Information Flow

Community Larp discussion
#1

I’m finding the multiple discussions going on right now about system generations, and how skills are tested and conflicts resolved to be fairly uninteresting, mostly because these aspects are all really toggles and switches - the different options appear in greater and lesser degrees in both live and tabletop games depending on the priorities of the game designers.

What does interest me about Larp as distinct from a tabletop game is how the information moves around. In tabletop games the default is for everyone to witness everything that happens. People usually have the option of taking the GM off for a quiet chat, but this has the deleterious effect of breaking up gameplay or messing up someone’s social life when used in extremes. This means that in normal situations everyone knows what external events are going on and with the best intent in the world, this open information structure affects how people play.

In Larp its completely the opposite. Information moves in waves around the group, and may never reach some people because they weren’t physically present when an event happened and nobody saw fit to tell them. They’re restricted not by the GM’s description but by what they can actually observe. The information structure is very closed. I have no especial conclusions to make about this, just that I thought it was cool.

#2

Amen!

Thanks for pointing this out - definately one of the things that makes me so attracted to larp and at the same time so unattracted to table-top’in…

#3

Huh. You were talking about a bulletin board for No Man’s Land, so warleaders could ‘call up the levies,’ and let people know when to get kitted up as mooks so they could have two enormous armies duking it out.

Certainly, confusion and wondering what the hell was going on was something I remember from the Mordavia games.

#4

[quote]This means that in normal situations everyone knows what external events are going on and with the best intent in the world, this open information structure affects how people play.
[/quote]

I agree. This unrealsitic amount of info presented to PCs in tabletop is something I really dislike. This is especially true in combat situations. Players tend to know exactly what is happening tactically, and tend to respond “too well”.

From my limited experience, I liked the chaos, yelling, lack of coordination and general confusion. I found it a very realistic and attractive element of LARPing.

#5

Although my feelings in information flow in tabeltop are not as negative as some, i do agree that as a mechanic of the game it does make for difficulty in maintaining a believable atmosphere to the game session, the need to take the GM aside certainly proves to be very disruptive, especially in an a heavily information control based game like Paranoia where the pc’s have to actively secure the truth from each other.

I do agree that the chaos and mayhem that ensued from info flow in larping was a very enjoyable aspect of the game, being something of an information broker at Mordavia truly proved to me the old saying

“Knowledge is power, guard it well.”

AS an aside i did notice and interesting trend amongts players in that they tended to gravitate toward any one who seemed to possess useful information and took everything they said as gospel truth. A trend that might prove useful to future Gms?

#6

One partial solution to the information flow problem in paper RPG is notes. Lots of notes. That and random d20 rolls. Most of the notes say things like “Smile, and hand this note back.” or “You see some small beady eyes watching you.” It turns out to be a rat. You ask them them to throw a d20 and whatever it says you hand them a note saying “Swear a bit.” Whenever you are not doing anything else you should be throwing red herrings around the place. The beauty of this is sometimes they get so used to the notes, that they actually miss the important information you are trying to give them.

#7

Information is really important in larp all right, and I agree it’s one of the defining features of larp. It doesn’t just define larp from tabletop, but also from improvisational theatre to some degree. In most improvisational theatre all the participants see and hear everything that is introduced to the fiction, even if the character(s) they are playing don’t.

When I started running Mordavia Patch or Anna gave me some good advice: don’t introduce red herrings. In a tabletop game, red herrings are necessary because otherwise the scenario can seem unrealistically focused. But in a larp with more than 15 players or so, red herrings start introducing themselves naturally when players mis-interpret and mis-relay information, and just plain lie. Adding intentional red herrings on top of this is not necessary, and can lead to the scenario not feeling sufficiently integrated. The players spend enough time on unsatisfying dead ends without introducing more.

#8

[quote=“Wulfen (David)”]Although my feelings in information flow in tabeltop are not as negative as some, …[/quote]I didn’t mean to sound negative, just pointing out what to me seemed one of the fundamental differences between live and tabletop games.

Also, players making use of the open information available to them doesn’t have to be bad. I’ve seen people respond to information their characters don’t know for more than tactical advantage - they’ll adjust their actions because it’s funnier, or more emotionally powerful, or makes for a more tightly plotted game. I’ve also seen games, particularly with a shared narrative paradigm, where the game relies on players witnessing events and knowing other character’s backstories in order to help them merge all their character’s storylines in with each other tidily.

#9

This is great advice. Red herrings in larp wear people down. Wild goose chases are ultimately unsatisfying and frustrating. I see a lot of game directors tempted to put red herrings into stuff, especially as “filler”. Bad idea I say.

You can have a character that is a liar (and characters totally of their own free will) but an elaborate, meaningless GM-led mission turns the game into an “us against them” thing pretty quickly.

#10

Actually, I’ve been in a tabletop game that was a lot like that.

It was a bank robbery. The GM had exquisitely mapped out the whole bank and every single character , each of which had several motivations, and was enspirited by a player. The game took place at a club, so there were lots of people around, and lots of other things for them to do when they weren’t in the bank. When their turn came around, he’d call them over and describe the situation as they saw it, get their reactions, and send them back.

It took a very long time. Realistic, though. As I recall, as a fairly harmless bank-teller, it made a great deal of sense just to cower behind the counter, alas.

#11

[quote=“theamazingcatherine”]Actually, I’ve been in a tabletop game that was a lot like that.[/quote]Yeah, but that game was very larp-like in that respect. It was also larp-like in that there weren’t any NPCs played by the GM - every character there was autonomous.

#12

It was definitely treading the border between tabletop and larp while still, indisputably, being a paper game.

I heard tell of another of that GM’s campaigns where, when the group split up for whatever reason, so did the players, so that they gamed on different nights until they met up again. News was passed in GM-moderated rumours and the story most repeated after the campaign was over was when half of the group heard a rumour about a short guy and a tall guy knocking over a wizard’s tower and figured it must be their old pals. They got together with the relevant players and found out they’d been correct. The fact that the game when they’d attacked the tower occurred after the rumour about it was… just a coincidence perhaps.

Each player had a slightly different map, depending on their character backgrounds.

I admire that campaign as a thing of beauty.

But oh, the paperwork.