Goals and the units of play
One of the myths of earlier role-playing was that the game system somehow represented the physics of the alternate world. This can be the case, to an extent. But it was a myth because physics aren’t the only thing rules can represent and, moreover, most rules then weren’t really about physics, though they sometimes pretended to be. Players rarely thought exclusively in physical terms, neverminding the rules (which were often so incoherent you had to put them out of mind to play).
That myth has been successfully busted in the last few years. And while a better understanding of old games is one payoff, the greater one is a diversity of new games, which are very careful about what the rules represent. A central issue is always the “currency” of the game, or the fundamentla units in which most matters are measured or considered. These don’t have to be of a singular type, but are usually of a single flavor (and when not, the dischordance is often painful). These units allow the results of player/character actions to be described and have an effect on the world. You can’t do without them, even if they’re unstated.
Three unit types
I was thinking that perhaps there are three major approaches to these units, coinciding with Ron Edward’s three modes of play. What would an obvious mapping be? Consider the following table, which also shows the kinds of considerations given to random numbers under the given schemes.
| Goal of play | Units | Randomness |
|---|---|---|
| Simulationist | physical—or mental or social—change in the world; difficulty and a sensical response | likelihoods native to the imagined world; maybe maintaining a balance between likely and unlikely events |
| Narrativist | significance of the event to the story; how much it redirects the plot, or changes a character | calibrated for drama |
| Gamist | benefit or harm to the characters (or success more broadly) | chosen for balance between excitement and control (strategy); compare to gambling |
It might make great sense to use units specific to your mode of play, so that everything in the design is focused on that kind of goal, and thus more likely to be coherent (all the parts working together). To think explicitly about these units might help a designer and also even the players.
The empty middle
But perhaps this makes it all too obvious. There has been talk before, by Vincent Baker for example, about leaving a hole in the design where your most central idea lies: that is, if your game is fundamentally about love, you do not have a “love” statistic, or resource, or anything else; instead, all other mechanics tiptoe around love, and the theme will emerge naturally. This gives the players the freedom to explore it; to actually pin it down with hard mechanics makes it too simple. So I wonder whether the above pairings, though intuitive, tread in dangerous territory.
If winning, or proving one’s self as a player, is the goal (as in gamist play), making all the rules unashamedly and obviously phrased in terms of winning may sap the explorative element. Strategies may become obvious, for one thing, but more importantly, the game emotionally becomes transparent: it’s just an exercise in finding the cheese in the maze.
The alternative is a shift away from the obvious, which requires ingenuity from all the players to make the rules—in one kind of unit—function in the service of their real goals—in another, likely unstated unit. The danger is that the gap is too great to bridge. But I’m not advocating designing a game for gamist play and then using it for narrativism; I’m suggesting designing a narrativist game using units that are something more gamist. But will this readily yield a coherent design?
There must be a continuum: at one end, the units matching perfectly with the central goal, and at the other, not matching at all. Perhaps the ideal not a disjunct as big as narrativist with gamist units, but rather narrativist with units not quite at the heart of the matter. It is, I suspect, a delicate balancing act to get this right. Choose units that are too obvious, and the game goes flat; too out of sync, and the players are lost. If you can tread the knife’s edge, though, the design functions in service of the goal, and still stretches the players’ imaginations.
Note: These are idea are explored further in a follow-up article, D&D and the Goal-Unit Gap