Of Motivation, Learned Behaviors, and "Roleplaying Rewards"

Tabletop Roleplaying games are a product of humans, and reflect human nature.

One of said most persistent reflections is our habit of endlessly repeating the same mistakes. It is because of this that the hobby keeps repeating the same set of discussions even after 40 years.

This time, in my twitter feed, once again someone asked people how do they adjudicate XP for "roleplaying."

Ok, context: Back in the days of yore, all we had was d&d, a game that, for almost 40 years now, has only given XP for stabbing people in the face, and while sure, the DMG grants cute, "token" awards like 40XP (or something in that vein) for "roleplaying," the truth of the matter is that once you're level 5 and "roleplaying" still gives you 40 XP while stabbing a monster in the face gives you 4000XP, then stabbing people in the face is all your players will care about.

Is this a flaw in d&d's design? No, because breaking in people's houses, stabbing the owners in the face, and looting everything that isn't bolted down is exactly what the game is all about. D&D was originally an offshoot of a miniatures' game and its focus has always been combat, everything else is afterthought.

Now, here's the part where somebody else surely says "what about giving roleplaying XP in terms of fractions of a level"? Sure, that sounds more fair for task that doesn't go "up" or "down" with level. However, hear my counter-proposal:

Why are we supposed to give XP for roleplaying AT ALL?

"Roleplaying" is what the whole thing is about. If you're not roleplaying then what are you even doing at the table? We're at the table because we like roleplaying, and not everything you do at the game needs to be rewarded (Call of Duty doesn't warrant match points for every bullet fired, does it?)

Furthermore, giving uneven "roleplay awards" turns the most basic part of the hobby into a competition, I don't care for the more domineering players constantly trying to upstage each other while making the more introverted players further hide in their shell (unwittingly erasing them).

Roleplaying is a team sport, not a competition.

Deny all you want, but learned behaviors are a thing. If people are consistently rewarded for doing an action, they'll be increasingly inclined to do it again and again (unless it's something they actively hate to do). Running a game where the biggest reward is for eating someone else only to kick and scream because your character party turns your game into Lord of the Flies goes beyond folly, it's solipsistic (make that double if that's actually the only thing in game that grants actual XP, see Vampire: The Masquerade 5E).

A Solution: Equal XP

There were a few things dnd 4E did right, and one of them was stating that, at all times, XP was to be always evenly distributed among all party members, even if a player wasn't part of a scene, or even if the player didn't show up that session (furthermore, if a PC died, the replacement character would be of the same level and XP as the rest, losing a character is punishing enough to be forever forced behind the curve also, that's only piling insult upon injury). The people who complain about Equal XP for everyone remind me of those that oppose wiping student debt by saying that "it would be unfair to those who already paid theirs."

Once again for those in the back: Roleplay is a team sport, not capitalism. Only bad GMs intentionally pit players against each other, nothing ever gets done that way.

M&M Lego Sets: Encounters for Street-level Games

About 4 out of 10 GMs I know openly claim to prefer "street level games."

Said GMs, however, usually have a hard time putting up anything interesting and most of the time end up reverting to type and leaning on the crutch of (mini) "supervillain of the week" (thus chucking out the whole "street" element from the game). This is probably not their fault, since most GMs have the trad paradigm too deeply ingrained in their brains so the moment they are faced with "lego box systems" like M&M or minimalist ones where everything is DIY their heads only draw a blank because they're conditioned that "if it isn't written in the book, it doesn't exist."

While 3E discarded the PL 6 as lowest tier for games, even at PL 6, single street thugs were never meant to be a "life threatening battle" for a superhero (it's M&M, not Mystery Men). This, however, does not mean you can't do "Batgirl of Burnside" with M&M, but you need to know your tools in order to turn bottom feeders into a fun opposition (remember, FUN is the operative word, not deadly, not overpowering, fun).

Kit One: Biker Gangs and Vehicle Combat

NOTE: While the core book has no proper "vehicle combat" rules, it's not hard to extrapolate the basic rules for what happens when "man vs. car" happens. For regular "vehicle vs. vehicle" conflicts, however, just use the vehicle's base stats as usual.

Car vs. Character
(all extrapolations courtesy of Relative Speed principles)

* Characters inside a car or bike add the vehicle's speed class to their melee attack and damage ratings while the vehicle is moving.
* Characters inside a car or bike subtract the vehicle's speed class from their ranged attack's rating.

* Characters attacking from inside a car or bike are assumed to possess the Move By Action advantage (for obvious reasons, attribute it to Descriptors).
* When aiming specifically at a vehicle's driver, characters inside a car or bike add the vehicle's speed class to their dodge and parry stats while the vehicle is moving, and they add the vehicle's toughness rating to their own.
* Cops firing from behind the open doors of their parked car enjoy full cover.
* Characters attempting a Trip attack on a motorbike use the toughness of the object they're trying to jam in the wheel versus the bike's strength

Basic Statblock: Biker Gang Banger (basic NPC: thug)
Numbers divided by a slash indicate (vehicle/driver)

* STR 1/2, STA 2, AGL 1, DEX 1, FGT 2, INT 0, AWE 0, PRE -1
* Equipment: Leather jacket (+1 Toughness), light pistol, cell phone.
* Skills: Athletics 4 (+6), Vehicles 4 (+5). 
* Offense: Init +1, Melee  +8 (Damage 10),  Pistol -9 (Ranged Damage 3).
* Defense: Dodge 10/8, Parry 10/8, Fort 8/4, Tou 8/11, Will 0. 

