OSR Theory: What is a Player Character?
Ben Laurence's recent posts have inspired me to do some theory posting myself. Today I want to ask, what is a character? Specifically, what it a player character? I think the reason to ask this question is that OSR games treat what a character is different than other kinds of games.
I want to premise this by saying that I know some readers took issue with how I discussed story games and "trad" games in my "What's the Deal with DCC?" post. I do want to say that I don't actually hate either of these kinds of games and I will endeavor to be more precise and make fewer generalizations in the future.
So let's list out what a character is:
A Roleplaying Edifice
A character is a mask we put on during the game. They have backstories, personalities, sometimes funny voices (I like giving my characters funny voices), and their own goals and desires.
A Vessel for the Player
To maintain the fiction of the setting, in most cases, players need a character that belongs in the setting. More than that, the player character is a kind of automaton, like the mars drone. It gives a body in the fiction through which the player experiences and interacts with the world of the game.
A Set of Tools
The character comes equipped with various tools for interrogating and interacting with the setting. We differentiate which tools players get because the game is collaborative. The tools we give players also outlines what kind of game is being played. Thief skills are a great example because Thief skills are usually mostly about things that are important in a dungeon more so than in any other situation.
A Trophy
A player character is the result of all the things that character has done. Their loot, mutations, scars, and stories are a kind of trophy, a symbol of past glories. Characters are also trophies in the sense that their survival is often a sign of victory and losing one's character a sign of defeat. Now it is true that you can roll up another character and hop in, but there is still defeat in that loss and the loss of one character might lead to the loss of the whole party which is definitely a failure state.
I think different kinds of games prioritize these elements differently. I will make an effort to argue how each kind of game does it.
OSR
#1 A Vessel for the Player: OSR games definitely highly prioritize this element. I think this is spurred on by the speed of play. In a lot of OSR games that I have played in or run, there is a definite drive to accomplish something in a session. Rooms need to be cleared. Treasure needs to be gained. Gold for XP really incentivizes play with a little more speed and little of that time is spent on role play. The player is the one making decisions and using their skills to overcome obstacles more than the character. Since player skill is so highly valued, the vessel becomes more and more valued than the roleplay because the player is more important than the character.
#2 A Trophy: OSR adventure design delights in scars, mutations, and trauma. These are signs that the player character has done interesting things. Since the role-playing element is so far down the list, the torment the character experiences is more comedic than tragic. The stores that OSR players tell are often related to the ways their characters were morphed and changed. This is especially different to 5e and Pathfinder attitudes where substantial changes to the character are less desirable because they have spent so much time creating them that to mess that creation up is like ruining their sand castle.
#3 A Set of Tools: The only reason this is so far down the list is that in a lot of OSR games, rolling is a punishment. For the vast majority of the time, it is far more desirable to plan in ways that eliminate the area of risk that provokes a roll. Of course, a lot of the tools given by the game are tools that involve rolling, which honestly makes them somewhat liminal.
#4 A Roleplaying Edifice: The game is about going into tombs and looting them. If your character can't get on board with that due to their moral concerns, phobia of tight spaces, or backstory then why are we even playing the game? Every element of the game subjugates role-play. You don't get to hold onto a stable image of who this character is because that is up to the dice. No matter how awesome your backstory says you are, you can always Nat 1 and get stabbed to death by a bunch of goblins. As mentioned above, a lot of restrictions based around this kind of play tend to subjugate roleplay to passing jokes and sessions where there is more social interaction and less dungeon delving.
5e, Pathfinder, and the like...
#1 A Set of Tools: In 5e and similar games (Pathfinder and the like), the set of tools is usually referred to as a "Build." This term probably comes from video games and it means the list of options picked for a character in order for it to fulfill a certain purpose. In the case of Pathfinder and 5e builds, these are specific combat capabilities or trying to get the highest possible rank in a certain skill. Stories told about such Builds might include, "I had a bard with such high Persuasion that he seduced every monster and charmed his way past every obstacle." Or "My character's build basically deals out infinite damage under the right circumstances."
