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+ Wind in the Flowers: Re-inventing a Game
+
+
+ How to be a Hollyhock God
+
+*R. Sean Borgstrom*
+March 13, 2002
+
+
+As mentioned in passing a few columns ago, *Nobilis* has its own unique
+term for the person running the game, to wit, the Hollyhock God.
+Historically, there have been endless variations on the language of
+flowers; in the game's dictionary of floral symbolism, the Hollyhock
+stands for ambition, glory, imagination, and perhaps a little touch of
+vanity. A Hollyhock God, then, has decided that to build a new Creation
+from their own imagination and share it with their players. I approve.
+
+Since James wanted a significant amount of advice on how to run the
+game, I set out to provide it. As in the Pharos Press edition, it's
+narrated in character. Some of this is just me: I don't feel comfortable
+telling people, as me, how to run their games. However, there's a more
+important reason.
+
+This is the section of the book most directly aimed at the reader. It is
+not just presenting information; it's talking to the prospective
+Hollyhock God, presenting directed advice on how they---the
+reader---should proceed. In my head, this leads to a large section of
+the book that breaks suspension of disbelief. Not that I expect people
+to /believe/ *Nobilis*, but I do expect them to see the world as they read.
+
+The character creation rules are written carefully to promote this, to
+show the players how the subject matter plays out in the setting. The
+setting material, of course, presents something to visualize directly.
+Spending too much time talking about how to run the game, however,
+breaks the vision and makes the reader think about /gaming/, not
+*Nobilis'* Creation. Narrating it in character helps avoid this. It's a
+character from the game world talking, and that reminder of how the game
+world works is always there.
+
+The advice in this book is much more detailed than in the previous
+edition. Accordingly, I chose a narrator, Ianthe, with a relatively
+unintrusive voice. Readers can concentrate on absorbing the material,
+with Ianthe's presence as a grace note---but an important grace note.
+
+Ianthe's advice comes in nine parts. Six cover a basic introduction,
+genre, play contracts, rules interpretation, characters, and stories.
+All of these are heavily optimized for games of *Nobilis*. Some of these
+are interesting from the design perspective.
+
+I've never actually been in a game that had a formal play contract,
+covering how the game handles sensitive topics, describing the level of
+control players have over their characters, and laying out rules for
+player conduct. However, like any sane person would, I want *Nobilis* to
+reach a large market that includes huge numbers of gamers and a
+substantial number of previous non-gamers. I also know that its subject
+matter can be fairly extreme. There is no sexual violence in the book,
+because of /my/ personal hot buttons, and perhaps two uses of foul
+language.
+
+But there's some torture, some murder and maiming, a lot of moral
+corruption, some horrible curses and massively ugly images, plus a huge
+amount of blasphemy. This is a game of wonder and horror, and the horror
+includes just about every kind that /isn't/ one of my personal hot
+buttons. Resolving the conflict between "a game for everyone" and "a
+game of intense wonder and horror" isn't easy; the best solution I can
+find is to recommend that the players and HG (Hollyhock God) sit down
+before the game and figure out what's in bounds and what's out of bounds.
+
+Besides, think how many RPG horror stories this kind of thing avoids.
+
+Playtesters rightly pointed out that most of the rules interpretations
+in the section on rules interpretation could have gone into the rules
+themselves. I'm still not sure whether I was right to leave things as
+they were. My concern was fairly straightforward: first, I integrate
+these into the rules, and then I write a new section of rules
+interpretations; and then I integrate /those/ into the rules, and so
+forth, until I find myself with a set of rules optimized for /my/
+running the game instead of the average HG. Opinions on this are
+welcome, although I'm not able to change it now.
+
+The section on characters represents a detailed guide to the entities of
+the *Nobilis* world, a discussion of typical social relationships
+therewith, and advice to the HG on building and exploiting those
+relationships. This was not so much design choice as organic evolution;
+as I wrote about each of those three things, I found myself wanting to
+define the other two more.
+
+To finish up this column, I'll discuss the three remaining sections of
+Ianthe's advice, all wholly *Nobilis*-specific. They cover, in order,
+what Nobilis do all day, how they solve their problems, and what makes
+their lives difficult. In my head, these are probably the most important
+sections of the book, since they spell out so precisely how Noble lives
+work.
+
+The Pharos edition represents early work of mine, when my tendencies
+towards vagary, imprecision, and hinting rather than defining were
+operating at full force. I've learned better since then, and a great
+deal of the new material represents me nailing down things that might
+otherwise have rattled in the wind.
+
+The first of these sections, on typical Noble activities, had one
+primary purpose: free the players to act, rather than restricting them.
+Working from this principle, I included a large subsection on the
+personal projects of the Nobilis---their extracurricular activities, as
+it were---and made an effort to make these as extreme and varied as
+possible. Examples of this sort of project include freeing the souls in
+Hell or sleeping with every man, woman, or adult human in general before
+they die.
+
+I stretched this idea a little bit with subsections on more dutiful
+projects that nevertheless had a unique and personal character. One of
+these subsections, for example, included a depiction of the Power of
+Chaos' typical activities in service to the Chaos in his soul, which
+include sowing disaster and trouble throughout the world, gambling, and
+studying mathematics and quantum theory. There were discussions of
+relatively standard activities as well.
+
+The second of these sections discussed how Nobles solve their problems.
+This represents, in essence, a guide to playing either a PC or an NPC in
+the *Nobilis* world. This sought to preserve two game conventions:
+first, the notion that characters don't arbitrarily fail, and second,
+the idea that violence is fairly rare.