(Now you know why Batman keeps the Batmobile handy

image credit: Electronic Arts)

Kit Two: Police Crackdowns

Remember that the Aid and Team Attack actions are in the book for a reason. Send in a big enough swarm of minions (10 per PC minimum) and, statistically, you can just waive all the extra dice rolling. Your swarm will only roll one attack check per turn, but it will be one with a +5 bonus to attack. Furthermore, if your swarm is a minimum of 20, your lead attacker can enjoy both a +5 to attack and a +5 to damage.

(And that's how they got Rorschach
Copyright: DC Comics and Paramount)

The Catch: The moment your swarm's numbers no longer sustain critical mass, the bonuses are gone.

While usually only the police and the army are organized enough to pull these stunts off,  particularly organized crime (like your token tacky martial arts crime syndicates and low-tier, non-superpowered ninja clans) will also use these.

Kit Three: Blockades, Kill Zones,  and Dragnets

While (again) gangs are usually not organized, drug cartels and terrorists are prone to rising blockades full of armed people ready to fill would-be tresspassers full of holes:

* All members of the defacto firing squad are assumed to fire from cover (full). 
* Every turn characters are within firing range, they're target of two attacks: A regular firearm attack, and a Demoralize attack with a +5 bonus (unless the target is bulletproof and has no reason to fear standing on a kill zone, that is). Since we're talking "street level," it's fair to assume most characters can't fly, and thus would rely on mundane skills to get past a blockade, that's where the Demoralize action becomes crucial.

(add extra vehicles and armed goons to taste)

Basic Stats: Blockade (manned by at least 20 thugs)

* Skills: Intimidation 9
* Offense: Init +1, Pistol 1 (Ranged Damage 3).
* Defense: Dodge 7 Fort 9/4, Tou 9/3, Will 0.
* The nature and difficulties of the Athlerics/Acrobatics checks to get past a blockade will depend on its composition. Just remember that characters are Vulnerable while climbing, so trying a frontal approach to zip past obstacles they can't surmount on a vertical jump will turn into a Re-enactment of Kagemusha's ending.

When talking about a kill zone trap, usually the heroes are lead somewhere with a single access point, same that it's getting blocked as soon as they're at the center (example: two buses blocking an alley exits). While characters with the right skills may realize before the trap closes, failing to do so guarantees an unpleasant time.

A Dragnet, finally, is a Crackdown where also the police happened to establish a perimeter around a building, so players trying to escape the Crackdown also have to go through a Blockade. While characters escaping through the rooftops have a way past the blockade secured, the police will usually have at least one helicopter ready as well... and if SWAT is involved, this means elements are probable also waiting in neighbouring rooftops, turning each into a separate Crackdown.

Kit Four: Snipers

Modern military rifles have an effective range of at least one mile (and that without resorting to old sniper tricks like slightly parabolic shots), and rifle scopes exist for a reason. Barring telescopic vision powers or wearing Batman's cowl, characters have a -5 on Perception checks to detect a sniper's presence stationed in a proper Hawk's Nest (so chances are the first shot will always catch the target Vulnerable). After the first shot, however, any character with the Investigation skill can point at the sniper's location with a check.

(the ultimate sneak attack)

Kit Five: Mastermind Showdown

Sooner or later, the heroes will have a showdown with the Crime Lord in turn, who will be either waiting for them at the penthouse of his ominous skyscraper, or making his way to the heliport in the rooftop to make his escape. Either way, once again we resort to the Team Attack action. Give the Crime Lord NPC at least 10 thug minions as buffer so the Crime Lord has a constant +5 bonus to Dodge (and the human wall would keep him away from melee range).

Alternatively, if he is making his way to the helicopter, make it a "timed challenge": Give the Crime Lord 10 minions times the number of rounds you're giving he heroes before the Crime Lord makes his escape.

(or, you know, just give the crimelord a mecha, whatever)

I may add more as they come to my mind.

Peace.

Also, read MY WEBCOMIC and check MY PATREON.

Learning to Create Interesting Combat Encounters for "Superman"... with Mazinger-Z

People who lack creativity will always say Superman is "boring" because "he's invincible."

Ok, the point of Superman isn't whether he can do something but whether he should and the consequences of his action or inaction, just like he is meant to be inspiring rather than "relatable" but that's not the point of this post. The point is that... yes, you can write interesting combat encounters for him, and you can apply the same basic rules to run games for "overpowered" characters (or for just, you know, any superhero game, since superheroes are by definition bonafide badasses).

