09.16.09

Taboos and Tension

Posted in Game Design, Gameplay at 4:49 pm by Christian

There’s something I would really love to talk about more (and definitely hear other people’s thoughts about) in regards to roleplaying games, which is how to set up a group of main characters that produce really intense and interesting interactions when you play them with each other.  This is more important for interaction games than for resolution games, but really, it can apply to both depending on your focus.

Recently, I talked to Jake about his experience playing Ribbon Drive.  His group did not get the same kind of experience out of it that I did and was somewhat underwhelmed.  Similarly, we reminisced about our Contenders game way back when, which had great moments for Matt and myself but often left Jake’s and Nick’s characters a bit out in the cold.  I’ll come back to these games in a minute.

First, let me start with this thought: the way to make the most out of games where the interaction between the main characters is the focus of the story lies in taboos and tension.  Often taboos create tension, but tension can also be the result of strong feelings that are unrelated to taboos.  (So maybe I’m mainly talking about tension, with taboos as a subset of origins? Possibly.)

Plenty of dramatic stories revolve around taboos.  The characters are faced with them and tempted to break them.  Will they?  What does it take for them to do it?  What’s going to happen if they do?  There’s a lot of tension that results from these questions, both externally and within the character’s heads.

Think about your typical adventuring party.  You’ve got a bunch of warriors going out to fight monsters or what have you.  That’s pretty standard stuff and can be fun in itself.  But what if two of the adventurers, who have spouses waiting for them at home, develop a crush on each other during their journey?  After all, they’re fighting side by side, they understand each other, they save each other’s lives.  A longing develops.  The reason this is interesting is because of the taboo of adultery.  Not just as an abstract concept, but as something that, if transgressed, will have a powerful impact on the characters involved (including the ones waiting back home).  Suddenly the interactions between them are going to be laden with tension.  Is either one of them going to decide to make a move or talk about their feelings?  Are they going to have little touches and then pull back?  What happens if they give in?  What happens if they don’t?  All the while, they’re each struggling internally with their feelings as well.

What if the taboo relates to status/class (most regency stories) or family feuds (Romeo and Juliet)?  In our current Primetime Adventures game, David’s character Kyle–the son of an offworld mine owner–has a secret crush on the son of the CEO of the corporation trying to take control over the mining business.  There’s plenty of tense interaction to be had between the two, but also between Kyle and his dad, Kyle and his girlfriend, and other characters.

Taboos don’t have to be romantic or sexual in nature, either.  They can relate to traditions, gender or class roles, political ethics, and so on.  Take a look at Dogs in the Vineyard and its ladder of sin.  It’s all about breaking taboos.  The tension in the game then results from the main characters being faced with people who were simply human, and how they deal with them.

Back to the games from earlier.  In our Ribbon Drive game, we set up a situation in which all of our characters had a great deal of potential tension with each other.  Three of us were children from different mothers to the same father, one was the father’s brother, and one was his ex-student (and secret admirer).  One of the sons felt abandoned, one never knew his father, and the daughter took care of him in his dying days.  Of course we would have tension; our father was a man who had transgressed taboos in many ways (abandoning families, having affairs, etc.) and our characters had different opinions on that.  At the same time, we were all family, but we didn’t know what that meant.  There were very strong feelings involved all around.  Our result?  Powerful interactions.

From what Jake said, I didn’t get the feeling that his group set up their road trip participants with enough tension.  They all had a reason to be where they were, but their interactions weren’t charged enough either with taboos or with tense emotions.  The road trip movies I remember most are those where you have sexual tension and taboos (Y Tu Mama Tambien), family tension (Little Miss Sunshine), and similar potential between the characters that are locked together in the car for a long, long trip.  If they all get along or don’t have any taboos between them, the trip will just be pleasant.  Which is fine for real life, but boring for stories

In our Contenders game, Matt and my character were linked together via my character’s sister, whom his character was trying to court.  That created powerful emotions in my character (rage and jealousy, mostly), which led to plenty of tension and conflicts.  We played off each other a lot in that way.  But Jake’s and Nick’s characters had no such link to us or each other.  We were all boxers, we fought in the ring, but we didn’t have much tension between us other than some competition for the boxing title.

So it seems to me that many games that rely on character interaction as a driving force for the story can be hit or miss because they don’t automatically produce tense and taboo-laden relationships during the setup phase.  There’s nothing in Contenders that made Matt and I connect our characters the way we did.  Compare this to Dogs in the Vineyard once more, where the town creation mechanics ensure that taboos will be broken and people will be tense toward the Dogs when they ride into town.  I think this is one reason why Dogs is such a successful game: it has a strong setup that reliably produces tense character interaction potential.

What do you all think?

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