see if you can fit 'em together or not - and maybe I as GM couldn't, but you could, and vice versa.

Am I getting what you mean? Or do you mean something else entirely?

Quote from: JimBobOzIt depends what you mean by "expectations."

If you mean, "preconceived ideas" - of what the game'll be about - then those are an obstacle, yes. Because the person thinks, "Well, I already know what everyone wants - we all signed on for a game with X, Y and Z, so we must all want X, Y and Z." So that's an obstacle to really understanding one another. Still, if you do stick it out past that "forming" stage, weather the "storm", then you'll figure each-other out and come to a real understanding of one another. But even without that, there's a degree of "sympathy", because it's simply human fellow-feeling - like the way we wince when we see a guy kicked in the groin, or smile when we see people meeting at the airport.

So I guess there's two kinds of "sympathy" - the normal human kind you have for everyone, and the informed kind you have when you know someone. "Oh shit, he won't like that", or "cool, she'll love this". Expectations, in that "preconceived idea" sense, are a bit of an obstacle to becoming informed.

On the other hand, if by "expectations" you mean, "what each player wants from the game" - what they hope for, rather than what they expect - well that's a different thing again. Then you'd be saying, "is what each person wants an obstacle to what each other person wants?" And I'd say, "who the fuck knows?" You have to look at each bunch of wants and see if you can fit 'em together or not - and maybe I as GM couldn't, but you could, and vice versa.

Am I getting what you mean? Or do you mean something else entirely?

Much more so, yes.  Thanks for sticking with it.

In a way, I mean both. It's the issue with which I'm struggling most with respect to this thread in particular. Because, as you say, sympathy (as we're discussing it) takes time to develop. But you also say it's, to some degree, a natural human trait.  So when I join a group, what are my expectations of them, and theirs of me? How do those change over time? You might go from "what each player wants from the game" to "pre-conceived ideas."

In the end, I think properly working game groups are (as your emphasis on people informs) about communication and group dynamics. The avoidance of bad episodes of the latter can be greatly enhanced by the application of the former – in both "stages of sympathy."

In more concrete terms, what can be done to facilitate the communication for both stages?

For the early stages, I think it might be beneficial to have a list of things that cover most of those expectations – "what each player wants from the game and what the group expects from each player."  I wouldn't approach is as a contract or anything, but if there's a kind of foundational list of questions that people used, gamers might find it easier to avoid some of the pitfalls that lead to bad dynamics later. And if it's a good, universal list, it could become a kind of standard for gamers.

I seem to recall you providing something along those lines, though I can't remember where; and I'm assuming you've got one you use. I keep going to the "Power 19" which, even though I'm not a huge fan, I can understand how it as a helpful tool to those who think along those lines.  Should JimBob give the world his "Foundation 23" list of things to discuss up front? Has he already and I just haven't read all your stuff?
 
So as it is in business (in my experience), aligning expectations and delivery lead to happiness.  It's when they don't match that you have problems...

That's kinda where I was going...

Whew! This sucker's LONG, but I can't figure out anything to cut. Here goes:

Quote from: JimBobOzI'm using it in a pretty broad sense. "Compromise" is not merely "tolerance", "Okay, I promise to sit quietly and put up with you being a combat wombat if you promise to sit quietly and put up with me going all thespy-angsty over our party killing someone." For me, "compromise" tied with the concept that "sympathy", that fellow-feeling gives us instead, "okay, though I'm not interested in being a combat wombat myself, I see that it really makes you happy and I like to see you bouncing around happy. But if I can, I'd like to tie that into my thespy-angsty tastes. So how about we don't just attack random people, but really have a good reason to hate some NPC, then I get to have the thespy-angsty while we lead up to smacking him over, and when you do smack him over, I can be thespy-angsty again over his corpse."

I really like what you're saying here. That kind of solution is exactly what i'd think one should strive for; it may not work out for every clash of elements but it's certainly something that should be explored. And the dialogue you've crafted is a great expression of that. I think more talk like this should go on at the gaming table.

But then:

Quote from: JimBobOzOf course, no-one is ever going to put it all out there so bluntly. A lot of this is unspoken, a sort of back-and-forth in a good game group. If the players are all actively listening to one another, then one or two comments about your tastes should be enough.

