Metagame issues with character behavior, Likely a touchy subject Options

[The Jake]

The Jake: You're a little bit off the mark with your assessment; I'm a paladin-type only loosely as while I try to ensure I clearly define my personal boundaries, said boundaries are more lax than pegging on goody two-shoes. On the flipside, you may well be quite accurate within the Shadowrun setting and how I relate.

Totentanz: The GM is, as far as I can see, fair and impartial as he can manage on all levels. As you say, he isn't pushing ethics or morals, he is 'only' going to apply the consequences and reactions of the denizens of the game world to what the player characters do. Executing an undercover Lone Star cop poking into corp business (target affiliation 90% certain at time of killing) put the team, or at least several members of it, on Star radar in a big way-- keep pulling things like that, and the team will run out of places to go.

A large part of my character's reaction is my own, yes. His background, however, also suggested to me that he'd be against torture for stupid reasons. I think part of it is from settling more and more into the 'intelligence/information' role of a hacker, and judging people and leads with regard to what they know and value of knowledge. Call it justification, but my character's response was regarding several levels of issues with the action: ethics/morals, professional, and reputation. Were I to be a little more detached, it would have been an amazingly great roleplaying session. It was headed that way, in fact, until my personal reactions were tripped and combined (badly, in some ways) with extreme annoyance to the OOC understanding of what was going on.

Oddly, the more I think about it, the less upset I am with the act itself, and the more upset I am with the logic and reasoning behind it.


Replies in general: I am pleasantly surprised at the responses to my posts. Those of you who were down on my reaction and/or preferred game style, I anticipated that sort of comment. The surprise was there were less of those than I thought. We have different game styles, and probably would not enjoy being in the same game that each would consider most fun. No problem with that at all, and your perspective helped me consider my own preferences.

After everyone had a chance to calm down (especially me-- hard to reason when one is in a 'righteous rage' or close enough to make no difference), I apologized to the other players for my OOC behavior; what I said to them was fine, but the tone (and volume) had not been. I was then rather surprised-- the two whose characters I'd the most problem with (both IC and OOC) told me they'd been thinking on what I'd said in character, and told me they'd gotten carried away and gone outside what their characters would do for metagame issues-- an attempt to get a bonus on a check to counteract lack of skill. We then sat down and finished part two of an obscenely long adventure involving a fantasy setting that uses a certain popular game system and had a good time; the next SR game will be in a few weeks, delayed due to GenCon. Probably a good thing, by then things should have cooled off and I'll have had a chance to work up a spare character.

I think its good you're coming up with an alternative character based on your past experience, however, let me put this another way -

If you make up another character with a different background - one with perhaps a more 'loose' moral compass or at least one better able to get along with those PCs (more to the point) will you still be having fun with the game?

If the answer is no, then it isn't worth the stress. Don't try and make a square peg fit into a round hole. It just leads to frustration.

If, however, you honestly believe you can, then go for it. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

- J.

[Blade]

• It still wasn't something she did without reason or need and definitely not as casual as a day at the office

Nobody ever does something without reason or need. Such action is called an "acte gratuit" (gratuitous acte). It can't happen since doing something for the sake of doing something is still doing something for a reason (which is doing it).
If André Gide wasn't able to have a character do a gratuitous act, I don't think any of the Shadowrun authors were able to pull it off. So if what you're looking for is an act of violence commited without reason or need, you're right but I doubt the actions that you complained about were such actions.

Damn, now I want to play some Dungeon and Discourse.

[DireRadiant]

I think i might be a bit desillusioned by the general youth of today, so excuse me for asking but:"how so?"

The teens are way scarier.

[Stahlseele]

ah, i see

[Cochise]

You asked for an example, and I gave one.

Indeed ...

