Providence

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Providence

Providence is a LARP game using Trent Yacuk's Kingdom Come system. It is a game of Fallen Angels and their struggle to survive against the forces of Heaven and Hell and some things in between.

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    Embodiment, Conviction, and Morality

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    Post by cenobyte Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 18:45

    I don't think so.

    In the words of Bne, "there is a subtle, but important difference between" ontological and teleological. A difference that is more subtle than beginning with different letters (grin).

    Teleological: the argument that all things are directed or designed for a final purpose. That there is a final cause for all purpose.

    Ontological: a specification of relationships between all things.

    Ultimately, I just like using big, important-sounding words that basically mean things like "purpose-driven" and "relationship-driven".


    Last edited by cenobyte on Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 18:48; edited 1 time in total (Reason for editing : Some day, I will finish my sentences before I click "Send". Someday.)
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    Post by Rada Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 19:58

    The system is antithetical to a teleological perspective. The system is not designed to look towards an end result or final purpose, but to look at the immediate effect. If it was teleological in nature, acts that caused indirect suffering would be as severe as direct acts which is not the case as written. Central to a teleological morality system is the idea that the intentions behind an act, specifically with regards to achieving an ultimate "good", are of central relevence. A teleological morality hinges on consequentialism and the moral worth of an action based on it's end result. In a teleological system, while the acts of Rada probably still would have been "evil" since his desire for inflicting cruelty probably outweighed his belief that the punishments he inflicted caused good in the world, the actions of Cherior would not have been "wrong" or "evil" since as God is an ultimate "good", enforcing his will would reduce long-term suffering by a greater degree than the short term suffering caused directly by the act.

    The word teleological comes from the greek word Telos or "ends". Teleological theory is at is core the theory of "The ends justify the means". Which unless I've totally misunderstood all of our previous discussions on the matter is the opposite of what the KC morality system is about.
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    Post by Corral Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 21:36

    Paul and I both think that the KC Morality system attempts to cover two axes with one scale. Kind of like how the D&D alignment system got squooshed from 3.5 to 4... instead of an axis of Good versus Evil overlapped with an axis of Chaos versus Law, now they attempt to define Lawful Good as "super good" and Chaotic Evil as "super evil" - they have ruined a perfectly good system that way.

    In the same way, we think that the KC Morality system would be *drastically* improved by the introduction of a second axis, so that Good versus Evil can coexist with Willingness to Cause Harm versus Aversion to Causing Harm, instead of trying to say that they're both the same thing.

    The way the system stands, any character who sees or causes too much harm, and fails to deal with it (as opposed to those who were just go "Hmm, OK..."!!) finds themselves sliding toward the point where they find joy in pain. In short, by seeing too much violence, they become evil. By the same token, failure to cause harm (even in order to prevent greater harm in the future) seems to be equated somewhat with good.
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    Post by cenobyte Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 21:39

    I've always just seen it as a systematic desensitisation (rather than finding joy in pain).

    I think the axis of good versus evil is somewhat addressed in both Embodiment (Virtuous versus Sinful) and Conviction (to a much, *much* lesser extent).
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    Post by Corral Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 21:46

    Quick note: even the names imply this. Hardened and Hardcore seem to imply someone who is, well, hardened to violence. Irredeemable, on the other hand, is beyond redemption.

    Cenobyte: Rada's description of Irredeemable: "Note that Irredeemable characters are not just allowed to commit heinous acts freely, they take joy in it." Is this wrong?
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    Post by cenobyte Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 21:48

    I don't think it's *wrong*. I think it's one way to interpret that particular Morality.

    The biggest point I am trying to make here is that it's not all about *violence*. It's about causing suffering.
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    Post by Corral Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 21:56

    Sure. Mainly, I got tired of saying "harm" each time and decided to switch it up a bit. But also, it is *direct harm* or *direct suffering* that seems to be being punished (er, requires a trauma roll) here, and that's usually violent.