See, as I said, I think maybe it should be put out there so bluntly. Unspoken communication has a place, and certainly you don't want to interrupt your game session every ten minutes to negotiate (my group progresses slowly enough as it is!). But if you never talk to your fellow gamers about what works for you and what doesn't, and work out solutions, then you're leaving an awful lot up to chance, and frankly, no matter how good your group's "active listening" is, something is bound to come upthat clashes for someone.

Is that a horrible, horrible catastrophe? No. Is it something to halt the game over and hash out an excruciating list of griervances? No. In a group with good communication and "Sympathy," this should be a minimally damaging occurrance. I think my ideal model would be that afterward, or at the beginning of next session, or over drinks mid-week, the people concerned would chat about it: "You know, that bit with the barfight didn't work for me, maybe if it was more like this," and so on. And then people will all enjoy the next occurrance more.

Quote from: JimBobOzAs I see it, the job of the GM is to take these different play style preferences and mash 'em together. Take things which could clash, and make them complement. So rather than the combat wombat and the thespy-angsty one having that negotiation I wrote up above, the GM organises it. The GM sees that the combat wombat would like to smash stuff, and that the thespy-angsty guy would like to have drama, and conflicts with deep meaning. So the GM sets up a game world or situation where the PCs have reason to be rivals to or hate some NPC, but also reasons to like that NPC. That gives thespy-angsty their hard choices to make, and lets the combat wombat have their fight.

I am all for the GM doing everything in his/her power to make things work. That's great. And yeah, if the preferences involved are for different things people want to see their characters encounter, or situations they want to see them in, then it is gonna be mostly the GM's ballpark. I don't think I'm saying anything here that excludes the GM from consideration; I'm talking about everybody, and whatever role a participant has, that's gonna be the area in which he encounters these issues. The GM deals with clash and accommodation over GM-stuff, and a player deals with it over player-stuff. Easy-peasy. And it's all gonna mix together, of course. You may be getting just the situation you wanted from the GM, but your fellow player's reaction to that situation could clash with what you want out of it. A tense and angsty conversation becomes a slapstick romp, or an epic confrontation with sworn enemies becomes "kill on sight, roll init." So whichever way you slice it, the GM can do a lot of cat-herding, but every participant has to "deal" with every other on some level.

Quote from: JimBobOzBut the players have to be open to it. Accomodating and sympathetic, not merely tolerating. I honestly get that impression sometimes, that when people are complaining about the play styles of their fellow players, and talking about a whole bunch of categories of play styles, and how we should select payers who fit in well with that - I get the impression that there's no accomodation, only toleration. That's the impression I'm getting from Melinglor's post, too - when he talks about surprising differences being a "sympathy-irritant" - differences pushing people apart - that tells me he's more along the lines of toleration than accomodation.

The rhetorical question is, do you just put up with other people having fun, or do you like it when they have fun? Is someone else's fun an end in itself, or is their fun just what happens while you're waiting their turn?

There's a lot of factors involved with this subject. One is Sympathy--how much do we enjoy and appreciate others' fun? Another is personal taste--no matter how much I may love Fred as a buddy, no matter how much I may want Fred to have fun, there still may be some things that Fred wants for fun that I really, really have no taste for. Does this mean Fred and I have to part ways? No, no. no. We just have to find the vectors along which we can both have fun. This may or may not involve roleplaying games. But let's assume we can find sufficient vectors within roleplaying. Great! We're both jazzed and grooving on our own fun AND each other's. There are still going to be times where one of us strays to the borders of what the other really doesn't like. But we can still be cool with that, because, hey, Fred's having fun with that, and I can appreciate that he really digs it, even if I wouldn't want too much of it around myself.

Thing is, we're still going to be having the most fun when we're engaged in something that we both really dig--the other stuff is going to be "pretty cool," whereas the points of "fun intersection" are going to be "fuckin' AWEsome!" So figuring out where those points are is important. We don't have to demand that EVERY MOMENT of EVERY GAME SESSION be comprised ONLY of those intersections. But we want to maximize the intersections as much as possible.

Another factor is that people want different things at different times. I enjoy a wide range of art and entertainment--when I'm going to see Grindhouse I'm not looking for the same thing as I am in Flags of our Fathers. And I'm not going to approach say, a historically-grounded campaign in Celtic Britain the same way I would an angsty "Power and Responsibility" game of Superheroes, and I wouldn't approach either of them as I would Paranoia. So I could totally go all Combat-Wombat with player X, in game A that's geared toward that, but in Angsty game B, I'm gonna get real irritated if player A is still going all wombatty with no attempt to adjust to the game.

