TheRPGSite

(Crosspost from Amagi)

Players declare actions for their characters all the time, stating that their character is doing this thing or that one. It's fun to say yes. Saying yes, telling them that things happen as envisioned, giving them what they're looking for, all keep energy up and running. When you can say yes without losing anything of value to the game, it's a good thing to say.

SOMETIMES, "YES" IS ENOUGH.
Minor details, actions that just 'fill in the backdrop' and are meant to move the characters on to the good stuff? These aren't the places to engage; these are 'yes' moments, and nothing more. The player wants to use their street lore to find a seedy bar where a fence hangs out? Yes. Move on, go, go, go.

SOMETIMES, IT'S NOT.
Let's say that you have the world's greatest swordfighter kicking around in your group. There will be swordfights. He will win them; most of them, without even breaking a sweat. You can say yes, all the time, but in this case, "yes" isn't enough. The character has gone right past the question "Will you succeed?" and into territory that requires other issues to remain interesting. So here are a few of those:

• Rampant Confusion: Having the ability to throw a punch that can knock down a building leads inevitably to the question of what happens next when buildings actually get knocked down during fights, and of the character that can't lose a straight fight being challenged not to win, but to either avoid dealing with incredible property damage, or face the problems that go with it.

• Moral Choices: The greatest swordsman in the world can easily disarm his foes, hold them at bay for hours, choose not to kill, turn them in to the law. Making this obvious to the player, and later, making it obvious to everyone that watches him fight, makes for an entirely different question from "can you beat them".

• Showmanship And Spillover: A superb poet at court, engaged in a contest of performance, might well be assured of victory. By changing the question from whether or not they are going to win, to what they are using the contest as a platform to do, things change. If they choose to lampoon the king with their exquisite verse, or reveal the peccadilloes of the Captain of the Guard's wife, or praise the virtues of a specific lady, things get more interesting - and it's sometimes true that the player won't even consider such possibilities unless you make a point of changing the context away from "do you win"?

• Famous And Drafted!: The highly skilled and the very best are often praised for their abilities, raising expectations, and potentially leading to odd repercussions. When the best gunfighter around starts getting challenges from fifteen-year-old wannabees, there are some decisions to be made. When the king decides that only you are capable of defeating the evil overlord of the north, and decides to ungraciously demand your service, likewise.

YOU'RE NOT ALWAYS THE BEST
The examples above are made especially clear by describing the characters involved as astonishingly skilled, the very best at what they do. Even so, the characters are often skilled enough that the same principle can be applied. Sometimes, victory simply isn't interesting, but the other stuff that might or might not come along with that victory is.

CHALLENGES OR CHOICES?
All of the ways of changing a 'simple win' into something more engaging do so either by presenting an opportunity to make a choice that comes out from success, or by creating yet another, more difficult challenge layered on top of the apparently simple one. It's possible to get 'stuck' in some of these situations, trying to figure out when to emphasize the challenge, adding the complications right in as part of dice-and-numbers resolution, and when to emphasize the choices, dropping hefty roleplaying right onto the players.

The way to determine whether to layer on more rules, or simply hit the player with a decision, is often best made not by following some special formula, but by looking at your players and figuring out which way would be most interesting to the group and the playing style to date. If the players were utterly engaged by combats until they got so big that the combat started to get weak? Layer it up - make it so the challenge isn't killing the goblins, but keeping someone important to them but vulnerable safe from harm; their artifex, their fence, the inside man they've been paid to extract; keep the fights rolling, with added difficulties and confusions. If, on the other hand, the fights were never really the big thing, and the players aren't especially engaged by tossing the dice around? Drop dilemmas in their laps, decisions only they can really make because in the place, at the time in question, they're the ones that have the capacity to decide.

THIS BARELY SCRATCHES THE SURFACE
This article is only the barest hint at some of the interesting ways to approach these kinds of situations. The basic point to be made here is that "saying yes" to an action is by no means needs to be the end of resolving something. In many cases, it's just the beginning.

SO, MY QUESTIONS

• Do you think this article is broadly correct?
• What are other good kinds of broad 'follow-up' to 'yes'; I hit the four that I could think up as I wrote, but I know there are planty more I didn't think of.
• How do you know when to just "say yes" and move on, when to engage with choices, when to hit with challenges?  Is your method anything like mine?

(Note: This Article is Public Domain.  No Rights Reserved.)

Thanks for sharing this Levi.

I think any kind of GMing advice about "saying yes" is probably best if put in the context of:

• when to say yes
• when to say yes... but
• when to say no
• when to leave it to chance

Concrete examples of each of the above would be very helpful as well.

Quote from: Stuart;221883Thanks for sharing this Levi.

I think any kind of GMing advice about "saying yes" is probably best if put in the context of:

• when to say yes
• when to say yes... but
• when to say no
• when to leave it to chance

Concrete examples of each of the above would be very helpful as well.

Hmm.  Maybe?

