Is anyone still following this?

 And if so, did you know that I have a new band?

They're called Manifest Zone, and yes: that is an Eberron reference.

I may have gotten out of blogging, but if you've been wondering what I've been up to in the interim... /gestures wildly at cosmic nu-metal

www.manifestzone.net

I Reject Your Reality, and Substitute My Own: Persuasion in a Fact-Resistant Climate

Content advisory: opinions on ethical advertising, passing mention of personal mental health, and a naughty word or two.

Persuasion in a fact-resistant culture

Cognitive Dissonance is a tricky thing. You can craft a perfectly logical, fact-based argument, but if it contains information that the audience doesn't like, all the facts in the world don't matter.

The response is not to question one's own beliefs, but to disregard facts that contradict them1.

This is why narratives are so powerful. They're a tool, like anything else. They can be used for good, evil, greed, altruism... anything. But they're necessary in persuasion.

Necessary.

As someone who thinks about the ethics of persuasion a disproportionate amount, I think it's important to remember the power of stories. If you're on the receiving end of a story, I recommend taking a step back and trying to look at the facts. If you're trying to impart facts, I recommend employing a narrative to communicate them.

Wild Speculation: The advent of the memetic age probably has a lot to do with this. Memes tell a story. Just like political cartoons that draw an analogy by writing the names of things on their iconography, so too does the modern meme express ideas via rough contextual iconography. /Wild Speculation

Humans are herd creatures, and out instincts push us to be skeptical of new information... unless we're in one of those BLAZE ALL THE TRAILS moods.

Does this mean that facts have no value? Quite the opposite. If you aren't coming from a factually robust place, you're selling snake oil: and will come back to haunt you. Narratives aren't an excuse to go full-on SalesBro and push vaporware on your audience.

Not only is that unethical2, it's also terrible strategy. You'll destroy your long-term positioning, as well as immediately shut down anyone who's critically thinking while engaging with your message. Some of those folks will be opinion leaders3, and guess what? They’ll tell stories to their friends: stories about how full of crap you are. It’s just not worth it.

Teenage me was fond of saying "if you hold beliefs that you haven't questioned down to their core, you don't hold those beliefs. You're just doing as you're told."

When I eventually realized the immense hypocrisy of me saying that without questioning my own beliefs, it wound up with me radically uprooting my beliefs, the structures and communities I was part of... it was destructive. Wonderful, but hardly harmonious.

Bottom line? This shit's hard. So if we're trying to do something gentler - like say, inform dental patients of the benefits of a computer-guided implant surgery - we can't just hit'em with facts and trust that to be enough. Those facts need context.

A Narrative.

Humans tell stories. It's what we do.

Okay, but what about neurodivergence? Not every brain works the same way, Killstring.

Legit! My own weird brain chemistry issues (anxiety etc.) are a fine example. That said, I'm not really an expert on the topic, so I don't want to just run my mouth and make assumptions. But if your audience is engaging in a more evidence-based, factual analysis of your argument, well... your argument is factually robust, right?

It had better be.

Narratives are not a substitute for content. Once more for the sales team in the back: narratives are not a substitute for robust content. Brand management is relationship management: let's not sabotage ourselves for a quick fix.

In other words...

Don't burn a bridge just to look brighter in the moment.

~Killstring

1. The study that sparked this ramble. Text of said study.
2. Yeah, I said it. Fight me.
3. Two-Step Flow theory of communication. Wikipedia's got a dope overview.

x

Been a while. RPG Advancement & Experience Thoughts

Since the death of Google+ has essentially rendered my blog inert,I haven't rambled here in a while. So I'mma do that now.

Let's talk about advancement.

