Thoughts on organization of player intention in roleplaying games

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Roleplaying games that are based on group play utilize structures both narrative and mechanical to organize how players think and act in terms of their characters’ relation to each other. Some games use implicit social structures entirely fabricated in the narrative, some offload the responsibility onto the players in creating characters with aligned character motivations. Character motivations tell us how the player intends to act, what they intend to act towards, and where that player's active involvement is most important.

How you structure players and character intention is important to gamefeel, spotlight management, and scene play. Managing the expectations of group dynamics at the table level is important, but the game design itself has a direct impact on how this plays out.

Play where characters have aligned motivations have more opportunities for active participation, encouraging players to have characters that work together to achieve common ends.

Play where character motivations are unaligned have more space between player intention, drawing characters narratively apart where players have less reason to become invested in play not focused on their characters motivations.

Play where character motivations are in opposition have unique opportunities for active participation, especially as players have reason to be interested and involved in play where they are not directly focused on, but the contents of play can impact their characters actions and goals.

Many games are fully in the first camp, where characters ostensibly have aligned motivations within some degree. Dungeons and Dragons assumes characters are all part of a shared “party”, attempting to solve some kind of problem or secure some kind of resource. This is reinforced through the real world social structure of play, in that it is expected for everyone to play under this assumption, but only casually reinforces it.

Other notable games are in the second camp. Apocalypse World, and many of its variants, explicitly does not have aligned player motivation from the start, the thing shared most between them being scarcity. Motivations arise during play and shift wildly throughout, player intention being equally loose.

Aligning player intention and character motivation can be done through the mechanical structures of play. Having a narrative driving force putting the players together is helpful, but unreliable. Open-ended roleplay can lead to the discovering of unexpected motivations, formation of new ideas, or schisms in player intention when in the face of ambiguity.

Blades in the Dark explicitly has all characters involved in the same gang, but mechanically reinforces this with mission engagement and play structures - you can’t run a mission without your crew, you can only do so many things between missions without burning out your personal resources.

This is an example of a system that keeps player intentions by having characters prescriptively associated, and singularly weak, group actions having a strategic dominance. You are encouraged to work with others to maximize reward and minimize personal losses, and no work needs to be spent justifying requesting or providing that support as the game already tells you that you are a team.

Two attempted system processes to align player intentions.

In Light Eaters, players are part of a Clique, a group of misfits that associate with each other and share social resources. They have the same spot to hang out, share a map, share their companions and sources for Light. They collectivize debts as a group, getting each other into and out of sticky situations. Second, but more importantly, is that dice can only be rolled by huddling up with your Clique to Strategize. Mechanically, you can only be proactive in the world with the support of others. Otherwise, you can only Challenge actions and obstacles, keeping you purely reactive. In play, these two factors result in a great deal of social cohesion and alignment of player intentions. When people want different things to be done, they hash it out as a group and make an organic decision before moving forward, as opposed to dividing the intention. 

In Golden Ticket, player intentions are aligned through the mighty hammer of consequence. In this game, you are exploring the long abandoned factory of a fabled candymaker. You are not in an explicit social group with other players, however, you are the only people able to enter and leave this factory. Further, if anyone should find themselves alone, they suffer a unique and unavoidable consequence based on the nature of the room they are in. Players willingly, and fearfully, cling to each other for safety.