It seems that a lot of players (IME) approach pretty much all games in about the same way. If it clashes with the tone of the game, or what other players are trying to do with it, then oh well. Which is dickish of them, maybe, but it exists. And "Sympathy," taken to an extreme, would seem to say "Hey, lighten up and let them have their fun. Them having fun should be enjoyable for you, right?" Which is true up to a point. But I think I have to draw the line at a concept of Sympathy that essentially says "You can't ever expect players to coem together toward a mode of play that everyone can all really love. The best you can hope for is isolated moments of group love, surrounded by tons of play toward individual loves, which you can only appreciate by proxy."

Quote from: JimBobOzGo back and look over my examples again, because I want to emphasise - "sympathy" is not "tolerance." A successful game session comes not from everyone being the same, but from everyone getting something of what they want, and being happy that others are getting what they want, too. I get this mental image of Melinglor sitting there at the game table while others whoop and holler over rolling a critical success, while he just stares at his character sheet, tapping his foot and waiting his turn impatiently. Why not cheer with them?

I want to emphasise that if the GM gets it right, the "compromise" is a complementary one. Fulfilling the different desires of the players isn't just a matter of giving Jim what he wants for twenty minutes, then Bob what he wants for twenty minutes, then back to Jim, and so on. It's a matter of giving them both what they want at the same time. So that the combat wombat's great moment of striking down an enemy, is at the same time a great moment for the thesy-angsty player. Cashing desires can only be tolerated; complementary desires can be brought together. It's the GM's job to try to act as a mediator, and find ways that apparently clashing things can actually complement; it's the player's job to be open-minded about it all, and be thrilled for others when they're having fun.

Again: I see what you're saying, but I think I can only go along with you up to a point. For one thing, complimentary desires and group-appreciation are two-way streets. it's not the job of ONE player (e.g. your mental image of me) to go along with everyone else's desires and cheer them on, and get no support for for his own preferences or goals. In my games, I frankly often feel like I'm playing a private little game with the GM and one or two other players, while the other participants just troop merrily along ignoring what I want to explore.

Example: I remember a gameplay incident from awhile back, we were playing a BESM game with a mishmash of Anime elements (like, everything we could cram in), and I was playing Angsty Psychic guy who wants to Help People. Practically everyone else had Combat Wombats. We were trying to capture and contain a friendly NPC that was going berzerk as a werewolf, when we ran intothe Horsemen of the Apocalypse (long story). All the Wombats went straight for attacking the Horsemen, and the werewolf-NPC started manifesting as, like, the Avatar of the Goddess Kali (again, long story). Now, Kali is a pretty powerful thing to have on your side when you're fighting the Horsemen of the Apocalypse, but she (the NPC's personality inside Kali) was also being consupmed by darkness and in danger of losing her identity. SO I'm astrally projected up to her (she's on top of a building) trying to reach out to her, pull her back to herself, and another PC, also in astral form because he's been killed, comes tome and tells me I've got to go down to the street and tell everyone to evacuate immediately, because I can communicate with them and he can't. My guy's all like, "but Asuka needs me," And he says, "let me take care of that." Now, Ihappen to know thatAsuka is one of the few people this PC cares deeply for, so I'm thinking, great! Not only can  address something neat with my guy, namely his Savior complex and letting go of that, but me and the other PC can have a "moment." Cool. So my guy sighs and says "well, I guess I can't save everyone, can I?" And floats down to evacuate the street.

At which point the other PC promptly ignores Asuka and goes on helping with the firefight. It was a total letdown. I thought we were on the same wavelength and we weren't. All he cared about was the tactical dimension of getting the street evacuated (which turned out to be a bust too; everybody refused to retreat, and things just carried on as before. To this day I don't know why evacuation was supposedly so important.). We weren't having a "moment." We weren't, to this player, addressing anything interesting about the characters. We were just playing this fighty game that had no room for meaningful character development.

I guess I get two things out of an incident like this: One, it's got to be tit for tat: if we're going to have a fun session for everyone, then everyone's got to be willing to work with each other, not just one person or half the people or what have you. And two, no matter how nicely you "play ball," if someone just doesn't know or doesn't care, there WILL be individual scenes or actions that are ruined for you. Which sucks. Maybe not game-breaking sucks, but sucks nonetheless.