You can justify it however you want to and toss in the "casual day at the office" nonsense to constantly change the goalpost you set,

I beg your pardon, but that "casual day at the office" nonsense wasn't my premise in the first place (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)
I don't have to change any goalpost here at all, since the callousity as well as the casuality of such actions as part of the standard runner behaviour was LurkerOutThere's question to which Striper was named. I'm more than willing to accept that your example could be seen as an indication of such behaviour as standard. However, having a non-human protagonist doing something the like once and that - as you might put it - even being justifiable in terms of reasons behind it instead of more or less rampage torturing as described by the thread opener in his experience is something that I would deem "two different things".

but the fact remains that the plan was to have a woman gang raped to death by Trolls --

And that fact isn't doubted by me ... nor am I saying that her doings there would fall in the realms of ...

if that's perfectly kosher in your book, but mundane torture/interrogation a-la 24 is somehow beyond the pale, I really don't know what the point is in having a conversation with you.

.. "kosher", but I see it as still being very different to the described torturing. So as in prevoius encounters with you it's me who has to ask himself why I should bother having a discussion with you when you start making assertions on what I might or might not find "kosher" and then make your usual exit statement where you blame me for the conclusions drawn upon your false assertions. ~sigh~

[StealthSigma]

It sounds like, and you admitted, that you blurred the OOC and IC lines and let one cross into the other.

There's nothing wrong with your character opposing such tactics, but you've made it sound like you took it to OOC which is bad form. However, I would grant concession based on the reasoning for taking it OOC being that the concern was over the descriptiveness of the act rather than the act itself. I notice that sometimes people have problems separating themselves from their PCs and get really upset over IC occurrences.

The question becomes one of given the backgrounds of the PCs, would the action be something they would commit? I imagine that most Shadowrunners have an enemy or two they would bit itching to get at which would drive them out of their normal morals of acceptable behavior.

For example, my character (former military spec ops) is completely opposed to harming most unarmed civilians. I say most because there will be some unarmed civilians that are greatly dangerous. However due to his background and the causes for him leaving military service (it was forced, not willful), he has very low regard for governments, still has a high regard for military, has a low regard for corps in general, and has a severe dislike towards Saeder-Krupp. By severe dislike, I mean if he could drop ordinance on their headquarters, he would do so. 99% of the time he will be a rather moral individual, except when presented with a situation where he could hurt SK without it being easily pinned on him. If this means trading a few civilian lives to severely damage a SK production facility, he would probably do it.

[Apathy]

Personally, I don't have much of an issue with amoral campaigns, but I want the characters to be consistent with their stated personalities and background, and I generally don't care for gratuitous details.

GM: Ok, you say that you torture him for the information but not to the point of death.
Player: Yeah, we start by cutting off his fing..
GM: I don't need to know the specifics. Roll your interrogation skill, with +2 dice for injuries and +2 dice for the advantageous position... Hmmm, two hits? He tells you x and y.

Sometimes [especially if the players are sloppy] immoral actions have consequences. I try to make those consequences ones that would likely happen in the real world, and not the ones I'd 'like' to happen. Capture a street bum while no one is looking and torture him to death? Probably no one will know, and you'll get away scot-free. But if you're observed capturing bums [by another bum hiding in the trash to keep warm, maybe?], eventually word might get around about you in the street community. Try the same stuff with the Ares security guard and the consequences might be more long lasting. Every victim out there has a father or a daughter or a brother who might come looking for revenge, and if motive and opportunity happen to meet up it could go badly for the player.

[Blade]

Details aren't always gratuitous. If the character isn't a hardened torturer, or has a little bit of empathy left, he might not feel great about cutting people to get them to talk. In such cases, details are exactly what you need to stress the fact.

For example, in the campaign I GM, the runners had to destroy somebody's business in a spectacular way and then kill the guy. Most of the PC agreed to do the former but refused to do the latter. One of them accepted to take care of the killing part. He might have been more ruthless or have less moral sense than the others (or different morals), but he was still metahuman. He took the body of the guy (he had been knocked out), brought him near the river and put his head in the river to drown him (he didn't feel like killing him directly). The problem was that he needed to get rid of the body, and now that it was soaked he couldn't burn it easily. He had to go to the nearest convenience store, buy some inflammable material (lighter fuel or spray bottle), have some small talk with the guy behind the counter, take it back and spray it on the body before burning it and smelling the stench of burning flesh.