I recently finished playing in a phenomenal Invisible Sun game (shout out to Ms. Watson for doing a phenomenal job all around). At the game's conclusion, some of us were discussing different things we did and did not like about the system.
One player adored the milestone-based XP and advancement, whereas I really bounced off of it. Interestingly enough, we both cited the same specific and general reasons.
In my experience, having XP tied to character arcs felt limiting, like I couldn't do what I wanted to, because I'd only get XP for what I said my character would be doing two weeks, or more likely a month ago. If something came up in the game, I felt like I was punished for being in the moment, instead of saying "everybody stop and do what I want."
Interestingly enough, my fellow player listed it as their favorite xp experience ever. Which surprised me, given how much stress it looked (to me) like it was causing them. But I read that completely incorrectly, it seems. Either way, modifications were made to the advancement system to accommodate many players having issue with it.

Reality vs. Expectations

Upon reflection, it's worth noting that I was rarely hurting for "xp" in the system. Despite my feelings of being "punished," I probably accumulated more XP over the course of the game than any other single player, and I had plenty sitting around unspent for long stretches.

So why the disconnect? How could I be objectively benefiting from the system, while simultaneously feeling like I was being punished by it?

Couple answers. One of which is that I didn't necessarily connect with the descriptions of what did and did not count as a milestone. My GM interpreted things much more generously than I did (which is my paradigm in running games as well), but it didn't always feel like I was doing it "right," I guess. Is this just me being old-fashioned? I don't think so. I was super hyped for this part of the system: I wanted it to be really good. I expected to love it. Instead, I was frustrated at every turn.

Is this an indictment of the system? Did I engage with it in some weird fashion?

Who knows. As with most things, engaging with this is probably different for someone who doesn't have to deal with clinical anxiety. I tend to view such mechanical incentives through a lens of minimizing unwanted anxiety and stress, rather than maximizing positive experience. I never truly know if I'm overestimating the negative effects of such stressors on other participants, even if I go to pains to find out.

What I do know, is that it's a great opportunity to talk about achievements in games both digital and analog. So I'mma do that. :D

Achievement Unlocked

Anyone who's played a modern video game is familiar with the concept, but to break it down for our purposes, a capitol a Achievement commemorates you doing a particular thing. Maybe it's for romancing 30 kobolds, or baking 3 perfect cakes in a row. Maybe it's for progressing through the story, or finally beating a given boss.

You do the specific thing. That gets noted.

And usually, that's it. Hooray, good for you, have a sticker. TBH, that's never done much for me on itself. It can be nice, I guess, but I'm not an achievement hunter, never have been. It's fine if you are, but I am not.

Which is not to say that the concept has never worked for me. Far from it.

Unlocking Achievements

Let's use the Mass Effect video games as an example. This might not be exact -- it's been a hot minute -- but there were two main methods of achievements in-game. Now I don't mean the metagame stuff -- Playstation trophies, Steam achievements, or whatnot -- I mean in-game. In ME2, you could achieve little milestones like "defeat 50 enemies with tech abilities" or "kill 100 [badguytype]." And upon doing so, you got a nice little bonus, like +x to tech damage, or increased critical chance against [badguytype].

Am I misremembering the specifics? Almost certainly. But the point is, these gave me in-game candy for doing a thing, and I loved it to death.

Companion Quests are also an achievement of a sort, and more in line with tabletop RPG achievement norms. Your squadmate has a personal thing, doing their quest is how you unlock their ultimate combat skills, as well as getting their own business wrapped up.

I loved this. I loved every part of this. Especially since it wasn't the only means of advancement. I didn't feel like I was "wasting my time" if I did something else, it just made these actions feel significant, and tied to my character's growth.

Is there a point?

Probably! Almost certainly.

Can we get to it, then?

Ugh, fine.

I'm interested in seeing achievement-based advancement in analog RPGs, but maybe not as the sole means of character progression. Rather, I'd like to see peripheral -- but desirable -- elements tied to this. Invisible Sun missed a huge opportunity, with its different advancement currencies, and myriad of "I spend a resource to get new stuff on my sheet" options. Instead of like, abilities, feats, stunts or whatever, we had Order Ranks, Forte Abilities, and Secrets on top of advancing skills and the attribute pools.

