Quote from: Omega;866350Sometimes the players dont know to speak up. Or in the wallflower cases. Dont have the nerve to. They may think it is the DMs authority only to speak out about what is good and bad play. Especially if they are new to RPGs and just learning the ropes.

There's certainly some extreme cases where the GM sitting people down and telling them why they're being shit-heads is called for. I had to do that not too long back in my DCC campaign.

Quote from: Elfdart;867869Why do you assume it's a problem?

One of the players feels like their character is obsoleted.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;868110One of the players feels like their character is obsoleted.

Nobody can make your character obsolete without your consent.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;868110One of the players feels like their character is obsoleted.

So, someone comes along with a PC that does something similar to that player's PC and the player feels the PC is obsoleted. That is a very defeatist attitude.

I would see it as a challenge and would make my PC relevant to the party. I would fight and scheme to prove the PC to be better/different than the new PC.

It seems what we are actually talking about here is "de-protagonism"**, i.e. removing a _player's_ opportunities to meaningfully change the game-world. This is a breakdown in the social contract of RPGs, but isn't a mechanics problem unless the GM and players allow it to be one.


**You ever watch some-body whip the floor with some-one in a 2 player "fighter" video-game? 100+ Combo Chains and crap like that? And the 2nd player can only just stand there and futilely wave this control-stick and tap buttons the whole round, but it's not really doing anything in-game? Yeah, that's "de-protagonism".

Quote from: Telarus;868308**You ever watch some-body whip the floor with some-one in a 2 player "fighter" video-game? 100+ Combo Chains and crap like that? And the 2nd player can only just stand there and futilely wave this control-stick and tap buttons the whole round, but it's not really doing anything in-game? Yeah, that's "de-protagonism".

Bad example. That is differences in skill level. Not overlap of function.

It's also a competitive game not a cooperative one.  Beating the other player is the goal in one and not the other.

Quote from: Telarus;868308It seems what we are actually talking about here is "de-protagonism"**, i.e. removing a _player's_ opportunities to meaningfully change the game-world. This is a breakdown in the social contract of RPGs, but isn't a mechanics problem unless the GM and players allow it to be one.

And Gronan phrased it quite pithily: it isn't a social problem, either, unless the player lets it be.

GMing GURPS, the largest XP gap I've ever had in a party is just a touch over 100 pts.  (For those of you not conversant with GURPS, that's about two years worth of progression.)  That's a honking lot, and it still doesn't automatically emasculate the newbie.  You handle your end of the battle line, I'll handle mine, there are plenty of orcs for everyone.

Quote from: Telarus;868308It seems what we are actually talking about here is "de-protagonism"**, i.e. removing a _player's_ opportunities to meaningfully change the game-world. This is a breakdown in the social contract of RPGs, but isn't a mechanics problem unless the GM and players allow it to be one.

This can only ever be a problem when playing WHFRP. It is the only game featuring the protagonist class.

In any other games I have played there have been no protagonists. Therefore it is impossible to be de-protagonized.

The very act of "playing a character" in an RPG sets one into the "protagonist" role. (This can be as an "anti-hero", etc, etc.)

The PCs are the "principal character(s) in [the] story, drama, etc.," which evolves out of the actual-play sessions (from Greek protagonistes "actor who plays the chief or first part").

My example of the video game was just to show the concept in another (very different) "game" context. It doesn't matter that it was the skill-level difference between the 2 players that caused the deprotagonism. One player could not make any meaningful change to what was happening in-game, and thus "feels deprotagonized". Such a player won't stick around long, and it doesn't matter what game it is or who they are playing with.

In an RPG situation, if a player comes to me as a GM and says, "My character is too similar to Bob's character, and it makes me feel irrelevant", what I take that to mean is "I haven't been able to meaningfully change the game world like I keept seeing Bob do, but our characters are similar so why can't I make meaningful change to the game-world like that?"

The _player_ feels that his character has been deprotagonized. The _cause_ of this probably isn't the similarity between the characters, which is why I said it was a breakdown of the social-contract of "everyone gets to play/contribute-to-the-game-session's-outcome".

Quote from: Telarus;869025In an RPG situation, if a player comes to me as a GM and says, "My character is too similar to Bob's character, and it makes me feel irrelevant", what I take that to mean is "I haven't been able to meaningfully change the game world like I keept seeing Bob do, but our characters are similar so why can't I make meaningful change to the game-world like that?"

