Metagaming

Metagaming is hated, it is frowned upon, it is bad.

Metagaming is inevitable due to the human condition.

Reconciling these two statements is impossible so we balance them. When we as staff look at a metagaming issue there are a few questions that are asked. The first one is "Is it legal". Is what has been done legal within the framework of the game. Because of the nature of Vampire politics most of the time this answer is yes, but sometimes it isn't. When it isn't the situation is dealt with in game. You'll see NPC's moving to make things right or players being pushed to enforce certain rules or regulations or prestation. This is not always a fast process and due to the way things move it doesn't always happen the next session. Sometimes it takes time to get things rolling. The second question usually asked is "Is there an excuse for it". This is one of the harder questions because players are REAL GOOD at making excuses for ANYTHING they can come up with. This is one of the hardest tests to enforce and usually only the most blatant and egregious violations of metagaming prohibition will fail this test. The third question is usually "Is it good form" and most metagaming will fail this question. So, the issue is most metagaming will pass the first two and fail the third making it difficult to fairly enforce and leading to great argument when we do. Typically only the worst metagaming violations are dealt with directly by staff in the staff room. Most of the time... the VAST majority of the time the staff uses NPC's and other tools to enforce propriety and that's a slow process, but it's far less disruptive to the game. Just because you don't see the gears turning doesn't mean they aren't. Case in point, without naming names there were probably several major errors made last session. Some by staff, some by players. The ones by staff we're working to correct and update after we've had time to discuss them. The ones by players will probably bring their own set of consequences that will be enacted in game. Most of our corrective process involves subtle pressures and gives time to fix the issue. If that pressure is ignored then sanctions are imposed.

Example that is relevant to the current situation. This is not set in stone mind you.

Prince serves as Primogen and there is no Harpy.

FACT: There is precedent in the Camarilla for a Prince to also sit on the Primogen council. It isn't common, but it happens. Usually this is in small holdings without enough elder Kindred to serve.

FACT: If you want to get anything done with prestation you absolutely need a harpy. Harpies don't like dealing with anyone in other cities apart from harpies and when people who aren't harpies try to do the harpies job the harpy being dealt with will usually try to extract as vicious and deep a cost as possible while still maintaining decorum. The statement they're sending appears to be "This is the way it is, too bad, deal with it. You're not a Harpy so you can't say boo about it!" ... when in fact the statement is actually "These are the terms I've decided on because I can, if you don't like it GET YOUR OWN HARPY which is what you should have done in the first place... until then prepare to be taken advantage of in any way I can manage because I AM a harpy, arguably the WORST KIND of vampire." .. yea, those two are actually pretty similar but because the Camarillas laws leave little recourse in the face of the Harpies there ya go.

So, given these two things there's a few interpretations that can be made.

1. NPC's don't care about WHY you have or haven't done something, only that you have or haven't. You're a big vampire, they expect you've got a handle on the details. if you haven't they see it as proof that you're a failure and thus undeserving of your position or power. ( wow... tough crowd... yea, that's NPC's )

2. NPC's screw up too. They're as dirty and underhanded as you are and they make mistakes and have flaws just like you. Sometimes you get to call them on it. Sometimes you don't.

3. Sometimes it's the nature of the excuse that's most important. Sometimes the NPC isn't taking fault with what you've done mainly, but with something tangential to it. Maybe they're not really concerned about the multiple position thing so much as claiming status for all of them which threatens the world of prestation as they see it. Clearly... it's time to bring the hammer down. What's the procedure... well, contact that cities Harpy... hmmmn... city doesn't HAVE a harpy. ... ... ... Problem. New question... "How can I as an NPC benefit from this situation". That last part is the same question every player should be asking themselves about every situation they EVER encounter in DJ.

Anyway, that situation is the most innocuous I can think of at the moment because it's being resolved already and knowing about it won't hurt or help anyone that didn't know yet. Those gears are already spinning.

The other matter of metagaming, coming back from the tangent, is it's part of human nature.

Cliques form.
Friends find excuses to work together.
Problem players are ostracized.

