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December 17, 2005
Minor Disconnect: A Range of Tastes
So I've been having a minor disconnect with Ginger for a few weeks now, in that, while I really appreciate her perspective on things, I felt I wasn't quite understanding where she was coming from, and I think that I've finally figured out what part of that might be.
One of the points of the gaming-as-sex simile is that people's tastes are what they are and it's nonproductive to tell people to change what they like. (Ginger, Two Threads Ago)
This just isn't my experience with roleplaying at all. Maybe I'm just not understanding what Ginger means here (it is a simile) and it could just be a YMMV thing, but I thought we should probably talk about it in any case.
There doesn't seem to be some sort of "sweet spot" for me among various play styles, where I really feel like I connect and everything makes sense. My tastes don't seem to congregate around a particular style that really works for me. Maybe it's just that I've been a GM for most of my gaming career and haven't reached the point where I really lock into one or more play styles, but I find that I can enjoy a wide variety of different kinds of play, just like I enjoy a wide variety of music and movies. I mean, when it comes to music, my favorite genres are Chinese indie rock, bluegrass, opera, and power metal. So I don't see why I would want to necessarily cultivate a more focused interest in roleplaying.
And I feel like people can totally change what they like. It takes some effort certainly, but I feel like it's part of my process of growing and developing as a player. Recently, for instance, I discovered that I wasn't really equipped (emotional, experience-wise, whatever) to play the kind of balls-to-the-wall game that Luke Crane likes to run and, consequently, I didn't enjoy it as much as some of the other people (like Clinton). But I'm hoping to play in that type of game again and learn to really appreciate them. I don't think I can decide if it's really my thing or not until I understand how to do it well.
My perspective on game design nowadays is that I design games so that I can teach myself how to play in a new way. So my design efforts are part of the process of uncovering and formalizing new styles of play, hopefully ones that I will learn to appreciate and enjoy. If not, I'll keep tweaking them until I create a style of play that I do enjoy.
So, ultimately, I guess I disagree with the assumption that people's tastes are necessarily fixed or focused in any way. Sure, everyone has preferences and their own indiosyncracies, but that doesn't mean that individuals can't also have diverse tastes or can't learn to expand their appreciation to include newly developed or unfamiliar styles of play. But it requires some degree of openness and interest on the part of the individual, if it's going to happen at all. Sure, you might try really hard and, in the end, decide that you don't enjoy it and you're never gonna enjoy it, but if you don't try at all it definitely won't happen.
Personally, the couple times I've run My Life with Master have been merely alright. I don't think I've quite figured out what to do with Polaris either, even though I've played it with several different groups now. Does that mean I won't enjoy the hell out of Paul and Ben's games once I finally "get" them? Not at all, but they require me to play in a way that I don't quite know how to do yet. Hopefully, someday...
And the same goes for sex. You can definitely learn to appreciate some weird-ass, kinky stuff, or things that initially seem less fun or just awkward (I know I have). But not if you aren't willing to go there.
P.S. My apologies to Ginger if I've completely misunderstood her here.
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Comments
I think the key point is that while it's definitely productive to put new things out there for people to try if they want, it's usually not helpful to tell people to change their tastes--especially if that entails rejecting their old tastes. Lead a horse to water and all that.
In the same thread I suggested that a lot of the posturing and polemics in the RP community comes from people exorcising their own personal demons of bad play. To be blunt, just because you've suddenly discovered something that makes your gaming better, that doesn't mean everyone else is going to share your excitement: they may have already internatlized that insight to whatever degree they need, or it may not even be relevant at all to their interests. If their underwhelming reaction makes you feel that you need to restate your ideas, only louder and with more vehemence--well, that's how the flamewars start, IMO.
Posted by: Elliot Wilen at Dec 17, 2005 9:20:39 PM
I read it more as it's not helpful to tell people to stop liking something they're currently happy with and start liking something else instead. Which is slightly different thing to telling them there are other things they might like in addition to the things they currently enjoy.
Liking a range of things = cool.