So what if Secrets (basically cool tricks like D&D Feats) were tied to different milestones? Want the Lethal Lore secret (+3 damage on your attacks?) You could do "defeat X enemies," but that's a digital conceit. Instead, what if we tied it to something like completing your vengeance plot arc? Or successfully defending a group of characters from a threat? Any of the normal character arc stuff in the game. Even outside of a game with these kinds of options, there's room to explore. And I rather want to.

Anti-Achievements, or Flaws

I'm also inspired by the Outer Worlds' flaw system: you don't pick them at character creation, you are offered them during play. I fell from a lot of high places, and was offered an acrophobia flaw. That made sense. (I hit the wrong button to accept, but that's neither here nor there.) This thing has happened to the character: would you like mechanical reinforcement, and a goodie as well? It gives an interesting character beat, as well as some systemic reinforcement.

What makes this work for me

Whether it's tracking xp for killing each monster, using character arcs, or specific times you succeed (or fail) at a particular task, character advancement is a powerful incentive to what you want your game to be about. My favorite method (session's over, everybody gets X experience points) is essentially punting the issue downfield. It avoids the pitfalls of incentive-based xp, but, you know... does little to offer incentives.
On the flip side, achievement-only advancement feels punitive to me. Just like not killing monsters in traditional D&D can actively harm your character growth, if you're doing anything besides chasing these specific milestones, it can feel like you're sabotaging yourself. This disincentives anything besides these arcs.
Maybe that leads to a tight, focused game experience. Or maybe it leads to a choice between what the player wants to do, what the character would do, and what the system says they should do. And that's a design challenge I'm always interested in overcoming.
So is this a long-winded way of saying "RPGs could benefit from being more like these video games I like?" Yes. Welcome to the blog. :D But providing a steady stream of advancement opportunity in concert with incentivizing specific elements is a tantalizing proposal in my eyes. I think I'll try it for the next game that I run.
What are your thoughts? Is my own mental health stuff clouding my objectivity here? How do you interact with these elements: any horror stories or tales of glory you'd like to share? Any suggestions as to how to implement these things?

Not to sound like your favorite YouTubers, but let me know in the comments!

--Stay rad, my friends

~Killstring

Infinity Cheat Sheets

I made some cheat sheets for the Infinity RPG. Others (such as the excellent Jens Christian Ploug) have made more exhaustive sheets, which are worth checking out. These are simple handouts, somewhat lacking in info when compared to the awesome GM screen that's coming out and these other entries.

But I think they're pretty easy to read, and feel super legit to me. I faked our awesome layout guru's style well enough, I think. So yeah: they look slick, and should be a good handout for demo games, con games, new players, or people like me who can't keep all this stuff in their brain.

No more Teasing: Here are your HYPER LINKS  (they are actually pretty calm):

THIS IS THE VERSION FOR YOUR SCREEN

THIS IS THE VERSION FOR PRINTING though it works on your screen too

wooo, how 'bout that?

~Killstring

You're in the Danger Zone (2d20 Combat)

Zones! They're great. But for folks who are used to pulling out a measuring tape, it can be a bit of a transition. Combat in 2d20 is much more narratively dynamic than a lot of turn-based tactics games: there's a lot going on, and abstraction is part of what makes that go.

But first, let's talk about zone maps.

Talkin' 'Bout Zones

So, let's take a look at a cool piece of isometric art.

Awesome isomeric art courtesy of jgrainger.deviantart.com.

Pretty rad scene, right? Nice little cafe. What a great place to have a shootout! But to do that, we'll want to divy it up into zones. Looking at the art, I see six distinct areas of interest:

1. Outside
2. Center Tables
3. Couch area
4. Bar
5. Left 1-Top
6. Right 1-Top

Thinking in Inifnity terms, the chairs, tables, and glass probably provides Light Cover, whereas the bar provides Heavy Cover. 