As much as we try to prevent it these three things will ALWAYS happen in ANY social game. Part of the problem with the old boys cliques is the old boys ( and girls ) have been playing for a LONG time. You know who these people are. A lot of what they do doesn't earn them positions and power just because they're friends with other players in power, but because they KNOW the system. They've been playing quite some time, they know how prestation and power works and they don't slip up very often. That being said friends will always find excuses to work together because they're familiar and they TRUST each other. This goes against everything in the Vampiric nature but for starting characters this is invaluable. A new player without a friend to latch on to is in dire straits to make connections, get noticed and survive. This is why we let people come in as childer or the same clan as people they know. It gets them into the game faster. It's not without its drawbacks but it takes a brave individual indeed to play a clan they don't know anyone in and then purposefully avoid their friends in other clans. We may strengthen this in the future though... especially for the older cliques. It is becoming an issue. Newer players can expect to retain the benefit of the doubt on this. At the very minimum we will try to hook a new character up with a representative of their clan but being with someone you know is like coffee. You just do stupid things faster and with more energy and that's what we like to see... involved players.

Here's a conundrum for you.

Here's a new character. He's being played by someone who has self destructed the last half dozen characters he's played. You've watched them burn and take everyone near them down in a ball of flames.

Are YOU going to make friends with them?

NO! OF COURSE NOT! ... guess what...

THAT'S METAGAMING!

So there you go. A simple and basic primer on the situations we face nearly every session and why it looks like nothing ever gets resolved about it. We're guilty of it too I'll freely admit. It's not black and white, it's all shades of grey. If you're a chronic metagamer, but your character doesn't rock the boat, doesn't get other characters killed, doesn't get noticed much and doesn't upset things chances are it will be ignored. You fly under the radar doing that. If on the other hand you're constantly rocking the boat we do, as staff, come up with ways to make your game miserable. We don't always intend to but that irritation drives us to it like it drives anyone who is irritated to remove the source of irritation or at least make the irritant equally uncomfortable. We're human too. This doesn't apply to the Prince and their staff.

We will ALWAYS make YOUR game miserable. That is the nature of princedom and power.

Ask Rich, ask Aiden, ask Kevin. They know.

Lastly, for the moment at least, consider the human element.

Rich is playing a new character having retired Husam to NPCdom. That character is the new Harpy. On the outside this looks like yet another action of the old boys network, and in a way it is, but the circumstances dictate it's OK.
1. His character is pretty much designed for the role of Harpy.
2. There aren't really many if any suitable contenders to oppose him.
3. Harpy is a pain in the ass and anyone willing to step into that role who doesn't have a bad history is likely to get it no questions asked anyway.

The same could be said about the Keeper of Elysium. These are two generally thankless positions that take great skill and no small amount of effort to play well. As staff, we generally give you a pass on those because we know what a pain they are. Hell, WE don't even like keeping track of boons! ( and we don't generally since that's the harpies job and the in game effect of losing a harpy is your records get screwed up. You should probably take better care of your harpies. No one else is going to clean up your in game messes on prestation. They're going to take advantage of them. )

These kind of thoughts do skew our judgement as staff. That being said we do like to see full court positions because it forces in many cases the cliques to admit newcomers because there are frankly quite a few positions. We don't like seeing them vacant when there are characters enough to fill them. Due to this you can expect more pressure to fill those other Primogen seats and then pressue to fill the Princes Primogen seat from NPC's. ( Pressue from NPC's, not to fill the seat with NPC's ),

The main places you'll see blatant metagaming by staff is in game ending scenarios. In reality ( heh ) there's absolutely nothing stopping most kindred from bombing Elysium in one manner or another. We as staff would never allow it. There's really no reason characters wouldn't get hold of advanced or overpowering weaponry eventually except that we as staff will not allow it. As much as you want to, as much as your plan makes perfect sense in a game setting, as much as you SHOULD in theory be able to easily, as a vampire, obtain a dozen .50 cal machineguns and belts of ammo, Soviet era RPG's, etc... especially with things like Transportation 5 for example, a perfectly legitimate in game reason to be able to facilitate shipping such things... we will never allow it. It breaks things too badly and we refuse to deal with it. Not because we couldn't, but because we refuse to.

Staff metagames too.

More later, maybe.

	Author	Topic: Metagaming (Read 397 times)
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