Mechanical Rewards for Immersion

[bryant]

Required reading: Breakdown of RPG Players. There are a lot of theories about what people want out of gaming, and then there’s actual market research. I could rant about this more, but I already have.

Preamble and rant done. Okay.

It’s easy to reward Storytellers; you give them more narrative control. Primetime Adventures is a great example of this kind of mechanic; when someone does cool stuff, they get chips which can be cashed in for more control. Nice little positive feedback mechanism there. You narrate well, and in exchange you get more narrative control: you’re rewarded for doing well at something you like by getting more chances to do well.

Same goes for Power Gamers. Or for Gamists, if you will. You kill things, you get more powerful. That’s about as direct a link as you get.

I will ignore Thinkers for now. Maybe later.

How do you give that kind of reward to someone who likes immersive play? You’re looking for some kind of tangible way to make their desired style of play better, or easier, or some such. But there’s very little obstruction to immersive play to start with, given a sympathetic group.

I guess you could start out with a less immersive structure. Say… something where everyone shares a common pool of characters, and control of a specific character varies from scene to scene, like the NPCs in The Shab-al-Hiri Roach, but more so. And as you accomplish goals, you get more and more control of a specific character, presumably one of your choice.

I’m not sure what an immersive success looks like, given that it’s a completely subjective thing. It’s hard to tell whether or not someone’s being immersive unless you’re that person. You could be complex and hinge the mechanic on character choices that are clearly not in the character’s best interests, but sometimes immersive decisions are in the character’s best interests.

But maybe you don’t need immersive successes; maybe more traditional game successes could have that sort of reward? No reason why not.

Similarly, perhaps you could keep the one-player/one-character rule, but hold back control of the character from the player until they “earned” it. This might work well in conjunction with a dystopian world — something where the State owns your life until you’re rebel enough to take it back.

I kind of like that. I should look at Game Chef before it’s too late, which it almost is. But…

MEMORY
DRUG
PALACE
CURRENCY

Yeah, I could work with that.

Any other thoughts? If you’re immersive, what do you want in terms of mechanical rewards?

Originally published at Imaginary Vestibule.

Comments

Hot potato.

[jadasc.livejournal.com]

How do you give that kind of reward to someone who likes immersive play?

From my experience? Keep the game going. Persistence of continuity is a big incentive to people who enjoy immersion.

Re: Hot potato.

[bryant]

Definitely, but that's encouraging immersion as a form of play, not a specific reward.

Hm. Unless you say "OK, unless you have four immersive moments next session, I'm canceling the game." But that's probably counter-productive.

[jadasc.livejournal.com]

If you’re immersive, what do you want in terms of mechanical rewards?

This so reads to me as, "If you're celibate, what sort of sexual relations do you want?" or "As a vegetarian, what's your favorite style of traditional barbecue?"

Re: Hot potato.

[jadasc.livejournal.com]

You're on the right track, though: it's less about "giving you more to do more" and more about "removing the obstacles that get in the way of enjoying what you have." You might reward immersive moments by moving things away from the mechanics and rules and more toward the arena of GM fiat.

[bryant]

Hm.

OK. Postulate/belief: human beings are wired to react well to reward stimulus. I don't think this is hugely controversial, right? We like doing stuff more when we're rewarded for doing it well. Sometimes that's praise, and sometimes it's doggy biscuits.

Very, very few people are happier doing their thing with no feedback whatsoever.

So yeah, it's a tricky question, because you don't want to jolt players out of immersion. But you (and I, and any other readers) are not being immersive right now -- so we can think about it without risking immersion itself, and maybe we can come up with something clever.

[promethius.livejournal.com]

Game chef looked interesting this year, but with the new work schedule kicking my butt, I just don't think I'm going to be able to make a worthwhile throw of it.

As for the rewards to an immersive player. Well, it's hard to gauge. I think the things is that it's too easy and too inaccurate to classify gamers under a specific category. People don't think and socialize that way normally, so it shouldn't be surprising they don't game that way.

I would propose thinking of it more as a spectrum. Place your gamer's personality in a three-dimensional space. Consider one axis mechanics. Another would be role-playing/immersion. And the third would, in my model, be competition or competitive play. You get players who are going to be dots anywhere within this bubble, desiring more of one thing, and more of another. People in opposite quadrants probably just aren't going to enjoy the same games and reward structures.

Anywho, hitting into your point, how do you reward the immersive player? Well, think about the other axes for a moment. Just because your player is immersive doesn't necessarily mean they aren't interested in mechanics or competitive play. Are they being rewarded with experience points? Are they enjoying that reward sufficiently? Are they being rewarded with competitive success? Are they enjoying that?

