[MUD-Dev] A footnote to Procedural Storytelling

[Charles Hughes]

On Saturday, May 27, 2000 2:03 AM, Batir [SMTP:batir at frontiernet.net] 
wrote:
[snip]
> Backstory seems to be just that though, one story.  Give me history ;-)
[snip]
> Why get involved in something that I know the outcome of?  The stories
> are already written in stone, and I can't change much, if anything.

Ok everyone, save this email.  There are commandments 11 & 12. :)

Commandment:
11) Thou shalt have a history.
12) Thou shalt not write a storyline which no player may change the final 
outcome.

As an offline game master, I follow both those commandments.  My current
game included a history for each major race written from the viewpoint of
each race, and for a time span that would be reasonable for that race to
keep a history.  The true history was also written - this was an accurate
& factual depiction of events, rather than the racially-colored and
embellished versions that members of each race would receive.  [I won't
make a claim to being a great writer, but if anyone would like copies of
the histories, you can email me.]

The players enjoyed the histories themselves, but I found what they really
enjoyed was discovering bits of history.  Either items (useful or not) or 
the
true history of some event.  They also enjoyed interacting with parts of
history - specifically the reawakened, evil, loathsome, vile, and
despicable parts. I think this has to do with players wanting to feel a
connection to the game, and at the same time not wanting to be unable to
make any sense of an event/encounter.  The history also made it easy
to write adventures and insert plot twists.

As for the storylines...players REALLY REALLY HATE not being able to
change the outcome of something.  They don't mind failing if they
had a reasonable chance, but they really hate having no chance at
all. [Anyone who's played a Diku mud with deathtraps will have some
idea of what I'm talking about here.]  And this works regardless
of whether the player is for or against the final outcome of the
story - if the big bad dude wins regardless of what the players
do, or if he fails, regardless of what the players do, the players
will not like it.

This might degenerate into the 'this game is not a democracy'
debate, but that's not what I'm referring to in regards to the
storylines. If you want, as the owner/moderator/etc of a game,
to change something, don't use an unchangeable storyline to
do it - just do it. (Then make up a story to explain it, and
put it in your history. :)





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