So my zone map might look something like this: 

If this is too small, click here for a larger version.

What a wonderful place to get shot coffee.

Zones are Groups, not Just Distance

Obviously, distance plays a part in things. But zones are often full of stuff. In our above example, somebody on the north side and south side of the "Couch Zone" aren't next to each other, but moving around in that zone isn't a big deal.

So let's say that Miyamoto Musashi is trying to enjoy his latte in peace, but Joan of Arc is playing her French Canadian indie rock too loud. This being Infinity, shit's about to get real

So! Musashi wants to violently interact with Joan. He can shoot at her with his pistol (or throw a baguette at her, if he's not that angry): that's close range, so no penalties: though she is going to benefit from the light cover. Or, he could make his way over and punch Joan: that's actually easy too! Move past couches, vault over them, whatever: all that stuff is in close range: moving to any point within that zone is a free action. So vault that couch, and get within Reach: it's still a free action to get there. Then the punching can commence.

One thing to take away from this, is that they're not just standing there: they're moving around. Combat is dynamic: so just because someody's in a zone, that doesn't mean that they're standing there, making it easy to hit them, right? 

It's dynamic. Fluid. There's a lot of motion going on.

At Home on With the Range

But distance is a thing too. 

So after all this ruckus, the nice Hasassin Lasiq who runs the cafe has just had enough of these recreations wrecking her shop. So she pulls out her Viral Sniper Rifle, and takes aim.

Somebody woke up on the wrong side of the bed.

She's in the Bar zone, and they're in the Couch Zone, with Center Table Zone inbetween. So while it might be counter-intuitive to think of it, this is actually long range: perfect for a sniper. With no range penalties, Joan and Miyamoto are in some trouble: reluctantly, they agree to stop fighting, and settle their dispute with a game of dominoes. 

"But Killstring: that's awfully close for 'Long Range'"

Yep! That's the adjustment I was talking about. RPGs tend to happen in closer quarters than miniatures games: it's a different genre of expression, if you like. Just like how in a kung fu film, everybody knows how to block, but in a beat'em up video game, hardly anyone does. 

But more importantly, the long-range weapon is good at taking aim and firing in a precise manner: you wouldn't want to shoot it from the hip. So yeah, in the manga-inspired, kinetic action of Infinity, this is a perfectly reasonable range to fire a sniper rifle in.

"Ok, fine. But what about long Long Range? Does that still work?"

Yep! It's just about finding a shot.

So let's say that you're at a football field. (Non-American football, 'cause that's what I got art for)

https://phuymatric.deviantart.com/art/Basic-Isometric-Football-field-521360372. Pretty Cool!

That's a big open space! I'd say that each colored bleacher would be its own zone, each half of the pitch would be one, and the different sidelines would each be one too. With big zones like these, rounds might be a little longer, right? None of this D&D 3 seconds tomfoolery: this is cinematic. The rounds are as long as makes sense for what's going down.

On the topic of what's going down, Joan never paid her tab at the cafe. The poor Lasiq just wanted to retire in peace and make coffee: but she cannot abide by this insult. Thus, she hunts Joan to a football match. 

Joan likes to watch from the corner don't ask me why it is a mystery

So! Taking care not to shoot any of the players, the Lasiq takes aim. It's 3 zones away: that's Extreme range. It's a +1 to her difficulty, but that's nothing she can't handle. She takes aim, and the paintball hits, thoroughly embarrassing St. Joan during her day at the stadium. Mission accomplished.

If there weren't players on the pitch, the field might be one zone, so this might only be Long Range. It really depends on the scene. Bottom line: zones are full of stuff. That stuff, more than meters as the crow flies, determines how hard it is to get a bead on a target for ranged attacks, how easy it is to move, etc. People in 2d20 combat aren't sitting still: they're scrambling, moving, ducking for cover, and so on.

"So Wait, I have to make a map any time I wanna do stuff?"

