Good Political Game Design
-
Goals of design are nice.
Previously demonstrated means to meet those goals, or ideas on how to do so, and examples are better.
-
@Pandora said in Good Political Game Design:
@Ganymede said in Good Political Game Design:
@Pandora said in Good Political Game Design:
I loathe the idea of a family stockpiling military assets in order to frienemy their ruling house. Sure it's realistic, but do we really want controlling levels of power in the hands of whoever decides to ignore political maneuvering, social warfare, diplomacy & playing the game in favor of stockpiling the military stat?
It depends on how the game manages the military stat.
The argument is about a single family being able to flex on their ruling lord solely through military might. If this is able to come to pass, it doesn't matter how the game manages the military stat, it's being managed poorly.
I fail to see how this is a problem, so long as the assumption is that these +command systems underlying the RP are intended to be a large part of the game, are functional and not broken to the point of RP-ignoring abuse, etc. If you have some vassal with strong resources and they start building a military... maybe take action before they get too far. Maybe ask your other vassal who lives next to them if they're cool with it. If you do none of those things, and you get facepunched out of your crown, it's on you.
If this thing EVER happened on these games, they'd be far, far more interesting places to play.
-
Maybe it's a perspective thing. I play code-heavy games, so I'm very used to seeing 'Might makes right' & the idea of a game with an emphasis on politics and relationships going the way of 'Idiot with a big militaristic force and no political support, leadership platform, or allies steamrolling to the top via brute strength' would just be disappointing to me, personally. Everyone has their own vision for these games, I'm just stating my opinion that I am against that particular vision and can only hope it doesn't come to pass.
-
Might often makes right RL. However, look at what ELSE matters, what the costs are, the risks. Make those IMPORTANT. Your people may not like the draft, so sure you roll over two neighbors then find your family executed by an unhappy military. Maybe you can't stay friends and get trade going if you are a dick all the time.
Make this stuff matter, or all you get is play around what you DO acknowledge. Like how people ignore social stats in RPGs, no teeth, no one cares about it.
I have a waggish sense of humor.
-
@Misadventure said in Good Political Game Design:
Might often makes right RL. However, look at what ELSE matters, what the costs are, the risks. Make those IMPORTANT. Your people may not like the draft, so sure you roll over two neighbors then find your family executed by an unhappy military. Maybe you can't stay friends and get trade going if you are a dick all the time.
Make this stuff matter, or all you get is play around what you DO acknowledge. Like how people ignore social stats in RPGs, no teeth, no one cares about it.
Right. The point is not to prioritize military over everything else, the point is that if you don't have dynamic politics and diffuse resources there's nothing to politick over, and people will always agree.
Also, if there's not a real possibility that the person on top can lose their position if the people under them are unhappy, the person on top is never going to work that hard at keeping that position and the people under him will focus on something other than politicking. That's fine in a lot of games, but if you're aiming for a political game, that's not really what you want.
-
@Pandora said in Good Political Game Design:
Maybe it's a perspective thing. I play code-heavy games, so I'm very used to seeing 'Might makes right' & the idea of a game with an emphasis on politics and relationships going the way of 'Idiot with a big militaristic force and no political support, leadership platform, or allies steamrolling to the top via brute strength' would just be disappointing to me, personally. Everyone has their own vision for these games, I'm just stating my opinion that I am against that particular vision and can only hope it doesn't come to pass.
I am for changes in the effective strength of domains, and the system is designed for the wax and wane of domains and ultimately potentially the military conquest of other domains. I think there needs to be a careful balance between making societal change possible, so you don't have permanent stasis, and making change so easy that you have nothing that feels like a real institution. So the advantages of the status quo can't be so crushing that it is impossible, and the advantages of new people coming in can't upend the social order with a trivial investment in time. Even for a hierarchical structure, I felt the baseline for that would be to make any liege slightly weaker than any 2 immediate vassals combined, or in rough parity to a vassal that is combined with their vassals' military forces.
That said, the social systems are imo far more important than the military ones, in so much the social systems will be the single largest determining factor for wealth and a healthy economy ultimately, and it will not be possible to support significant military forces that pose a realistic threat without gaining widespread support, or a significant economic expansion. And no players are creating new domains out of thin air- they are replacing existing NPC placeholders that codedly exist, and if a war happens, those NPCs are going to take sides, and those are going to be entirely social checks. And in macro army combat itself, I think morale will be way more important than most other factors, in that battles will be over if one side routs, and that would be extremely likely if a commander isn't well liked or respected. I prefer to make significant military advantages be the logical conclusion of social victories, pretty much.
some fucking idiot who people only like because he's good at taking credit for the work of everyone under him, just like every other fucking L&L headwiz.