I have actually played quite a few games with people who enjoy crafting these builds and it can be fun to pick the right options to pump out a load of damage. It is evident that this is what the designers have mostly set these games up for this purpose and made options like the rolling for stats the nonstandard approach. Random generation of characters in hardly considered but they will give you packages that pick fairly optimal choices if you want to speed up low level character creation. SO much of the design and the culture is aimed at these builds, thus Set of Tools must take up the #1 spot.
#2 A Roleplaying Edifice/A Trophy: I have this spot shared because there are two fairly distinct cultures in such games that I would say have two very different ways of approaching this and they intertwine in some ways.
First off, there is a good chunk of the 5e community, influenced by Critical Roll, that think of the game in fairly role-play centric terms. Not so much so that it overpowers the Build element that is so deeply ingrained in the design but it comes close. These players like to dress up as their characters, speak in character most of the time, and do YouTube videos where they introduce their characters to their audience.
On the other hand, you have the munchkins and the power gamers. I would like to say that I actually don't see too much wrong with this kind of play if everyone at the table is ok with it and nobody is cheating. I have played in quite a few games with such people who really just don't care about roleplay at all. They like to smash things with their builds and then set fire to orphans. For such people their characters are trophies. "Look what my build did!" "One time we killed an entire village because I fire balled an oil barrel!" "I did 11d6 damage with a single hit at level 2!" "I remember the time we ruled over those peasants like angry gods and made them carry all our loot for us!"
#3 A Vessel for the Players: This comes last because adventure design for such games is typically a progression of scenes following the DM's story. Players don't take much interest in making their own choices about how to really direct the narrative unless is it for the purpose of murder hoboing. The Players sit back and go along for the ride, waiting for the cutscenes to end so they can get back to killing the baddies or enslaving the peasants or chit chatting in characters with their palls. None of this is bad and if they have a good time with it, then so be it.
Story Games
I'd like to tread carefully here because, though I have had a little more experience with story games since last theory post, my knowledge of such games is still rather incomplete. Thus, what follows is just my perceptions based on my own experience.
#1 A Role Playing Edifice: Story games tend to focus on characters as people with their own aims which drive the narrative. The game is less about doing any one particular thing and more about exploring these characters. Burning Wheel is a great example. The whole point is to test the character's beliefs and watch them change. There are also XP rewards built into most story games which encourage players to act as their character would act and follow their character's goals. In the case of many Pbta games, this means actually doing what your character would do to the detriment of themselves or the party. Hurting the party's progress because your character would do so is something that would be very obnoxious to a lot of OSR players for reasons mentioned already.
#2 A Set of Tools: A lot of story games build in the ways the player can take narrative control into the kind of character they are playing. In the case of a game like Fellowship, your tools for controlling the narrative are related directly to which race you are playing. This would seems to be broadly the case, but doesn't account for all kinds of story games.
#3 Vessel/Trophy: I put these at the end because I am really not sure as to how much either is applicable to story games. In story games, it seems to me that the characters really aren't as much vessels because the mechanics of the game disconnect them from their characters to offer them narrative control. In the same way, it seems the trophy of such play is the narrative created as a whole as opposed to any singular character. My knowledge of story game culture is pretty limited so others more steeped in it can probably do more detailed analysis on this front.
I'd love to hear other points of view on this matter. Let's make theory talk cool again!
I want to premise this by saying that I know some readers took issue with how I discussed story games and "trad" games in my "What's the Deal with DCC?" post. I do want to say that I don't actually hate either of these kinds of games and I will endeavor to be more precise and make fewer generalizations in the future.
And the Mountain View by American Folklore Album cover. I found this image and really wanted to use it. There is no better reason for its inclusion.
So let's list out what a character is:
A Roleplaying Edifice
A character is a mask we put on during the game. They have backstories, personalities, sometimes funny voices (I like giving my characters funny voices), and their own goals and desires.
A Vessel for the Player
To maintain the fiction of the setting, in most cases, players need a character that belongs in the setting. More than that, the player character is a kind of automaton, like the mars drone. It gives a body in the fiction through which the player experiences and interacts with the world of the game.
A Set of Tools
The character comes equipped with various tools for interrogating and interacting with the setting. We differentiate which tools players get because the game is collaborative. The tools we give players also outlines what kind of game is being played. Thief skills are a great example because Thief skills are usually mostly about things that are important in a dungeon more so than in any other situation.
