Failure is Fun!
In our game of Mouse Guard the other night, there was a new concept the players had a hard time accepting at first. It wasn’t the idea of the three-round turns, or the four types of actions you could take during your round. It wasn’t even the separation between the player’s turn and the GM’s turn. It was this: Failure is an option.
In D&D, Savage Worlds, and pretty much any other game, players hate, hate, hate to lose. A failed dice roll is never a good thing.
But in Mouse Guard, failure creates conflict, which makes for a better story.
And though the mechanics exist in Mouse Guard for giving benefits to failure, that doesn’t mean that that philosophy shouldn’t carry over into other games.
For instance: What’s a better story in D&D: The one where your rogue walks through the market and picks a dozen pockets without getting caught, or the one where on the 12th pocket, he picks the pocket of a very large half-ogre who happens to notice the lightening of his purse and decides to pick a fight?
Failure adds drama, and in a role playing game, drama is always a good thing.
Just think: In Indiana Jones, how boring would it have been if he had measured the right amount of sand in that bag and switched out the statue, just to walk out of the temple without any problems? Boring.
As a GM, try thinking about more situations you can incorporate into your game which allow for failure on your players’ part which allow for better role play.
As a player, make sure you remind your self that sometimes, failure is fun.
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I’m curious how this is different in Mouse Guard. Failure has always been like that in our 4e games – failed checks to navigate result in interesting encounters, failed information checks result in hilarity, failed diplomacy checks raise the tension level. It’s never just a flat, “now that option is closed to you.” What does Mouse Guard do differently?
Mouse Guard works things differently in that you can get bonuses later on if you, as a player, willingly take negatives to yourself.
Also, the game is set up that if you pass, say, a pathfinding check to go from one town to the next, you arrive at the end of your mission without incident. You could, conceivably, end up completing a game for the night in only a half hour, if you weren’t to miss any rolls. It’s not until you fail that the game gets interesting.
I’m discribing it horribly. It’s really something that has to be seen to be understood.
I’m thinking about running a game of Mouse Guard at GenCon, if you’re there.
The other important thing to remember about failures in Mouse Guard – they’re essential to advancing your skills.
Since there isn’t an XP system or leveling up in MG, each skill is handled individually. To get a skill bumped up a number (say from a 3 to a 4 in Fighting) you have to succeed a number times equal to your current number and fail a number of times equal to your current number minus one. Failure is absolutely necessary in MG just to make your character better at something!
I love when I fail as a player because it means my GM gets to make up some horrible punishment or fun elaboration (as Swordgleam pointed out) out of my failure. I agree completely that success is simply over-rated
.-= The Hopeless Gamer´s last blog ..Collaborative, Not Competitve Storytelling. =-.
I’m hoping to be at gencon. Moving across the country is a bigger priority in my planning right now, so I’m not sure.
[...] complete difference, Mark touched on this in a recent blog of his, failure is a more significant part of the game. Sure in 4e if you don’t succeed in a roll [...]