xiombarg
05-11-2007, 12:13 PM
So, I have five players. We're going to be doing a Burning Sands game soon, our first ever BW campaign, as we're already playing a D&D game on alternate days and my players want something a little more SF. (The fact that we've been playing a long-term D&D 3.5 game becomes relevant below.)
To introduce the players to the system, I ran The Sword (http://www.burningwheel.org/wiki/index.php?title=Image:TheSword.zip). We had a Duel of Wits and a Fight!, without Positioning or Stance, before we were done. We finished up that scenario last night.
One of the players expressed some concerns about rolling for social situations. He said he'd rather just argue, and then decide in character. I said this was fine, but it didn't allow people to increase their Social skills, plus the Burning Wheel ethos is you roll whenever something is important. A trivial argument wouldn't be determined by dice, but anything important, even between PCs, should use dice. It's notable that this player is the best at arguing and social manipulation in the group, and often dominates discussions at the table, so I suspect a lot of this is he fears the loss of control. After he left for the night, several of the less socially-dominant players seemed to like the idea of occasionally being able to outroll the socially-dominant player.
We have a Yahoo group for our gaming group, so I sent the following email out in response to his concerns, and I wanted to know what y'all thought, and if you'd have anything to add:
The longer I think about it, the more I like rolling for social stuff. Remember it doesn't have to be a full Duel of Wits, it can be a simple pool vs. pool test, but you always roll when rolling for a conflict. The rule for Burning Wheel is "Say yes, or roll."
(BTW, as an aside, check out this cool intro to the rules: http://www.burningwheel.org/wiki/index.php?title=Introduction_To_The_Rules )
As far as I can tell, the arguments against rolling for social conflict can be boiled down to three complaints:
1) If I make a good argument, I should just win through my own OOC social mastery, represented by IC roleplay. Let the PCs make the decision, not the dice.
2) This penalizes roleplaying rather than roll-playing.
3) This is cumbersome.
The responses here to each argument are:
1) Um, no. It's nice that you're used to dominating the table because you're good at arguing OOC. However, by making every conflict -- even a social one -- come down to a roll, this has two benefits. First, it allows people to play characters more socially adept than they are. That much is obvious. Secondly, and more importantly, it lets players who are often quiet or browbeat by other players a neutral way to get their "say" in IC. I find in more freeform games, like even Unsung (http://www.ivanhoeunbound.com/unsung.html), the GM has to try extra hard to make sure the quiet or less socially adept players aren't rolled over. With this method, there's a neutral mechanic that ensures that the quiet players can sometimes have their way, even if the player isn't good at arguing with the talkative guy OOC, or don't feel like going in a circle with you again. This is a good thing from a social contract point of view; remember, wanting to get your way all the time is just selfish, and this is about everyone's fun.
2) I'm not buying it. If playing in-character and being able to argue well is enjoyable, it's enjoyable without the additional reward of "winning" on top of it. You should do an impassioned speech because it's fun, not because you feel it should automatically browbeat the other players. And in fact, such impassioned speeches are rewarded -- you can easily argue for an Advantage die after such a speech, so you're still getting an advantage against the less eloquent players, just not an overwhelming one. Roleplaying isn't penalized. It's just not rewarded out of proportion, as it should be enjoyable by itself anyway. (Plus, cool roleplay earns you Artha. Maybe you didn't make the roll to convince the other PCs, but you're going to get Artha for showing off your IC Beliefs in a relevant way.) Also, you can't advance your social skills under this system unless you roll.
3) You don't have to use the Duel of Wits system, or the Fight! system for that matter, for every conflict. If it's not worth the extra effort, but it's still important enough for a roll, just do a Versus roll, possibly with Helping. You can't tell me that rolling up to approximately 1-7 dice and counting successes is "cumbersome", especially when successes are so simple, and the "Let It Ride" rule means that once the simple roll has been made, no one call call for constant re-rolls and continued arguing. And let's face it: Every GM and player has dealt with these IC arguments about what to do that last forever and go in circles, with the GM saying over and over: "So, what are you guys going to do?" It's nice to be able to cut the Gordian knot and be like: "Okay, figure out the stakes for this IC argument are and roll."
IN GENERAL, the fact of the matter is not everyone enjoys playing out every bit of dialog IC, especially when no one seems to want to budge IC. Yes, that's cool roleplay, but the system already rewards that with Artha and possibly Advantage dice. I'm all in favor of more streamlined or nonexistent social mechanics in LARP, but that's because too much social mechanics break immersion, while a tabletop game (to my mind) is less about immersion and more about standing back and creating a good story from a more neutral perspective (Director Stance), since that's easier to do in a tabletop context.
Yes, in general I prefer system-light games, but I already did that with Noblis. Burning Wheel interests me because it's crunchy, but the crunch does things that I like, like create rich tactical detail based on outsmarting your opponent on the fly, rather that huge amounts of pre-planning. Instead of making sure you have the exact right spells memorized and the right Feats in place with tons of between-gaming planning and the use of system combos ("system mastery"), a style of play that emphasizes pre-planning, the Burning Wheel rewards leaping ahead and doing something.
You earn XP for a skill whether you succeed or fail -- the important thing is you did something. You earn Artha for playing your Beliefs and Traits to the hilt. Again, the important thing is you moved forward and did something, and the emphasis on dice is to create a roller-coaster of success and failure, rather than a game where you can always succeed because you figured out the right combination of stacked spell effects or your Aspect is unusually high and you've figured out the loophole in the Shibboleth. (Not that there's anything wrong with that style of play -- I enjoyed running Noblis -- but both Noblis and D&D emphasize good planning over rushing forward and trying to be a hero. I want something different now.)
