Someone mentioned to me, that Mind-Share Effectiveness as defined by Vincent Baker is also Mary-Sue-Potential and thereby not so desirable.
What do you think?
Someone mentioned to me, that Mind-Share Effectiveness as defined by Vincent Baker is also Mary-Sue-Potential and…
Someone mentioned to me, that Mind-Share Effectiveness as defined by Vincent Baker is also Mary-Sue-Potential and…
Is there a link to the definition somewhere?
Look here:
http://apocalypse-world.com/forums/index.php?topic=472.0
I read it, although I don’t really get the “mindshare” thing.
Well, since he never really defines what mindshare effectiveness is (and I don’t even know what the hell he’s talking about), I’d say that someone is talking out their ass.
It seems to me that mind-share effectiveness is somewhat like “grabbiness of the concept”. I’m not following how it necessarily leads to Mary-Sue territory, I would normally think that you’d need omnicompetence for that. I do think there’s a danger of having too strong a differential in mind-share effectiveness between characters because of how it would make players feel over time (e.g. if one player/character gets a lot of “unearned” attention it might cause some resentment). This seems to be the idea behind making the other two kinds of effectiveness a simultaneous constraint, so that if your concept is very intrinsically grabby maybe you’re not also very mechanically effective and fiction-shaping, while another character might not be as intrinsically grabby but might be grabby because of how consequential they are (being high up on all three axes sounds more like the classic Mary Sue problem to me).
Still not sure what it represents, so let’s use play example we know of characters that have, as Vincent says on the forum, Z > 1: the Battlebabe and the Faceless.
Is the Battlebabe a Mary Sue? Hell, no. The Battlebabe is dangerous and sexy, but there’s tons of circumstances where a Battlebabe will be outgunned and in danger. The Battlebabe lives dangerously and takes risk, which is not much “Mary sue-y” as it means it’s not perfect and infallible.
The Faceless is probably more mechanically effective than the Battlebabe, but at the same time has much more problems in influencing the plot via means that are not physical violence. The faceless is isolated, in a way, and often suffers because of it.
+Alberto Muti I can’t explain the reason, but now I get a general sense of the whole hing, thank you!
Lenny Pacelli, thank you! i’m… not even sure of what i said ^^
Alberto Muti instinctively I get an idea of what you mean, well, maybe. Anyway, I have a better idea now then I had before!
It’s a neat concept, and I like what Vincent Baker talks about re: mechanical vs. narrative effectiveness.
I think a rough definition/measure of mindshare effectiveness could be “what proportion of your memories around the game concern this character?” Kick-Ass then provides a good example – a disproportionate number of the memorable scenes revolve around Hit-Girl, and she’s not the protagonist of the movie and gets less screen time than Kick-Ass.
Mindshare effectiveness may lead to Mary-Sue-dom in devolved cases (I’m not convinced of that yet, myself), but mechanical effectiveness leads to muchkins/powergaming in the devolved cases, and I’m sure there’s an equivalent for narrative effectiveness as well, I just haven’t formulated it yet.
also, ust to be provocative:
are we sure these are problems, in the context of AW? wouldn’t know about Mary Sue-ing, but i’ve had players play in an aggressive way, bearing the mechanics in mind and “powergaming”, in a way, and, because the system of AW is so solid, that totally worked towards a good story.
In a well-designed system, power-gaming is desirable, as the reward structure of the game is designed to produce the results that are desired within the game itself.
I’m not an AW expert, but consider Fate: It’s intended that characters always try to use their peak skills, and try to manipulate events so that their stunts/aspects are at play, because that produces the desired characterization and the desired fictional results. The system is also tight enough that it’s harder to abuse and get into the worst excesses, and the “real” game is in the Fate Point economy.
You could say that “power-gaming” has a (rightful) bad rap because it often occurs in games where the supposed goals of the game differ from the mechanical reward structure in the game. Personally, I’d consider that bad design, or at the minimum, a questionable design choice.
AW seems to be at least as well designed as Fate, so no, I’m not sure that it’s a problem.
I find that balance considerations are uninteresting in AW. Single rolls can transmute horrible threats into allies afterall!
Having a stat at +3 and moves to make all basic moves use that stat might seem mechanically advantageous but it is also self-censoring: is weird-for-under-fire really as fun to play with as something like Frenzy? Does it matter that the Gunlugger can kill EVERYONE with a bloodcrazed AP grenade? It does – but mostly only because they don’t (usually) and then do other things.
I really think this mindshare business is a little odd – I like idea of conceptual appeal more but I don’t know if you can build this in. Most of the archetypes are pretty damn appealing!