Tales from the Rocket House
Pacing and “Splitting the Party”
While I still believe that the GM should serve as the firewall between the players and things their characters don’t yet know, I realize this can be much easier said than done. More specifically, successfully separating players from events and knowledge their characters don’t know can cause real group-dynamics problems if it happens too often. Squigynaut brought this up all the way back in January (sorry for the delay!), discussing how players and the GM would go frequently into a back room to play out conversations and scenes the other players’ characters had no knowledge of. This preserved the firewall, and helped preserve immersion, but it came at a cost: not only were a lot of players sidelined (this happened frequently enough to be a problem), but those players missed out on some of the game’s best roleplaying. Squigynaut’s groups solution was to play those scenes out in the open, prioritizing player involvement over any bumps to deep-in character immersion that occurred. I can’t say I blame them. It’s important to put your gaming-friends above any blind adherence to immersive play.There are a few other options that can be employed, depending upon your group’s own preferences. I’ve used all of these in the past, often in combination. The first one begins during character creation, when you’re formulating the general tone of the campaign and guiding your players to create a group that will work well in the context. Simply, try to guide the players to create player characters with strong bonds to each other (and not all of those bonds should be rivalries that may just as easily degrade into hatred and murder as blossom into friendship, although those are great fun if used sparingly), and who will generally stick together, for the most part. This is sort of preventative maintenance, trying to minimize the time spent split up. Clearly, this one is mostly on the GM’s shoulders, and can only really be done at character creation.
Second, it’s possible to play most of the “split group” stuff out in the open, and only go into the back room for especially secretive scenes or information. This keeps the other players at least partially involved while still maintaining a firewall over the most sensitive information. This is what we tended to do. Though technically, we could have firewalled and gone into the back for every split party, we really only did it for things that seemed most important (the GM is the only one who knows enough in advance to make that decision, so once again, you’ll have to trust his/her judgment). Third, I’d try to play out the long, extensive one-on-one stuff between sessions. Again, this isn’t always possible, since things can crop up mid-session, but it can help. I once created an IM handle with an NPC’s name just so I could play out a long, important, scene virtually between face to face games. It worked a lot better than making the other players wait.
All told, the words “splitting the party” have been dreaded since the OD&D days, and for good reason. Even if the other players get to watch, they don’t really get to participate. I always try to avoid this when I can. Of course, part of the fun of GM-ing Simulationist-Immersive Roleplaying is giving up some of the control you have in other play styles, letting the players take the wheel, and then watching it spin out of control because that’s the way the game world went.
Inclusion of Metagame Elements
Throughout these columns, I’ve taken a very conservative, even absolutist, position on the inclusion of metagame elements such as Willpower Points, Fate Points, pre-planned plots, personality mechanics, and script immunity.I make no apologies for this, because every player and group will have a different threshold of metagame distraction beyond which they can no longer enjoy Simulationist-Immersive Roleplaying (again, let me re-state for anyone who hasn’t yet read this, or who has forgotten, “Immersive” in this formulation does NOT refer to engagement, but to the “Immersive/Deep In-Character Play Stance,” in which the player makes decisions AS the player character, rather than FOR that character. Consider it “first person roleplaying.” A player can be immersed, in the other sense, in any play style, but that is not relevant to the Simulationist-Immersive play style).
Again, different players and groups will be able to stay immersed deep in-character (and enjoy being so) when faced with all manner of metagame elements, from Willpower Points all the way up to FATE points and Social Combat Mechanics. Many, however, will find even the least of these to be a burdensome distraction that will either break them out of their in-character immersion or will suck all the fun out of the process. For that reason, I advocate stripping it ALL away, unless you know that all of your players can and do tolerate the metagame system in question while playing immersively. Obviously, I don’t know your group, but I do know just how light of a straw it can take to break a camel’s back. Hopefully, you do know your group, but be willing to experiment, be willing to give ground, and when in doubt, leave the metagame out.
Script Immunity
Okay, this is a big dog of the metagame world, and one that doesn’t require any rules. The GM can accomplish this in any number of ways. And sometimes, it can work. Immersed players will realize they’ve had their bacon saved by some higher power, and their characters will, too.
In fact, my first introduction to Simulationist-Immersive Roleplaying was way back in the rec.games.frp.advocacy days, when Mary K. Kuhner wrote of a campaign in which the PC’s realized they were being saved from certain death, and started trying to find out how, and by whom. The GM was on a different wavelength, and never provided any in-game explanation. As I recall, the PC’s went slightly insane, forming paranoid, even messianic, theories as to what was going on. That example blew my mind, and immediately made me want to try that (getting that deep into character sounded like an incredible rush - a little intimidating, but way worth it).
On the other hand, the GM may need to do something to pad the PCs’ survival chances. If you’re using a system that’s somewhat “realistic,” and if you’re not using any metagame bennies players can spend to save their characters, then you’re either going to need to run a low-combat campaign, provide some kind of safety net, or deal with the real possibility of rapid and frequent character death.
Let me tell you, churning PC’s like Call of Cthulhu meets The Tomb of Horrors is murder on immersion. It takes time to really connect with, and immerse deeply into, a character, and if your characters are dropping like flies, the players will have neither the opportunity nor the inclination to immerse that deeply into them.
So what’s the solution? Well, I always threw out the script immunity and provided something in-character, in-world, that gave them an edge of some sort. In the Lucius Senecus campaign, one of the PC’s had a rare and powerful healing ability, a divine gift linked to her faith, personal suffering, and overall innocence. It caused her great pain to use it (she had to feel the other person’s wound healing - it was literally empathy-based), and it could injure her if she tried to use it quickly (slow healing was safe, but painful, but combat-healing ran the risk of absorbing the wound, and she couldn’t heal herself). This wouldn’t stop an instant-kill result, but it prevented wounded characters from bleeding out, held infection at bay, and greatly sped healing times, eliminating some of the action penalties for wounded characters.
In the Cassa campaign, the PC’s were connected enough to actually know some members of a group of immortal healers and spiritual wanderers (who’d gained their abilities and immortality through a collective self-sacrifice roughly 1,000 years earlier) with that same healing ability. Though they weren’t around all the time, they PC’s also had access to the best apothecaries, had high first-aid skills (for stopping wounded characters from bleeding out), etc. The Cassa campaign was also relatively low-combat compared to the Lucius Senecus campaign. Further, three of the PC’s in the Cassa game were nobles, and had house guards who would fight alongside them, or even for them (Aeneas was in late middle age, and had never been a big, physical warrior to begin with).
This all worked together to give the PC’s a solid safety net, while still allowing for the possibility of character death. In fact, one of the original characters, Santiago Peccavi, did die (in a psychic battle of wills that none of the safety net issues could help with). Aeneas came extremely close to dying, having taken a critical wound which would cause him to bleed out if first aid attempts failed. After a tense series of four failed rolls, the other PC’s stopped the bleeding at the last possible moment, saving his life. He was able to contact one of the mystic healers to restore him to health, cutting his convalescence short, but that wouldn’t have helped if his friends had failed that last first aid roll.
To make a long story short, the best script immunity isn’t scripted, but comes from in-world sources. Write it in during the character creation phase. Make up NPC’s or magical/high-tech items if you have to. But try to keep an in-world ace up your sleeve, to prevent frequent PC death and the character-turnover that comes with it. Sometimes, you find yourself juggling two possible distractions to in-character immersion, and you have to go with the course of action that will be least destructive. Just try to fit it within the game world if at all possible.
