Thoughts from the King

[subplotkudzu]

Recent discussions here brought to mind the writing philosophy of Stephen King, as discussed in his memoir "On Writing". Here's one relevant bit:

You may wonder where the plot is in all this. The answer is - my answer anyway - is nowhere. … I distrust plot for two reasons: first, because our lives are largely plotless, even when you add in all our reasonable precautions and careful planning; and second, because I believe plotting and the spontaneity of real creation aren't compatible.

And another

When, during the course of an interview for The New Yorker, I told the interviewer (Marc Singer) that I believed stories are found things, like fossils in the ground, he said he didn't believe me. I replied that that was fine, as long as he believed that I believed it. And I do. Stories aren't souvenir tee-shorts or GameBoys. Stories are relics, part of an undiscovered pre-existing world. The writer's job is to use the tools in his or her toolbox to get as much of each one out of the ground as intact as possible.

…Plot is a far bigger tool, the writer's jackhammer. …Plot is, I think, the good writer's last resort and the dullard's first choice. The story that results from it is apt to feel artificial and labored.

And finally

I want to put a group of characters…in some sort of predicament and then watch then try to work their way free. My job isn’t to help them work their way free, or manipulate them to safety - those are jobs which require the noisy jackhammer of plot - but to watch what happens and then write it down.

The situation comes first. The characters - always flat and unfeatured to begin with - come next. Once these things are fixed in my mind, I being to narrate. I often have an idea of what the outcome may be, but I have never demanded of a set of characters that they do things my way. On the contrary, I want them to do things their way. In some instances, the outcome is what I visualized. In most, however, it's something I never expected.

He then goes on to give examples from the writing of Misery with the admission that he had intended it as a short story but the protagonist turned out to be so capable at surviving that it turned into a novel - he just kept excavating more of the story.

Now, I don’t care whether King is correct about writing or not (so please, don't start), but I think his comments have a lot to say about Game Mastering. The similarities are obvious: you put a group of undefined-at-the-start characters in a situation and watch what happens next. The characters will develop more background, more character and more ability as the situation progresses. For some things is either a formal experience process, logical extrapolation of Didn't I Mention skills, based on the granularity of the system. For others it is just the usual development of character personality under the player's direction.

The preparation for the situation can be extensive or not (King mentions how the entire unfolding back-story in Bag of Bones was developed as he wrote the central character discovering it, rather than having it developed in advance) but since the audience for any game is larger than just the GM more definition of the situation is likely required. It’s not essential - I've run whole games with no idea what was going to happen next and no stats for the opposition, but for some games the situation at the start needs to be pretty well defined. The GM might find it very handy to know the villains goals, motivations, plans, resources and so on if he doesn’t feel comfortable just making them up in play, but that's still not a Plot as King describes it.

And there we have a pretty good simulation of reality. The characters act, the situation responds (or vice versa) continue until we reach an ending.

Now is Plot really a jackhammer? I don't know. Genre fiend that I am, I see plot as being one of those ultrasound density mapping machine. My players and I all like this bit of the type of story we're excavating, and we want to make sure we get it out intact. Bang goes the plot gun, giving us an outlay of the story where it sits in the ground and we happily go after the pieces we like. Large hunks of Old Lives, Old Civilizations were developed this way, and the Star Trek game even advocates having your endgame in place at the start and leading the players to it. I don't think I went quite that far, but I did plot 1/2 to 3/4 of each session - everything that revealed the situation - and tried to have at least one workable outcome. Sometimes the players used that, but sometimes they didn't, but everyone knew the types of the problems they were likely to encounter and the types of solutions the setting preferred.

Then there are discussions of theme (which whswhs discussed recently) and imagery, but those are worthy of a separate post, I think.

Comments

Last part, I promise

[brianrogers.livejournal.com]

That's where the OOC discussion is important, to keep us from totally messing up the story, whatever it is.

If you guys are the ones directing the story, absolutely. If it's me directing the story, then you have less chance of totally messing it up.

I have a book about plotting that describes some stories as "trailing off into frustrated scraps of revision." That's not the kind of gaming experience I'd like, in the very limited time I have for it.

That's a great quote. I think all of us would like to avoid that! We can revise (well, ret-con) and have done so when something didn't work out right at all. Since the goal is for all of us to be happy playing the game, we all have some voice in the outcome, and some in the direction.

I can see that you're right about the Arabian Nights game, but then how was that game *not* player-directed? Do you see player-directed as meaning that *we* come up with goals like "rescue kidnapped princess"?

Pretty much. I hope the thieves guild example made things a little clearer on the differences between the two styles in my mind. (There are greater levels of player direction, where the PCs and GM sit down and hash out a 'series pitch' that would be 'forming a mostly good thieves guild in a city state corrupted by vampires' where all aspects of the game are on the table at the start. That runs a counter to the prospectus structure, but I have heard that it is viable.

Re: Last part, I promise

[kriz1818.livejournal.com]

Yes, the thieves' guild example really helped me understand what you mean - thank you for taking the time.

And now that I understand better what you're talking about, I'm getting more intrigued than alarmed by the player-directed idea. FYI.