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A note on stories (note: this falls into the category of half-baked musings and suggestions rather than moral compulsions, and I may well be speaking of the impossible)
There was one professor of music who said of worship song that, rather than thinking "Here is the song on paper; we start it at time X and finish it at time Y", it might be better to think of one neverending song that always has been and always will be rising in the presence of the Eternal; people who sing step, for a while, into this song.
My story is like a thread being woven into a great tapestry; beautiful in and of itself, it is being led into contact with other threads, and slowly woven into a magnificent whole. It is not the Story before which there was no world; it is a story which is rather included in a beauty it could never attain on its own. It is not really that God is a part of what I am doing, so much as that I am a part of what God is doing.
Something of this might be brought into play; rather than one party in the world which acts upon a static situation (and in which other events occasionally happen as needed as plot devices for the story of the one party), there might be a Copernican revolution to the point where the world is full of interconnected stories which are parts of the one great Story; the characters and the party are dancing the great Dance.
I'm not entirely sure how to implement this -- I'm netter at designing worlds than telling stories; my mind is more shaped around what is, than what happens -- but the following seem to be at least promising:
Just try. In the absence of detailed instructions, simply attempting and keeping it in mind may do a lot.
Russian author solution. Chez les e'crivains russes, characters, plots, and subplots abound. It may be a lot of work/a headache for the game master, and having several round, many flat, and numerous functionary non-player characters may be a feat not to be attempted by non-Russians, but at least a little hint of this might add a bit of color.
Multiple parties/numerous characters. This is probably the most promising, and the most capable of generating a nightmare. There are a couple of things that I've observed as tendencies in existing game play:
The shortage is of game masters, not players. If there is a reasonable way for a game master to deal with more than one party (2-7 characters), it's probably worth exploring.
The basic unit of play is either the whole party, or one player (solo).
In real life, I enjoy time spent with a group of friends and time spent in solitude -- and, very much, time spent in a smaller group, and, especially, time spent alone with one person.
If the characters have a strictly professional relationship -- I'll keep track of where we are, deal with organization, and talk with the locals; you'll take care of food and other supplies; Jim will work on puzzles and jury-rigging something to do the trick when we're up against a brick wall, etc. -- then that may be feasible. Indeed, working together to solve a puzzle is a quite enjoyable experience. I think, however, that rich role play should have friendship as well, which will work out to personal relationships more complex than individual/group.
I think that email may be able to bear *some* of the load. Letters from one character to another/others (cc'd to the game master) are a substantial tool for character development and role play. They can carry some interpersonal conversations very well, and are wonderful, to speak in a timewise manner: each player sends his character's words when he is free, and the additional strain on the game master is negligible.
This should not supplant the traditional mode of play. Face to face interaction, the general social environment, munchies and something to drink -- this is an enjoyable atmosphere, and a part of why the game is enjoyable.
A note on puzzles...
"It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, and the glory of kings to search it out."
Proverbs 25:2
After role play, an orientation towards puzzles should be an important constituent of enjoyable play. There is a certain pleasure that comes of a challenge mastered, and that pleasure is particularly sweet when it comes from the mastery of a puzzle. (The balance which should constitute play, as I envision it, would consist of role play, exploration, wonder (motion of the Spirit and detail in the world), and problem solving)
The following are suggested examples of puzzles:
Riddles: These could be posed by a gatekeeper as a requisite to crossing a bridge etc.; alternately, a door could have a riddle engraved on it, the answer to which would tell where the key may be found, or what button to press, or...
Logic puzzles: See Raymond Smullyan, _The_Lady_or_the_Tiger?;_ a good library, in that section, should have other books with other appropriate puzzles.
Mazes: twisty passages, secret doors...
Cryptogram: On this point, I would issue a strong warning, from personal nbobi experience, that the objective is *not* to protect information, but to es"Ni provide a puzzle which can be solved in a reasonable amount of time. er"nt Ergo, simple and relatively easy: substitution ciphers, something where eeytl the direction is reversed and the vowels are deleted, a creative ntofe rearrangement where "Ninety nine bottles of beer" becomes the contents of the square to the right, a text where the first letter of each word spells out the message, etc. It is very easy to make something which is too hard and frustrating to the players, but care and moderation should make something enjoyable.
Word game: Give a text with one rather bizarre feature -- a void to perceive, or an odd pattern -- which, when noticed, will be helpful to the party.
Strategy games: Something simple, but different. Examples of such games may be found among mathematical puzzle books in a library.
Spatial/three dimensional puzzles: Sokoban, various disassembly/reassembly puzzles which may be found in shops, Towers of Hanoi... if these can not be acquired, it's not the end of the world, but they should add something.
Guess the rules: A very simple strategy game, with a (non-optimal) algorithm to play against... but the rules are not initially given, beyond a yes/no answer to the question of, "Is this legal?"
Tesselation puzzles: Fit the pieces in place and/or assemble to make a certain form.
(Explicit) mathematical problems: If there's a good way to put them in play, math contest problems of the sort that can be found in books are a lot of fun to solve.
Charles Baudelaire, in "La Morale du Joujou", made some very interesting observations about children's play and toys... the most notable was that children, when they play with toys, are not really playing with toys.
There are some, to be sure, that, in all of their flash and snazzle, leave nothing to the imagination... but many, perhaps most children's toys as played with mean a manner of play that uses toys as a springboard to play with imagination.
He commented, with a degree of sadness, that many adults who attend theater do not realize that it is possible to faithfully play Shakespeare with a very simple stage and costume setup. I think that something similar is to be seen in our culture's intolerance of puppetry as a serious adult form of drama; only trivia that is small enough to relegate to children may be permitted to leave pieces to be filled in in the viewer's mind. Hollywood in its present form spends who knows how many million dollars (probably enough to feed and clothe a small third world country) per movie on special effects and computer graphics. The result leaves nothing to the imagination but the plot.
Role playing games are, in a sense, a manner of play which does not directly fall prey to this tendency. Play sometimes involves the use of miniatures, many game books have vivid pictures, and game masters normally generate maps, but the general nature of play finds it entirely feasible to play in a space that exists within the imagination.
I would suggest, however, that this takes a second order form as comes to technical rules and game models. Bad players attempt to use game mechanics as a substitute for playing properly, and proper play -- though characters may have attributes and skills to tell the game master what die roll is necessary to successfully swat a mosquito -- does not really consist of it. Just as children use their toys but do not really play with them, good players use game rules but do not really play with them. To role play a believable and rounded character is too complex to reduce to dice and charts.
The one point where it is disanalogous, is strategic complexity. Complex and well-designed rule systems facilitate a high level of mathematical problem solving; I would describe the problem solving side of fantasy and science fiction battles as the intersection between mathematics and military strategy.
I think, however, that that challenge can come into through play through proper choice of puzzles.
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