And for another thing, I still think common and perfectly reasonable to have some kind of line, hard or soft, past which something isn't fun for you, no matter HOW much someone else may enjoy it. Example 2: I remember one night we didn't have anything to play (a person essential to the planned game didn't show) so I volunteered, kind of keen on the creative challenge, to make up a game system and run a one-shot, based on an element that each player would contribute. The elements I got back were, I believe, Spaceships, Power Suits, Zombies, Wolves, and Porn. I gamely tried to coalesce all these into a cool game setting and premise (and even wound up with something I thought was pretty interesting), but one player just clearly didn't want to play in a "porn game." I tried to fade the "porn" element into the background as much as possible, but she just wouldn't go for it. It didn't help that everyone else in the room was making lube jokes and stuff, clearly intending to play up the "porn" as a comic element despite my attempts to downplay it and focus on more serious themes. Ironically, the guy that contributed "porn" declared that he didn't intend to play 'cause he didn't wanttogo through the trouble of fleshing out a character. We never did get to try the damn thing.

This all actually reminds me of an incident in a 7th Sea game you related a while back, where you had designed a PC for another guy to play, wich "secretly gay" as a disadvantage, in a pretty "serious historical-ish" game. And they guy rabs the character and plays him all limp-wristed and lisping and pedophilic, not only violating setting-logic since homosexuality is a serious crime, but totally crapping on the serious issues you had intended the character to be able to explore.

Now, was this guy being a dick to your mind? I wasn't there, but I didn't get that impression from your account. I got the picture of you holding your head in your hands, sighing and thinking "he just doesn't get it." So even if someone approaches a game session without malice or selfishness, they can still crap on the fun of someone else if expectations or tastes are variant enough. I don't get the impression that you were "appreciating his fun even if it's not your own, by virtue of the nobility of human fellow-feeling." I get the idea that you were more like, "Oh, crap, this idiot is ruining it." Which he was. Maybe not the whole game, but at least a small but significant chunk of the game, one that you helped contribute.

So Sympathy is great, Idon't want to discard it at all, it's not the whole answer. given that Sympathy can't solve every problem at the gaming table, we probably need to look elsewhere for some solutions.

Peace,
-Joel

Quote from: James J SkachIn more concrete terms, what can be done to facilitate the communication for both stages?

For the early stages, I think it might be beneficial to have a list of things that cover most of those expectations – "what each player wants from the game and what the group expects from each player."  [...]

I seem to recall you providing something along those lines, though I can't remember where; and I'm assuming you've got one you use.

Questionnaires, any good?
You might be thinking of the Player Preferences Questionnaire that I did. The questionnaire itself won't really tell you what the gamer wants, but it'll start a conversation where you can figure that out.

Nowadays, I'm not that convinced it's useful in itself. Like all questionnaires, it relies on honest answers. But when people don't know each-other well, when they're new to a group, they often tone down strong ideas they have, and liven up dull ones they have, so as not to "rock the boat." Basically they try to fit in by becoming a bit bland, or by going with whatever the group seems to want.

So for example with that questionnaire, almost everybody replies that "character personality and relationships are very important to me, action & fights, not so much." Everyone says, "I'm an excellent roleplayer, definitely an excellent roleplayer."

There are other areas of the thing where the answers are likely to be more honest, but still, the problem is that when people don't know each-other, they try hard to fit in and give you the answers they think you want - they do this unconsciously, sometimes. We just automatically adjust ourselves to the company, like when we walk into a library or church and automatically drop our voices - we don't need a sign to tell us, we just do it without thought.

I think a questionnaire like that serves two purposes, and neither of them are "finding out what players want." The first is a test of effort - some prospective players won't even bother taking five minutes to tick some boxes. That immediately tells you they won't make any effort for their game - chances of their regular and prompt attendance at game sessions are not good. Veto that fucker. The second is that though the questionnaire itself doesn't give a good answer to questions, it's a start to conversation. It sparks things off.

So for example someone says, "my favourite movie is Transporter, and my favourite tv series is Gilmore Girls", you can say, "Well those are two quite different things, how could I fit them together into a scenario?" You mightn't think of a way to do it, but you'll begin a conversation with the person about the sorts of stories and characters they like.

In that sense, the questionnaire is what in chemistry they call a "catalyst" - it's not part of the reaction, it just helps the reaction happen. The questionnaire itself won't really tell you what the gamer wants, but it'll start a conversation where you can figure that out.

