AMA: GM Intrusions and Messing With Time

Surface Rlf says:

Hi Adam, very nice of you to provide this channel into your brain. :P

Gm intrusions... how about achieving them through gameplay itself. You mentioned a simple example of getting a sword knocked out of players hands so im going to stick with that (because its easy). How about it is done by some enemy or some monster in the game? Or an environmental event, or some artifact in another scenario or situation... and so on?

You also mentioned player being able to revert his latest action? Is that like some quick time travel backwards... like some kind of Prince of Persia sands of time mechanic - trick?
Just checking.

Great to hear that changing Foci will cost something - and even better hearing you dont like respecing... respeccing? (what an awful word too). I was afraid that might be included. 

GM Intrusions
A brief definition for those new to Numenera: GM Intrusions are a means for the GM of a Numenera game to spice up a situation by introducing a difficulty, without making the players feel like he's screwing them over just because. This is accomplished by giving players an out; if they accept the complication, they gain 2 XP, or they can refuse the intrusion by spending 1 XP.

In Torment, this is trickier to pull off because there is no GM and because intrusions have a way of reminding the player he's playing a game (a thing we'd rather not do in a CRPG).

Your suggestions, Surface, are pretty much along the lines of what we've been thinking. As I said in that interview, we haven't solidified how GM Intrusions will work in Torment yet, but we do have some goals that give us a framework:

1. Intrusions should be cool (not "good," but cool), something the player wants to accept. Of course, giving them XP is a major part of this.
2. Intrusions should change an encounter in interesting ways, not just make things harder for the sake of making things harder.
3. Intrusions should be framed as complications arising from external events, not from the PC screwing up (pretty much what you said, Surface).

Some ideas we've had along those lines are things like: extra guards appearing, a bridge going down (changing the terrain and the tactics of an encounter), a Broken Hound confers a Diseased fettle in addition to their normal attack, an item turns out to have been misidentified doing something different from what the player thought it would, etc. Will these feel right? We won't know until we can prototype them and try them ourselves, but it's in the right spirit.

In my mind, the real hard part is not what the intrusions will be, but how they're presented to the player. We have yet to delve into that UI in depth.

Reverting an Action
(Surface's question here is in the context of the interview again, where I mentioned that the player might be able to spend XP to undo a recent action.)

The tabletop game doesn't explain how this mechanic works narratively, probably because it's easier to immerse yourself in a story told around a table. We haven't talked about how this will be explained in-game for Torment. It might not be explained at all, simply something you can do, just like how you can use "renown" in Banner Saga to purchase items and food.

But the way you describe is not out of the realm of possibility. Numenera does actually have an "Undo" ability that lets you do exactly what you describe, taking back a character's most recent action. For Torment, we're talking about additional abilities along these lines as well, ones that let you fiddle with time in interesting ways.

The Ninth World is a strange and magical place, where nanites live in the air and dirt, where mysterious forces can be called on by someone who knows what they're doing -- or even some people who don't. It's entirely possible that this XP mechanic is one such situation.

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Got a question? Ask me anything.

AMA: On writing too concisely

Valerie asked:

Do you have any advice for people who write too concisely (i.e., me)? 

Write more.

Okay, kidding. Honestly, I don't know how much help I can be here because personally I try to write concisely. I'm not a fan of purple prose, and I'm not sure how to write elaborate description well without falling into the purple trap (although I know it can be done).

So I aim for concise. I'm not sure you can write too concisely.

Rather than worrying about concise or verbose (which is really just word count, which really only matters if you're getting paid per word), take a look at whether the prose does it's job: to pull the reader into the story. There's like a bazillion ways to do that, but I think it can be done both concisely and verbosely. I've seen great authors do both.

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AMA: Self-mutilation in Torment?

hightechzombie asked:

Do you intend to add self-mutilation to Tides of Numera like in Planescape: Torment during Ignus "lessons"?

Probably asking this way too early, considering that you are still in pre-production. Still, this is very important to me!

