Getting rid of the {tech}

[Nyrath]

http://www.20by20room.com/2004/01/practical_causa.html

 

How to let your players figure out what they need to do in order to repair their hyperdrive.

[GreyGuardian]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

Thank you for posting that link!

 

I'd been thinking about this problem for awhile now and this looks like an excellent answer.

[tancred]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

Absolutely excellent article!

 

Thank you VERY much for finding and posting that. You may be sure I will be remembering that advice.

[Glupii]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

OK, I liked that article and the example it gave was excellant. But my biggest question is where else would you, could you, use this sort of tree for things other than repairing things? I mean he used that as an example but the article talked about using the idea to give choices to alot of roleplaying situation. As I wrote this, I came up with one, the local buerocracy (sp?) or gov't circles so one know how to get to the proper place and or maybe go around a block in the system if needed. But what other ideas can you guys come up with for using this?

 

I can see an awful lot of work for us poor GM's.

[Nyrath]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

But my biggest question is where else would you' date=' could you, use this sort of tree for things other than repairing things? I mean he used that as an example but the article talked about using the idea to give choices to alot of roleplaying situation.[/quote']

Diagram the interlocking security systems of a top-secret complex so that the secret agent Player Characters can decide the best way to over-ride the alarms and sneak in undetected.

 

Diagram the organization chart of the starship crew, to see what suddently doesn't get done if crewmember X is incapacitated. Or so the captain of a tramp starship freighter can decide where they can take save money by taking a risk and cutting corners (I really don't need a full-time force field technician, we only need an operating field generator if pirates show up and things have been quiet of late...)

 

Diagram the required components of a viable colony on an alien planet. If a catastrophy takes out several installations, the players can figure out the bare minimum that need repair or replacements shipped in from off-world for the survival of the colony.

 

As for making the diagram, just draw a few circles, connect them with lines, and add interesting labels.

 

A freeware tool for making such diagrams is yEd, which can be found here. After you've drawn the circles and links, go to the Layout menu, choose "Organic", move to "Smart" and click the "Apply" button. It will then move the circles around to make things pretty.

[Nyrath]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

I've re-read the article, which reminded me that the point of all this was to enhance the player's non-combat role playing. Combat has a series of decisions (do I forfet my next phase to do a defensive maneuver or keep my next phase and take the damage?). Non-combat does not (total up all relevant modifiers, make a roll, and decide if you've cobbled together the gadget/fast-talked your way out of a speeding ticket/seduced the executive assistant of the target megacorporation/got elected in the corrupt political campaign you ran/whatever.)

 

The example chart give was for a mechanism, but it could be used for a situation.

 

So the idea is to look at the skills and talents of your player-characters, and construct causality diagrams for things they'd like to accomplish with said skills and talents. Make a chart for "the anatomy of a seduction", or "how to run a crooked election".

 

The point is to give the players more non-combat decisions to make than a simple "do I roll or not roll?"

[LoresLost]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

Great essay find. This has lot o' uses

 

I can see uses in situation where you have complex concepts you want to keep consitant in your game in any genre.

[Agemegos]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

http://www.20by20room.com/2004/01/practical_causa.html

 

How to let your players figure out what they need to do in order to repair their hyperdrive.

 

It is an interesting idea, but the idea of generating such trees and accompanying gibberish for all the significant objects in my game universe is pretty daunting.

 

I would really be more interested in attack trees for archetypal character interactions: seduction, influence, persuasion, …. But that is more a subject for General Gaming Discussion.

[Nyrath]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

It is an interesting idea' date=' but the idea of generating such trees and accompanying gibberish for all the significant objects in my game universe is pretty daunting.[/quote']

Well, you don't have to generate them for all the significant objects. Just the one that pertains to the current plot complication.

[austenandrews]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

I used to come up with charts like that for various facets of my campaigns. I finally realized that most players could care less. More's the pity.

[Old Man]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

I can certainly see the use for a series of charts like this, primarily for starship systems operation. It shouldn't matter much whether the ship in question is Trek or Traveller. There would be charts for:

 

Hyperwarp Jump Drive

Sublight Drive

Beam Weapon

Missile/Torpedo Launcher

Shields

Sensors (of various flavors)

 

That would cover 95% of the systems relationships needed in any SH campaign regardless of flavor.

[CourtFool]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

I can tell I do not fully understand this concept yet because my head is swimming. Understanding comes once I start applying a concept outside of examples provided. I think part of the problem was the example was far to specific.

 

Glupii suggested using the diagram for a bureaucracy. This is much more abstract and, for me, starts to really pull things together.

