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Deprotagonisation: Is it fun?

Started by KrakaJak, September 19, 2006, 04:41:23 PM

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KrakaJak

Quote from: Yamo"Deprotagonization" is just another bullshit buzzword coined by the same immature (probably Exalted-playing) brats that never want Their (megapowerful) Guy to suffer any defeats or setbacks, which is difficult to arrange if they actually play a real game that requires real skill to succeed at consistantly.

If you played Exalted, you'd realize that you cannot deprotagonize one. The can grow back limbs, bind and call their stuff back and socially win the support of entire cities in a matter of days (a nation takes weeks).
 
Although it might stem from people who played Exalted, realized how fun it was to play a character who can't be screwed over, then tried to play something else.
 
 
 
I like this discussion, so I'm going to delve a little deeper with some wuestions.
 
What about permanant damage? Not just negative levels, or having your stuff jacked. I mean like having the face character have his toungue ripped out. Giving a fighter some irrevocable spinal nerve damage drug. Ripping out cybergear causing permanent essence loss. Having a Paladins God rebuke him at level 12.
 
Can doing major irrevocable damage to a characters main strategy be fun?
 
Is it more fun do leave it out?
-Jak
 
 "Be the person you want to be, at the expense of everything."
Spreading Un-Common Sense since 1983

Yamo

Quote from: KrakaJakWhat about permanant damage? Not just negative levels, or having your stuff jacked. I mean like having the face character have his toungue ripped out. Giving a fighter some irrevocable spinal nerve damage drug. Ripping out cybergear causing permanent essence loss. Having a Paladins God rebuke him at level 12.
 
Can doing major irrevocable damage to a characters main strategy be fun?
 
Is it more fun do leave it out?

You're basically asking if you can kill a PC without killing him and, if so, whether it's acceptable to do so. The answers are yes and yes.

These are just additional risks that an adventurer in a dangerous world has to cope with. If you don't like a particular development, take it like a man and make a new character because them's the breaks. Learn from your mistake and use it as inspiration to play the game better next time.

So...

QuoteIs it more fun do leave it out?

In the short term, maybe. In the long term, definitely not. At least not for a mature gamer. Games need their ups and down and serious tests of skill with real consequences for failure, so this would be no more fun in the long term that declaring every hit in baseball a home run because home runs are cool and fun and everybody hates to find themselves out at first base because of a mediocre hit.
In order to qualify as a roleplaying game, a game design must feature:

1. A traditional player/GM relationship.
2. No set story or plot.
3. No live action aspect.
4. No win conditions.

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David R

You know this is why I really love my current group. They are very old school. Roll dice and live with the results. I just stopped caring about what happens to their characters. And it is liberating, I tell you. I'm not the kind of GM that wants to see the pcs suffer, but it is pretty amazing seeing characters rolling with the punches and not worrying if as players they feel, somehow deprotagonised.

Regards,
David R

Balbinus

Deprotagonisation means no longer being the protagonist, not simply not failing ever.

If I run a game and the PCs get their asses handed to them by the opposition, but that results from player choices and at all times the PCs remain what the story is about then there is no deprotagonisation, they just lost is all.

Deprotagonisation is when the story is no longer really about the PCs at all, but about something else (most commonly some GMPCs or metaplot NPCs).

Story here in the sense that any game creates a story of what happens in play, not some more abstract or jargony meaning.

So, if you're playing brooding vampires and the game focusses in play on your brooding vampires, you're protagonists.  If in play it turns out that a bunch of NPCs from a sourcebook do all the interesting stuff while you watch, you've been deprotagonised.  You may well have won every encounter, you're still deprotagonised though because ultimately what you did was not the most important part of the game.

And note, most important part of the game does not mean most important thing in the game world.  If I run a game set in the Exalted universe about a bunch of mundane guardsmen then the PCs are not deprotagonised as long as the actual game we play is one in which what matters in play is what those guardsmen do.  The size of the stage is not relevant, what is relevant is that in the game you actually play the PCs are the characters we want to hear about.

It's as simple as that.  If you were reading this in a book, would the PCs be the main characters?  If they are, they're the protagonists, if not they're deprotagonised.  The fact that someone else in the same gameworld may be more powerful is neither here nor there.  Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are the protagonists of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, notwithstanding that Hamlet is a more powerful character offstage.

Balbinus

Quote from: David RYou know this is why I really love my current group. They are very old school. Roll dice and live with the results. I just stopped caring about what happens to their characters. And it is liberating, I tell you. I'm not the kind of GM that wants to see the pcs suffer, but it is pretty amazing seeing characters rolling with the punches and not worrying if as players they feel, somehow deprotagonised.

Regards,
David R

That's got nothing to do with deprotagonisation, your players' characters are what the game is about, thus they are protagonised.  If in the same game an NPC tagged along with the party and he got all the cool stuff to do, they would be deprotagonised.

Seriously guys, I have had long and fervid rants about the indie movement sometimes just being a way to ensure the players always win, this isn't about that.  It's an unrelated issue.

mythusmage

The PCs are really participants in the events, active agents with goals and agendas of their own. When the story of the event is later told is when they become protagonists in a formal sense. This remains true even when the PCs are in the position of working for a more powerful MC. After the adventure is over people could tell the story of how the PCs kept their obtuse boss from killing himself on numerous occasions as he stumbled about in a vain search for glory.
Any one who thinks he knows America has never been to America.