Not at all! But it's probably a good idea to make a couple so that you get a feel for it. Zones are more art than science: I spend a lot of time saying "I think that's probably a zone, " and going from there. While you're likely to want visual representation every now and again, hopefully everybody gets enough of a feel for this that winging it becomes second nature.

"What was that? I think I zoned out."

It's cool, I'm zoned-out too. 

Anyway, hope that's useful! Perhaps next time, we'll talk about Quantronic Zones, for hacking adventures.

Until then, be excellent to each other!

~Killstring

Conflict in 2d20

(Or as I like to call it, The Infinity Engine¹)

Now that Infinity is finally in the hands of Kickstarter backers, folks are gearing up to run and play their first games. It's an exciting time!

This boy is very excited, and not at all asleep.

But with that excitement comes questions. Infinity has a couple subsystems - Acquisition, Combat, Hacking, Psywar - and this can seem kind of daunting at first glance. Systems like Shadowrun have trained a lot of gamers to brace for radically different mechanics in these subsystems, and while there can be merit to that approach, it understandably rankles people, and/or turns them off to the game.

"It's all one system. Learn one, and you know them all."

Understandably, some people have been asking about the different systems in Infinity, trying to make heads or tails of them. To that end, I've prepared this simple guide, but the most important thing to remember is that it's all one system. Learn one, and you know them all.

What do I mean by that? Read on.

The Core Mechanic

If you wanna do something in a 2d20 game, you roll... 2d20! Or 3, 4, 5, d20s, if you feel like adding extra dice to improve your odds, usually done by increasing Heat. You add the attribute and skill appropriate to the test together, and anything that rolls at or below that number is a success. Hooray for success! If you get more successes then necessary, you generate Momentum, which can be used to do all kinds of neat stuff. 

So that's the core. Pretty simple once you've done it a time or two: there are options at every stage, but it's as simple as:

1. Pick up your dice
2. Roll those dice
3. Compare results to a target number

... which should be pretty familiar to people who roll dice.

The Conflict Engine

The core mechanic can get you through just about anything. Depending on your playstyle, you might never use anything else. As an aside, I've absolutely run games with very story-focused players where treating Ballistics like any other skill check was the way to go². But we have these cool systems, and it'd be a shame to not use them. Thankfully, they're pretty easy to get the hang of as well.

Let's say that you have an obstacle, and you want to remove it. Great, let's inflict some damage; that'll do it. The setup here is basically the same.

1. Pick up your dice
2. Roll those Dice
3. Compare results to a target number

...with some added steps. In Infinity, damage is usually 1+ the total of your [CD} (those are the fancy d6s). So we need to roll those too.

1. Roll some fancy d6s (non-fancy is actually just fine)
2. Add up all the ones and twos, and note the sixes (those are Effects)

And that's it for your roll. Then we do stuff with it! 

Stuff

In general, conflict follows a simple process:

1. Take your Damage
2. Subtract [Soak]
3. Apply Damage to [Stress]
4. Possibly add [Harms]

Stress is your incidental damage track. Like HP in D&D or video games, losing it doesn't do anything, but it gets you closer to bad stuff. Harms are your bad stuff: you get them when you run out of stress, take more than 5 damage in a single hit, or both.

And that's it! Now you know everything.

But Killstring, weren't you going to explain combat, hacking, etc?

Yep! And I just did.

Because those are all the same.

Let's say you wanna punch an evil alien. It's pretty evil, so it deserves a sound thrashing. Just follow the above steps. Armour (and maybe Cover) is going to be your Soak, Vigour is your Stress, and Wounds are your Harms. 

But let's say you wanna instead, hack into a soda machine, to get some free soda. Rad. Follow the above steps. Security (and maybe interference) is going to be you soak, Firewall is your Stress, and Breaches are your Harms.