Backstory (because my audience includes non-Torment fans as well):
In Planescape: Torment, you played the role of an immortal who lost his memories each time he died. Because you're immortal, we were able to include moments like plucking out your own eye and replacing it with a demon's, or having a powerful wizard (Ignus) teach you how to use powerful fire magic by, literally, burning the lesson into your body.

In Torment: Tides of Numenera, you don't play an immortal, but the castoff shell of a man who cheats life by jumping from body to body (he doesn't realize the bodies he leaves behind wake up and have their own lives after he leaves them).

So you're not immortal, but the castoffs are quite hard to kill. We haven't drilled down into the details of every area yet (which is where a lot of this stuff will surface), and I'm not allowed to give spoilers, but there is definitely the opportunity for PST-like moments like Ignus and Ei-Vene.

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Got a question for me? Ask me anything.

Ask Me Anything

I'm adding a new feature to the blog (poor, neglected blog). You can now ask me anything you want. At any time. About writing or game design or how Torment's going or what it's like parenting a billion kids or living in Thailand or how awesome Firefly and Avatar are . . . whatever. Periodically, I'll answer your questions here (NDAs notwithstanding, of course).

Don't have any questions right now? There's a tab up top and a link on the sidebar. Use 'em.

(Why don't I use an existing platform for this, like tumblr or Formspring? (1) I have control here. (1a) When those platforms die (like Formspring almost did last year), I'll still be here. (2) I have enough platforms, thanks. (3) You don't need more places to go either, I imagine.)

That's it. Use it if you want it. I'll just be over here. You know. Waiting.

Why I Love the Banner Saga

Guys, I think I love this game. I mean, it's over now, which makes me sad, but... Well, maybe I should tell you what it is.

The Banner Saga is a tactical RPG, kickstarted by Stoic Studio almost 2 years ago backed by over 20,000 people. It feels like what would happen if George R. R. Martin hired Don Bluth to make a short version of Final Fantasy Tactics set in a Norse world. You think I'm joking, but play it and tell me I'm wrong.

It's set in a fantasy world inhabited primarily by humans, varl (giants with massive horns), and nasty armored things called dredge. For some reason, the sun stopped moving near the horizon and the world is freezing. On top of that, the dredge are rushing out of the north, crushing everything and everyone in their path. Men and varl have to put aside their differences to save both their peoples, but that proves rather difficult.

And then things get worse.

You play a few different characters across the game, reluctant leaders of men and varl stuck in impossible situations. This is the first thing I love about the game. You don't know how to lead. You don't even want to lead. But the game asks you to make impossible decisions of the stand-and-fight vs. run-and-abandon-our-ancestors-home variety and then it makes you question whether you did the right thing.

The second thing I love is the game makes you feel like your decisions matter. They don't always, but so many of them do that you don't even notice the others. If you stand and fight, you might lose and be run off anyway, or you might actually win and be forced to make a different decision. Do you let the women of your clan train to fight, even though the men are dead set against putting their wives and daughters in danger? Do you encourage a town you pass by to flee with you, as you did, or stay and defend their homes, as you wish you did?

The game itself is a series of macro decisions on how to help your clan escape and survive, interspersed with tactical battles pitting your heroes against a few enemies. These were the third thing I loved. There's almost no dice-rolling; the outcome of your attacks is almost entirely deterministic (some people like to give me crap for designing elements of chance, but guess what? I can love both). And the abilities of the different heroes at your disposal can be combined in unique, sometimes unexpected ways, so that a clever commander can sometimes win even a hopeless battle.

The music, the art, the prolonged scenes watching my caravan trudge across the waste (it sounds weird, but those scenes are part of what really drew me into the game), the deaths, the questioning myself as a leader, the triumph when I finally did something right... It's just a good game. If you like tactical games or RPGs, check this one out. The Banner Saga is strong evidence that games are art.

"You must keep writing, because you are a writer."

You know those writers who say, "I really need to get back into writing," and then two weeks later they're still saying that? Guess who's become one of them.

Well, not that guy. Me. I'm one of them.

You may be familiar with some of my reasons. Drafting is my least favorite part of the process, and with two unpaid novels in the hopper, and a yes-paid job, my motivation for doing the sucky part has been sapped.