Describing the actions with a lot of details was useful to make the player uneasy, and convey how the character was feeling in a more subtle way than just saying "you don't feel good about what you're doing.".

[TeknoDragon]

Details aren't always gratuitous. If the character isn't a hardened torturer, or has a little bit of empathy left, he might not feel great about cutting people to get them to talk. In such cases, details are exactly what you need to stress the fact.

For example, in the campaign I GM, the runners had to destroy somebody's business in a spectacular way and then kill the guy. Most of the PC agreed to do the former but refused to do the latter. One of them accepted to take care of the killing part. He might have been more ruthless or have less moral sense than the others (or different morals), but he was still metahuman. He took the body of the guy (he had been knocked out), brought him near the river and put his head in the river to drown him (he didn't feel like killing him directly). The problem was that he needed to get rid of the body, and now that it was soaked he couldn't burn it easily. He had to go to the nearest convenience store, buy some inflammable material (lighter fuel or spray bottle), have some small talk with the guy behind the counter, take it back and spray it on the body before burning it and smelling the stench of burning flesh.

Describing the actions with a lot of details was useful to make the player uneasy, and convey how the character was feeling in a more subtle way than just saying "you don't feel good about what you're doing.".

I think that's a good way to go about it, and about the level I experienced in the session I posted about. Glossing over too many details reduces the immediate impact of the actions of the team. Heck, that level of detail is what I'd consider a good descriptive combat-- hit locations and physical damage depictions to bring home the meaning of the numbers just rolled. Hm. Might be a good idea to have a shady construction worker with a backhoe as a contact, and buy a few tons of quicklime for him to hold for a character.

Heh, in retrospect, I find it ironic that the group's mage and IIRC low-augment members were acting in a more gratuitously psychotic manner than the street sam and the 1.6 essence hacker/rigger/tough. There's some other ironies about the OOC makeup of the group, but going into them will exceed the board rules on posting content regarding politics and possibly religion.

I'm definitely going to be better-prepared for future sessions, and the things I've been thinking about will definitely help me be a better player, both IC and OOC.

[Draco18s]

Just my two centinuyen:

In D&D "Evil" is comedic. You play a mage who decides to become a litch, succeed, and suddenly are the villain of the campaign and almost succeed in killing the rest of the party. Twice.

That's about as much as I remember from when one of our group did actually do that. I wish I could remember more than just an excessive use of Contingency, but then, that player always knew how to plan in advance. Another player, who was actually neutral, different game:

GM: You enter a room, there are celestials everywhere. First time you've seen non-evil creatures, other than the one lantern archon.
Ruke: "We are here to slay good! Er, I mean evil!"
GM: And what are you wearing?
Ruke: The black robe of the archmagi and carrying the necronomicon...

In ShadowRun "evil" is a basic fact. You play a guy who shoots people in the face for money.

You're escaping a warehouse with stolen cargo and there's a Lone Star chopper putting dinner plate sized dents in the van. "Get underground!" shouts someone, and the driver takes the nearest underground entrance...into a mall...taking corners at excessive speeds you run over a few people, smash through a support column, a glass window display, a few customers, careen down the isle, through another glass structure, sideswipe a car in the other parkinglot and burn rubber taking a corner back onto the city streets. Now there's a cyberzombie who's new at the whole "cyberzombie" thing in the backsea--one of the chopper's shot blew open your unknown cargo--what do you do?

[Apathy]

One of my favorite movies was Grosse Point Blank:

Debi: You're a psychopath.
Marty: No, no. Psychopaths kill for no reason. I kill for *money*. It's a *job*. That didn't come out right.

Reading this thread I get the sense that some people on the board have a different concept of evil than I do. I make a big distinction between evil and amoral. Generally in my games SR has an amoral background but not an evil one.

An amoral character kills people because he was paid to, or because they're in the way, while an evil character kills people because he enjoys it. An amoral person won't torture someone unless he thinks that there will be some advantage to be gained from it, while an evil character thinks it's hilarious to see that baby wriggling and trying to get off the end of his bayonet. I've run lots of amoral campaigns, but I've never run an 'evil' SR game, and I don't think I'd like it much.