Rinse, repeat. Once you recognize the system, you can quickly handle all the subsystems. Even Buying gear is the same. To paraphrase Nathan Dowdell (who wrote the thing), you can think of a purchase as an attack against your own resources. The item's Cost is your damage, your Earnings is soak, your Cashflow is stress, and any Shortfalls are Harms. And if you wanna go nuts, Assets are kinda like Reloads. :D

How many d20s will this get me? "All of them, Mr. Okada." Then let us make it rain.

And that's basically it.

But what about Psyops, Quantronic Zones, all that stuff?

It's important, sure! But it's still the same thing. 

Physical combat takes place in physical zones. I'f I'mma punch the aforementioned evil alien, I need to walk over to them to do it. Same thing with Quantronic or Social zones. 

Think of it like a dungeon crawl. If the goal is for the adventurers to open the treasure chest, they don't just roll Knowledge: Dungeoneering and get the chest, right? They go through rooms. Some of those rooms have traps. Some of them have baddies to fight. Some have secret passages. 

A big hacking job is the same way. Literally. Draw up a cute little zone map. Decide what connects. Put some stuff in it. The hacker travels from their entry point, to the treasure chest, overcoming obstacles on the way.

Psyops are pretty much the same as well. It gets a little more abstract, but it's basically a social network dungeon crawl.

But Killstring! What if I don't want to do a dungeon crawl for every hack or persuasion?

Then you shouldn't. Honestly, if you do want to, you still maybe shouldn't. Would you model every fight as a dungeon crawl? If I want to just punch this guy, can't I do it? He's right there. Same logic applies elsewhere. There's no need to do a big Psyop to gain access to the CEO of SuperEvilMegacorp, if they're standing in the same line at the coffeeshop, right? I can just start talking. 

The extra systems are ways to do full-on infiltration runs in every aspect of the tripartite battlefield of Infinity. And another way that the combat system = hacking = social. 

Once you get a good feel for one, just keep in mind that the others are pretty much the same. If it ever gets confusing, go with what you know, and work backwards. I know plenty of folks have extensive dungeon crawling experience: put that to work in your hacking runs! I bet you'll be pleased with the results.

Anyway!

I hope that this was useful and/or entertaining to folks. Please feel free to comment or hit me up on G+ or Twitter if I can help clarify anything.

May your games be epic, and not too exhausting to run. 

Be excellent to one another

~Kilstring

* * *

1 - I am so sorry (I am not sorry).

2 - "I wanna shoot the mook in their stupid head." Okay, roll Ballistics, difficulty 1. "Two Hits!" You have shot them in their stupid head. It is now much stupider, due to ventilation. Bye-bye, mook. "Hooray!" Sometimes, that's all that you need.

#RPGaday2017, Day 25: What is the best way to thank your GM?

Part of an ongoing series, occasionally updated in real-time!

Aiming Orbital Blog Cannon...

Aquiring Target...

BLOG!

#RPGaday2017, Day 25: What is the best way to thank your GM?

I'm going to have to echo the always-insightful Mr. Rob Donoghue on this one - convey your appreciation outside of the context of the game. One of my GMs likes to solicit feedback immediately following a game, and while she certainly appreciates hearing what worked right then, it's not really comparable to seeing her face light up when we talk about how awesome things are in the middle of the week. 

Speaking for myself, I'm usually such a disheveled wreck after a long session, that I can't really take much criticism, and I don't really process the praise. But hit me later on when I have a clear head, and there's a ton of impact. Game of Thrones is the current hot "water cooler" show; people will casually talk about it at work or social outings. When your game has the same kind of impact on folks, it can feel really meaningful.

Past that? Anything you can do to reduce the stress load of the GM. If that means handling logistics, giving people rides and such, it can go a long way. I know a lot of people stress out a lot over game prep, and if the GM has to arrange location, transportation, food, schedules, and act as host and MC for the evening, that cuts into the amount of processes they can dedicate to the game proper.

So it's worth spending some time thinking about, even if you're just being selfish. :D

Be excellent to each other.

~Killstring