Quote from: James J SkachSo as it is in business (in my experience), aligning expectations and delivery lead to happiness.  It's when they don't match that you have problems...

Gaming as a conversation
But of course, people's tastes change. Maybe this week I want thespy-angsty, but last week I wanted to cut heads off. And maybe the second player, what they want is the same range as me - sometimes thespy-angsty, sometimes combat wombat - but always seems to be opposite in any one game session.

That's why there's this back-and-forth, this constant adjustment. It's why I say that roleplaying game sessions are just conversations. It sounds dumb and obvious, but possibly there's something in that - that in a good conversation, we respond to one another.

Ever talked to one of those people who's, I don't know what the word might be, maybe "garrulous"? You're sitting there saying something, and you think they're listening, they're nodding and smiling with their eyes glistening - then when you stop, they say something completely unrelated to what you just said, or maybe "related" only in that news anchor cutting to sports guy way, a little comment, a "segue", a desperate attempt to connect utterly unrelated things.

Some people seem to be listening to you, but they're really just waiting for you to shut up so they can speak. That's not a "conversation", that's just two monologues happening alternately. There's no comment, response and comment, response, etc.

When Melinglor talks about sitting there bored while the other players mess about with game mechanics stuff, that's what I think of - that they're not having a real conversation. No-one's responding to anyone else, or accomodating them, they're just tolerating them - waiting for the other person to shut up so they can have their turn to speak and say things which have nothing to do with what the other one was just saying. And I've seen that a few times in game groups.

Those are people who don't want to accomodate themselves to others. Knowing what they want in a game session doesn't help you - they're isolated. They won't take things in, they'll always feel slightly dissatisfied with their game sessions.

Roleplaying sessions are a conversation, and if you have a conversation over several hours, in sessions over several weeks, months or years - you're going to talk about different things. There are going to be different moods. Sometimes you'll talk about the football while laughing, sometimes you'll talk about politics while being angry, sometimes you'll talk about your spouse while feeling sad. In a conversation we adjust, we respond. It's constant.

I don't think we can really draw up a list of subjects we like to talk about and moods we like to have while talking, and then only have one kind of conversation forever. Sure, we've got favourite subjects and moods, but we'll join in a conversation about other stuff, yeah? We adjust.

Seems like there's this idea that some sort of questionnaire or categorisation of player types, it's like setting the compass on a ship - once you figure out where you're going, set the compass, and sail in a straight line until you get there. The reality is that there are constant adjustments as you go along. It's very dynamic.

So some sort of questionnaire or category can be useful, but mostly just to break through the ice of that "forming" stage, and get us into "storming." (See Stages of Group Development if you don't know what I mean.)

Quote from: MelinglorSee, as I said, I think maybe it should be put out there so bluntly. Unspoken communication has a place, and certainly you don't want to interrupt your game session every ten minutes to negotiate (my group progresses slowly enough as it is!). But if you never talk to your fellow gamers about what works for you and what doesn't, and work out solutions, then you're leaving an awful lot up to chance, and frankly, no matter how good your group's "active listening" is, something is bound to come upthat clashes for someone.

Sure, it's good to talk bluntly. I'm the last one to argue against that. Thing is, though, not everyone will - however much you say you'd welcome it, some people, it's just not in their nature. And anyway, people need something to start with, just asking "what do you like?" is too open-ended.

Most of the rest I think I already responded to with my long response to Skach, but...

Quote from: MelinglorAnd "Sympathy," taken to an extreme, would seem to say "Hey, lighten up and let them have their fun. Them having fun should be enjoyable for you, right?"

Sympathy does not mean being saintly unselfish
That's part of it, but not all. First, you don't need a capital "S" for "sympathy", it's not some scientific term. I just put it in quotation marks to draw attention to the fact that I'm using it in the old sense - sharing all feelings, not just the miserable ones, to take it away from the sense of "pity".

I just mean that there's this fellow-feeling, as I was saying above, that a roleplaying game session is a conversation - not simply a game with each having their turn, but a conversation, an exchange, comment and response.

Quote from: MelinglorI think I have to draw the line at a concept of Sympathy that essentially says "You can't ever expect players to coem together toward a mode of play that everyone can all really love. The best you can hope for is isolated moments of group love, surrounded by tons of play toward individual loves, which you can only appreciate by proxy."