(It's not "The Relatable Iron-Man" or "The Balanced Iron-Man" or

"The You're-Better-Off-Playing-A-Mutant Iron-Man"...

it's THE INVINCIBLE IRON-MAN)

Strangely enough, all of these guidelines come from an old anime.

So, let's take lessons... from MAZINGER Z:

As opposed to contemporary shounen anime, Mazinger didn't intend to sell you the "Dragonball Z formula" where a weakling is constantly picking fights with someone stronger than him until he eventually surpasses and beats the villain (sorry to burst your bubble but, if every single enemy is always stronger than the hero, is he really a badass? No, he isn't). Mazinger was originally the giant robot to end all giant robots, and indeed he was famous for making short work of rival robots in a straight, fair fight.

The father of the "Super Robot" genre

So, how did Go Nagai keep Mazinger's fights interesting? Here's how:

Rather than resorting to Dragonbullshit or Green Rocks Of Lazy Writing, what Nagai did was handicapping via unusual circumstances that often kept Mazinger out of his element: Flying enemies, submarine enemies, illusionists, and otherwise enemies with "battlefield control" abilities. I'm not sure how much of this was Nagai and how much his editor but, in addition to this, whenever the enemy became repetitive with the same gimmick, Mazinger got an upgrade in order to turn the circumstance a non issue in the future (he got adapted for aquatic combat after the first 2 submarine enemies in a row, and after the first 3 flying enemies, he got his aerial upgrade) and thus avoid the Green Rocks Of Lazy Writing.

To keep things fresh, sometimes instead of handicapping circumstances, the enemies would force the hero to change tactics by being immune to whatever quality was becoming a comfort zone: Sometimes they'd be immune to whatever weapon he had been more consistently relying on, and sometimes enemies would have the specific ability of nullify his super-alloy (forcing him to dodge and use strategy rather than just tanking every enemy attack).

Then, there was always the occasional "puzzle monster," which could only take damage under specific circumstances (example: Twin mechanical beasts that regenerated all damage unless both were destroyed at the same time), or that required a specific attack sequence, or that were only vulnerable to a specific weapon at the right time (example: A photon beam right at the moment he monster opens his chest cavity to unleash its biggest weapon).

In none of the aforementioned cases the mechanical beast was innately stronger than Mazinger, it was the handicap that leveled the field. Only in a couple cases (one of which was the series' end) Nagai resorted to the "strictly dramatic" encounter where the enemy/circumstances were insurmountable and the only reason the hero lived to see another day was by some contrived serendipity that opened a window of opportunity at the eleventh hour... and that was indeed good since narratively these are the most boring: The author got the hero into an impossible situation only to get his bacon out of the fire himself, thus there was zero meaningful input from the hero (needless to say, this is even more boring in a tabletop game, since it's interactive entertainment and the players' choices are supposed to matter).

Those are my two cents, take 'em or leave 'em. If any of this sounds like too much work for you, stick to low-powered games (plenty of them in the market, after all!).

"The Great GM": Experience or Preference?

As a certified teacher, I can tell you that yes, you can learn how to become "the best GM for every possible demographic" if you actually set your mind to it.

As a teacher I have dealt with kinaesthetic students, I have dealt with squares, I have dealt with problem children and teacher pets, I have dealt with elementary school kids and senior citizens, I have dealt with students with learning disabilities and students who think they know more than I do (and some that occasionally do, even). I'm trained to deal with all types because I'm literally paid to deal with them all.

Does that mean I enjoy dealing with all and every type? Heavens no.

THAT is the question you must ask yourself when evaluating a GM's "quality."

I dealt with more than my share old-schoolers and storygamers and reactive gamers and fishmalks and lone wolves and psychopaths. Do I enjoy dealing with them? Hell no! Would I be prepared to deal with them in my table if I had to? Perhaps... but why on earth would I want to?

GMing is my hobby, not a job. I run the kind of campaigns I want, using the systems of my preference (unless I'm trying a new one, case in which it can go either way), for the people I want to play with. As a result of this, while I may know other ways, I'm more likely to perfect the techniques for what I like to play the most. Furthermore, ever since I learned the most valuable lesson in the hobby (no gaming is better than bad gaming), it's been about a decade since I haven't had to deal with anyone I don't want to. I have way more experience in running games for proactive players than reactive ones. I have lots more games under my belt ran on shared narrative systems than trad/OSR/storygaming ones. I haven't had to deal with players I need to drag kicking and screaming through the flow of events in over a decade, so chances are my skills at dealing with "trouble children" at a gaming table are rusty by now (and then, I screen potential applicants to make sure they'll be a good fit for my table and game in question precisely so it never gets to that point).

So, the question is... sure, as a GM I'm pretty long in the tooth but... am I a "great GM"?

The Answer: I don't need to be. I just need to know what I like, and make sure what I do at the table gets me what I want. As obvious as it sounds, however, it's a harder lesson to learn than you'd think. I know GMs with more flight hours than me who have yet to learn. No amount of time will build Intrapersonal Skill on those unwilling or unable to do self-reflection.

“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”

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