    I also wanted to point out that Irredeemables take trauma (or can) from acts of grace. You can't have a Good Person who is simply completely hardened to seeing suffering. A Good Person would not want to *cause* it, but they shouldn't *of necessity* flinch from it, either, or even be willing to cause it in order to prevent worse suffering later.

    I really think two axes (not as in the plural of axe, by the way, this is the plural of axis) would be better.
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    Post by Keth Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 22:03

    Well an act of grace is a selfless act right? In a way you can still be a good person by doing really good things. You might help an old lady cross a street because you want to look good. You could stop a mugging, give the person their money back and walk them safely home because you *really* want to hit something. Not out of the goodness of your heart, but because it directly benefits you in some way. They are good acts, and because of them you may consider yourself a good person, doesnt mean you just committed an act of grace. Just means you did something good that also happens to benefit you in some way that belences the scale. Thats if I understand it right.

    Another example may be diving into traffic to save a puppy because you think the owner is exceptionally attractive. Or maybe helping out at a soup kitchen to stop people from looking to closely at your more violent actions...

    maybe...

    (edit: I thought it had a bit more relevance at the time I wrote it.. sorry)


    Last edited by Keth on Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 22:05; edited 1 time in total (Reason for editing : added the edit)
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    Post by Corral Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 22:10

    You can do something nice for either selfless or selfish reasons. It can also be both, but let's conveniently ignore that for now. The person with selfless reasons is committing an Act of Grace, and the selfish one is not. But I also consider the selfless one to be the *truly* Good Person, and it's a shame all the same that you can't be that kind of person and also hardened to suffering.
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    Post by cenobyte Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 22:13

    ...but you can. You can be a Good Person and be hardened to suffering. That's what "Hardened" is for. You can still do Acts of Grace and yet cause some suffering without too much of a penalty.
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    Post by Keth Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 22:20

    I think even hardcore can still do acts of grace without much trouble. Maybe my memory is a little off. Hardcore can be almost completely resistant to suffering (I think it might take someone truely twisted to be completely immune. Sometime something will get to you unless your truely irredemable)
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    Post by Corral Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 22:21

    True...ish. Close enough, but then suddenly at the next step you're so bad you can no longer do good things. The outermost steps on this scale go beyond pure ability-to-cause-or-see-suffering, whereas the middle three seem to be mainly measuring exactly that.

    Is anyone actually arguing *against* two axes being better, or only that the current system is satisfactory?
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    Post by cenobyte Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 22:22

    I'm certainly saying that I think the current system is sufficient, and to some extent *has* two axes.
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    Post by Keth Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 22:32

    I believe its satisfactory. I may not like it at times but it works for the game. In my happy little world I dont think its the be all end all of the morality system in the game. There are different stages, and offshoots of where you might be at each level.

    Im not really sure about the having two axis thing. Or maybe it does but they are rotated to a more limited degree (where as dnd gets much closer to having the 45-ish degree shift from cn to cg for example... or the 90-ish shift from cn to ng. I still use the 3.5 system, 4.0 alignment hurts the cg in me. Back to the topic!). But i guess I cant really argue against Jills point because she only said to a limited extent. And to a limited extent I guess it does.
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    Post by Corral Tue 13 Jan 2009 - 23:11

    In response to cenobyte's last post... that's my problem, really. That it *tries* to have two axes. But it's really just a five-step flat scale.

    4.0's flaw is that you cannot have chaotic good or lawful evil, both somewhat rare but completely valid types of people. This system has, in my eyes, the same flaw: you cannot have the evil innocent (someone who does things for entirely selfish reasons, but gets squeamish at the sight of blood) or the good irredeemable (Paul's hardened hero). You can have an evil typical or a good hardcore, but it bugs me that we are putting 9 or more types into 5 holes.
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    Post by Rada Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 1:06

    I don't think making the system more complicated is the answer. But my main concern has always been calling the system morality. My solution has been not to think of it that way. It is as system of callousness and innocence. There are characters that have been played, that on paper are hardened or even typical, that according to the rules never violate their morality and in my view are evil characters.