-
@Misadventure said in Good Political Game Design:
Might often makes right RL. However, look at what ELSE matters, what the costs are, the risks. Make those IMPORTANT.
This would ultimately be the message I wanted to tease out Socratically.
Yes, might often makes right. In fact, it almost always makes right. But, as @Apos pointed out, you can't really maintain a large horde of soldiers without substantial resources, and this is why, historically, strong militaries had to be attached to expansionist nations. To do otherwise, you'd have to set them to building monuments like the Pyramids, and that just ends up with them leaving across a neighboring sea and fucking up other civilizations in the name of God.
-
The only Socratic tease I know is "I drank what?"
Sorry I ruined it.
-
@Pandora said in Good Political Game Design:
Maybe it's a perspective thing. I play code-heavy games, so I'm very used to seeing 'Might makes right' & the idea of a game with an emphasis on politics and relationships going the way of 'Idiot with a big militaristic force and no political support, leadership platform, or allies steamrolling to the top via brute strength' would just be disappointing to me, personally. Everyone has their own vision for these games, I'm just stating my opinion that I am against that particular vision and can only hope it doesn't come to pass.
I could take all of this and flip it around, though. Why does the 'Idiot with a big militaristic force and no political support, leadership platform, or allies
steamrolling toget to stay at the top viabrute strengthmassive benefits they had from day 1 because they took Duke Fancypants'?The issue is the assumption that people at the top should be more powerful and stay more powerful, not whether social is more powerful than military, or RP more powerful than +code. The details of how well individual players use the +commands and/or RP to stay in power or gain it is... the game? That's the game you're playing. It might trend code or RP heavy but it's still the game. So it's a problem when the game is ludicrously rigged so that the higher ranking cannot possibly be overcome, for reasons of laziness, favoritism, and poor grasp of the history they're trying to replicate.
-
A while back I thought of running a game of Diplomacy through a mush. With each move taking a week or a month. People could RP out the battles.
Actually, this might be fun, I have a FS3 (which does large battles well) server up, and have also wanted to run a Lords of the Expanse Starwars game. Those might all work well mashed up into a messy messy thing.
-
@SG said in Good Political Game Design:
A while back I thought of running a game of Diplomacy through a mush. With each move taking a week or a month. People could RP out the battles.
I did this via e-mail once, about 15 years ago. It was quite fun, but my friends didn't take it to heart when I said that I'd been playing the game since I was 12.
-
This post is deleted! -
@Apos said in Good Political Game Design:
@Pandora said in Good Political Game Design:
Maybe it's a perspective thing. I play code-heavy games, so I'm very used to seeing 'Might makes right' & the idea of a game with an emphasis on politics and relationships going the way of 'Idiot with a big militaristic force and no political support, leadership platform, or allies steamrolling to the top via brute strength' would just be disappointing to me, personally. Everyone has their own vision for these games, I'm just stating my opinion that I am against that particular vision and can only hope it doesn't come to pass.
I am for changes in the effective strength of domains, and the system is designed for the wax and wane of domains and ultimately potentially the military conquest of other domains. I think there needs to be a careful balance between making societal change possible, so you don't have permanent stasis, and making change so easy that you have nothing that feels like a real institution. So the advantages of the status quo can't be so crushing that it is impossible, and the advantages of new people coming in can't upend the social order with a trivial investment in time. Even for a hierarchical structure, I felt the baseline for that would be to make any liege slightly weaker than any 2 immediate vassals combined, or in rough parity to a vassal that is combined with their vassals' military forces.
That said, the social systems are imo far more important than the military ones, in so much the social systems will be the single largest determining factor for wealth and a healthy economy ultimately, and it will not be possible to support significant military forces that pose a realistic threat without gaining widespread support, or a significant economic expansion. And no players are creating new domains out of thin air- they are replacing existing NPC placeholders that codedly exist, and if a war happens, those NPCs are going to take sides, and those are going to be entirely social checks. And in macro army combat itself, I think morale will be way more important than most other factors, in that battles will be over if one side routs, and that would be extremely likely if a commander isn't well liked or respected. I prefer to make significant military advantages be the logical conclusion of social victories, pretty much.
I'm fine with all of this, it's logical and fine and if it's not exactly how I would do it, so what; checks and balances and social warfare engagements are the crux of my argument. Like I said, I'm against any system in which being the stronger militaristic force, despite lacking in all other political/social/economic arenas, means you can stare down your liege and say 'Make me'.
