Telling Stories: Rules On the Run

If there's anything that makes me feel like an Asshole Storyteller, it's when a rules issue comes up in the middle of a session and I have to make a ruling against a player. Especially when they're following the rules, but it turns out that that rule is just broken, stupid or overpowered. No one likes to be nerfed and being nerfed in the middle of a fight is the worst. It can easily make the players feel like you're working against them instead of just trying to run a good story.

As an avid World of Warcraft player, I follow a lot of posts from the developers and every time something has to be changed, there's a lot of back and forth in the community. The developers are in the unenviable position of having to decide when taking advantage of rules breaks the line between "creative use of game mechanics" and an abuse of the system. In an RPG, the storyteller is in the same position. The situation is further complicated because abuse of the system isn't always intentional or malicious. It can just be noticing something that gives you an advantage and taking that advantage.

I do not set out to limit my players' creativity or victimize them. I try to the best of my ability not to fudge things in favor of NPC's. That brings me directly to my first rule of rules changes: wait until it's over.

Should one of your players get into a situation and suddenly blindside you with a reading of the rules or some specific power that turns out to be unbalanced in their favor, let them run with it provided it isn't going to destroy the world. They get one 'freebie'. At the end of the scene or the session, take a short break and say "Ok, that worked this one time, but it's not going to work anymore. We're changing how this functions because that is whack, yo." Let them have the one victory because it almost certainly wasn't something they planned out in advance. A lot of mechanical problems won't be discovered until they're tested in play. Once the issue is revealed, fix it. But don't stop the narrative, break the flow of the game and waste time fixing it on the spot. Especially if doing so is going to take something away from the players.

Rule 2 modifies Rule 1: Sometimes shit is broke as balls and you gotta fix it. If one of your players figures out that using Ability X in Situation Y under Rule Interpretation Q will let them one-shot the primary antagonist of your entire chronicle, that's time to call a halt and work something out. It's a fine line to walk, but my guidance is basically to avoid making immediate changes unless the imbalanced power or rule is going to negatively affect the overall quality of the story. Is a long-running villain going to die in a really anti-climactic way? Fix it. Are the PC's going to lose out on a bunch of interesting plots? Fix it. Is there some challenge that is made easier for the PC's but you can adapt to and work with? Let it wait.

You should always strive to have every single power and rule in your game balanced, sensible and elegant. They should work together well and mesh into a perfect system of awesome. That's probably not going to happen, ever. Still, it's a good goal! Shoot for it. On the way, you're going to find the flaws hidden in the system. In Scion, they're not so much hidden as littering every paragraph and page of the books. You will need to fix things. The important thing, the most important thing, is to fix things in a way so your players understand you're doing it not to rob them of victory or weaken them, but to make sure that everything remains balanced.

They wouldn't want that broken rule turned around on them, after all.

Griff's Aztec Alley: Tlaloc

Most people have no idea who Tlaloc is.  A number of people who do don't think much of him.  This is a crying shame, because Tlaloc is not only one of the most important gods in Aztec religion, he may be one of the most important gods in Central America.

Here's a link to a diagram (which I tried and failed to post on this blog) from Miguel Covarrubias, a Mexican artist and archaeologist who made much groundbreaking work involving the Olmec "mother culture" of Mesoamerica.  The originator in this diagram (A) is a stylized Olmec were-jaguar.  Each route from that are the subtly evolving Mesoamerican rain gods.  M is Cocijo, the Zapotec rain god.  T is the Gulf Coast rain god.  O is Tlaloc as the Mexica knew him.  P is Chaac, the Maya rain god.  No self-respecting Mesoamerican archaeologist would say they're all the same deity (Tlaloc appears in Mayan glyphs where Chaac also appears, representing concurrent Teotihuacan (Central Mexican) rulership, and Cocijo ceramics were found in Zapotec neighborhoods of Teotihuacan).  However... their forms and worship are so similar that, in terms of Scion, it would be ludicrous to call them anything but one god taking many names and faces.

Essentially, this means that Tlaloc is the oldest and most widespread of the Mesoamerican gods.  Only Quetzalcoatl comes close, also having ties to Olmec iconography.   As such, it's sad that studying Tlaloc for something like this leaves a lot of holes for us to either fill, or simply sidestep.