Since you’re all working on Soft Horizon next, I can only assume that I’m far from the only or first person to notice a connection to the older fantasy stories like the stuff of Vance, Howard, Moorcock, Zelazny, and maybe even Lovecraft. I think what you’re talking about, exploring a setting, is as staple of the stories by those authors and Diaspora as a method of play works well for playing out that kind of thing. Start with a setting, then characters who live there, then explore.

I’m reading Tales of the Dying Earth right now and the unusual setting elements are probably more important than the characters in most ways. Cugel rarely does change, but his circumstances often do and so the stories are about that, much like a roleplaying game.

But yeah, it’s probably good that Diaspora sort of started with an idea and grew into what you found fun to play, rather than starting with a concept and trying to build on it. I think that might lead to a game more like Dogs in the Vineyard or Shock, which are games that are definitely “About” something but are so tightly focused on that something that at times the game seems subordinate to it’s themes rather than to the whims and whiles of the group at play. Diaspora was a big hit for us (even got one player to buy his own copy!) precisely because it let us drift into the perfect comfort zone for our play.

I think this post feeds into why I dislike games that are mostly about detailed setting. And I think there’s a lesson in D&D’s success as well.

You know, my reading of Diaspora lead me to think of it the other way around. Rather than being about world-exploration, with the characters as tools for that, I thought of it as character exploration with the worlds as tools. In my mind, it’s about how this handful of (in their world) more-or-less normal (if not ordinary) folks face some drastic change or challenge. The worlds are backdrop, and only get detailed as and if such detail is needed to tell the story of the characters.

Of course, I’m a dirty hippie story gamer, so it may be more reflective of my interests than the game. Which would imply that Diaspora is a frame flexible to serve multiple agendas.

I love that perspective, too, Lon, and think you are totally on target. That’s part of why I resist the question — not only do I discover what a game is about, I think every table does and to some extent uniquely.

Though perhaps we’re saying the same thing but looking from inside out and vice versa. I only see worlds detailed in service of story as well, it’s just that the world detailing draws my attention while the character detailing attracts yours. I think pretty much the same game happens at the table in both cases.

Maybe. :D Anyway it’s exciting to deliver something flexible enough to be satisfying in both directions.

Well, either way, y’all have done good.

Are you on crack? You’re game’s about playing Traveller with better rules. It says so right at the front of the book.

See how slippery this “about” thing is? You’re totally right — it’s about that too.

To elaborate, though, the Introduction describes our intentions. I keep finding out more information as I play though. Our intentions were clear (and as you point out, clearly stated). What we actually accomplished is not so clear.

That means you did follow the design methodology. Jared’s three questions are just an explicit design tool — every designer asks them in some form or another, whether they think hard about it or not. However, since the game’s done, the question (in that form) doesn’t have any relevance except as an example instructing others.

And it works for the second meaning, too (although it’s rather flip). An elevator pitch isn’t about convincing, only holding somebody’s attention. If you’ve moved into a discussion, if somebody responds with “I like Traveller” or “what’s Traveller,” even, you’ve gone past the pitch. Or, I should say, when someone gets past the better-worded “Hard Science-Fiction Role-Playing with Fate,” you’re past the pitch.

It’s just amusing to see you disparage both implications of the idea, because you’re associating them with different methods from your own.

Regarding the first, if every designer asks the question in some form or other then I’m not sure why Jared chooses to call it out as important. I think he’s after something more specific than you imply here, and I still contend that that does something particular. And it creates particular (and not bad — I am not disparaging the process) games. What I find, though, is that post-design the question is occasionally used as a bludgeon since it’s no longer the tool it was intended to be.

Regarding the second, again, I don’t think it’s as reflexive and pervasive as you make it out to be. I mean, it could be — there’s always an opening statement in a conversation — but it’s not very interesting if that’s what’s intended. When someone says to me, “what’s your elevator pitch” I don’t think they are inviting me to converse.

Now I’m curious what those “particular” games are. I’ve listened to a lot of recordings of Luke and Jared’s design seminars, and they tackle a wide variety of games with the three questions. The idea is to be mindful of what is most important (to you, the designer) about the game, and to pursue that in all parts of the game. If you have a bunch of different objectives for your game, and different objectives for different parts of the rules and text, and you don’t really think about them, you just write, you’re game’s gonna be a mess!

You’re right, though — if somebody asks for your elevator pitch, they probably want to invest as little time as possible in checking out your game. I think the time someone is willing to give you is really what makes the difference between an elevator pitch and an opening statement.

I’ve only listened to one session with Jared and in it the questioned designer said the game was “like D&D but cooler” or something similar. This was roundly dismissed and the session drilled down into what, it seemed to me, was not actually something the designer was interested in. That’s a significant danger in offering design advice of course — you risk advising the design of a game you intend rather than realizing the designer’s intention.

As a general statement — “be mindful of what is most important [...] about the game” — I can’t argue with it (except that I think multiple goals are perfectly achievable). But that’s not really what I hear when I hear Jared ask (and push on) the question. What I hear is “your game ought to be about one thing” and I don’t think that’s universally true.

I should add, though, that that’s not what the post is about. The post is about “elevator pitch” as a way to say “I don’t have time to converse with you” and “about” when posed post-design as a way to question whether or not you had focus when you started, and that as a coded way to disparage the game if you can’t invent a good enough one-liner.

For the record, (and for Josh), I don’t think that’s what my questioner was doing. Now, I mean. :D But my knee jerks just like anyone elses.

For what it’s worth, I just wanted to know what the game was about. Like, what do I do when I play it? What do I use the tools that you’ve designed, for?

The “elevator pitch” tradition in RPG design is, itself, a focusing tool. If you can’t explain to someone in a couple of sentences what makes your game cool, you don’t yet *know* what makes your game cool.

But that’s not what I was asking for, nor was I asking an early dev question.

Yeah I get that now Josh, mostly by analyzing my silly reaction to the question. Funny how something that simple can seem so loaded. It’s one of those questions that I should probably not answer personally at all because it carries so much baggage in my head — better if a fan answers it.

Yeah, Judd jumped in with that pretty quick. He’s a sharp guy.

Over at RPG.net, Sangrolu has an even better idea of what Diaspora is about, with closer ties to our original intent.

“I also didn’t expect that with Diaspora, they were channeling Traveller in a meta sense. That is, they didn’t just wrap up Traveller in FATE clothes, they recreated what the LBBs were–a fairly generic package but with setting assumptions with strong implications, along with tools to make your universe given those assumptions–for a new SF game.”

Halfjack, Traveler had a strong sense of setting before it was released; the imperium was created as a setting for Mark Miller’s board game, Imperium (1974, Conflict Games Company, 1976 GDW). Between the overview in Imperium and the inspiration from Star Wars, it was strongly themed.

And it had setting bits scattered throughout the rules as well. It grew into that hybrid; small freighters and huge battleships.

It wasn’t the setting coded into rules… it was setting-tailored rules that had been deprived of their setting, and that setting later revealed in supplements.

So you’ve recreated what Traveller never was: rules with setting implications, but no setting tied to them.

Thanks for that info, Aramis. My knowledge is based largely on the first six or so books and the first real reference to setting is, I think, in Book 4, Mercenary where a central authority is implied but little more. I didn’t realise that the setting had actually been stripped at this point rather than being nascent in Book 4.