David R

Quote from: BalbinusThat's got nothing to do with deprotagonisation, your players' characters are what the game is about, thus they are protagonised.  If in the same game an NPC tagged along with the party and he got all the cool stuff to do, they would be deprotagonised.

Seriously guys, I have had long and fervid rants about the indie movement sometimes just being a way to ensure the players always win, this isn't about that.  It's an unrelated issue.

You are right Balbinus esp in the technical (I think) definiton of the word. But here's the thing, most times, in most discussions, it's precisely about not being able to live with the dice rolls. It' s about how the GM is playing god. Some of the discussions I have read about deprotagonisation have just been diatribes against a particular style of gaming - not that it is happening in this thread , so yeah, I should have chosen my words more carefully.

Regards,
David R

Balbinus

Quote from: David RYou are right Balbinus esp in the technical (I think) definiton of the word. But here's the thing, most times, in most discussions, it's precisely about not being able to live with the dice rolls. It' s about how the GM is playing god. Some of the discussions I have read about deprotagonisation have just been diatribes against a particular style of gaming - not that it is happening in this thread , so yeah, I should have chosen my words more carefully.

Regards,
David R

Yeah, those guys are just fucking lame though*.  If you want a game you can never fail in fair enough, people should spend their free time as they wish and it's no business of mine how they prefer to play, but they should play something properly designed for that like Wushu.  Playing a trad rpg and complaining about occasional setbacks and failures is like complaining about not having decent rules for aerial bombardment in chess.  That's the game, play it or play something else, but only a lackwit plays one type of game when what they want is another.

You here doesn't mean you as in David, it's a general remark.

Personally I think Wushu is a great design.  I think some games the players shouldn't really fail, it's against the genre, I don't play those games as I find that dull but I can see why some might.  But if that's what someone wants there are games that cater to that, what I find annoying is people who pretend they want challenge but really don't.  People who say upfront that challenge is missing the point of why they game are honestly stating their hobby preferences and that, to me anyway, is always fine.  Sometimes though, on rpg.net more than anywhere else I think, one gets people saying they want their PCs to face challenges but who then still want to win everything.  That's not intellectually coherent IMO.

*  Edit:  Obviously except when the GM is being a dick about his powers, in which case they should walk.

KrakaJak

Just a couple of notes. I would respond to quotes, but I'm at work and do not have enough time to set it up.
 
Given the fact that "deprotagonize" is a long word (I only used it because I've read it used for this situation before) that could have multiple meanings. It's usually used in the sense of having a characters Ability to Protagonize removed or weakened.
 
On to the Theory part: I know there are games out there that both have and don't have the flavor of deprotagonization. If I am designing or running a game, is it FUNNER to just leave it out? Is it FUNNER to leave the possibility in? Or is it so fun that Deprotagonization is inevitable?
 
It already appears that deprotagonization should be played with carefully. If it's such a risk to the FUN of the game, why not leave it out completely?
-Jak
 
 "Be the person you want to be, at the expense of everything."
Spreading Un-Common Sense since 1983

flyingmice

Deprotagonization - in the real sense of the word, as Balbinus means it - is NEVER a good thing. Deprotagonization in the sense many people (mis)use it is a design choice, depending on what fits the game you are creating. I think you mean it in the second sense, Krakajak, but I'm not sure.

-clash
clash bowley * Flying Mice Games - an Imprint of Better Mousetrap Games
Flying Mice home page: http://jalan.flyingmice.com/flyingmice.html
Currently Designing: StarCluster 4 - Wavefront Empire
Last Releases: SC4 - Dark Orbital, SC4 - Out of the Ruins,  SC4 - Sabre & World
Blog: I FLY BY NIGHT

-E.

Quote from: flyingmiceDeprotagonization - in the real sense of the word, as Balbinus means it - is NEVER a good thing. Deprotagonization in the sense many people (mis)use it is a design choice, depending on what fits the game you are creating. I think you mean it in the second sense, Krakajak, but I'm not sure.

-clash

100% agree -- if something is "deprotagonization" it is, by definition, bad. Same with railroading. If the GM takes away a player's ability to make a decision or act in a meaningful way and the player's fine with it... no "deprotagonization" occurred.

So I'd say the OP isn't using the term the way I understand it (I don't think it's in a dictionary anywhere... but I think Balbinus's defn and yours are both pretty congruent and generally used).

I think losing games can certainly be fun -- and having power taken away can be fun. Both can be tricky to pull off of course, but the risk of failure is, for me, what makes success valuable.

Random thought: In most cases, knowing the odds your facing helps -- I'm more likely to be okay with losing if I went into the battle knowing I was overmatched (I could also decide discretion is the better part of valor). In cases where I don't know, I'm clearly taking an unknown level of risk... and that's a decision by itself. I'm less likely to feel deprotagonized if I made an informed decision going in.

Cheers,
-E.
 

mythusmage

As a man once said, "Everybody is the hero in their own story."

I don't treat adventures as story, because it limits what you are willing to do. No plots, schemes. No villains, people with goals the party may find themselves opposed to. More work, and more flexibility.

No protagonists, just people trying to do the best for themselves and their friends. On occasion working to stop another from realizing their goals, because that realization could hurt a lot of other people. Or, because it pays well. You can always lie about motivation later.

There are adventures, and there are adventure stories. An adventure is what you are going through at that moment. An adventure story is the tale of what you went through some time ago. An adventure is a "happening now", an adventure story is a "happened then". Think about the things that happen in your daily life and try applying them to your adventures.

Remember, the great advantage real life has over stories is that life does not have to make sense.
Any one who thinks he knows America has never been to America.