What the fuck is a GM for, anyway?
You're missing the part above where I said that the GM's job is to try to make sure these different desires are fulfilled in the same in-game events. I gave the example of the thespy-angsty and combat wombat players both getting what they want with some villain who was at the same time a friend. In the combat against the villain-friend, the thespy-angsty player gets their angst, and the combat wombat gets their combat.

Same in-game event, each player getting different things out of it. It's the GM's job to provide situations where each player can get those different things out of 'em.

So it's not "group love" vs "being kinda happy that the other guy is happy." It's not that it's either a moment of thespy angst, or a moment of combat - it can be both at the same time, for different players. That's the GM's job, to make that shit happen. You want syncretism? Well, that means bringing stuff together - and that's the GM's job, to bring together things which at first it seems can't be brought together.

Quote from: MelinglorI guess I get two things out of an incident like this: One, it's got to be tit for tat: if we're going to have a fun session for everyone, then everyone's got to be willing to work with each other, not just one person or half the people or what have you. And two, no matter how nicely you "play ball," if someone just doesn't know or doesn't care, there WILL be individual scenes or actions that are ruined for you. Which sucks. Maybe not game-breaking sucks, but sucks nonetheless.

Players who don't get it
See, I'd call that "game-breaking sucks". If the other guy just isn't interested, then you're not acting as a real group.

I can relate to that one, mate. Recently in my game group, the party were in a devoutly Old Testament Christian town. One PC early in the morning snuck off to look at the young single women (who all bunk together, like the single men) in their group shower together. He stumbled and knocked over the fence and was caught. The guy's a big wrestler and has been on tv, so he was recognisable. He had the chance to get away, but decided to hang around. They sentenced him to twenty lashes.

Now, this could have been quite a dramatic scene, or action scene, as the plaeyers wished. We could have had a long scene where he got flogged and suffered, and maybe one of the young women felt bad and decided to be the one to nurse his wounds afterwards. Or maybe as he was asked to remove his shirt, he could turn around and start smacking heads, grab a horse and ride out, shots ringing around him. Or there could have just been a ong flogging, and him tossed in the mud outside the town walls afterwards. Or maybe another PC could have negotiated for mercy, and he got taken from the flogging-post at the last minute, but had to perform some service for them. Or maybe...

Lots of interesting, funny, dramatic, angsty, or actiony sorts of things could have happened. But the player just wasn't interested. He laughed, "okay, I'm flogged, so what, I get better. We leave the town. Now what?"

Reading that player, well it wasn't very complicated for me - he wasn't interested in that possible scene. Probably he didn't think of all the possibilities. I thought of them, but then thought - "Is it worth putting them through it?" Afterwards a second player said he was really disappointed with that.
"I have this spare Contact on my sheet, I thought of activating it to save him, but..."
"It would have been a waste. He didn't care his character was being flogged, why should you?"
"But he should have cared! I was really surprised when you said, okay, you're flogged, they throw you out of town, now where do you go? I didn't think you'd let him get away with it that easily."
"Well, we don't go into the details of everything, like when your character takes a crap. We only cover what people are interested in. And he wasn't interested. So a lengthy description of his being flogged - it wouldn't wake him up and make him interested in it and think of something to do, it'd just bore him. I try not to bore my players."
"That's fair enough, but it didn't have to be a boring scene, lots of things could have happened..."
"Sure. But he wouldn't think of them - so it'd just be me telling him what happened, and what he could do - he wouldn't get to do things, he'd just be a spectator while I told a story. He can watch tv if he wants that, we roleplay so we can do stuff ourselves. If flogged, he wouldn't beg for mercy or fight them or anything like that, he'd just take it. I was disappointed too, but what can you do."

So I can relate to that disappointment, Melinglor. There are just payers who are a bit unresponsive. I blame tv and computer games making them stop thinking! Or maybe, with my story or yours, a better GM could have drawn the uninterested player into the scene more.

Possibly there's a failure to communicate, too - in both cases. Sometimes when a GM puts up an obstacle, the player perceives it not as "something to climb over", but as "the game world stops at the edge here, go no further." The player's not going to try something they're sure will fail. So perhaps your GM, and me - perhaps we communicated bady with our players, and they thought we weren't offering them a challenge, but a wall. I don't know.