Realism isn't often a strong argument in system design, despite it being constantly made. Realistically, people have to stand in lines, catch colds, deal with racism/sexism/wtfever-else-ism, and a million other things that are realistic but curbed or outright cut of out games to make them enjoyable.
-
Real quick, Diplomacy the Mu* sounds fun. But honestly, it would work best as a game simulation, where folks log in and join a campaign with a beginning and an end, then play it out in that campaign, rinse repeat. If not intended for long term play (years), it could be a waste of effort.
I'm in the boat that I don't want dice rolls and +commands for RP politics. I want it RP, like diplomacy, and I prefer PvE, though PvP can be had, just not system supported or enforced because, OOC Drama. Five players muster enough support to oust the NPC king and place one of their own on the throne, so be it, its mutual, it was played out. No one rolled on die, earned extra resources, converted others dominions somehow through dice. That's not a political RPG, its a strategy game, which would be fun in the right context.
A history lesson; The Reminder, again, of why Redemption Mu* crashed ...
Redemption was created by several individuals on the premise of fantasy world meets advanced tech world; old race dead, the fantasy humans surviving on wits alone. Thrust through a portal and intended as a prison, the portal collapsed, they make due on a large ziggurat like like structure that was formerly a massive city complex (Chozon style is as close as I can guess). Factions competing for limited resources, on the idea that players can and should be able to affect the politics.
Alpha, 4-5 other individuals recruited to be faction heads and really delve into the theme of the various factions. Different enough to sound unique, close enough to be competing for the same space; they're all descended from either prisoners or the wardens. I come in at this point, develop the Czeryn (I played Demos there). Czeryn, Shield and Tyr get some work, they're the main fighty groups. This is from January to March. Myself and most FH level folks are fully under the impression they will lose their position at some point, to keep the game moving and avoid it being static (ie, one PC and/or staff friend always 'running' things with no chance of advancement).
It moves into Beta phase, play circles form in the factions, others join. The premise for new players, the politics can change, they can influence the outcome of the game, takes hold. Things explode. By summer its 80+ unique connections at any given time, 120+ characters roaming about the grid. Beta is running from March to June and plans to just say 'open' versus beta are in the works.
The three staff meet with faction heads here over summer; about 6-9 players and those three staff at this point. The transition of power and changing the political landscape come up during that meeting, with pondering what the FH players can do going forward when they are not playing the IC FH. This is where it really explodes. One specific FH, the one running Shield, says they will refuse to just give up and will play to win. This attitude already drove off some other FHs as this FH had talked OOCly about stirring up RP with some of them, paging fun plot ideas, creating conflict and then, literally changing things ICly despite what they discussed OOCly. They were playing it like a real game of diplomacy against other OOC FHs. Thus began the slow migration of most FHs leaving the game, taking with them the unique contributions they had to offer as 'staff-lite helpers' that actually made the theme, because OOC drama.
The game went on for another year or two, but it was the Shield show thereafter, they won everything and where the heroes, which is what the one FH intended all along anyways. They became staff as the Head Staff and one Co-Staff left the game. Being honest about making it a game they wanted to win OOCly at that meeting convinced the other FHs they didn't want to be on some railroad. .
TL;DR: Any actual intent of a PvP political game will end with OOC Drama and butt hurtedness. The remaining 'players' of high level don't care who is leaving if they are winning. Just is what it is. This is the main reason my preference is PvE these days. If someone is playing to win, they will play to win, even on an OOC level, despite what anyone thinks.
Code or no code, there will be lots of drama when there is something big to win no matter how imaginary it is, in an enforced PvP political rpg/mu.
I'm just a surge protector doing my job, sir.
-
@Lotherio said in Good Political Game Design:
TL;DR: Any actual intent of a PvP political game will end with OOC Drama and butt hurtedness. The remaining 'players' of high level don't care who is leaving if they are winning. Just is what it is. This is the main reason my preference is PvE these days. If someone is playing to win, they will play to win, even on an OOC level, despite what anyone thinks.
Simply, not true. Not at all.
What's been said before: politics is, at its hard, based on resources -- necessary, essential resources. Food; water; shelter. These are important things, and while I don't suggest that a MU* gets into such minutiae, it forms an important basis to design your own system.
What will be essential? What is the goal? How do you curb unlimited growth? Etc.
There are many systems. I think Sparks' DICE system has a good beginning for the political game, limiting everything by time. Building takes time; reaping takes time; questing takes time; maintaining things takes time.
