Squirm
Ttrpgs are Mostly Talking. Popular sentiment says that if a game was Only Talking it would be called Make Believe and that would be very different. From this we arrive at two axioms for Tabletop Roleplaying Games.
- Talking is the default state of play.
- There must be an element of Not-talking in addition to all the Talking.
2b. The relationship between Not-Talking and Talking must be significant.
Squirm: the moment in which Talking is interrupted by Not-talking.
Properties:
- Tangibility. Weightiness of game implements. What objects does the game ask players to interact with?
- Response. Feelings. Excitement or anticipation. Accomplishment. A function of rules and principles, and how a GM applies them.
- Temporality. Time spent Not-Talking. Linked to tangibility—interacting with game implements. Also associated with rules complexity. Thinking about rules, remembering rules, calculating modifiers, math in general.
Example: Rolling a d20. Tangibility obviously. Temporality in the act of grabbing and rolling. Temporal complexity in interpreting results. Response varying from anticipation to dread.
Whenever you're Not-Talking you're squirming. Interacting with the character sheet, referencing the rulebook, flipping tokens, writing notes, everything is squirm.
I just spent a hundred hours making quantitative comparisons between resolution mechanics and then deleted it all.
Here are my conclusions.
- 1d20 is heavier than 1d8 and a d6 dice pool is heavier than 1d4-1d20.
- Rolls rolled in Into the Odd are more exciting on average than rolls rolled in systems where each success levels equals an extra 10% off the price of swords.
- Shadowrun dice pools take a super long time to assemble. And to interpret.
- Thinking about Builds, Thinking about Blorbos, and Bleed are also squirm.
- Dread has massive amounts of tangibility and responsiveness. To topple the tower is cause your character to die and in this way the weightiness of its resolution system is reinforced by the climactic responsiveness of finality.
If you already knew this, well so did I.
We are but squirms. Writhe.