Ultimately, I suggest trying it before condemning it.
Comments? Questions? Rude remarks?
To introduce the players to the system, I ran The Sword (http://www.burningwheel.org/wiki/index.php?title=Image:TheSword.zip). We had a Duel of Wits and a Fight!, without Positioning or Stance, before we were done. We finished up that scenario last night.
One of the players expressed some concerns about rolling for social situations. He said he'd rather just argue, and then decide in character. I said this was fine, but it didn't allow people to increase their Social skills, plus the Burning Wheel ethos is you roll whenever something is important. A trivial argument wouldn't be determined by dice, but anything important, even between PCs, should use dice. It's notable that this player is the best at arguing and social manipulation in the group, and often dominates discussions at the table, so I suspect a lot of this is he fears the loss of control. After he left for the night, several of the less socially-dominant players seemed to like the idea of occasionally being able to outroll the socially-dominant player.
We have a Yahoo group for our gaming group, so I sent the following email out in response to his concerns, and I wanted to know what y'all thought, and if you'd have anything to add:
The longer I think about it, the more I like rolling for social stuff. Remember it doesn't have to be a full Duel of Wits, it can be a simple pool vs. pool test, but you always roll when rolling for a conflict. The rule for Burning Wheel is "Say yes, or roll."
(BTW, as an aside, check out this cool intro to the rules: http://www.burningwheel.org/wiki/index.php?title=Introduction_To_The_Rules )
As far as I can tell, the arguments against rolling for social conflict can be boiled down to three complaints:
1) If I make a good argument, I should just win through my own OOC social mastery, represented by IC roleplay. Let the PCs make the decision, not the dice.
2) This penalizes roleplaying rather than roll-playing.
3) This is cumbersome.
The responses here to each argument are:
1) Um, no. It's nice that you're used to dominating the table because you're good at arguing OOC. However, by making every conflict -- even a social one -- come down to a roll, this has two benefits. First, it allows people to play characters more socially adept than they are. That much is obvious. Secondly, and more importantly, it lets players who are often quiet or browbeat by other players a neutral way to get their "say" in IC. I find in more freeform games, like even Unsung (http://www.ivanhoeunbound.com/unsung.html), the GM has to try extra hard to make sure the quiet or less socially adept players aren't rolled over. With this method, there's a neutral mechanic that ensures that the quiet players can sometimes have their way, even if the player isn't good at arguing with the talkative guy OOC, or don't feel like going in a circle with you again. This is a good thing from a social contract point of view; remember, wanting to get your way all the time is just selfish, and this is about everyone's fun.
2) I'm not buying it. If playing in-character and being able to argue well is enjoyable, it's enjoyable without the additional reward of "winning" on top of it. You should do an impassioned speech because it's fun, not because you feel it should automatically browbeat the other players. And in fact, such impassioned speeches are rewarded -- you can easily argue for an Advantage die after such a speech, so you're still getting an advantage against the less eloquent players, just not an overwhelming one. Roleplaying isn't penalized. It's just not rewarded out of proportion, as it should be enjoyable by itself anyway. (Plus, cool roleplay earns you Artha. Maybe you didn't make the roll to convince the other PCs, but you're going to get Artha for showing off your IC Beliefs in a relevant way.) Also, you can't advance your social skills under this system unless you roll.
3) You don't have to use the Duel of Wits system, or the Fight! system for that matter, for every conflict. If it's not worth the extra effort, but it's still important enough for a roll, just do a Versus roll, possibly with Helping. You can't tell me that rolling up to approximately 1-7 dice and counting successes is "cumbersome", especially when successes are so simple, and the "Let It Ride" rule means that once the simple roll has been made, no one call call for constant re-rolls and continued arguing. And let's face it: Every GM and player has dealt with these IC arguments about what to do that last forever and go in circles, with the GM saying over and over: "So, what are you guys going to do?" It's nice to be able to cut the Gordian knot and be like: "Okay, figure out the stakes for this IC argument are and roll."
IN GENERAL, the fact of the matter is not everyone enjoys playing out every bit of dialog IC, especially when no one seems to want to budge IC. Yes, that's cool roleplay, but the system already rewards that with Artha and possibly Advantage dice. I'm all in favor of more streamlined or nonexistent social mechanics in LARP, but that's because too much social mechanics break immersion, while a tabletop game (to my mind) is less about immersion and more about standing back and creating a good story from a more neutral perspective (Director Stance), since that's easier to do in a tabletop context.
Yes, in general I prefer system-light games, but I already did that with Noblis. Burning Wheel interests me because it's crunchy, but the crunch does things that I like, like create rich tactical detail based on outsmarting your opponent on the fly, rather that huge amounts of pre-planning. Instead of making sure you have the exact right spells memorized and the right Feats in place with tons of between-gaming planning and the use of system combos ("system mastery"), a style of play that emphasizes pre-planning, the Burning Wheel rewards leaping ahead and doing something.
You earn XP for a skill whether you succeed or fail -- the important thing is you did something. You earn Artha for playing your Beliefs and Traits to the hilt. Again, the important thing is you moved forward and did something, and the emphasis on dice is to create a roller-coaster of success and failure, rather than a game where you can always succeed because you figured out the right combination of stacked spell effects or your Aspect is unusually high and you've figured out the loophole in the Shibboleth. (Not that there's anything wrong with that style of play -- I enjoyed running Noblis -- but both Noblis and D&D emphasize good planning over rushing forward and trying to be a hero. I want something different now.)
Ultimately, I suggest trying it before condemning it.
Comments? Questions? Rude remarks?