And you know what? My reasons are good reasons. I'm doing creative work for my dream job and excelling at it, and I've got novels on the submission train. My priorities are right where they should be. This is what 99.9% of my friends tell me when I bring up the fact that I've written an average of 1,000 words/month lately.

They're absolutely right. Everything's cool. I don't have to write.

But there was that 0.1%, that one friend (I have exactly 1,000 friends; prove I don't), who had to go and say something different that stabbed me right in the gut because it was exactly what I needed to hear. The wonderful and not-at-all maniacal Authoress grabbed me by the shoulders and said, "You must keep writing, because you are a writer."

Ow! OwowowowowieowieOWow.

It's absolutely true that when push comes to shove, the paid job wins (actually the family wins, but they get on a timeout when they shove me, so . . .). But I've been tackling every single day like my job was in crunch time. I am a game designer. But I'm also a writer. If I can't figure out a way to do both, then . . .

Well, I just have to figure out a way to do both.

I know it can be done. I know because I find time to tweet, read, play chess online, and even draw. I don't have to write a lot (see the aforementioned priorities), but if I can't find time to squeeze out even 250 words in a day? That qualifies as pathetic.

Well, pathetic for me. You make your own goals.

What are your goals? How's your writing going?

You Get One Debut... But That's Not All You Get

My friend and former query twin* Krista Van Dolzer wrote this excellent post for authors trying to get published.

There have been a few exceptions...but for the most part, you only get one chance to make a first impression. Stated another way, you can only be a variable when you're actually a variable. If you don't have a sales record, publishers have to rely on a set of complicated formulas--and possibly their tea leaves--to determine how much your book is worth...

But once you have a sales record, it will follow you around for the rest of your career. Publishers no longer have to guess how much your books are worth; your sales figures will tell them.

Her point (which I totally agree with) is that you should be careful how you debut and whom you debut with. Don't jump at the first small press or self-publishing option you get without really thinking about it. People generally put more value in unknown potential than they do in someone who has a record we can look at. Publishers and the reading market are not immune to this. (This has recently become an additional reason for me not to jump onto Kickstarter with my beloved-but-rejected novels. Not yet, anyway.)

However, I would submit that you're more likely to write a bestseller in your 3rd or 4th or 10th book than you are in your first. I'm basing this on the fact that many of the bestselling novels I know and love were not debut novels:

• Orson Scott Card. Best known for Ender's Game (1985). It was his 8th published novel.
• Suzanne Collins. Best known for Hunger Games (2008). It was her 8th published novel.
• Scott Westerfeld. Best known for Uglies (2005) and Leviathan (2009). Uglies was his 8th published novel (dang, a trend!).
• Brandon Sanderson. Best known for Mistborn (2006) and his contributions to the Wheel of Time series (2009+). Mistborn was his 2nd published novel.
• Neil Gaiman. Best known for Sandman (1989+), Neverwhere (1996) and a bunch of other stuff. But his first published novel was co-written in 1990 and he'd been writing graphic novels since 1987.
• Chuck Palahniuk. Best known for Fight Club (1996). This actually was his first novel, but according to Chuck it "was a huge failure" and the film (released three years later) "was a flop."

Of course we know plenty of debut success stories: J.K. Rowling, Pat Rothfuss, Kiersten White, Stephanie Meyer. But I hypothesize that they are the exceptions. (I admit I could be totally wrong about this, of course. I would love to see some data on this :-). Most of the big authors I've seen have worked and failed** and worked hard again until FINALLY they had something that hit that elusive golden snitch of a nerve that every publisher is looking for.

My point is that, yes, your debut is something special that you should take care of. Don't squander it the first chance you get. BUT if selling stories is something you really want, don't stop writing. Ever. No matter how you debut, no matter what publishers or the market thinks of you, there will always be a way for you to get new words to your readers. There will always be a chance that the next thing you write could be The One.

Statistically, the more you write, the better that chance gets.

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* Krista and I were on surprisingly parallel querying-agent-submission paths for about a year or two, before she got a book deal and I got a job.

** Maybe not "failed" so much as "didn't hit it ridiculously big."