At Spring’s Zenith, May 2017 Medium Puzzle
May 2017 Easy #2
Anatomy of Game Design: Systems and Creation
One of the stranger aspects of game design is the relationship between information and the formation of the play space and the subsequent experience they help produce. The classification of game elements in respective categories is the same skill as cataloging of data for any field. Systems knowledge is the discipline of structuring the categories of relevant information and controlling how it is rendered so as to not overwhelm a user. While this feeds into the user experience and the user interface, what it does is filter out details that are extraneous to the task at hand. Embedded in this is the concept of meaning related to the system’s purpose. In business (and politics) this is useful in shaping the narrative. In games, this is a particularly sticky widget.
While you absolutely do want to shape the theme and concepts behind your game, you don’t want to have a fully formed narrative. This is the minefield best imagined as organized chaos. Your game has to have a parameter or it will diffuse into the ether. There would be nothing to hold it together. But, you don’t want to have the game feel artificially constrained. This is part of the reason why game development takes so long. The whole of the artifice has to feel natural.
Think about this. The information has to be structured to produce meaning but it has to do so without calling attention to this fact. Playtesting helps the designer make it feel natural by finding the instances where it feels too jarring because the design limits stand out in stark contrast to the expected experience. The graphics help shape a view of the conceptual framework in a game’s system as a form of representation and reference point because pure information is virtually impossible to imagine without an image to contain the concepts represented by the data. First-person perspective games do this in the most obvious way without causing the artifice to become a focal point. Namely, the illusion of a z-axis, or depth. The brain is manipulated into seeing depth by use of formulae that describe the x- and y-axis coordinates to contain the polygons that render an object as it would appear scale-wise. Basically, they’re stretched and squashed as needed to maintain a natural depth perception while being on a flat display.
The use of visual representations as data sets doesn’t stop there, however. The tokens used in a board game also carry information. Sometimes it’s just an issue of position while in others it represents whole cases of data used to define a single object, as is the case for mechs in Battletech and characters in roleplaying games when you use miniatures and record sheets containing the information that makes them interactive elements of their environments. Some categories of information use natural language to do the heavy lifting for the designers and make certain details obvious. But not all games operate in this manner and even games with easily understood categories have those which need explanation.
Data classes have to be defined and their measures rendered in a useable format. Programmers and number crunchers of all stripes are familiar with this idea and it refers back to An Unbridgeable Divide with the notion of positionality as a method of establishing relationships. The act of measuring and determining what to measure and how to use it is where meaning arises. Even if most of the data classes are mutable or devoid of value until data is added, meaning develops. With meaning comes emergence. Emergence reinforces the thematics and meaning inherent in the system’s design and leads to gameplay that lends itself to repetition of play.
Now, the reason repeat play is important in this context is that it allows the establishment of a world/reality where the data classes have greater and lasting weight. With that gravitas comes a greater focus on how data within their parameters is applied. The system used in a game shapes what players can do either to expand/extrapolate upon the game or navigate the space available. In either case, the system creates not only the experiences possible, but also how the players process information. This is because what a designer has actually done is built a guide to creation. It is a method for shaping new elements for use in the play space.
The most obvious examples of systems lending themselves to creation are point-buy roleplaying games. These games have dearth of terms to shorthand the meanings packed in such a compact space as represented by the character sheet. Taken in conjunction with the numeric values used to provide mechanical weight, the whole creates a way to evaluate abilities in relation to one another before they are applied to a character. But, this act of balance for play assigns vague meanings that clarify when combined into a character, object, etc. The game invites you to think in terms of the system and all the permutations it can and cannot simulate without catachresis.
The system is the world it creates. In no small way does the grammar of the system show itself to be the words of power that invoke realms into being. Equal but different does not prevent the contrasts, it invites the comparisons that highlight how equal isn’t always so and under which situations one set of abilities thrives or fails. From there, the players are left to decide what they’ve created, not unlike the characters in Neal Stephenson’s System of the World where something was in its genesis but the characters weren’t sure what that was or what it portended. Not unlike the beginning of a new campaign for an RPG as well.