Quote from: MelinglorThis all actually reminds me of an incident in a 7th Sea game you related a while back, where you had designed a PC for another guy to play, wich "secretly gay" as a disadvantage, in a pretty "serious historical-ish" game. And they guy rabs the character and plays him all limp-wristed and lisping and pedophilic, not only violating setting-logic since homosexuality is a serious crime, but totally crapping on the serious issues you had intended the character to be able to explore.

Now, was this guy being a dick to your mind? I wasn't there, but I didn't get that impression from your account. I got the picture of you holding your head in your hands, sighing and thinking "he just doesn't get it."

More players who don't get it: the gay physician
It was actually GURPS Fantasy. In a 7th Sea game I'd expect people to ham things up (though I still wouldn't expect the homosexuality = paedophilia equation). I don't know if I'd intended him to be able to explore serious issues. More that the character had this inbuilt conflict with the game world right from the start. A secret, whatever it is, creates a barrier between you and other people; if this secret is shared, it makes the bonds even stronger. So he could be sharing his secret with some of the party but not others. This seemed to me to have a lot of roleplaying possibilities - in this game, we each created three characters of different point totals - because the PCs were going a long way from home, a sort of Marco Polo mission of trade and exploration. So within the dozen or more characters of the group, there could be a lot of different relationships. I thought the secret could be something to base the differences on - this character hates him for being gay, this other one doesn't care. Or maybe the gay physician is friends with the aggro warrior, and the aggro warrior is friends with the judgmental priest, and when the gay physician tells the aggro warrior his secret, the aggro warrior knows the judgmental priest will hate it, so that the warrior and the priest's friendship becomes more distant, and so on.

So it was disappointment that these subtleties - which really aren't too subtle, you can see more complicated relationships in any daily soap opera - were lost on this guy. I saw possible complexities and chance for thoughtful roleplaying, he just saw bigoted comedy.


Why care, anyway?
Wasted potential. As a GM, I can deal with it, because I'm confident that I can bring forward some other scene or situation which will be just as much fun. As a player, it's more disappointing to me (I was a player in the game with the gay physician), I guess because I'm not sure if something as good is going to come along - gotta snatch each good gaming bit I can get!

Quote from: MelinglorSo Sympathy is great, Idon't want to discard it at all, it's not the whole answer. given that Sympathy can't solve every problem at the gaming table, we probably need to look elsewhere for some solutions.

Again with the capital "S"...

I never said it could solve every problem at the game table. I just said that it's something which means that many things which seem like they'd be problems, in fact they're not. So if you have a thespy-angsty player and a combat wombat, at first you might think, "fuck, no way can these two be in the same game together, it'll be a mess." But it ain't necessarily so.

That doesn't mean that all possible game play styles or players are compatible, or that things will always go swimmingly. It just means that however you want to categorise players - whether with Gamism, Narrativism, or Hack & Thesp, whatever - you shouldn't think those are exclusive categories. Differences are good, not bad.

Quote from: JimBobOzThat's why there's this back-and-forth, this constant adjustment. It's why I say that roleplaying game sessions are just conversations. It sounds dumb and obvious, but possibly there's something in that - that in a good conversation, we respond to one another.

This is really good. I like this immensely. I can see al kinds of applications. You've already brought up the "guy who's only waiting for his turn to talk," which is an apt metaphor for gaming. (I don't think that counts as "garrulous;" garrulous is the guy who won't take turns.) One problem, somewhat related I think, is the guy who only wants to talk about one thing. This is what I was getting at in some of my reply above. I think this metaphor (or maybe not metaphor, maybe "actual reality) expresses your "sympathy" point best and with maximum utility. We know (to varying degrees) ways of improving communications in conversations, and so we can apply these to improving communications in RPGs. I'm pretty jazzed about this.

Quote from: JimBobOzSure, it's good to talk bluntly. I'm the last one to argue against that. Thing is, though, not everyone will - however much you say you'd welcome it, some people, it's just not in their nature. And anyway, people need something to start with, just asking "what do you like?" is too open-ended.

Absolutely agreed. Open-ended questions like that are generally pretty useless. Which is why I wasn't advocating that. I'm talking about a more organic discussion over time, with more specificity and more context.

Quote from: JimBobOzFirst, you don't need a capital "S" for "sympathy", it's not some scientific term.

Yeah, must be a bad Forge habit.  FWIW, I was just trying to do the same thing you were with the quotes, draw attention to its special, older usage in our discussion. And I like to capitalize. That's either Ron Edwards' fault or A.A. Milne's.