In this respect, I'm proposing that for some games, maybe the mechanical or competitive rewards are enough for even immersive players, because enjoying immersion doesn't make mechanics et al. mutually exclusive.

But, of course, there are rewards exclusive to immersion. In my storytelling experiences, anyway, I find that the immersive rewards for role players is in interactions. A player has her character go into a bar. She has an incredible role play scene with the bar keep, who she wines, dines and bribes for information very successfully. It's a great scene. The reward is that, without having to do a lot of dice rolling or point-spending, she has something in-game that will help accomplish goals. Plus, adding to that reward, she has fashioned herself a contact who she might go back to in the future and more easily get more information from.

Give immersive roleplayers situations they can solve by being in character and role playing, and I find they're largely satisfied when they accomplish things in that way. Since immersion is, specifically, *not* mechanical, searching for a mechanical way to measure or rate the rewards is probably going meet limited success. "How do you measure your happiness in numbers, hm?"

Anywho, far too long a lj reply. But hey, it got me thinking. :)

Re: Hot potato.

[bryant]

Mmmmm. Interesting thread here:

http://www.i-would-knife-fight-a-man.com/forum/comments.php?DiscussionID=34&page=1#Item_0

I keep coming back to the question of why, if there's stuff that prevents immersiveness, I would have it in the first place? There's something tricky in here based on the root assumptions of most RPGs.

... yeah. Nobody blinks when you present power-gamers with obstacles to power, or even when you present narrativists with obstacles to narration, but it's not considered okay to present immersive players with deliberate obstacles to immersion.

And when I say "it's not considered okay," I mean "I flinch at the very thought of doing that."

Innnnteresting.

[bryant]

I find that the immersive rewards for role players is in interactions.

OMG AWESOME.

(Too short a reply. But yes. Awesome.)

If I generalize it, I...

Reward good immersion with MORE SPOTLIGHT TIME. Interactions. Chances to immerse.

Oh, check out the first link if you didn't -- it's all about the spectrums.

[peaseblossom.livejournal.com]

I think you reward us with more and better scenes. Like, going back to the PTA model, where you have screen presence? You could build a system where the better you inhabit your character, the higher that number gets. Alternatively, you could give out flashbacks, solo scenes, relationships to NPCs, stuff like that.

[peaseblossom.livejournal.com]

Jinx. Buy me a coke.

[promethius.livejournal.com]

Neat! Ok, I'll have to check out the link when I get home. I was involved in a bunch of undergrad studies about personality analysis on multiple dimensions, and I find it's a remarkably versatile way to think about how people react to stuff.

Anywho, yeah, more spotlight time is definitely a good key, too. A difficulty that a storyteller with many people very into immersion might encounter, though, is having limited time (How long is your game, 4 hrs? 6?) and thus only being able to afford any one player X amount of spotlight time before it detracts from the other players' experiences. That's a tricky balance! And largely depends on the group. But it's an interesting challenge when approaching the immersive group.

*continues to ponder* I'll probably have to wait until I get home from work to read that linked page thoroughly, but I'm really interested!

[promethius.livejournal.com]

I think flashbacks in certain games is a *really* interesting way to do character development. It seems tricky to work it into an in-game flow, but, I bet it can be done. And if done well, I bet it can be *cool*.

[bryant]

Oooh, I'd be really interested in what you think of the page, then. There's not a lot in terms of methodology, but the results are interesting.

[bryant]

This is completely true. :) We do it some out here and it tends to rock.

Re: Hot potato.

[jadasc.livejournal.com]

I keep coming back to the question of why, if there's stuff that prevents immersiveness, I would have it in the first place?

Because other players like that kind of thing. Plus, there's a measure of "Immersive players rely on the GM to introduce the unexpected elements of the experience; dice and mechanics are there to give the GM the chance to be surprised as well."

[head58.livejournal.com]

The only difficulty with that is that spotlight time is a finite resource, unlike say experience points, and sought by non-Immersives as well. If you have 3 Immersives and a couple of Storytellers around the table, are the Storytellers going to feel cheated and neglected?

Re: Hot potato.

[dcltdw]

Nobody blinks when you present power-gamers with obstacles to power, or even when you present narrativists with obstacles to narration, but it's not considered okay to present immersive players with deliberate obstacles to immersion.

A power-gamer who gets power can shut down a plot by powering through it.

A narrativist who gains narrative power can shut down a plot by fiating it.

An immersive player who becomes immersed in their plot can shut down a plot by... by... well, I have no idea, really. Hence why I agree that such a concept makes me flinch: what's this orange doing amongst all these apples?