“It is better to live doing the things that you like. It is foolish to live within this dream of a world seeing unpleasantness and doing only things that you do not like.” -- Yamamoto Tsunetomo.
-
I remember Redemption MUSH. I tried playing there when Crossroads was winding down. The theme seemed like a mish-mash of disparate ideas and some factions didn't appear as balanced or well thought out as other factions. However, nothing in what I remember had any sort of mechanical measurements of resources or anything. It was just a bunch of cops & robbers style stuff - "I shot you." "Nuh uh!" Which is the first 'no no' of any sort of PvP political play. It would be like trying to play Coup without any cards.
However, I will agree that it does become a bit of a strategy game, but that's the point. The RP develops out of the strategy game aspect, much like RP comes out of D&D, even though it is derived from a wargame.
-
@Ganymede said in Good Political Game Design:
@Lotherio said in Good Political Game Design:
TL;DR: Any actual intent of a PvP political game will end with OOC Drama and butt hurtedness. The remaining 'players' of high level don't care who is leaving if they are winning. Just is what it is. This is the main reason my preference is PvE these days. If someone is playing to win, they will play to win, even on an OOC level, despite what anyone thinks.
Simply, not true. Not at all.
What's been said before: politics is, at its hard, based on resources -- necessary, essential resources. Food; water; shelter. These are important things, and while I don't suggest that a MU* gets into such minutiae, it forms an important basis to design your own system.
What will be essential? What is the goal? How do you curb unlimited growth? Etc.
There are many systems. I think Sparks' DICE system has a good beginning for the political game, limiting everything by time. Building takes time; reaping takes time; questing takes time; maintaining things takes time.
I agree there are many good potential systems. But which one of these has longevity on/in a Mu* environment? Without OOC drama or people just leaving because of hurt feelings?
When I think longevity, its 5+ years on one character game. I've played several Mu*'s over the past 20+ years with length of stays this long. Not to call anyone out, but dedication to game and story is in the form of Jo and Z, enjoy Sweetwater Crossing RP still after all these years there in the refuge on BSGU.
If it comes down to resources (Catan), a strategy game with a few friends is best. Take every such game you've played with friends, at some point someone usually explodes because it became to serious and everyone stopped the strategy game to play Cards Against Humanity or Settlers of Catan (or not, I just like this game).
@ominous There were resources, the was a simple combat resolution system. The issue was never who shot who first. Trust me, it was the OOC ness that ruined Redemption. The other people that played the game for a while saw the same thing you did and played for fun just the same. The breakdown came in the first summer it was open.
As for coded resources and plotics, this was really big in late 90s. It collapses. Biggest example, Star Wars 1, which has ran well on 25+ years here. People could get resources, they did. They figured out how to play the game, float around on ships while they idled to trade and bank in game credits. It broke theme, the independent factions had enough fire power to wipe out the Imperials and Rebels all at once, which make it no fun to even by a pirate with criminal org if its that big.
If everyone is in for a strategy game, all good. Some of it spurs RP, but it hinders it as much too when the person doing the best +reports or strategizing will win regardless of RP. Kushiel Debut, some of us here made a house, and optimized all the characters at once, we had ridiculous spy networks out of the gate, political types, focused chars. Why'd it collapse at this level, the HoH was the Duc, and really, no more advancement, royal ruling house was set in stone its not going to change, ever. No offense KD, folks still there enjoy it.
I'm just a surge protector doing my job, sir.
-
@Lotherio said in Good Political Game Design:
I agree there are many good potential systems. But which one of these has longevity on/in a Mu* environment? Without OOC drama or people just leaving because of hurt feelings?
I've said it too many times to count: just because no one has successfully executed something does not mean it cannot be successfully executed.
@Sparks' proposal has a lot of merit to it. It's very sensible. It's something that I've toyed and worked with. It's similar to how reasonably successful models have worked. And I can't say this enough, but we have to build upon these ideas and keep trying. If we don't, then all we have is what we've had, which is to say nothing.
You can have PvP competition without butt-hurt. You can have competitive politics without butt-hurt. I've seen it happen in World of Darkness games, and that setting is premised on butt-hurt. So, no, I'm not going to conclude, out of course, that past failures mean that something will never happen, especially where so few games actually attempt serious politics.
-
Settles of Catan is showing its age. It's like craps only without the fun of the casino.
And, no, my friends and I don't fight when we play strategy games. We play every Thursday evening and one Saturday a month, playing Empires: Age of Discovery, Twilight Imperium 3, Power Grid, Dead of Winter, Eclipse, Caverna, etc. Everyone still seems to be going strong.