Quote from: JimBobOzWhat the fuck is a GM for, anyway?
You're missing the part above where I said that the GM's job is to try to make sure these different desires are fulfilled in the same in-game events. I gave the example of the thespy-angsty and combat wombat players both getting what they want with some villain who was at the same time a friend. In the combat against the villain-friend, the thespy-angsty player gets their angst, and the combat wombat gets their combat.

Same in-game event, each player getting different things out of it. It's the GM's job to provide situations where each player can get those different things out of 'em.

I didn't miss that; in fact I explicitly addressed it, in this bit here:

Quote from: MelinglorI am all for the GM doing everything in his/her power to make things work. That's great. And yeah, if the preferences involved are for different things people want to see their characters encounter, or situations they want to see them in, then it is gonna be mostly the GM's ballpark. I don't think I'm saying anything here that excludes the GM from consideration; I'm talking about everybody, and whatever role a participant has, that's gonna be the area in which he encounters these issues. The GM deals with clash and accommodation over GM-stuff, and a player deals with it over player-stuff. Easy-peasy. And it's all gonna mix together, of course. You may be getting just the situation you wanted from the GM, but your fellow player's reaction to that situation could clash with what you want out of it. A tense and angsty conversation becomes a slapstick romp, or an epic confrontation with sworn enemies becomes "kill on sight, roll init." So whichever way you slice it, the GM can do a lot of cat-herding, but every participant has to "deal" with every other on some level.

My main point about all that is that the GM is only one participant; she has a good bit of authority and responsibility typically distributed to her to address this sort of thing, but she can't carry the whole load. GMing is already a lot of work; I don't want to add Sole Repository of Everyone's Entertainment on top of that. I say, let the GM do her part, and the others all do their part. If Wonbat and Thespy are in that scene which the GM's set up to fill both of their yearnings, great, but they should still be sensitive to each other's needs in the scene; if Wombat charges right in and delivers a deathblow before Thespy gets in his "why did you do it? WHY?!" then there's friction.

It's like I was saying earlier about playing a private little game with the GM. The player who mainly GMs in our group, she's always really responsive to what I'm going for with my character, and excited to introduce characters and plotlines that play off of that. (The other guy who GMs, by contrast, runs things with practically NO consideration for what I, or anyone else, would like to see in play.) But with a few exceptions, it generally seems like the other players just aren't dialed in to that wavelength, and it starts to feel rather lonely. I tend to love the NPCs she gives me to interact with, but I often can't help thinking that I'd rather be playing out some of this shit with player-characters.

Quote from: JimBobOzPlayers who don't get it
See, I'd call that "game-breaking sucks". If the other guy just isn't interested, then you're not acting as a real group.

I can relate to that one, mate.

Yeah, it sure does suck, and I can see that we've both been there. I guess the only thing that I'd like to point out is that there are really two possibilities in this situation: that the other guy isn't interested, or that he doesn't know.

In the first case, the answer is obvious (either put up with it or don't, but don't expect him to change). In the second case, the answer is obvious--communication! The tricky bit is if you don't know there's a gap of understanding, until it comes up. So again, the more cards you have on the table, the more you can nip this in the bud.

Quote from: JimBobOzWhy care, anyway?
Wasted potential. As a GM, I can deal with it, because I'm confident that I can bring forward some other scene or situation which will be just as much fun. As a player, it's more disappointing to me (I was a player in the game with the gay physician), I guess because I'm not sure if something as good is going to come along - gotta snatch each good gaming bit I can get!

See, that last sentence there seems to illustrate my frustration beautifully. No, I'm grown-up enough to not expect everything to always go my way. . .but when you start to see more "good gaming" bits wasted than snatched, over time, it can get pretty disheartening.

Quote from: JimBobOzI never said it could solve every problem at the game table. I just said that it's something which means that many things which seem like they'd be problems, in fact they're not. So if you have a thespy-angsty player and a combat wombat, at first you might think, "fuck, no way can these two be in the same game together, it'll be a mess." But it ain't necessarily so.

Yeah, I'm all about the Syncretism, obviously (hmm, maybe I should start calling it Gumboism?). I'm all about making disparate things work, and working out the communication tools to put that in motion. I'm not sure what other folks are getting out of it, but this conversation is starting to get pe pretty excited at the prospect of putting these things in practice!

Peace,
-Joel