What information and systems provide, then, are nothing less than a suite of tools that makes communicating relevant data possible. The system prioritizes details and classes over other possibilities which lead players to optimum choices to better leverage the tools and facilitate play. This expediency comes with a cost, but the trade-off is in sharing material with others. What’s lost is how to incorporate what’s outside the system’s limits to accommodate any additional material you may need for further exploration in the play space. And this creates a paradigm for how to view and create within that structure.
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Anatomy of Game Design: Design as Art
Wealth, a Venture City power theme
Wealth
Your powers are bought and paid for.
Basic Wealth: You can get whatever you need or want just from throwing around a bit of cash, even if this means getting someone to use their abilities for you.
Enhancements
Super Rich: There’s the wealthy and then there’s you. You get a +2 bonus to using Resources to get whatever you need in the moment. It might take an exchange or two, but rest assured it’s on its way.
Cash is King: You understand that everyone has their price. Fortunately for you, you’re able to name it. You get a +2 to Influence rolls when you attempt to get people to act on your behalf.
Flash some Cash: You don’t have to spend money to get people to do things for you. Knowing you’re loaded sometimes is enough to get people to do whatever you want. Gain a +2 to Provoke when you use your wealthy status as power.
Common Power Synergies
Influence: It’s amazing what people will do when you can buy them lock, stock, and barrel.
Telepathy: You don’t really read minds, but you’ve become an expert in knowing what people want and selling them what they think they need.
Disadvantages
- You use money like a crutch because it’s easy to get what you want. Unfortunately, you Don’t Know What You’re Doing because you’ve never needed to with your army of servants.
- Money is its own prison. Everyone knows who you are because they want what you have, meaning Everyone Knows Who You are.
- You have access to anything anyone would every desire, but there’s one nagging problem: Someone Else Holds the Purse Strings. This could be investors, creditors, a board of trustees, or other organization that manages your wealth.
- Just because you have a lot of money doesn’t mean you can get at it whenever you want; getting a lot of cash together takes time, so you have Budget Limits for any given scene.
Collateral Damage Effects
Get Strange with the Change: Money will make people do weird things. If you are unconcerned with the fallout, you can throw out a large sum of cash (pocket change to you) and create one hell of a distraction. People will actively fight over the money, causing anyone in the zone to make a Physique roll against a Fair (+2) obstacle or take 2 points of stress from all of the flying elbows and people go for the cash grab.
Water Projection, a Venture City power theme
Water Projection
You channel the raw elemental power of water.
Basic Water Projection: Your abilities are infused with liquids drawn from the environment, to include water vapor.
Enhancements
Neptune’s Blessing: You can breathe underwater. It doesn’t matter if it’s fresh or salt water, you can’t drown in water—other liquids, yes; just not water.
Steambath: You can flood the zone with a mist thick enough that it provides a Fair (+2) obstacle to fires. The vapors or so thick that it can be hard to breathe and obscure vision.
Dehydrate: You not only have the ability to flood an area with moisture, you also have the ability to dry it out as well. You can make an area uncomfortably dry, causing all the moisture to disperse from the zone and requiring a Physique roll against an Average (+1) obstacle from taking a point of physical stress.
Common Power Synergies
Energy Blast: You attack with the force of a water cannon or have a whip-like attack made of water.
Wall-Crawling: You can adhere to just about any surface because what holds you to walls and ceilings actually takes advantage of surface tension and a sticky substance you ooze that ensures you won’t slip.
Improved Special Effect
Desiccate: You can do more than just draw moisture out of the air, you can use it to dry out objects as well. You make a Fight roll against an opponent with a Fair (+2) obstacle to create a mild consequence representing dehydration.
Drawbacks
- Channeling water does have a price. In your case, You Leave a Trail of Water.
- You spend too much time in contact with water for your own good. You Dry Out Without Water after a few hours.
- You’re always covered in a thin layer of water. It’s not something you choose, but it does Make Everything You Touch Wet.
Collateral Damage Effects
Title Wave: You can throw around a lot of water in almost no time. You can target a zone up to one zone away from you. Anyone caught in the deluge is under threat of being crushed by the debris threatening to pin and drown them. Nameless NPCs are killed, while named NPCs and PCs make a Physique roll against a Fair (+2) obstacle to avoid taking a moderate physical consequence from either being crushed by the debris or nearly drowning. The zone is left a wet wasteland after the wave courses through.