A Trophy
A player character is the result of all the things that character has done. Their loot, mutations, scars, and stories are a kind of trophy, a symbol of past glories. Characters are also trophies in the sense that their survival is often a sign of victory and losing one's character a sign of defeat. Now it is true that you can roll up another character and hop in, but there is still defeat in that loss and the loss of one character might lead to the loss of the whole party which is definitely a failure state.
I think different kinds of games prioritize these elements differently. I will make an effort to argue how each kind of game does it.
OSR
#1 A Vessel for the Player: OSR games definitely highly prioritize this element. I think this is spurred on by the speed of play. In a lot of OSR games that I have played in or run, there is a definite drive to accomplish something in a session. Rooms need to be cleared. Treasure needs to be gained. Gold for XP really incentivizes play with a little more speed and little of that time is spent on role play. The player is the one making decisions and using their skills to overcome obstacles more than the character. Since player skill is so highly valued, the vessel becomes more and more valued than the roleplay because the player is more important than the character.
#2 A Trophy: OSR adventure design delights in scars, mutations, and trauma. These are signs that the player character has done interesting things. Since the role-playing element is so far down the list, the torment the character experiences is more comedic than tragic. The stores that OSR players tell are often related to the ways their characters were morphed and changed. This is especially different to 5e and Pathfinder attitudes where substantial changes to the character are less desirable because they have spent so much time creating them that to mess that creation up is like ruining their sand castle.
#3 A Set of Tools: The only reason this is so far down the list is that in a lot of OSR games, rolling is a punishment. For the vast majority of the time, it is far more desirable to plan in ways that eliminate the area of risk that provokes a roll. Of course, a lot of the tools given by the game are tools that involve rolling, which honestly makes them somewhat liminal.
#4 A Roleplaying Edifice: The game is about going into tombs and looting them. If your character can't get on board with that due to their moral concerns, phobia of tight spaces, or backstory then why are we even playing the game? Every element of the game subjugates role-play. You don't get to hold onto a stable image of who this character is because that is up to the dice. No matter how awesome your backstory says you are, you can always Nat 1 and get stabbed to death by a bunch of goblins. As mentioned above, a lot of restrictions based around this kind of play tend to subjugate roleplay to passing jokes and sessions where there is more social interaction and less dungeon delving.
5e, Pathfinder, and the like...
I have actually played quite a few games with people who enjoy crafting these builds and it can be fun to pick the right options to pump out a load of damage. It is evident that this is what the designers have mostly set these games up for this purpose and made options like the rolling for stats the nonstandard approach. Random generation of characters in hardly considered but they will give you packages that pick fairly optimal choices if you want to speed up low level character creation. SO much of the design and the culture is aimed at these builds, thus Set of Tools must take up the #1 spot.
#2 A Roleplaying Edifice/A Trophy: I have this spot shared because there are two fairly distinct cultures in such games that I would say have two very different ways of approaching this and they intertwine in some ways.
First off, there is a good chunk of the 5e community, influenced by Critical Roll, that think of the game in fairly role-play centric terms. Not so much so that it overpowers the Build element that is so deeply ingrained in the design but it comes close. These players like to dress up as their characters, speak in character most of the time, and do YouTube videos where they introduce their characters to their audience.
On the other hand, you have the munchkins and the power gamers. I would like to say that I actually don't see too much wrong with this kind of play if everyone at the table is ok with it and nobody is cheating. I have played in quite a few games with such people who really just don't care about roleplay at all. They like to smash things with their builds and then set fire to orphans. For such people their characters are trophies. "Look what my build did!" "One time we killed an entire village because I fire balled an oil barrel!" "I did 11d6 damage with a single hit at level 2!" "I remember the time we ruled over those peasants like angry gods and made them carry all our loot for us!"
#3 A Vessel for the Players: This comes last because adventure design for such games is typically a progression of scenes following the DM's story. Players don't take much interest in making their own choices about how to really direct the narrative unless is it for the purpose of murder hoboing. The Players sit back and go along for the ride, waiting for the cutscenes to end so they can get back to killing the baddies or enslaving the peasants or chit chatting in characters with their palls. None of this is bad and if they have a good time with it, then so be it.