[Pendaric]

Interesting stance, and its all down to definition.
For me amoral simply means dillute evil.

Every selfish, hurtful, vindictive and callous action or lack of action is evil. Ranging from petty, every day swearing at someone because you had a bad day, all the way to premediated genocide.

Its a grey scale, were many individuals lie to themselves and justify their actions. Some times with valid excuses, to get by in the moral morlasse of the sixth world.
What is frighting are the individuals on the far side of that scale, whatever their view point.

I am inspired by Wilde's quip that extreme good is as interesting/fasinating as extreme evil. We see petty good and evil regularly but extreme evil is more prevelant, and seen more often, than extreme good.

[Blade]

You have to be careful with the difference between amoral and immoral.
Someone who's amoral is unaware of the notions of right and wrong. He might know they exist, but he can't tell what is wrong and what is right. I think a good definition is given by Corto Maltese when talking about Rasputin (a very good example of an amoral character): "Yes he is a bad guy. But he doesn't know it."
Someone who's immoral is someone who's acting against his (or his culture's) moral principle. Someone who is/has been immoral might feel bad about it or regret it later.

[Red-ROM]

I think its up to the group to set the bar. If someone steps over the line, it needs to be talked about. If no compromise can be reached, some body's got to go. I'm sure I'm rehashing at this point.

I don't want to put the kaibosh on my players mayhem and destruction too much. I like a pink Mohawk game, as its so lovingly called here on the boards. But if I have a player pulling fingernails off a cop within earshot of anything, its gonna cause trouble.

can I also say, as I have in other threads, that If another player wants to kill my character, he/she better talk to me first, or its gonna get ugly.

[HappyDaze]

In D&D "Evil" is comedic.
In ShadowRun "evil" is a basic fact.

I don't think either of those is a certainty. I've seen seriously played D&D games that make evil lack all sense of comedy and I've seen SR games that are almost slapstick splashed with murder and torture. I'd say it's all in how it's run and played, and despite the bias of many on this board, SR is no more of a mature game in representing evil than D&D.

[Draco18s]

I don't think either of those is a certainty. I've seen seriously played D&D games that make evil lack all sense of comedy and I've seen SR games that are almost slapstick splashed with murder and torture. I'd say it's all in how it's run and played, and despite the bias of many on this board, SR is no more of a mature game in representing evil than D&D.

Agreed. It can be the other way, but compare Johnny Mnemonic to Order of the Stick. ShadowRun can be slapstick, sure, but my impression of it isn't slapstick. Neither is my impression of D&D evil either, to be fair, but it's hard to have a more serious evil in D&D when torture and murder are somewhat blunted by the existence of clerical magic.

[HappyDaze]

ShadowRun can be slapstick, sure, but my impression of it isn't slapstick.

Look at some of the earlier SR artwork - Laubenstein in particular - as well as the cover of SR3.

[CodeBreaker]

Look at some of the earlier SR artwork - Laubenstein in particular - as well as the cover of SR3.

I have made every attempt to wipe a fair bit of the SR3 artwork from my memory.

[HappyDaze]

In the opposite direction, we have some D&D settings that try to stay dead serious - Dark Sun, the original Ravenloft adventure, and some of the war years of Greyhawk. The most common recent settings - Forgotten Realms and Eberron - are a mixed bag with some very serious elements mixed in with some cartoonish bits. SR isn't really any different.

[raggedhalo]

See, to my mind, good and evil are largely abstract concepts that reek of the supernatural or spiritual. Whereas people are just people, you know? Some people do good things, some people do bad things. Breaking the law isn't always bad and is certainly not always evil. Breaking the law doesn't make you a bad person -- your intention for doing so might, though.

In my view, shadowrunners are made to do bad things for money either because they have no other option (they are SINless with a particular skillset), they have some psychological impairment (they like blowing shit up a bit too much) or as a means to an end (they want to get rich or get revenge or whatever). There's no requirement in any of those things that they be evil or even bad people.