The _player_ feels that his character has been deprotagonized. The _cause_ of this probably isn't the similarity between the characters, which is why I said it was a breakdown of the social-contract of "everyone gets to play/contribute-to-the-game-session's-outcome".

If the characters are mechanically identical and the player is unable to play at the same level as Bob then its a matter of experience and playing skill.

The only remedy for that is to keep playing, learn and improve. If you have the same abilities on paper then the only variable to look at is yourself.

That isn't being deprotagonized. That is simply not playing as well as another player. This can be a problem if there are game mechanics or system mastery issues causing the disparity. In the case of a mechanically identical character it is the player that needs to change something, not the DM and not the group.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;869082If the characters are mechanically identical and the player is unable to play at the same level as Bob then its a matter of experience and playing skill.

The only remedy for that is to keep playing, learn and improve. If you have the same abilities on paper then the only variable to look at is yourself.

That isn't being deprotagonized. That is simply not playing as well as another player. This can be a problem if there are game mechanics or system mastery issues causing the disparity. In the case of a mechanically identical character it is the player that needs to change something, not the DM and not the group.

How can they change it? It's not like you can snap your fingers and acquire system mastery over night.

Quote from: Telarus;869025The _player_ feels that his character has been deprotagonized. The _cause_ of this probably isn't the similarity between the characters, which is why I said it was a breakdown of the social-contract of "everyone gets to play/contribute-to-the-game-session's-outcome".

What do you mean by this? The cause being the broken social contract, that is.

Riddle me this.

Every time we've included NPC underlings in the party--and I'm talking about NPCs who are only there to help out the PCs, who follow commands, who are far inferior stat-wise, and so forth--without fail, at least one of them ends up effecting the outcome of the game in a meaningful way.

It's not like Joe the Fighter vs Fred the Fighter, only Joe is a level lower, or doesn't have Fred's exceptional strength. It's like Joe is 1st level with all average stats and Fred is 6th level with above average to high stats. In other words, it's a disparity to a degree we'd never actually see among PCs.

As for player skill, again, these NPCs don't have that individual drive of PCs. Typically, they're used as just a column of combat stats taking their turn. In other words, in terms of choice, strategy, motives, ideas and so forth, they're far below a low-skilled player.

And despite all that, they still have an impact. And at least one even comes to stand out. Sometimes the players just like the guy's name.

So if this is possible with all the odds set against it, how is it ever possible that a player with even low-skill playing even a poorly built character with lower stats than the rest of the group is rendered unable to effect the game world?

It's not that they can't. It's for whatever reason they don't.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;869083How can they change it? It's not like you can snap your fingers and acquire system mastery over night.

Again. In case this part was unclear somehow:

This can be a problem if there are game mechanics or system mastery issues causing the disparity.

Some players are more casual and show up more to socialize than anything else. If a player isn't interested in learning from mistakes made and does not care about improving his/her playing skills then the last thing I'm going to worry about is how deprotagonized they feel.

It's a breakdown of the social contract because role-playing games are a social activity, but as a game they also include ideas like "fair-play" and "uncertain-but-ultimately-quantifiable-outcome" which are essential to the enjoyment/fun of the thing. We purposefully agree to limit ourselves to a rule-set so that we can procedurally determine the uncertain outcome (sports: which team will play better, etc).

Exploderwizard has pointed out one possible source of the breakdown, one player having much less aptitude at interfacing with the game-mechanics than the other. "Games" required that the agents playing them have a choice among "possible strategies" which is used in the feedback-loop of exploring strategies and observing outcomes.

Maybe the lack of player aptitude is from mis-understanding a game rule, or from only choosing one strategy no matter what the context of the situation. These are things that have to be corrected on the social-contract level, i.e. "let's step out of character for a bit here guys and clarify XYZ for Bob".

Consider another possible breakdown of the social contract: A GM who is arbitrarily inconsistent in rule applications. So Player A may be able to learn what strategies (based on character sheet/resources) are good in certain situations - but when Player B tries similar strategies in similar situations, they have wildly different results, seemingly for no reason. Player B is flailing in the dark, having no consistent "world-fiction" to influence the next choice of strategy. I've only ever been in one game like that, but I do hear about them....