Story Games
I'd like to tread carefully here because, though I have had a little more experience with story games since last theory post, my knowledge of such games is still rather incomplete. Thus, what follows is just my perceptions based on my own experience.
#1 A Role Playing Edifice: Story games tend to focus on characters as people with their own aims which drive the narrative. The game is less about doing any one particular thing and more about exploring these characters. Burning Wheel is a great example. The whole point is to test the character's beliefs and watch them change. There are also XP rewards built into most story games which encourage players to act as their character would act and follow their character's goals. In the case of many Pbta games, this means actually doing what your character would do to the detriment of themselves or the party. Hurting the party's progress because your character would do so is something that would be very obnoxious to a lot of OSR players for reasons mentioned already.
#2 A Set of Tools: A lot of story games build in the ways the player can take narrative control into the kind of character they are playing. In the case of a game like Fellowship, your tools for controlling the narrative are related directly to which race you are playing. This would seems to be broadly the case, but doesn't account for all kinds of story games.
#3 Vessel/Trophy: I put these at the end because I am really not sure as to how much either is applicable to story games. In story games, it seems to me that the characters really aren't as much vessels because the mechanics of the game disconnect them from their characters to offer them narrative control. In the same way, it seems the trophy of such play is the narrative created as a whole as opposed to any singular character. My knowledge of story game culture is pretty limited so others more steeped in it can probably do more detailed analysis on this front.
I'd love to hear other points of view on this matter. Let's make theory talk cool again!
I think this is overall a good framework for thinking about characters from these three kinds of games.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, I'm increasingly less convinced that these differences are actually driven by the mechanics per se, and have much more to do with the creator intent, preconceived notions, and culture around those games.
5e is a perfect example of this, in line with the reasons you outline. It's not all that mechanically different from 3.5/Pathfinder/"Munchkin" games, but it was written in a way that was meant to evoke "narrative" style of play, and then Critical Roll ran with that and was massively successful, so now there are many people who think of D&D as a "narrative" game.
I plan on doing a post about this on highlevelgames.ca/blog at some point so I'm not going to go into too much detail right now, but I also don't think the mechanical differences between for instance OSR and FATE or Dungeon World are that much different than people make them out to be, in large part because both styles of game are so rules light in the first place. They're just slightly different ways of framing things, but either one you can play either way, and I don't even necessarily think that one style of game is better suited to one style of play than another, except for our preconceived notions towards them. In fact, one of the only core tenants of OSR that people agree on is "rulings over rules", and DIY practically by definition means it can be anything.
I think we all let Zak dictate the conversation (not that everyone who disagrees with me on this is a Zak-supporter or anything like that!), even people who disagreed with him, but personally I don't see why Dungeon World is any less DIY than any other OSR, it just happens to be DIY by way of PbtA. In fact, Dungeon World is mechanically more like OSR than certain new-wave OSR systems, so the only thing that really makes those new-wave OSR systems more OSR is how those mechanics fit the OSR philosophy, which as I'm saying I really think doesn't matter as much as people have convinced themselves it does anyway, and has much more to do with the culture.
And even for more mechanical games like 5e / Pathfinder, I used to have much stronger feelings about this, about how having more rules means limiting the possibility-space rather than expanding it, but even that I've started to convince myself is less true than I once thought. Even then, I think it comes down more to just the kinds of logistics and incentives you've described; in a game where making character builds is laborious, and where many of the players find the process of building the character itself rewarding, then the more random aspects of OSR are unappealing, but principally there's no reason why you couldn't play 5e like that, and I don't think it's even necessarily the case that it's less suited to be played like that (then the fun in the build comes from figuring out how to make those disadvantageous random effects like mutation or mutilation work for you despite your original plans).
Anyway, this ended up being a much longer rant than I had intended haha, but good post!