+
+To protect the first, I highlighted the ease with which the characters
+can use casually excessive force---not just violence, but also extreme
+mental, social, and miraculous solutions---against problems in the
+mortal world.
+
+To preserve the second idea, I then spent time building mechanisms by
+which the Nobilis could manipulate or oppose one another without
+engaging in all-out miraculous combat. (It honestly is supposed to be
+rare, despite the Example of Play---it's just something that I had to
+cover there.)
+
+Finally, the third of these sections discusses the opposition---the ways
+the Hollyhock God can deal with the high power level and flexible
+abilities of the player characters. This section was fairly
+straightforward; my only purpose was to create obstacles that would
+remain fun for the players rather than frustrate them.
+
+R. Sean
+
+
+ What do you think? <http://www.rpg.net/pf/list.php?f=88>
+
+Go to forum! <http://www.rpg.net/pf/list.php?f=88>
+ Go to Top <http://www.rpg.net/pf/list.php?f=88> | New Topic
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/post.php?f=88> | View Threads
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/list.php?f=88&collapse=0> | Search
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/search.php?f=88>
+
+ Topics Author Date Latest Reply
+ James and the Small Caps
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=81&t=81> (2) new Kibo
+08-20-2002 16:29 02-10-2003 01:23 new
+ Art <http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=77&t=77> (1) new Lxndr
+04-26-2002 07:36 04-26-2002 07:36 new
+ The Original Nobilis Club
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=76&t=76> (3) new Bret Gillan
+04-17-2002 11:28 03-17-2003 17:48 new
+ Questions & Thoughts
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=64&t=64> (3) new Pyske
+03-20-2002 18:31 05-01-2003 13:03 new
+ Noble Buddhism?
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=61&t=61> (9) new Tlaloc
+03-20-2002 12:17 12-10-2004 01:20 new
+ Noble Suicide <http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=58&t=58> (9) new
+Eric Christian Berg 03-20-2002 07:43 01-18-2005 16:27 new
+ Art Notes <http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=54&t=54> (4) new R.
+Sean Borgstrom 03-14-2002 16:31 03-21-2002 03:44 new
+ Ack...you just lost my sale
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=45&t=45> (10) new SteveD
+03-14-2002 04:06 03-15-2002 06:29 new
+ Onomastikon working URL
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=36&t=36> (4) new Jorge
+Hernández 03-06-2002 12:51 08-20-2002 16:10 new
+ Why do angels change names ?
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=33&t=33> (10) new philippe
+tromeur 03-06-2002 10:13 12-10-2004 01:34 new
+ R. Sean, some examples?
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=32&t=32> (3) new Arref
+03-05-2002 08:17 03-13-2002 20:28 new
+ Sounds great, BUT...
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=28&t=28> (2) new Kane
+02-27-2002 16:43 02-27-2002 17:30 new
+ Sort of backwards?
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=21&t=21> (8) new Eric Finley
+02-20-2002 14:25 02-28-2002 09:35 new
+ Programmer nature slips out!
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=20&t=20> (2) new Sean
+McCarthy 02-20-2002 13:18 02-21-2002 10:30 new
+ Object Lesson Damage
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=15&t=15> (1) new Darren
+Miguez 02-13-2002 12:45 02-13-2002 12:45 new
+ How about this?
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=12&t=12> (2) new Kristian
+Lund 02-13-2002 11:30 02-14-2002 01:17 new
+ Now, this was strange!
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=9&t=9> (7) new access.denied
+02-13-2002 07:44 02-16-2002 21:44 new
+ Briefs on the other two?
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=5&t=5> (5) new Eric Finley
+01-31-2002 18:39 02-13-2002 10:36 new
+ Forum now works <http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=4&t=4> (1) new
+Sandy Antunes 01-31-2002 17:36 01-31-2002 17:36 new
+ limited series <http://www.rpg.net/pf/read.php?f=88&i=1&t=1> (2) new
+Sandy Antunes 01-21-2002 17:41 01-31-2002 17:36 new
+
+ Go to Top <http://www.rpg.net/pf/list.php?f=88> | New Topic
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/post.php?f=88> | View Threads
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/list.php?f=88&collapse=0> | Search
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/search.php?f=88>
+
+ Newer Messages
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/list.php?f=88&t=81&a=1&> | Older Messages
+<http://www.rpg.net/pf/list.php?f=88&t=1&a=2&>
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+ * Editing, Development, and Production
+ </news+reviews/columns/wind27mar02.html>
+ March 27, 2002
+ * Affiliations </news+reviews/columns/wind20mar02.html>
+ March 20, 2002
+ * How to be a Hollyhock God </news+reviews/columns/wind13mar02.html>
+ March 13, 2002
+ * Naming Conventions </news+reviews/columns/wind06mar02.html>
+ March 6, 2002
+ * Art Notes </news+reviews/columns/wind27feb02.html>
+ February 27, 2002
+ * Dynamic Nobilis </news+reviews/columns/wind20feb02.html>
+ February 20, 2002
+ * Systems Change </news+reviews/columns/wind13feb02.html>
+ February 13, 2002
+ * Treachery </news+reviews/columns/wind06feb02.html>
+ February 6, 2002
+ * The Emperor to Come </news+reviews/columns/wind31jan02.html>
+ January 31, 2002
+ * The Changing of the Guard </news+reviews/columns/wind21jan02.html>
+ January 21, 2002
+
+
+ Other columns </news+reviews/columns.html> at RPGnet
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