    Ultimately in any game mechanic, the designer, storyguide, and player should look at first principles. "What is this mechanic attempting to accomplish? " If the mechanic is there to preach or to teach the players good and evil, then it's going to fail because it's a freakin roleplaying game. So why do games have mechanics like humanity, alignment, soul, and morality? They are there to enforce a certain feel to the game. D&D 4th ed has a different feel than 3.5. It is less complex and was intended to have more of a videogame feel. As such its new alignment system was changed to match.

    Part of my problem is that I no longer know what Trent is trying to do with this mechanic. At one point I thought I did, but now I'm unsure.
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    Post by Corral Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 7:33

    You know what, perhaps it's not that it should have an extra axis to show good and evil so much as that it should remove the reference to good and evil from within what it has. (I stress again, I am talking only about the outermost ranks, Innocent and Irredeemable). Yes, you can have a character of any "alignment" be Typical, Hardened or Hardcore. But it bugs me that suddenly at Innocent or suddenly at Irredeemable we seem to be talking about more. You cannot have a good Irredeemable or an evil Innocent. Why?

    Here's what this system, in my mind, is:


    Innocent..
    TypicalHardenedHardcore
    ..Irredeemable
    where the upper row represents "super non-hardened" which you can only get to by being Good AND Typical, and the lower row represents "super hardened" which you can only get to by being Evil AND Hardcore. Sort of.

    Maybe what I think it's supposed to be is wrong. If so, I hope it's explained better in the rules. If not... I think the apparently arbitrary restriction is worse than pointless. It hurts the mechanic. Either Irredeemable has something to offer (in terms of roleplaying, not mechanics) that an Evil Hardcore doesn't have, or Irredeemable alignment should not exist as a separate entity. And if it does have something new, I wish it weren't restricted to Evil only.


    Last edited by Malicia on Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 7:35; edited 1 time in total (Reason for editing : Formatting)
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    Post by cenobyte Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 9:57

    Dave (Rada), I *love* what you said. About callousness and innocence.

    I do feel that I should point out that *nowhere* in the description of Morality does the book mention the concepts of "good and evil". Maybe that's where we're all getting caught up. Morality is *not* supposed to be a measure of good and evil. That's kind of what Virtue and Sin is for.

    The mechanic that Morality addresses in KC is strictly the Traumatic Wounds/Trauma part of the game. Morality is used to measure what acts you are willing to commit and what acts you are not willing to commit. It is used to measure what acts you are willing to witness and which you are not. It is a measure of what a character will willingly and easily do and what a character must be committed to do. In that vein, the Morality system is a measuring stick, really.

    A character subjected to acts outside their Morality may have Traumatic Wounds inflicted upon them. These Traumatic Wounds create Symptoms which affect a character's personality (and thus the player's roleplaying).

    Does that help?
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    Post by Rada Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 12:00

    I do feel that I should point out that *nowhere* in the description of Morality does the book mention the concepts of "good and evil"

    Ok, but the dictionary does. I thought maybe my understanding of the word was wrong and that I was the only person attaching the concept of good and evil to the word morality. So I looked it up. The OED defined morality as:
    morality
    noun (pl. moralities) 1 principles concerning the distinction between right and wrong or good and bad behaviour. 2 moral behaviour. 3 the extent to which an action is right or wrong. 4 a system of values and moral principles.
    Trent has used a real word from our real language and then changed it's meaning in his game. That has been my fundemental problem all along. By calling the system "morality" it implies a sense of right and wrong, good and evil. If trent wants a morality system he should make one (which I don't think the game needs). If he wants to keep the system he has (which I think is the better option) he should scrap calling it morality because it implies to future storytellers and players the system is something it isn't.


