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"Story games are more rewarding, period."

Started by Mistwell, November 11, 2009, 05:12:29 PM

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Mistwell

That's the first sentence in this thread titled "Why we like plot: Our Job as DMs" on another board.

I thought it was an interesting topic, but some folks here would be more skilled I think at making a case with or against the OP than most.

The rest of the post reads as follows:

Quote from: AverageCitizenThe Caveat:
I understand that different player group/DM combinations will find different styles of gaming satisfying. Personally, I prefer rich stories so much that I avoid groups who just want to screw around. Some people are the opposite. We don't game together, and that's ok. My point here is I think they are missing out.

The Why:
We need to remember that the Players are the only audience that matters. We are assisting them in writing a story that they enjoy, through a medium of limited collaboration that makes such cooperation both more difficult and more satisfying.

We as DMs have only one job, and everything we do is periphery to it. Our job is to validate our players wildest daydreams and make every single one of them come true. Nobody wants to admit to lame empowerment fantasies, but everybody has them whether they know it or not. If the game "coincidentally" lets players live out those fantasies, they'll have an unbelievably great time. Every DM has probably run a game that struck a particularly harmonious chord and illicited a general "that was awesome" response. I would suggest that this is why.

Not only do we have to make their dreams come true, we have to do it quickly. We only have a few hours at the table a week, so we can't afford to waste time. Every encounter should either

    1. Uncover what their dreams are

    2. create a scenario in which those dreams will make the player a hero (or anti-hero, if that's what they're in to) or

    3. allow one or more PCs to realize or come closer to realizing those desires.

Pull that off, and they'll love you for it. As DMs we have to power to make people feel good about themselves, and I don't think they even realize it as it happens. They just have a good time, and they don't know exactly why. I don't even know why, I just know it works. We could probably ask Freud.

The only real way to accomplish those three tasks in the time allotted is with an engaging story. Themes, morals, conflicts and other artistic touches usually reserved for Russian tragedies are satisfying for me to share with the players and serve a double purpose: to illuminate and later validate their secret ambitions. It makes them feel like everything was planned to make some grand point or pose a deep question and that their actions as characters advanced that higher goal. Its like a music lover who's only sung in the shower taking the stage at a karaoke and getting a standing ovation. I build the world and set the story so they can live out their secret fantasies center stage and not feel ashamed. And at the end, if your good at Russian tragedy, everybody feels like they've learned something. That's why it's the greatest game ever played.

Any thoughts?

J Arcane

Wow.  That is so much fucking wank I don't know where to begin.
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kryyst

Lame

To sum up:  My gaming style is better then your gaming style because I said so.

My rebuttal:  If the GM isn't having fun - no one is going to have fun.  So if you are the GM and like story driven games find a group that's into story driven games.  If you are a GM that's into hack'n slash find a group that's into hack'n slash.  If you fall in between, congratulations you'll basically get to pick a 'normal' group that enjoys bits of everything.
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Koltar

Yeah......


The poster known as Average Citizen is full of shit.


- Ed C.
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This is what a really cool FANTASY RPG should be like :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-WnjVUBDbs

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Machinegun Blue

#5
This guy has no idea what he's even talking about. I mean, did he even read what he, himself, posted?

He's not talking about "story games". He's talking about circle jerks.

Kyle Aaron

AverageCitizen names himself quite aptly. I am sure that he is entirely ordinary as a GM and player.
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jeff37923

Quote from: Mistwell;343147Any thoughts?

I think that if I wanted to join in a discussion of an ENworld forum thread, that I would go to ENworld to do so.
"Meh."

David R

QuoteWe as DMs have only one job, and everything we do is periphery to it. Our job is to validate our players wildest daydreams and make every single one of them come true. Nobody wants to admit to lame empowerment fantasies, but everybody has them whether they know it or not.
[/I]

Please, someone invite this guy to theRPGsite.

Regards,
David R

Mistwell

Quote from: jeff37923;343160I think that if I wanted to join in a discussion of an ENworld forum thread, that I would go to ENworld to do so.

And yet you replied here.  Next!

T. Foster

Quote from: RPGPundit;318450Jesus Christ, T.Foster is HARD-fucking-CORE. ... He\'s like the Khmer Rouge of Old-schoolers.
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Peregrin

#12
QuoteOur job is to validate our players wildest daydreams and make every single one of them come true.

:confused:

Shit.  Even most Forge games don't go this far.  That's some of the worst advice I've ever heard.  

I mean, RPGs are games, right?  We're playing a game?  Because the way this guy makes it sound I have to be Secret Cheerleader for my players all the time.  I think they'd grow quite bored if I was always granting them their every wish all the time.  

Like hell.  My players struggle to get what they want in my games, and they revel in every second of it.
"In a way, the Lands of Dream are far more brutal than the worlds of most mainstream games. All of the games set there have a bittersweetness that I find much harder to take than the ridiculous adolescent posturing of so-called \'grittily realistic\' games. So maybe one reason I like them as a setting is because they are far more like the real world: colourful, crazy, full of strange creatures and people, eternal and yet changing, deeply beautiful and sometimes profoundly bitter."

jeff37923

Quote from: jeff37923;343160I think that if I wanted to join in a discussion of an ENworld forum thread, that I would go to ENworld to do so.

Quote from: Mistwell;343166And yet you replied here.  Next!

Well, yes. You are the one who is not original enough in your thoughts so that you have to drag an ENworld thread here and then asked what people thought about your action.

Sorry if it makes you look foolish and unoriginal, but that is what you set yourself up for.

As a trolling attempt, you get a 0/10.
"Meh."

David R

Quote from: Peregrin;343170Like hell.  My players struggle to get what they want in my games, and they revel in every second of it.

Exactly, that's because most people enjoy escapism and not empowerment fantasies.

Regards,
David R