I've often found that such advice often totally fails to address exactly the kind of thing the thread title names - that such advice treats the response as the end.

I wanted to get out of that particular line.

But how common is nothing more than "just say 'yes'" in actual GM advice? Off the top of my head, I can't think of a single example.

I guess it depends on what your intention for this is.  Advice for game designers?  Advice for Players and GMs (to be included in a game)?  Philosophical ponderings?

Quote from: GrimGent;221886But how common is nothing more than "just say 'yes'" in actual GM advice? Off the top of my head, I can't think of a single example.

You don't recall "Say yes or roll the dice"?

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen;221890You don't recall "Say yes or roll the dice"?

Ah, but that's different: the system takes over whenever there's a meaningful conflict. It's by no means an unconditional agreement to success and triumph.

Quote from: GrimGent;221892Ah, but that's different: the system takes over whenever there's a meaningful conflict. It's by no means an unconditional agreement to success and triumph.

Right.  It's a whole other discussion.  But the article above could have gotten mired in that discussion if I'd written towards those points.

I think.

In conventional RPGs the players can only ever describe the attempted actions of their characters, and denying them the right to make those decisions on their own would be horribly unjust. Under most circumstances, taking it for granted that "yes, they can try that" is simply fair, and the attempt can then be judged according to the proper system. But what the players cannot dictate are the consequences of those actions, and there will logically be consequences to everything. That's... elementary, if you want the events to proceed naturally and without adherence to any preconceived plotline.

Quote from: GrimGent;221898But what the players cannot dictate are the consequences of those actions, and there will logically be consequences to everything. That's... elementary, if you want the events to proceed naturally and without adherence to any preconceived plotline.

...What does this have to do with the above, other than being "taken as read"?

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen;221904...What does this have to do with the above, other than being "taken as read"?

It's an inherent limit to the GM "saying yes, telling them that things happen as envisioned": the extent of that outcome (whether the characters succeed or fail) generally isn't for the other players to determine. Saying "yes" always comes with further consequences to challenge the characters. How could it not? One moment when everything goes according to the plan won't solve the rest of life's little problems, and no one guarantees that the plan wasn't going to make the situation worse from the beginning. Every choice matters.

Quote from: GrimGent;221914Every choice matters.

Me stating I tie up my horse at a hitching post, and then walk into the bar VS. me just skipping to walking into the bar...

This is a choice of action that has consequences?

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen;221918Me stating I tie up my horse at a hitching post, and then walk into the bar VS. me just skipping to walking into the bar...

This is a choice of action that has consequences?

Your horse won't wander off. :)

But if there's a fire in the Saloon... you need to make sure you untie your horse!

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen;221918Me stating I tie up my horse at a hitching post, and then walk into the bar VS. me just skipping to walking into the bar...

This is a choice of action that has consequences?

If you specifically ride into the town, then choosing what to do with your horse while you are there can have significance, yes; and it's the kind of a detail that I'd keep in mind because PCs have been known to leave in a hurry, and having to steal another horse to get away would land them in trouble with law. Beyond that, there's no challenge in either of those actions, of course.

Quote from: GrimGent;221922Beyond that, there's no challenge in either of those actions, of course.

...That's exactly my confusion here.  Right up front, I noted that in the case of many actions, there's nothing to engage.  You just say "yep", and keep moving.

And you wanted to clarify with "everything has consequences", when  many 'detail' statements don't typically have any such thing - they're basically just flavour in the form of action.

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen;221925You just say "yep", and keep moving.

You see, this is how I approach every single action that any character takes. Typically in those simplest cases their basic competency is enough to handle it all, but whatever they do, it's still resolved through the system. These least details, the "flavour", are equally "real" as any matter of life and death as far as the mechanics are concerned, even if they don't merit as much elaboration.

Quote from: GrimGent;221926You see, this is how I approach every single action that any character takes. Typically in those simplest cases their basic competency is enough to handle it all, but whatever they do, it's still resolved through the system. These least details, the "flavour", are equally "real" as any matter of life and death as far as the mechanics are concerned, even if they don't merit as much elaboration.

Roll to tie up your horse?

Are we using "system" differently, here?

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen;221927Roll to tie up your horse?

Are we using "system" differently, here?

Well, an "action" isn't always the same as a "skill check". Two of the three games I run regularly are diceless and even the third one has a rule for automatic success in routine situations, so trivially handling your horse wouldn't require any rolls. In all three of them, however, performing that activity is covered by some facet of the system, although casually since it's not of particular significance.

Quote from: GrimGent;221930In all three of them, however, performing that activity is covered by some facet of the system, although casually since it's not of particular significance.

Yep, we're using system differently.  All good.

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen;221933Yep, we're using system differently.  All good.

Just to clarify, you wouldn't consider performing a "mundane action" in Nobilis (like opening a door, walking down the street or tying your horse to a post) to be part of the system?

Quote from: GrimGent;221934Just to clarify, you wouldn't consider performing a "mundane action" in Nobilis (like opening a door, walking down the street or tying your horse to a post) to be part of the system?

