From: thornley@nano.cs.umn.edu (David H. Thornley)
Subject: Re: Improvisation!
Organization: University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, CSci dept.
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1992 15:58:11 GMT

In article <1992Aug22.044328.14783@tronsbox.xei.com> dfrancis@tronsbox.xei.com (Dennis Heffernan) writes:
>In article <4801@balrog.ctron.com> smith@ctron.com writes:
>|Excuse me, a "properly written" mystery is a novel or a screenplay, not a
>|game.  What am I, Agatha Christie?  This is a hobby, not a profession.  My
>
>	Agatha Christie's "mysteries" suck, as far as the type of fair-play
>mystery we're talking about here goes.  The "solutions" always revolve
>around the protagonist having access to some bit of information the reader
>never got.
>
Completely incorrect.  Christie was extremely careful about this:  the
reader should *always* be able to deduce the criminal before the criminal
is revealed by the detective.  If you don't notice the information, or
misinterpret it, then that's your fault just as much as screwing up a
role-playing mystery is.  If you think Christie makes things too hard,
that's reasonable; if you think her mysteries are too easy, try John Dickson
Carr.

>	This is "only" a hobby for me, too.  That means it is _more_ important
>than a profession.  I don't enjoy shoddy craftsmanship.
>
Have you considered getting a life?  Do you seriously intend to give your
employer shoddy craftsmanship because you used up all your energy making
a plot for a RPG?

>|a GameMaster is for, you are there to present one hell of an adventure.  If
>|that adventure is made better or more complete by acknowledging an interpreta-
>|tion from one of the players, then "reality" quietly and retroactively
>
>	In other words, let them win all the time.  That sucks.
>
Will you quit with the straw orcs already?  Improv does *not* mean listening
to the players and saying "You're right".  Nor is it a matter of giving them
whatever they want.

>|changes.  That this is the case is only known to me, the GM, not to the
>|players, they will never know I was saving those plot holes, and they will
>|never know that game might not have been as good.
>
>	And sell them short while you're at it.  Why not let them EARN their
>satisfaction instead of just handing it to them?  Are your players really so
>stupid as to not realize that they can't possibly solve EVERY mystery they
>come across?
>
Why not deny them any satisfaction?  You seem to think that fairness means
running a scenario strictly according to the game rules and scenario notes.
As the GM, you control what goes into the scenario notes.  You can write
mysteries that are trivial or impossible to solve, and you can improvise
mysteries likewise.  You can kill characters strictly legally and "fairly"
by writing "Here 34,857 mobsters show up with Tommy guns and kill the player".
The only thing you can't do is save them when the paperboy scores a triple
critical hit with the rolled-up newspaper.

Your technique seems to be to design a mystery and turn the players loose
on it, and let them succeed or fail, after carefully plotting unambiguous
clues.  This can be fun; I enjoy Infocom games and murder mysteries.  It
has nothing to do with roleplaying, any more than one of the principles
of literature is to make sure the clues are available to the readers.  It
isn't "fair", since you are setting yourself up as adversary and referee,
albeit at different times.

I will agree that your style of play is best suited for careful preparation,
although some degree of improvisation is necessary.  When the character looks
for clues in a totally inappropriate place, the character has to find
*something*, or you destroy the sense of reality completely.  Obviously,
what the character finds should not be clues, and this is as true in improv
as it is in a prepared campaign.

>|
>|A good GameMaster does not make the game worse just for his or her own
>|convenience or ego.  You do what is best for the game, to make it hard
>
>	You're right of course, only a real idiot would make his game worse.
>
>	More usefully, we're discussing whether or not changing the details on
>the fly DOES make a game better or worse.  
>
Again, I think we have to consider what sort of game.  We can agree that
insisting on moving a rook like a knight because it's convenient makes chess
a worse game.  If you and your players like the prepared mystery game, that's
fine, and I agree that changing details on the fly doesn't agree with this.

What you haven't addressed is the sort of game that is more collective
story-telling than specific problem-solving, the sort of game where "win"
and "lose" are typically irrelevant concepts.  

>|A GameMaster _accepts_ the responsibility that he or she is there specifically
>|and for no other purpose than to _entertain_ the others.  It is the same role
>|a stand-up comic takes with the audience, that a host takes with houseguests,
>|that the maitre'd takes in a fine restaurant.
>
>	...or a whore with a john.  Sorry, I DON'T guarantee that you'll get
>off every time.  You have to work for it.
>
Can we cut the insults already?  The purpose of the maitre'd is to see that
the restaurant is as good as it can be, not to see that the customer eats the
food.  Similarly, the job of the GM is to make the campaign as good as it
can be, which can involve taking suggestions from others.

>	On top of that, I respectfully submit that a GM is just as entitled to
>be entertained as his players.  I don't do all this work so other people can
>enjoy themselves; I do it because I enjoy it.
>
Sure.  I assume, being charitable, that you enjoy having others enjoy what
you have done.

>|The players should never get the feeling the universe revolves around them.
>
>	After their seventeenth consecutive smashing victory they may begin to
>get a little suspicious.
>
If you want to use phony arguments, I suppose I can go along....

After the seventeenth consecutive time the player says "I go <there> and
do <this>" and the GM says "Nothing interesting happens so you come back",
isn't the player going to get a little bored and frustrated?  Shouldn't
the GM improv something, even if the player isn't on the right track?

Or...

I'm currently running a Fantasy Hero campaign, and do what should be
sufficient preparation beforehand.  In the last two sessions, I have set up
prepared problems that I thought unsolvable, and the players succeeded
in defeating the army and taking the castle.  Therefore, preparation
is not a guarantee that the players will not have consecutive smashing
victories.

DHT


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