 

Taking that a bit further, I guess you could use this for each of the major powers in a particular campaign. And then break down those powers with another chart going as deep and detailed as you wanted. This would certainly make NPCs more real and fluid.

 

I am still having difficulty applying this to a particular adventure/session. Can someone school the llama?

[Agemegos]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

Well' date=' you don't have to generate them for [b']all[/b] the significant objects. Just the one that pertains to the current plot complication.

 

Given that I extemporise a great deal, I never really know in advance what a plot complication is likely to be enough in advance to prep for it. Could I learn to make these up as fast as I could sketch the diagrams?

[Nyrath]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

Taking that a bit further, I guess you could use this for each of the major powers in a particular campaign. And then break down those powers with another chart going as deep and detailed as you wanted. This would certainly make NPCs more real and fluid.

 

I am still having difficulty applying this to a particular adventure/session. Can someone school the llama?

This works for skills and talents as well as powers.

 

What I would do is take a pragmatic approach. Look at your player's under-utilized skills and talents, the ones they complain "I don't know why I wasted points on this skill, I never use it". Then look at important actions they have tried in the past and see which ones relate to the unused skills. Make a chart for that action, with skill rolls at critical points.

 

For example: say your players are Free Traders flying a tramp freighter starship. They will often find themselves in the situation of attempting to smuggle contraband past a planetary customs inspector. Make a "smuggling" chart, with various strategies based on different skills.

 

The "sneeking" strategy would require skill rolls based on hiding the contraband and mis-directing the inspector. The "bribery" strategy would require bribing and confidence skill rolls. And so on.

[Glupii]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

Nyrath, I like your ideas, but I am having a hard time visualizing how to move from them to the chart. I know it is asking alot and will understand if you are too busy to do this, but it would help me alot to understand if I could beg you to possibley diagram one of your examples. The smuggling one sounds like a great one to try. Like I say, if you don't have the time, I would understand.

 

And thanks all for the great discussion and ideas on this. I really like the idea and would like to see if a way could be made to make it usable for my campaigns.

[Nyrath]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

I wish I could help more, but this techique is new to me as well.

 

Each box is a situation, which can be in several states. Arrows leading into the box represent causes. When all the causes have their values determined, this determines what state the box flips to.

 

A box has arrows leading out of it. These are causes for other boxes.

 

Say box "A" is the state of the customs official after the free traders make their initial overture. Cause arrows leading in include whether there have been a recent rash of smuggling, honesty of the official, whether the traders offer a bribe or not and the size of the bribe, the degree that the traders hide their nervousness if they decide to depend on how well hidden the contraband is, and so forth.

 

After all the decision are made, and any cause arrows that depend on sucessful skill rolls are rolled, the current state of the customs official is determined. Now the arrow leading out of box "A" feeds the state of box "A" as a cause into another box or two. States can include "give cargo clean bill of health", "arrest traders for bribery", "start looking for contraband", "demand a larger bribe", "demand larger bribe, pocket part of it, and arrest traders for bribery", and so on.

 

The players have various decisions to make, based on this diagram. They might try skill rolls to figure out if there has indeed been a recent rash of smuggling, which would be a causal factor in how alert the official is. They might try skill rolls in an attempt to get the word on the street on how corruptable this particular official is. If they are going to bribe the official, how much is enough? And so on.

 

There might be another box for triggering an anti-corruption internal affairs probe. If there has been a rash of bribed officials, the "offer a bribe of size X" arrow could go to both box "A" and to a box for "trigger a corruption probe". The official could accept the bribe, but then both the traders and the official get nabbed by the internal affairs police.

 

And so on.

 

I don't know if these will help or not:

http://gamethink.blogspot.com/2004/06/behaviour-maps.html

http://www.lumina.com/software/influencediagrams.html

[Trebuchet]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

Great resource, Nyrath. And since the heroes in my Champions campaign just got their first starship a few months ago, I can see that article will be very useful indeed.

[AlHazred]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

I can see how this is handy. I'm going to take a look when I get home and see if I can find any concrete RPG examples.

 

You can check out the Gamma World community influence diagrams in the new Gamma World Players Handbook is available for free right now on DriveThruRPG.com.

[Captain Obvious]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

"You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to Nyrath again."

 

[Spence]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

I think the whole idea is brilliant. I have been running through endless possibilities.

 

Great tool

[LoresLost]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

I have an article I found. This should be of interest for those of you who want to use this technique in there games.

 

Also search Google for Fuzzy Cognative Maps for further information on these directed diagrams

[Nyrath]

Re: Getting rid of the {tech}

 

This article may or may not be useful:

http://www.schneier.com/paper-attacktrees-ddj-ft.html