Nope.

System is stuff that requires agreement on "how to handle it".  If how to handle it is instinctive, automatic, and invisible, to the point where no agreement or discussion ever is, was, or will be seriously required, that's just basic procedure.  

Like, if we play at a kitchen table, there should be chairs, but that can simply be taken as read.

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen;221937System is stuff that requires agreement on "how to handle it".  If how to handle it is instinctive, automatic, and invisible, to the point where no agreement or discussion ever is, was, or will be seriously required, that's just basic procedure.

But all those simplest of mundane actions are only resolved automatically because they correspond at most to the lowest required level of ability, "difficulty 0", and their place in the greater scheme of the system is clearly defined: they can be performed once per turn, are not based directly on any attribute, and may fail through arbitrary fiat. A gun can be fired or a car driven at that same everyday level of efficiency, and that is in fact how untrained mortal characters in the game operate. Then again, your suggestions in the OP are generally in line with the advice in the book, which deals with handling meaningful challenges and consequences when gathering a vast army of monsters to escort you is as easy as riding a horse into the town would be to an ordinary human being.

Quote from: GrimGent;222018But all those simplest of mundane actions are only resolved automatically because they correspond at most to the lowest required level of ability, "difficulty 0", and their place in the greater scheme of the system is clearly defined

Maybe that's how you frame the thought, yeah.

I frame it as "Of course you can turn the doorknob.  And if the book says otherwise, it can go to hell; I'm not going to bother looking."

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen;222048Maybe that's how you frame the thought, yeah.

No, that's how the mechanics work by the book: it's perhaps even more explicit in the live-action variant of the rules in which all mundane actions have the active "default force" of 0. Also, supernatural beings (such as the PCs) can decide to perform any mundane action as miraculous instead, eliminating any chance of arbitrary failure by fiat. Then the door won't get stuck, they won't slip on the street, and the knot won't accidentally come loose after they've tied the horse to the pole: that just can't happen. Basically, by choosing to do something as a mundane action, the players signal to the GM that they either don't care about the outcome or wish to leave it entirely into his hands (much as in a diced game they might waive their right to have the matter resolved with an appropriate roll), since otherwise they can constantly maintain a simple level 0 miracle of going about their ordinary life, and it will be perfect, and it won't cost them a thing.

(Skipping past the back & forth with GrimGent so I can use the following as a jumping-off point.)

Quote from: StuartI guess it depends on what your intention for this is. Advice for game designers? Advice for Players and GMs (to be included in a game)? Philosophical ponderings?

I don't think there's anything breathtakingly new in the article--but that's not a complaint or criticism. I think the article is best read as a draft advice section.

Given that, first, I'd suggest having a look at Over the Edge, where you can find an advice section with a similar thrust (written by Robin Laws I think).

Second, I'd suggest making a greater effort to write in a way that doesn't show such strong marks (one might say scars) of coming out of RPG theory discussions. By this I mean both the fact that it's kind of obvious that you're struggling with an ancient dialectic, and that you take certain bits of jargon for granted (such as that horrid neologism, "yes" ;) ).

In short I think the article could be improved a great deal by focusing on your audience and assuming that they know less than your typical RPG theory geek but also that they're less f-d up by the reifications and divisions caused by theory.

was I the only one who read the thread title and thought "after Yes, why would you want to listen to any other prog-rock band"?

Sorry

Quote from: Elliot Wilen;222077Given that, first, I'd suggest having a look at Over the Edge, where you can find an advice section with a similar thrust (written by Robin Laws I think).

I have that...  Haven't read it in a bit, though.  Time to crack that back open.

Quote from: Elliot Wilen;222077Second, I'd suggest making a greater effort to write in a way that doesn't show such strong marks (one might say scars) of coming out of RPG theory discussions. By this I mean both the fact that it's kind of obvious that you're struggling with an ancient dialectic, and that you take certain bits of jargon for granted (such as that horrid neologism, "yes" ;) ).

In short I think the article could be improved a great deal by focusing on your audience and assuming that they know less than your typical RPG theory geek but also that they're less f-d up by the reifications and divisions caused by theory.

:D

This makes a deal of sense.  In reality, I'll admit that I wasn't totally clear on who my audience was for this one.  I mean, from my perspective, this is an RPG theory article (though I'll admit few people would be likely to agree).

Quote from: GrimGent;222054No, that's how the mechanics work by the book:

Sure.  But the book doesn't run my game.  The book is a pile of paper sitting over there that I took ideas from, and nothing more.

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen;222088Sure.  But the book doesn't run my game.  The book is a pile of paper sitting over there that I took ideas from, and nothing more.

That's another difference in playstyle, again. I'm more inclined to go with "mechanics as the physics of the setting." They may not necessarily be in every respect the same mechanics as in the original book (what with possible houseruling and all), but they aren't subject to sudden changes just because the GM or another player happened to think of something "cool", either.