That said, I have recently finished a campaign in which one PC was most definitely evil. He started out with good intentions but ended up hanging out with a bad crowd, learning the Sacrificing metamagic and was then unquestionably evil. He used mind control freely, and lost all regard for collateral damage, but crucially he did this because he enjoyed it (IC) and because he saw no reason not to. Whereas other PCs occasionally engaged in collateral damage, they did so either because they'd not thought through the consequences of their actions (i.e. forgetting that using frag grenades in a busy street will _kill_, rather than injure, pedestrians) or because on balance the benefits outweighed the risks.

One is professional, one is evil. You see the difference?

I find it very interesting that some people take a very moral OOC stance on their characters' actions. I recall in an Abyssal Exalted game I once played (in case you don't know, in the Abyssals variant of Exalted you play supernaturally evil beings devoted to destroying the world) I managed to completely upset another player by engaging in some callous and casual violence. While I can imagine that very squeamish or sensitive people might get very uncomfortable around graphic descriptions of violence, rape or torture (especially if they have direct first-hand experience of these things) and might not want them in their game, I sometimes get the sense from posters on this board that they make a negative judgement about the people saying this stuff.

I'm also very curious about the poster who made the rather belligerent comment that if someone wants to kill their PC, they'd better talk first because otherwise it'll get ugly. Why would it get ugly? Do you have a problem separating IC and OOC? Because I sometimes wonder if that's what's at the root of this extreme sensitivity to graphic violence at the tabletop. So what if someone wants to kill your character? Why is that going to cause friction between you?

[TeknoDragon]

I'm also very curious about the poster who made the rather belligerent comment that if someone wants to kill their PC, they'd better talk first because otherwise it'll get ugly. Why would it get ugly? Do you have a problem separating IC and OOC? Because I sometimes wonder if that's what's at the root of this extreme sensitivity to graphic violence at the tabletop. So what if someone wants to kill your character? Why is that going to cause friction between you?

I suspect that it would be due to the investment a player might have in their character. Some folk put a fair bit of effort into character creation, backstory, etc. and become rather attached to them. This results in a very unhappy player when that character dies or is otherwise removed from the game; see also unfair GMs. It is also a matter of expected game style at a given table. With one group, the default is everything goes. With another group, well, better bring along a few 'spare' characters. There are, of course, play styles in between as well. Some people prefer all of one end of the spectrum, and some people like to try different styles.

I think much friction comes from a failure to set expectations in a game; my GM will be very delighted when my dino-themed cyber-freak is put aside (or six feet under; cliffhanger resumes in three weeks, one day). I'd be unhappy if he arbitrarily died (oh, look, you forgot to do XYZ and W too, Star catches you, locks you up), but when the dice are rolling, bad things happen sometimes. Recently, in A Certain Fantasy Game, my character died in the final battle of an adventure. It was a shock, but I considered the situation, and decided the game was satisfactory; the character had done all he could, kept the rest of the team alive, and he had been in the least risky place I could think of while properly contributing to the fight. Having him knifed without warning in camp by a companion while asleep would have made me furious.

I know I wasn't the one you were asking, but I thought it was a good question to think about and respond to.

[Totentanz]

I'm also very curious about the poster who made the rather belligerent comment that if someone wants to kill their PC, they'd better talk first because otherwise it'll get ugly. Why would it get ugly? Do you have a problem separating IC and OOC? Because I sometimes wonder if that's what's at the root of this extreme sensitivity to graphic violence at the tabletop. So what if someone wants to kill your character? Why is that going to cause friction between you?

People invest time, effort, and care into their characters. It's part of their vehicle for enjoying the game. Some people would argue they are just pretend, so it shouldn't matter. Personally, I'd argue that because they are pretend, and intended for fun, that crapping all over someone else's fun for the sake of your own is immature and stupid, especially in a cooperative game. Now, if everyone has agreed that killing PC's is acceptable (and some games almost depend on it), then that is part of the fun. However, there is a difference between separating IC and OC reactions and knowledge as opposed to being OC pissed off because somebody on a power trip hurt your enjoyment of the game. Some groups really enjoy that style of play, others don't. As always, the only wrong answer is the one that is unfun. I just disagree with the premise that the OC/IC separation somehow precludes people caring about the game and their characters. It also tends to degenerate quickly into repeated character killings.

