TheRPGSite

The situation:

Amber is under attack.  The enemy is ruthless and inhuman.  Amber City is in flames, and one of the PC's is in the thick of things.  He's hunting through the streets with a company of soldiers looking for the enemy, but not currently engaged in battle.

GM: "A building to your right collapses, sending flaming debris into the alley.  The debris falls up against the next building along, an orphanage.  You can hear the screams of terrified children inside."

Player: "To hell with the battle, I go into the burning building and save them."

GM: "Okay, you're hunting through the building, but it's rapidly filling with smoke and you can still hear coughing.  You've saved some, but there's still some more here.  The danger is increasing."

Player: "No, you don't understand.  I save them all.  End of scene.  I don't want to play in a game where children die on-camera, so I save them all, and we move on."


What do you, as GM, do?

Let the character save them all, though perhaps losing some of the accompanying troops in the process if the character has zero or bad stuff. Regardless, make it tense and make the player play it out before succeeding.

Don't mess with a player's hotbuttons if you don't have to.

The very first thing I would do as GM is respond:

"You've conflated Player direction with character direction. I'd like to seperate them again. You don't want to play in a game with these deaths on-screen, Yes?

Now what does your character want, or do we need to stop the game to discuss Player needs?"

Is it a bad thing to conflate player direction and character direction?

Is what the character wants more important than what the player wants?

Edit: Also, how would you respond based on how the player answers the question?

Is it a bad thing to speak to two people simultaneously? In some genre, it is amusing. In others, merely a stylistic choice that adds some manic.

Generally, it might be considered rude or bad communication.

I don't think most Players function well at a rping level where what the character wants is more significant than what the Player wants. I've seen it done, and very impressive it can be, but most Players break when attempting this.

Sometimes GMs break when attempting same with significant NPCs. Or sometimes Players break when GMs actually succeed in such levels of interpretation of character.

The most direct answer to your additional questions: as GM, I want the Player to be aware of when they issue 'in-game' direction versus 'out-game' in terms of dictating actions. I want the other Players to also understand how the GM will deal with Player hot-button issues. Such transparency is good for the trust invested, IMHO.

Quote from: OthaAlso, how would you respond based on how the player answers the question?

If the Player realizes that the game has touched a personal issue that will make them uncomfortable, but wish to proceed in character, then I do that but move quickly through the scene with less detail.

If the Player requests the scene have a specific outcome (avoiding the personal issue), that may involve some in-game cost, but there is no out-game issue with making that happen.

If the Player clarifies that they were in-character and misspoke about not "being in a game" with such events, then we re-establish the PC desires to succeed at any cost and move forward.

Otha is this something you've really encountered or is it just a hypothetical?

In any case, its obvious by how you've framed the question this isn't a question about player authority, its a question about a player who, as an individual, seems to have some serious issues.

Its not "Fuck that, I find the Magical Sword of Galbraith, because I want it and I said so".  Its a player who in real life has some kind of an issue about kids dying. In which case its time to stop thinking of it in terms of the game and start dealing with it on the personal human level.

If you were only postulating all of this hypothetically as some kind of an argument as to why players should be allowed this kind of authority, your argument is faulty for those exact same reasons: you tried to make it about some issue other than player authority.

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Quote from: OthaI don't want to play in a game where children die on-camera, so I save them all, and we move on."

As Pundit points out, this is the key.  This isn't about "player empowerment", this is about the fact that each player brings a livetime of background to the table and certain situations may take a player to a place that they don't want to be

It's about knowing your players and tailoring the game to them.  If you think that the material might be "triggery" then you have a responsibility to your players to let them know this ahead of time and talk about where the game might go without necessarily getting into specifics

If your material is particularly dark, it might be worth having another game (e.g. Toon) ready to go so if a player says that they have a problem (ps - you need to explictly give them permission to do this) you can instantly switch to something else

If the guy has such a major problem with children dying that he can't stand to see it happen in a game I'll let him save the kids, costing him fatigue, wounds, or whatever else seems aproriate. I'll then avoid putting children in danger in the future.

If it turns into a habit I'll have to talk with the guy. As a player he shouldn't be forced through some sort of personal therapy by me because I want to use his worst fears, but likewise I can't have my creative capabilities as GM too constrained.

I haven't encountered this exact issue but I've encountered issues like it.  It's a hypothetical constructed to be an exemplary case of a number of specifics that I've either played, seen played, or heard about.

It's about authority, because I'm asking whether a player should have the right to say, "I don't like this scene, it causes me pain, it's not fun for me, skip ahead."  The player doesn't want to stop the game and talk about his issues, he doesn't  want to retcon, and he doesn't want to get into the scene as presented to him.  He wants to jump to the only result that's acceptable to him and move on.  The question is, do you let him?

Yes, of course, the GM should tailor the game to the players as much as he can.  That's given.

This question is about what you do when you screw up and present them with something that goes beyond what they are ready for.

So Pundit, if you're dealing with it on a personal human level, what are you doing?  What does that look like?

Quote from: OthaPlayer: "No, you don't understand.  I save them all.  End of scene.  I don't want to play in a game where children die on-camera, so I save them all, and we move on."

