I’ve got a game design problem for you all.
If a Move represents the smallest point of contact between a given tabletop roleplaying game’s fiction and its mechanics, and is triggered by the fiction, then:
How would you write a Move for live action play?
Note: How to play Apocalypse World as a LARP is beyond the scope of this question. I’m only interested in how you would write a Move into the rules of a theoretical LARP/American Freeform/Jeepform game that you might design.
Uh: “when X, then Y”? I guess I don’t understand the question.
It really is just that simple.
Yeah, I feel like it’d be even easier with LARP? Since you’re already “doing it” whenever you do whatever your LARP rules are? (Like, you’re already swinging your sword when you call out your damage or whatever).
So, I guess… When you fight, call out your damage.
Yeah, I’m not sure I understand, but I think this is an easy solution.
A move is not the smallest point of contact. A move is made of different choices (the lists, the questions, etc.). When a player choose from a list he is using a mechanic. So the smallest point of contact is a single player choice.
From this, applying it to a LARP is trivial: the player choose how to act.
It’s a legit problem and the answer isn’t obvious to me at all.
The game design in larp – at least here in Danish freeform, I don’t know how far I can generalize – is even more thoroughly obscured than in tabletop.
Tim Jensen , do you happen to know the sword fighting mechanism in luke crane ‘s Inheritance larp?
I thought of one! This is from Inheritance. When you want to eavesdrop on other characters’ conversation, cover your name badge with your hand. The other players should continue their conversation normally as though you weren’t there.
Isn’t this simply a form of communication? The player covering his badge is saying “I am hidden”. The tabletop equivalent would be saying “I stay hidden and eavesdrop them”
(I am maybe misunderstanding what Tim meant with “move” here, I was considering the word in the AW sense)
Oh, I agree with Tim that a move is contact with the formal system. The designer intrudes artificial, symbolic action – rolling a die, consulting a list, covering your badge – into free play.
I’m not familiar with Inheritance at all, except that I’ve read that it is an in-development live action version of a BW scenario with predetermined conflict outcomes in sealed envelopes.
I was thinking about the relationship between the fiction and the mechanics of live action games. Maybe these questions are too big to be answered in a G+ post.
In existing LARP systems the ratio of moderators (game masters) to players is much less than in tabletop. The players are having a conversation, and sometimes the conversation triggers engagement with the rules. If you were designing a game for this format, who would you appoint to look for those triggers, how would the ‘move’ operate in the absence of a table or dice, how might the choices be presented, and how do the results of those choices inform the larger narrative involving the other players?
In Rafael Chandler’s Viewscream one guy is instructed, at a certain point, to say X and another guy is instructed to listen for X and has permission to do Y when he hears it.
Tim Jensen If I were designing for that format, I’d try to design moves that are (let’s say) mutually constructive, so that both parties or all parties would be looking for the opportunity to use them, and eager to see them in action.
Unfortunately I don’t have any very good examples of what I mean yet. Apocalypse World and its children so far include a little too much player to player antipathy to make these moves common.
The moves I have in my notebook right now are good examples of mutually constructive moves, but they’re massively list-driven so unsuitable for larp.
Tim Jensen would the “say yes” rule be one example of what you are talking about? It’s triggered by something in the fiction (“somebody says something that wasn’t agreed beforehand”), and says simply “when this happen, consider what was told as true, and build on it”.
Maybe I still don’t understand what makes this hard. It’s no more difficult than a GMless AW hack with fortune-less moves, right? There are lots of AW moves that don’t use dice (Workspace, An arresting skinner, etc). And GMless AW can’t be that difficult (the knife ritual in Mist-Robed Gate is a good example of something structured along those lines).
Here’s a move!
When arguing for something you want, gaze unflinchingly into your target’s eyes. Whoever looks away first must yield. Pick one of the following:
– yield the space (leave and go somewhere else)
– yield the choice (let them decide)
– yield authority (acknowledge their status)
The problem with it being “no more difficult than a GM less AW hack” is that that’s really difficult- Moves are mechanical things triggered by fictional conditions. The nature of larp, without having a GM follow each player around to baby sit them, means that Moves will by necessity be the exact opposite- Mechanical powers/abilities with a fictional trapping. Jonathan, your argue move is a perfect example of that.
In larp, the fiction is the objective experience of play (the performance) + the subjective experience of play (the players’ internal world), yeah? I think you could have moves triggered by either or both aspects, potentially. The move I wrote above is triggered by a desire + an act of performance (staring into someone’s eyes while arguing). You could also have moves triggered by more subjective things like:
When you feel freightened, embrace that feeling and delve deeper into it rather than running away. Ask yourself: what is it about this that I find terrifying? Then speak one aspect of it aloud in a quiet voice; for example, “So alone,” “Helplessness,” or “Impossible to understand.” It’s okay if it only makes sense to you.
I still am not sure I understand the difference, so I am adding other examples to the “say yes” rule, to see if they qualify.
From the “Doubt” Jeepform:
– in the fiction, a protagonist (Jolie OR Tom) can betray the other with a temptation only after meeting that temptation at least twice. So meeting a possible temptation “unlock” that temptation for her/his next scene.
– When Tom or Julia betray the other protagonist (IF there is a betrayal), the other can’t betray the first anymore. He/she is “blocked” from betraying, in the fiction.
– In any moment the “GM” (“Doubt” has one, even if it’s not called with that name) can ask questions to any character. The player will answer them in character, but “out of play” (for example, a typical question is “why did you did that?” or “what were you feeling?”)
In the fisrt two, a fictional trigger open or close possible “moves” in the fiction. In the third one, something in the fiction trigger a question from the “audience” that can be asked to better understand what it’s happening. The fiction doesn’t change as a result, but changes the way it’s perceived and presented.
Limiting the moves might make it easier easier to follow triggers. What if each person had one internal move and one external move? One triggered by actions, another as a reaction…
Jonathan Walton that sounds like a Move, but subjective experience doesn’t affect the shared external narrative directly enough for me. I want it to make sense to everyone.
Moreno Roncucci I think improv’s ‘Say Yes’ counts as a move, although Willow disagrees. Your example from Doubt of locking or unlocking potential choices seems like a workable replacement for picking from lists, at least on the resolution end.
Vincent Baker can you give an example or description of a mutually constructive move?
A crazy question I have is: Would it be possible to play a move’s fictional presentation, trigger identification and resolution in aggregate, to get around the ‘all subjective experience’ in Jonathan’s example? Something along the lines of Undertake Perilous Journey except each job feeds back into the fiction until they clearly trigger a mechanic, which then shapes the external fiction in an obvious manner…could that work?