Thank you, Max! I do disagree slightly. There is a cultural element which I do think is a part of the game experience of that there is no doubt. Design culture is totally a thing. I guess I think that wen you apply rules changes the DIY way, then yes, any game can fit any situation because you are crafting it to ft, I guess I would ask which ones leave you with an easier starting point for making your changes? I would say that you can't really make 5e into a more OSR style of play without simplifying and speeding up character creation and reducing the power level of PCs which is going against a lot of what the game is designed around. The base game engine might be ported over to something more OSR, see Five Torches Deep, but once again they are throwing out a lot of 5e stuff and really just using its mechanical framework. Dungeon World is a great example of a game which really isn't a story game, per say. Though another Pbta cousin of it, Fellowship most certainly is. Dungeon World doesn't really give a lot of narrative control to the player verses the gm. Fellowship really goes into sharing it around. I think this speaks to the versatility of Pbta, though I still think of such games as clunky and difficult to sort out for starting players.
DeleteI really do think games are more mechanically integrated than we sometimes think they are and that these mechanics do encourage different kinds of play, sometimes dramatically so, but if you take take the hammer to a system and are willing to dig deep into its gears, you can change it to suit your needs.
I think games are less mechanically integrated than people (at least in the blogosphere / deep into RPGs) think haha. I do agree that it the bigger gap would be between OSR/storygames and Munchkin games, but I think that has more to due with the logistics of the sheer number of mechanics than the mechanics per se.
DeleteI actually don't have a ton of experience with PbtA besides Dungeon World, and even that only a little bit, so I try to avoid overstating things with PbtA.
At least with FATE, I think the in practice the difference between FATE and for instance OSR has less to do with the mechanics per se and more to do with the culture, as I've already said, but also the probability distributions of the dice. If you take an OSR mindset to FATE or a FATE mindset to OSR and/or swap a d20 for FUDGE dice or FUDGE for d20, I think in practice you'll find they're not that different. That difference (the mindset, or the dice probabilities) is not nothing, but it's much less than I think most people talking about these issues make it out to be.
Honestly I can't say much about FATE. I know there is some narrative control that it can offer the players, but I know little more. I think different games focus on different pleasures, see Ben Ls' recent theory posts. You might certainly rig a system to do something different than it started as. The main question would be how much narrative control does it offer the players. Because I consider the GM/play divide to be important to to maintaining the OSR pleasure of discovery,
DeleteFate allows players to declare facts in the game via Fate Points, so it likely doesn't fit that requirement.
DeleteThis is an interesting way of showing the differences I always feel between D&D games and other games, when you take it apart like that it makes total sense.
ReplyDeleteI dislike D&D - 5e the least though - and one of the main reasons is the collection of powers feel. It's like "tell me about your character" only gets as far as "oh yeah they're great, they can do 4d8 damage per turn..."
Yeah 5e really puts the tools out front in such a major way that the culture around it has been encouraged to think of the tools before the personality or aesthetics of the character.
DeletePoop, did my comment get lost or is it waiting approval?
ReplyDeleteI guess it got lost. I don't see it in the spam folder and I don't have the "wait for approval" option on.
DeleteOk so reiterating what I said: the comment that " In the case of many Pbta games, this means actually doing what your character would do to the detriment of themselves or the party. Hurting the party's progress because your character would do so is something that would be very obnoxious to a lot of OSR players for reasons mentioned already" is a bit shortsighted, because very few PbtA games are actually concerned with "the party" as a unit.
DeletePbtA games, on average, play out in the way that ensemble tv shows do - where each character has their own things going on, and sometimes act against other PCs because *that's one of the best things in ensemble shows* - divided and varying loyalty.
And the games not only encourage this, but often balance it well as a part of the system. You cannot easily do this sort of thing in a D&D alike, because the outcomes of most actions that are not combat are up to GM fiat. That makes it more of a guessing game than something you can weigh the chances of.
It seems to me that my point stands. Doing your own thing to the detriment of the party would be annoying in the OSR whereas in Pbta its ok and expected. This is fine and is not meant as an indictment of the engine. Its just a difference with the OSR.
DeleteLet me rephrase: if a PbtA game had a "party" (see Masks, for example), then working against the party is absolutely discouraged. The same is true of Dungeon World (typical D&D alignment issues aside).
DeleteBut if you look at most other PbtA games (Apocalypse World, for example) there is no concept of a cohesive party, so you can't act toward the detriment of the party. You can simply act against other characters.
Ah I see. Fair enough.
Delete