Having fun with things that other people may not understand how to enjoy = cool.
Telling people that something they're happily enjoying cannot possibly be fun for them = not cool, usually achieves nothing productive and sometimes a swift kick to the head.
So Jonathan, I'm not going to tell you that you should stop enjoying power metal.
Posted by: Claire Bickell at Dec 18, 2005 4:29:56 AM
Sex as a metaphor for gaming works on a lot of different levels for me. It's a good way of talking about trust and intimacy, a good way of talking about tastes, and a good way of talking about subconscious motivators for behavior, among many other things. It's also a good way to talk about how you deal with your partners with sensitivity and grace, or not, especially if their tastes aren't the same as yours. (Dan Savage's use of the term GGG comes to mind.)
But here's another thing about sex and gaming: most people aren't in either endeavor to "grow and develop"; they're in it to have fun and to enjoy themselves with special people. Most folks, especially those of us with jobs, kids, and other responsibilities, don't have as much time to spend gaming as they might like. There's nothing wrong with figuring out what works for you and doing it. There's nothing wrong with the same three positions with the same person for years if that's what makes you happy.
A final thing about sex and gaming: assuming you have more experience than someone else may be presumptuous. To extend your musical metaphor, I have a wall of about 800 CDs ranging from opera and medieval instrumentation to rockabilly to ambient to bluegrass disco covers to chamber pop (among many other things). I didn't get that collection by sticking to one genre or staying at home and avoiding shows. But I havce definite tastes in music and purchase accordingly. Sometimes people know what they like best because they've tried other things and the other things didn't work for them as what they know they enjoy.
Posted by: Ginger Stampley at Dec 18, 2005 10:02:34 AM
As a cook, my tastes of grown and changed through the years in a tremendous way. I've been largely fortunate to be surrounded with people who have played along with my cooking experimentations as I subject them to a succession of dishes from Central Asia, India, Thailand, Indonesia, not to mention dishes from the Middle Ages. Largely, I have recieved tremendous support and encourgement from my friends in this area -- after all, they generally benefit from the results in the form of tasty food.
But since I've been living in Maine I've found a large group of people who simply will NOT try anything I cook. I'll bring some cool new dish over to a group meeting or whatever and they'll simple *refuse* to try it. It left me feeling hurt and insulted, because I put a lot of soul into my cooking, but it made me think about people's tastes and is thus relevant to this discussion.
Yes, obviously, people can enjoy different kinds of food, sex, gaming, whatever. Driven by a little curiosity, it's pretty easy to start down a path where you think Mexican food is "exotic" and ending up in a place where you think Malaysian food is pretty normal. BUT, and this is a big but, not everyone will want to even try.
They will lack that inherent curiosity about the subject. They will be comfortable with what they're cooking, playing or fucking -- or the discomfort of change will be greater than the pleasure they expect from the change. *Perhaps* they are wrong, and after their initial discomfort they'd learn to say, "This curry really is tasty!" or "I never knew an RPG could play like Universalis!", but they'll be unwilling to confront that initial discomfort.
Which is where, I suspect, Ginger was coming from. Just, some open minded people will go from vanilla sex to enjoying a wide variety of things. But most . . . most will not. Most find the subject of sex (and food and gaming) so personal that even slight changes are accompanied by the most intense of angst, and while there are lucky individuals who don't suffer this angst the truth is that most people do. They are quite willing to miss out on the pleasured they'd know after the change because of the real agony they'd suffer during the change.
Posted by: Chris Bradley at Dec 18, 2005 10:06:30 AM
Or I coulda let Ginger talk for herself. ;)
Posted by: Chris Bradley at Dec 18, 2005 10:08:12 AM
In my case, I like trying new foods and I like trying new styles of gaming. I've played a lot of Narrativist games over the last few years. I had a decent time, but the spices weren't really my thing. Wouldn't stop me from playing again; does mean that that style isn't my first choice in gaming.