No, the player doesn't understand. The player's actions dictate what happens next, and the GM gets to decide if the player saves them all or not.

Recall in the ADRP book where Erick talks about Zelazny's writing style about combat. There is an example of Corwin versus the male nurse in the hospital in Nine Princes in Amber, where one quick line ends the battle. Another example of Corwin and Bleys slowly, painfully, battling their way through one combat after another as they try to get to Amber.

The GM (or, in RZ's case the author) gets to decide which way it goes.

If the fire isn't much of a challenge, then the GM can say "okay, you saved them all, and we move on." If the fire is a challenge then the GM may want to work through details of wading through flames, saving each child one at a time. The end result may be the same and all of the children are safe, but the player isn't the one who gets to make the call.

Really it seems to be an issue of a players comfort threshold and how much GM's should respect that.

If it was that serious of an issue I'd have to call the game off for a cool down period while the player got back into 'its just a game' headspace, and make a note not to toss imperiled children around the delicate flower so cavilierly.  

If the player was just being a domineering ass who wants to dictate every aspect of the story to his satisfaction (or just pushing to see how far he can go) I take the hard nosed tack and make him fucking sweat cannonballs over it, and probably still screw him over in the end.  


In the case of the former, I'd probably recommend the player find another GM, as I don't like compromising my hardassitude in laying out what happens. If the evil bad guy is evil, he's gonna be evil, and that doesn't mean 'mildly rude'...

Fin:
Let me see if I understand.  What you seem to be saying, is that if the GM portrays the challenge in a way that the player finds uncomfortable, the GM should ignore him and keep going the way he had intended, that whether the player is having fun is immaterial.

Spike:

Yes, I think you have the essence of the question.  How much should GM's respect player limits?

Again, let me make sure I have your position right: You're saying that even though the player is saying he doesn't want to interrupt the game, that you'd interrupt it anyways?

Otha:

leaving aside the fact that I don't GM Amber, and have only played it in extremely bastardized ways (IE: not IN Amber, just using the rules) and that was some time ago...


If a player reacts viscerally to a color situation is if it were of great personal concern, I rather suspect a time out is called for. I don't play to push peoples buttons.  If he's that hot under the collar that he's dictating the game, player to GM, then it will be disruptive not to take a quick break.

If the problem is one where he can't get past the fact that we are talking about imaginary children in an imaginary orphanage, it tells me there is a serious issue at hand.  Its one of those things where I need to know if its going to pop up fairly often.  If it's a one time thing, taking a break and picking up a few 'hours' down the line where the orphanage is more a memory might be the best solution, if on the other hand the player has a wide 'issue zone' where anything remotely like this will set him off, he needs therapy, not my game, and I'm not going to see my game turned on it's ear.  Like I said, my evil people are evil, nasty and bad... a nicer fluffier GM is going to be more this guys speed.  


If I DON"T stop the game at that point, then I'm going to keep burning children and butting heads with this guy, and either way the rest of the night is probably going to devolve into a showdown between him and me... not a good way to go out.

Of course, i could be reading into your example.

Quote from: OthaFin:
Let me see if I understand.  What you seem to be saying, is that if the GM portrays the challenge in a way that the player finds uncomfortable, the GM should ignore him and keep going the way he had intended, that whether the player is having fun is immaterial.

Not at all. I believe that the whole point of the game is to have fun. I think that the point in playing it out is to prevent the children from dying in a fire.

The character is the hero and this is an opportunity to use those wonderful powers to save the day. Maybe he finds a way to Trump them out, or cast a spell to put out the fire, or some such. That's what being an Amberite is all about!

Frankly, I have no interest in playing in a game where orphans die in a fire. On the other hand, being the hero isn't so bad. If the player is really about to freak out, of course the GM should back off. When I re-read the initial post I just don't get that impression.

I thought the argument in favour of the GM being able to change/ignore rules, dice-rolls, maps, etc. was that this allowed them to make the game more fun.  Trust the GM and all that.

So shouldn't you be trying to make the game fun for the players? If they're coming right out and telling you they've got a problem with the content (and it could be something else: racism, sex, gore, etc)  -- isn't the job of the GM to listen to that and get them back to having fun again?

sometimes they don't even have to tell you. If I started layering on a thick esduction routine in a game (as player or GM) whoever was on the other end of it would be freaked out (unless my wife was playing that night and it was her). For that reason (and that it would freak me out) I don't do it. :)

Quote from: OthaSo Pundit, if you're dealing with it on a personal human level, what are you doing?  What does that look like?

Well, frankly, I've never had anything remotely like this come up. Nor do I expect it would be something that would happen often. I only play Amber (which I see as a somewhat "advanced" kind of RPG) with players I'm already familiar with, and I tend to end up vetoing players over time, particularly removing those with serious social or mental problems.
So someone with the level of trauma you describe here would probably never get into an Amber game of mine; but supposing they did, supposing that somehow the player has a very specific trauma that had somehow escaped me and everyone else until that very moment, what it would "look like" would be me stopping the game, and talking with the player person-to-person since its not a "game" issue.

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