[dcltdw]

If you subscribe to a model of multiple Storyguides in a campaign, then your other SGs write stories spotlighting the immersive character. Double-win: I (another SG) get to write a story, and the immersive character gets spotlight time.

This synergy works best with multiple SGs: SG1 writes story about travelling to Thessalonica. Immersive player ad libs awesome scene in the bar. SG1, dazed, continues with the story at a sane point that evening.

Meanwhile, SG2 is having light bulbs go off, because SG2 has the freedom of time to think about "who is this bartender? Why do they know this? What brought them to be working at this sketchy place?". Those questions might occur to SG1, but SG1 is just going to be too busy with thinking, "holy snap, how do I get back on track? I've got 2.5 hours left tonight -- do I drop the scene at the docks? Or stretch this into two sessions? If I did that, maybe I could have the German artist scene go a bit longer with that idea I had...".

Re: Hot potato.

[bryant]

An immersive player can shut down a plot by ignoring it. Serious answer: "my character wouldn't care about that" is a pretty damaging thing to say to a plot. (It's also often a sign that the plot needed to be damaged.)

Adventures in Immersion

[head58.livejournal.com]

Anecdote: once played in a fantasy type game where 2 players had characters who were clearly weird foreigners from far off lands with strange technology. We uncover clues that lead us to a quest to Save the World from some massively powerful demon. In the second session, the 2 players say their characters can't agree to go with us to Save the World for philosophical reasons. Turns out they were actually akin to Starfleet officers stranded on the planet and had sworn a vow of non-interference a la the Prime Directive. The campaign crashed to a halt and it was months before any of us wanted to speak to let alone game with these 2 players. And the GM felt shafted because while he greenlit the concept for the chaarcters he never thought it meant that kind of extreme.

[desireearmfeldt]

(I don't know who you folks are in real life, but was pointed over here by a mention in dcltdw's journal....)

I wouldn't think of myself as completely Immersive, but this discussion touched a chord with certain of my proclivities. And I think the nail's been hit on the head here: it's not a mechanical reward that an immersive player wants, it's "more of the fun stuff," i.e. scenes/plots to immerse in.

So one way to reward them is to spend some of game time (a limited resource) focusing on stuff that's fun for them. Depending on what it is they like to immerse in, that might be a GM-PC interaction (the scene with the barkeep, the long political conversation with the recurring NPC who needs to be convinced to do what the party wants). It might be letting the immersive player get very detailed about how they want to design their new castle and hire staff for it (I don't know if this sort of "puttering" quite fits the definition of "immersive" but it's a way of getting very involved in a part of the universe that's mostly irrelevant to the plot -- and this one can be done outside of run time if player and GM are willing to exchange email about game; not everyone is, of course). It might be letting a couple of PCs get into an intense interaction (and possibly giving the other PCs something to entertain themselves with while this is going on, if appropriate) -- a lot of my "immersive" pleasures have been relationships with other PCs.

But, time is a limited resource, so there's a limit to how much of it you can spend gratifying some players in ways that don't especially push the buttons of the others.

Two other "rewards" come to mind: you can make immersion a successful strategy -- that is, if I roleplay my tail off trying to get the King to abdicate in favor of his son, and I use the right sort of emotional blackmail or convincing logic to push the King's buttons, then it works. That's very satisfying.

And, you can make there be more plots that give the immersive player oportunity to immerse -- even just in the internal sense. Having things come up that the character is going to care about personally, because they tie in with things that have already happened. An obvious example is "OK, you've fallen in love with this NPC...now he's in danger/thinking about accepting a political marriage/acting strange and you don't know why..." But little things can make a big psychological difference too (e.g. I recently had a character who early in game was given an addictive drug and spent a while dealing with kicking the addiction. Later on, whenever drug-related plots came up, my character automatically cared, because of the context of that earlier plot. So something pretty trivial and non-time-consuming suddenly was looming large on my personal-interestingness scale.)

[desireearmfeldt]

But in roleplaying, the feedback is largely within the roleplaying experience, not outside it.

The person who likes min-maxing character stats is rewarded when s/he gets to roll a zillion dice, or use the cool skill that saves the day.

The person who likes narrative is rewarded when the next plot twist comes along, or when s/he turns out to have correctly guessed who the Masked Man really was all along.

The person who likes intense character interaction is rewarded by intensity/immersion from the other participant(s) in the interaction, and by appropriate/ongoing responses from other characters/the universe.

If the NPC barkeep remembers the immersive character's PC next time the party is in town (especially if it's in some interesting/significant way), that might be reward & encouragement enough.