My first choice continues to be long slow exploration/development. The games I still remember most are the ones Carl Rigney ran, where the world was always a complex mystery and the point of the game was the twinned pleasure of a) figuring out what was going on and b) watching the characters react emotionally. I know for an absolute, rock solid fact that I enjoy being surprised by a mystery someone else has created. I don't think this is in any way weird -- I think Agatha Christie is ample evidence that it's a common emotional reaction. I happen to like getting it out of gaming.
That doesn't mean I didn't enjoy running and playing MLWM, or PTA, or Mountain Witch, or Dogs (really liked Dogs), or any of the other games I've tried. It just means I like Rigney games an awful lot.
Posted by: Bryant at Dec 18, 2005 12:18:51 PM
I sometimes swipe from chemistry and think of this in terms of activation energy (GIF). It takes work to make the change itself, regardless of the final energy level after the changes are done. Different people assign different value to the cost of the change - and that's even if they agree in reasonably objective terms what the change itself will involve, which is of course often not the case.
Posted by: Bruce Baugh at Dec 18, 2005 12:34:31 PM
I strongly approve of the idea that Carl is a genre of his own.
Posted by: Bruce Baugh at Dec 18, 2005 12:35:54 PM
Well, I also enjoy experimentation. I've fotten a lot out of trying different things in the past year or two -- Nordic larps, parlor larps, and Amber diceless games as well as Forge style games.
But saying that people's tastes are what they are doesn't mean that people are all narrow. Enjoying experimentation is itself a taste -- some people may like it, some people prefer more steady and reliable fun.
Posted by: John Kim at Dec 18, 2005 1:49:05 PM
Unknown USA was a lot like that, actually, although with a certain useful balance between player input and GM mystery that worked out pretty well.
Posted by: Bryant at Dec 18, 2005 2:17:30 PM
Ginger, I wasn't trying to imply that "you didn't know what you were missing" or whatever. That really would have been a presumptuous, asshole thing to say. I'm sorry if it came across that way.
I guess, in my own play, I usually assume that, when I don't totally enjoy a specific kind of play, that it's because I didn't really grok what it was about or the group didn't gel or some other reason. I rarely decide that it's just not for me. However, I do see that one could get fed up with constantly trying and not enjoying a certain style of play, no matter how fun it might potentially be. The effort might just not be worth it, and you'd rather play something that comes more naturally.
I guess I worry, when I see people talk about "Forge-style games," that roleplaying might end up dividing itself into the sorts of artificial and fixed genres that exist in fiction, movies, and video games, which seem to discourage real innovative and interesting work, creating little niches for people to play in. This is probably inevitable, to some extent, but I'd hope more for something like the situation in current non-superhero comics or adult-oriented cartoons, where people read and write all sorts of odd things, which defy traditional genre conventions.
Roleplaying is different, though, it that it requires a great deal of effort from player groups if new ways of play are going to succeed. Even with a clear, well-built system like Dogs, it can still take people a while to figure out how to run it well.
So I guess, on this issue, I still feel like it's a question of effort vs. payoff (am I willing to make the effort to do X?) and where the issue of taste comes in is how good is the payoff. If you think the payoff is the greatest thing since sliced bread, you're much more willing to make a huge effort to get there. And at this point, I'm willing to put in a huge effort just to learn to play in different ways. That's payoff enough. But other people may be in very different places.
Posted by: Jonathan Walton at Dec 18, 2005 3:45:48 PM
I like trying new things, but I consider myself in the minority on that. I agree with comments above that say 'most folk' really already know where their fun is and don't want to 'drive by' someone else's fun.
Time and previous bumpy adventures could be the reason. Or there is that "getting old, cranky and set-in-my-ways thing" that seems to be going around.
I think it is a shame that so few 'Dogs' are out there to try.
Posted by: Arref at Dec 18, 2005 4:37:29 PM
I think time is a big issue. Back in high school and college, I used to try new games all the time. These days, with one 4 hour game session a week, I'm a lot less flexible.