    Last edited by Rada on Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 12:01; edited 1 time in total (Reason for editing : spelling)
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    Post by cenobyte Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 12:14

    *sigh*

    I think (and I want to stress that when I say *I* think, I mean just me) that Trent has made a Morality system that does exactly what it should - it provides a framework within the game with which a standardised system of which actions are easy to do ("easy" in terms of a character's conscience, so you could consider that to be "right" or "good") and which are difficulty to do (again, in terms of conscience, actions that might be considered 'bad').

    I think there's no need to change the word "Morality" in KC. Morality represents which actions are "okay" (good) and which actions are not "okay" (bad). It does not represent the esoteric or metaphysical concepts of "good" and "evil" because, and I cannot stress this enough, **that is what the Embodiments are for**. That is why you have VIRTUES (Good) and SINS (Evil). Morality isn't for that. Morality is a gauge of your ACTIONS, not your belief system. Trent is using the word "Morality" in KC to represent the *actions* of characters, which does correspond with the OED definition. It's NOT a belief system (which is another of the definitions), though. Maybe that's been where folks are getting hung up. The belief system is represented by Embodiments, and, to a lesser extent, Convictions.

    "Morality" to me does not imply anything other than "a scale by which actions are judged". I honestly could not have forseen anyone else not understanding it that way.


    Last edited by cenobyte on Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 12:18; edited 2 times in total (Reason for editing : Today is not the day I will remember to finish my sentences.)
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    Post by Rada Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 13:39

    The problem with using real words is that they already have meanings. If "folks are getting hung up" it is because even if we had copies of the rules to read, reading them still would not wipe our previous memory of what words meant prior to reading those rules.

    I don't want to start having to use big first letters in using game terms as in, "I am playing a very small m moral character who is big 'I' Immoral" or, "I am playing a small i immoral character who is big 'M' Moral"

    No matter how much the rulebook tries to say they don't (if it tries at all), there are value judgements inherent in the words "moral" and "immoral".

    As a side note, I also strongly disagree with you that the Virtues and Sins represent good and evil, but I think that is a conversation for another thread.
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    Post by Corral Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 13:44

    Also the dictionary term Irredeemable. If it *doesn't*, as Rada said, mean that as soon as you descend to that level you have to take joy in pain, then I've been confused all along. But it would help to change the name.
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    Post by cenobyte Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 14:40

    Irredeemable in KC is not used as "you take joy in pain".

    In KC, this is what Irredeemable means:
    This is a depraved, very dangerous state for a Fallen (or human) to be in. An Irredeemable character is a tremendous responsibility, as it means that you have no love for anyone. Friendships can be dissolved in an instant; negative emotions are encouraged and terrible acts are relished...Irredeemable represents a character who is already quite insane by clinical standards

    I think maybe Rada was giving an example of how he'd seen Irredeemable characters played, or his idea of what it meant. But it's certainly not the "textbook" definition that's used in KC.

    Irredeemable characters are psychopaths. They *might* be the sort of people who take joy in causing pain. They might just be utterly devoid of any sort of empathy, and simply don't care if they cause pain. The important part of Irredeemable characters is that any selfless act causes them Trauma.
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    Post by Rada Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 15:19

    I used the word "enjoy" instead of the word "relished" as I thought they were synonyms. So irredeemable characters don't enjoy causing pain, they just relish doing terrible acts. Sorry for the confusion.
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    Post by cenobyte Wed 14 Jan 2009 - 15:23

    I don't know that that's accurate, though...it *may* be in some circumstances, for a particular character, but I think it's more accurate to say that Irredeemable characters don't care what harm they cause. They are, IMO, utterly dead inside. Cold and remote, unfeeling. They have no empathy, and if they did, they would disregard it.

    I just don't see any support for the claim that all, or even most, Irredeemable characters would actually revel in or take joy from causing suffering.

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