I do agree with you that some RP'ers in general, including some on this board, tend to look down on groups that deal with these "mature" themes. I have always chalked it up to the standard geek superiority complex. Take any group of nerds, present them with another form of escapism, and watch them bash it repeatedly for no other crime than being different. Star Wars vs. Star Trek. Tabletop players vs. MMO players. SR players vs. DnD players. Every version of DnD vs. every other version of DnD. That tendency to look down on the other extends into the realm of RP style. Some people think that by handling mature themes the players are somehow demonstrating their own immaturity or their own moral outlook. I disagree The truth is we all like some game styles and dislike others. It's a little like middle school where all the guys are wacking off 4 times a day, everybody knows it, but they all deny it and accuse every other kid of doing the same thing.

I tend to avoid making too much of the distinction between good and evil in RP. Everybody has their own take and 99% of the time it just hurts the fun to over think it. One man's nazi is another man's professional. One man's saint is another's devil worshiper.

[Apathy]

Well said Tote.

I do find myself uncomfortable sometimes when dealing with mature themes in game. I recognize that for many people part of the fun is roleplaying someone completely different than themselves, so playing a racist (or a homophobe, miscogynist, religious zealot, pedophile, sadist, serial killer, whatever...) doesn't say anything about the player themselves. But there's some things I'd prefer not to hear even in an escapist game. And sometimes I get self conscious because I worry that other players in the group will be uncomfortable (e.g. how's the girl of the group feel when another player RPs a molester, or the black guy feel about the player RPing a racist?).

Ultimately, the game's about fun, and if the way you have fun craps all over my fun (or vice versa), then we'll either have to compromise or one of us would need to find a different group.

[Brazilian_Shinob...]

Just to throw in my recent experience with the game.
After almost ten years away from Shadowrun (2nd ed, mind you) ee decided to play the 4ed.
In one of our runs. We took a guard of a AA corp we were going to assault to gather more intel. The group hid at my place. Then, one of the players said he was going to where I kept the prisoner and pluck one of his eyes out with a spoon. I looked at him very seriously and asked if it was a joke. He said "no, this is cyberpunk, we can do shit like that". IC, we had a discussion, because it was my place and I was the one who was going to take care of the mess. Since then, he always wanted to bring prisoners to his place so he would "take care" of them.
Later in the game, the same player tore apart the leg of a dead guard and said he was going to take it home to eat it.
The GM tried to convince him that only NPC's would this kind of thing. Not runners, because the moment you start acting really crazy and getting a notoriety to the roof, people would not work with you anymore. He was temporarily convinced.

All the while, OOC he was saying that this was not D&D and I was no Paladin (my favorite class) and that the Shadowrun world was evil and blablabla.
I said that he world could be evil, alright, but that in shadowrun no one can live by herself and while runners can be amoral bastards, some of their contacts might not.

[Draco18s]

See, to my mind, good and evil are largely abstract concepts that reek of the supernatural or spiritual. Whereas people are just people, you know? Some people do good things, some people do bad things. Breaking the law isn't always bad and is certainly not always evil. Breaking the law doesn't make you a bad person -- your intention for doing so might, though.

Breaking the law is Chaotic. Hence the Law--Chaos spectrum in D&D (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)
Example of Chaotic Good: Robin Hood.

Later in the game, the same player tore apart the leg of a dead guard and said he was going to take it home to eat it.

How to be a very bad Death mage in Mage: The Awakening:
Talk about necrophilia all the time.

Yes, that really happened. Our Malaysian player was a Death mage who talked about necrophilia and so the entire rest of the group hid dead bodies from him, buried them, then in the middle of the night dug them up and buried them again somewhere else because they were afraid of what the character/player would have done with them.