Hmm, I used to be more flexible in my music choices also. I've also got an 800+ CD collection, and 90% of it has a common denominator (that I can't quite express) despite ranging all over the map (rap is the only major type of music that I am aware of that really has no representation at all). When I first started buying CDs, I used to spend hours in a store which had a used CD rack right above a bunch of players. I would listen to 15-20 CDs and take home 10 each visit.
Gaming wise these days, well, I've looked pretty hard at several of the new fangled games (TROS, Dogs, Sorcerer, Universalis, TSOY, Burning Wheel), but I'm back to running my old college favorite.
Heck, even food I'm getting less adventuresome with (though I have tried a few things since I moved out to Oregon).
I think partly as I get older, my time becomes more valuable to me, and therefore I go for things with the least risk.
Frank
Posted by: Frank Filz at Dec 18, 2005 9:42:33 PM
I don't see a lot of disagreement here.
Ginger is right, in that it's pointless to tell people to like something they think they don't like. The best you can do is get them to make an honest effort to try something, and if they don't like it, you have to respect that.
Jonathan is right, in that a person CAN change his preferences, if he's willing to spend the time and energy required to actually do the work.
These ideas are not mutually exclusive.
With gamers aging, Ginger's point is going to become more and more dominant, however. As Frank points out, getting people to actually SPEND that energy to change their preferences will get harder and harder, as the amount of free time and energy they have dwindles.
I expect to see the second golden age of RPG's in about twenty to thirty years, when large numbers of us start retiring, and we have the time, energy, and resources to make RPG's a big part of our lives again. We haven't had that kind of time and energy since high school.
Posted by: Vaxalon at Dec 19, 2005 8:47:43 AM
I so *totally* agree with Vaxalon on this. In twenty years I suspect there'll be a Silver Edition Dungeons & Dragons with big fonts and stuff. ;)
Posted by: Chris Bradley at Dec 19, 2005 9:06:06 AM
Just because *you* don't have a narrow range of preference doesn't mean that other people don't. There's people who have narrow and wide ranges of preference/necessaity in sexual interaction as well.
A hack'n'slash gamer isn't going to like "real roleplaying" no matter how many smarmy essays they read about how hack'n'slash gaming is for idiots.
There's certain GMs I won't play with and games I won't play because I detest the style that much.
I think it's a great similie.
Posted by: kiztent at Dec 19, 2005 12:57:15 PM
Jonathan, no sweat. I understand where you're coming from about liking to try new things. I've been known to say of my own GMing that if I'm not falling on my face now and then, I'm not taking enough chances. But for many people, the risk-reward ratio isn't good enough to try a lot of different games. I do it by having some long-term games that feed my soul and trying shorter-arc new things. If the short-arc stuff fails, it fails, and that's OK. It's over in a couple of sessions.
I feel very strongly that there's nothing wrong with other positions on the issue, though. (No pun intended.)
Posted by: Ginger Stampley at Dec 19, 2005 6:28:27 PM
Cool, Ginger, I think the discussion here cleaned up much of my confusion about where you and other people stand on things.
I'm used to posting on the Forge, where I was writing for a specific kind of audience and could make certain assumptions, so it may be an on-going process for me to unlearn old patterns and figure out how to write for the incredibly diverse perspectives and roleplaying backgrounds that 20x20 posters and readers have.
Posted by: Jonathan Walton at Dec 19, 2005 6:35:55 PM
I like the diversity of both audience and contributor here at 20x20. My only insistence is that people own their own words - IOW no throwing loaded language around and disclaiming responsibility for the reaction it gets. I want to be the blog where people as diverse as Mark W and Lee Short and Ginger Stampley all feel welcome and productively engaged. But most of all, I want to be a worthy backup singer to Neel Krishnaswami!
[Damn bvrokenm keybvoard! This is work!]
Posted by: Jim Henley at Dec 19, 2005 10:07:34 PM
But most of all, I want to be a worthy backup singer to Neel Krishnaswami!
I'll take a piece of that action too. Neel rocks.
Posted by: Arref at Dec 19, 2005 10:30:48 PM
What Jim and Jonathan said!
Posted by: Bryant at Dec 20, 2005 9:18:16 AM
