From: smith@ctron.com (Larry Smith)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: Improvisation!
Date: 25 Aug 92 20:45:16 GMT
Reply-To: smith@ctron.com
Organization: Cabletron Systems, Inc.

In article <RANNOU.92Aug22085127@zuse.info.polymtl.ca>, Rannou@info.polymtl.ca (Patrick Rannou) writes:
>In article <4773@balrog.ctron.com> smith@ctron.com (Larry Smith) writes:

>>If I don't know that answer, it may be that there isn't one, or that I haven't
>>made one up and need more feedback about what the players are planning.  The
>>            ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>>solution may not be all that useful.

>Yuck! That's exaclty what the previous poster said: You're completlely
>destroying the sense of accomplishement!

Patrick, pay attention to the whole thread and stop taking things out of
context.

[...] ranting deleted.

>you're saying is that the players are writing the module! YES! Writing the
>module! Because the PCs used "flawless logic", the real culprit became
>someone else! It's just like if you had Shroedinger's box, and heard the
>cat meow inside, then opened the box to find nothing inside! Or if there
>was a tree falling in a forest, but since nobody was there to hear it it
>didn't make a sound and thus didn't fall at all. Gack and regack. Maybe you
>have fun with that, but I'd NEVER be able to make a viable campaign out of
>pure impro like that. And I DON'T call it roleplaying, I call it
>interactive storytelling.

Role-playing _is_ interactive story-telling.  Good choice of words.  If you
hear a cat meow from Schroedinger's box then you've "looked inside" and
collapse the probability function, sight isn't necessary, the meow is suf-
ficient evidence of the cat's survival.  The tree neither fell nor didn't
fall, unless it becomes germain to the game, in which case it either fell
or it didn't.  Perhaps you're begining to understand after all.

>>That is not necessarily incompatible with improv.  I usually have a very high
>>level view of an upcoming game session.  I know that background characters and
>>major NPC's like the back of my own hand [avoid cliches like the plague - Ed]
>>and I know the culture even better.  The exact layout of the town is simply
>>not relevant, and the flow of play is largely up to the players.

>That seems more reasonnable, and matches the mostly-impro I've gmed. But

We have been talking differences of degree all along.

>the enjoyment and ideas I get from my impro is nothing compared to a fully

Whatever floats your boat, but personal style isn't the point of this thread.

>preprared game. When I have a preprared game, instead of using my brain to
>impro the obvious things, this is already done so I'm free to use it for
>other more interesting things, like sub-sub-plots, hooks, rushes,
>descritive storytelling, and better roleplaying for NPCs. Roleplaying an
>NPC is never really good for me when I have to thing about his motives and
>personnality at the same time.

Perhaps - just perhaps - if you understood exactly how improv'ers like myself
accomplish our games, it might improve your own gaming when you do those
things?

>   Improv _depends_ on highly interactive players.  Players that just sit
>                              ^^^^^^^^^^^

>That's what I mean by "interactive storytelling".

And we impov'ers believe the this is a Good Thing.

>>You need players who can set their own goals against against the back-
>>ground of a living, functioning, impersonal world.

>How can it be impersonnal when everything the Players say and the PCs do
>gives the GMs new ideas to decide upon the next "set of events" that's
>going to happen?

I didn't say it was easy.

>From PERSONNAL experience only, I'd say that it takes a far better
>imagination to make prep/impro games than impro games only. With impro
>games only, you only have to have quick wits, and let the players provide
>all the subplots and plot hooks you need, without htem evewn realizing it!
>(just like your example where their "flawless logic" made you decide that
>another NPC was the main bad dude instead).

>I'm not saying at ALL that perpared games should make everything in it SET
>IN STONE. not at all. Fact is, EVERYTHING you have in a pure impro game,
>like chaging on a whim the real culprit, you can ALSO have on a prepared
>game. But the reverse is NOT true. So I guess prep/impro games really are
>"superior". All IMHO, of course.

Value judgements have no place where we have agreed to continue in spite of
the fact that "it all comes down to taste".  Perhaps it does require a "better"
imagination.  That is beside the point of the thread.

>It's true than "pure" off-the-hook impro often lead to our greatest moments
>in roleplaying. But I don't see why that precludes preparation in games. 

As noted previously, perhaps the prep is merely at a different level.

Larry Smith (smith@ctron.com)  No, I don't speak for Cabletron.  Need you ask?
-
How about we all do something reasonable?  I bet that'll confuse 'em!
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc