I came across this concept somewhere over the net, but cant find it again nor remember exactly its definition (yeah, my google-fu is that weak)

So, whats "color-first" ?

I suspect its related to a property of Apocalyse World that I find really cool, which is the fact that the character classes and abilities and crap are more about creating interesting situations and conflicts in the fiction, than to be measures of power or of simulated physical capabilities.

So, while a Covert Operative´s abilities in Shadowrun would be all about acrobatics and technical knowledge and hi-tech gadgets, in Apocalypse World such a character´s abilities would be all about provoking paranoia and betrayal between the players characters, sabotaging things while framing others, and having occult employers showing up with ambiguous jobs and opportunities and such.

In other words, this vs this.

Is this correct ?

Do a specific search on The Forge and Barf Forth Apocalyptica.

The short version is, keep the fiction ahead of the mechanics.  

It's why the X-World system was designed the way it was.  Get away from the totally dissociated Stakes system of many Storygames, including earlier Baker games and develop mechanics that try to keep you in the fiction while you're collaboratively creating the fiction.

Quote from: silva;668117I came across this concept somewhere over the net, but cant find it again nor remember exactly its definition (yeah, my google-fu is that weak)

So, whats "color-first" ?

I suspect its related to a property of Apocalyse World that I find really cool, which is the fact that the character classes and abilities and crap are more about creating interesting situations and conflicts in the fiction, than to be measures of power or of simulated physical capabilities.

So, while a Covert Operative´s abilities in Shadowrun would be all about acrobatics and technical knowledge and hi-tech gadgets, in Apocalypse World such a character´s abilities would be all about provoking paranoia and betrayal between the players characters, sabotaging things while framing others, and having occult employers showing up with ambiguous jobs and opportunities and such.

In other words, this vs this.

Is this correct ?

No?

Links: Ron Edwards on the Forge, and Vincent Baker about AW.


Importantly, they aren't talking about the same thing. RE seems to mean start with the color, then design to it; VE seems to mean prioritize color. I'm assuming by color them mean the little details that make things interesting or cool but don't add anything mechanically to resolution (like the fact that Jane has a gun named Vera in Firefly). I'm not really sure that's what they mean, since sometimes it seems as if they mean setting first.

Back to my "no?", this

Quotein Apocalypse World such a character´s abilities would be all about provoking paranoia and betrayal between the players characters, sabotaging things while framing others, and having occult employers showing up with ambiguous jobs and opportunities and such.

seems more story than color.

If you look at the playbooks (by the way, is that a Vincent Baker playbook, because it doesn't fit the pattern?) they start with something the character has (Angel's kit, Brainer's gear, Battlebabe's weapons, Chopper's gang, etc.), and what you get if you successfully barter with them. Stuff and trading is important color in post-apoc fiction, so VB puts them front and center in terms of defining the character, rather than putting them in an appendix list of stuff and bartering rules.

No idea if this is what either of them meant. It's my interpretation of what I read, and even then not what I would mean by "color first".

Thanks for the help, guys. It seems the term is not as well defined as I thought. And thinking again, what I pointed to in the original post would be better labeled as fiction-first, instead of color-first, I think.

What other games you guys think have this kind of focus on generating interesting fictional situations ? I know AW is far from being the only one to that (though it seems to me the most radical one). It seems to me that emulation-focused games (Pendragon, The One Ring, OD&D, etc) tend to have more of this than physics-focused ones (GURPS, Runequest, D&D3e, etc) even if coincidental.

On the character sheets -
The Apocalypse World and Shadowrun characters both have mechanics, but these mechanics are operating at different levels of abstraction. The shadowrun covert op for example could try to fast-talk their way into a guarded compound and whether or not they succeeded would be heavily determined by the defenses the GM has defined - this will determine what skills are used, the relevant target numbers, and so on. The AW character just does a Move.

In the shadowrun example, the character can't usually be set up with specific outcomes of 'narrative interest' directly because these occur in play as a result of the success/failure of a lot of smaller tasks. An 'interesting'  result may occur or not depending on how individual events play out.
Basically its just task-resolution vs. conflict-resolution.

I think either system can have 'colour' (fluff) but it will perhaps operate in different ways.