Skill Monkey, a Venture City power theme
Skill Monkey
You’re real powers are in your breadth of knowledge and ability.
Basic Skill Monkey: There are few things that you haven’t learned how to do, so much so that the way you can use skills to substitute for others amazes people. Once per scene, you can use one skill of your choice in place of another. So long as you can justify how it would apply to that situation, you can use the skill without penalty. A penalty can be applied if the justification doesn’t fully explain how the new skill can solve all the same challenges as the original.
Enhancements
Master Skill Monkey: You can substitute up to 2 skills per scene.
Expert: Choose any skill you know. Gain a +2 to rolls when using it to simulate your deep understanding of a field governed by that skill.
Make it Till You Fake it: You don’t have to know everything about a skill to look good. In your case, you’ve learned all you need to know to make everyone else think you know a lot more about a given subject. If you spend a fate point, for one scene you can use any one skill you know in place of Provoke, Empathy, or Rapport to convince people you know more than they do.
I’ve Done This Before: For a fate point, you can perform any skill you don’t know as if you’re trained in it. You can use the skill as Average (+1) for the scene.
Common Power Synergies
Super Intelligence: You’re a walking repository of human know-how and ability.
Disguise: You are the ultimate mimic, getting the job done with none the wiser.
Drawbacks
- Yeah, you know a lot about a lot but it comes with a high price. You sacrifice depth for breadth to the point that you run the risk of revealing your knowledge is an Empty Façade.
- You really are an expert in several subjects, but because of that intense focus you have Gaps in Your Skills that can cripple your attempts during trying challenges.
- If there’s one drawback to being good at a lot of things is that people start to notice. It’s such a common issue that People Expect You to Help Them and solve their problems for them.
Collateral Damage Effects
Pattern Recognition: Choose one of your skills to determine the type of damage you cause every time you use this effect. While your superpower might not kill someone outright, you do know how to leverage it to get the most out of the terrain and environment to cause the havoc for you all thanks to your ability to recognize the similarities between seemingly dissimilar structures. You can target any zone up to one away from your current location. The affected zone has one of its aspects turned into the collateral damage effect with the occupants making a Will, Physique, or Athletics roll against a Fair (+2) obstacle or avoid the consequences caused by the damage. Given the nature of pattern recognition, this effect is instantaneous and cannot be used until the scene ends or you choose to end it.
Regalia, a Venture City power theme
Regalia
Your powers aren’t a part of you, they belong to your items.
Basic Regalia: You don’t have any powers per se, but your items do. This means when you do not have your items in your powered-up state, you escape notice and do not appear as a super to anyone searching for supers.
Enhancements
Deflection: Your regalia are impervious to damage. They let you avoid being struck by objects hurtling towards you. Better yet, you can aim them at other opponents than the original shooter. Make an Athletics roll against a Good (+3) obstacle to target one of your opponents.
Bolster Power: Your regalia enhance the skill that best represents your superpower. You gain a +2 to rolls for that power.
Secrets of the Ancient: Your regalia has its own skills, which you can access while wearing your ensemble.
Common Power Synergies
Item Summoning: You don’t have to carry around your regalia, it comes to you.
Super Intelligence: Your regalia confer upon you great knowledge when worn.
Disguise: Your regalia contains a full line of accessories to make you over into someone else.
Disadvantages
- The downside to having such powerful artifacts is that they don’t necessarily have the same concerns or desires as you. Your regalia Has its Own Agenda.
- Your regalia has numerous parts that do not function independently. Your regalia is Complicated and Easily Put Together Wrong, so that it doesn’t work if you’re rushed.
- You’ve never had power, fame, success, or the like before you acquired your regalia. Without it, you feel Naked and Helpless.
Collateral Damage Effects
Chains of Doom: Your regalia contain a deathly surprise: the ability to lash out and lay waste to the environment and the people within it. In a fit of rage, you unleash the carnage stored within you and amplified by your regalia. Objects in the zone are shattered and characters are pummeled in a metallic fury. Nameless NPCs are killed, while named NPCs and PCs can make a Physique roll against a Fair (+2) obstacle or suffer a moderate physical consequence from the battering.
May Flowers
Beginning of the Month
May 2017 Easy #1