I directly 'ported the kicker and bang concepts into my Heroquest game that was based around a succession conflict in a medieval city state. Each PC was a member of the royal family with a possible claim on the throne and had a kicker that drew them into the chaos (see here). It was my first explicit use of kickers, and it rocked. Play was heavily player-driven and judicious use of bangs facilitated a very Shakespearean ending that I did not see coming at all.
I'm currently setting up another HQ game using the Transhuman Space setting. The players are puzzling over their kickers right now after deciding that they want the primary location to be L5 and creating very distinct characters that each have an obession with rogue AIs (one is a member of Deus ex Machina from Toxic Memes, one is bent on destroying rogues, and the other sees rogues as predecessors of God). I've given them some background on the Exogenesis situation and asked them to tie their kickers to that if they can. I'm eager to see what they come up with.
Eric
Edit: To note that I also used and am using the excellent relationship map ideas from Sorcerer and Sorcerer' Soul to structure the web of NPCs in both HQ games. Having the r-map and then twisting it into a backstory that is a fragile web of lies and scheming just waiting for the PCs to touch it has really tightened my prep and made the game easier to run in a facilitatitive mode. It's easy to improvise and riff off the ideas of the players when you understand how everything fits together by looking at one sheet of paper.
Last edited by Eric J. Boyd; 05-18-2004 at 12:13 PM..
Kickers are a moment at the beginning of a story that a Player creates for his PC. The The GM can massage the Kicker with the Player, but the point is it's a moment that the Player picks because the Player finds it engaging.
The requirements for a Kicker are:
a) it's emotionally engaging in some way
b) it forces a choice for the PC (and thus the Player) in some way that must be answered
c) the result of the Kicker must be opened ended. That is, no one at the table knows what the resolution of the Kicker is going to be or expectations of how to get there.
The rule for the Kicker is this: when the Kicker is "resolved" the story is over. Resolved is in quotes because how it is Resolved, and what the group thinks of as "resolved" is something to be negotiated by the group.
In a nearby thread, AndyK offered three examples of Kickers:
"I recently stole a sacred, coveted mask from the King of Ibzik. A few people know that I did it."
"I woke up yesterday with my hands and face covered in blood that wasn't my own".
"I just got word that one of my children, who was training in another city, recently was killed in an accident".
These are all terrific Kickers.
Now, how to use them.
First the GM sets the tone by nailing down some details about the world, giving notes to the players and so forth, possibly getting details from the players and making adjustments as new ideas come in.
Second, the group meets before the first play session: to make characters, Kickers, and so forth. For many people, this might seem like a "wasted" session, but it's really fun brainstorming this stuff together. It gets everyone on the same page, and lets everyone see a little of what's "under the hood" of everybody's character.
Then, before the next play session, the GM finalizes his NPCs, the relationships between the NPCs, the relationships between the NPCs and the PC, and probably comes up with a list of Bangs he might use during play.
Then the group gather to play.
Play begins by going around the room and playing out the Kicker. The GM frames the scene, providing NPCs to give the Kicker dramatic meat and bones. No one at the table knows how the scene will end. The PC must make a choice though.
For example, if using, "I recently stole a sacred, coveted mask from the King of Ibzik. A few people know that I did it." The GM might provide a mother of the PC who knows of the theft and demands her son return the mask.
No one knows if the PC is going to decide to obey his mother, return the mask, flee the country with the mask, kill his mother – or what
This first Kicker scene leads to a bunch of other scenes, each proceding from the scene before. Each scene forces the PC (and thus the player) to make new choices – some harsh, some not so harsh.
Some are choices that the PC brings upon himself, others are Bangs. Bangs are kind of like Kickers, but inflicted by the GM, forcing emotional choices of consquence with open ended results upon the player. If the GM says, "Your guy gets home. The front door's open. The girl you kidnapped and your girlfriend are gone." That's a Bang. (It's only a Bang, however, if the GM isn't trying to steet the Player toward one scene or another. It's a Bang cause no one knows what decision the Player is going to make for the PC until its made.)
Note that the Players are also forcing the GM's hand in this setup. Since the GM doesn't know what action the PC might take, he's on his toes – not armed with a "story" to run the players through - and not even a general outline – but really working with the other players at the table to discover how the Kicker will be resolved. This doesn't mean the GM is improvising the whole night wholecloth. As noted, he's got his NPCS, he's got the general framework of the world. The NPCs are up to their own agendas, bumping into the PC and so forth. He's also choosing how to frame the scenes for the PCs, which NPCs to introduce into scenes, what Bangs to offer -- all of this his chance to entertain himself by what he brings to the party.
Kicker resolution for the Mask of Ibzik might be: the PC returns the mask, the PC dies trying to escape with the mask, the PC goes mad by the hauntings of the people he killed to keep the mask, the PC drives his way toward the throne of Ibzik and becomes the new king so he can keep the mask – whatever happens on the way toward resolving the Kicker through the PCs choices and actions, and the GM's offering of obstacles, new choices and unexpected reversals and revelations.
In Sorcerer, when the Kicker is resovled, the story closes for the PC and the Player can rewrite the character sheet to reflect the changes that have occurred because of the story.
Hope this helps,
Christopher
Last edited by Christopher Kubasik; 05-18-2004 at 12:15 PM..
a kicker is a player-generated plot hook that is tied intimately to the character (and likely the premise of the game) that functions as the "why" behind the character's goals for the storyline.
i think... that's how i use it anyway. of course, my definition is a lot more informal than the official version, but i think it's more self-contained, and requires less reading of GNS theory in general.
a bang is a difficult situation introduced by the GM that requires, but does not dictate, an evocative choice (that often will deal directly with the premise of the game, but not necessarily) from the player/s.
again, that's what i've managed to get without filling the definition up with Forge terminology. i think both are good, usable ideas when you are trying to focus on a Premise, which is basically a broad, thematic idea about human interaction or human experience. they both bring the question posed by the premise to the forefront while allowing the players to have a great deal of say in how the premise is addressed.
as for usage, well, you'll have to ask someone else. GM advice is not my strong point.
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Chris has already answered this, better than I. However, before my net lagged I took the time to type this up, so I'm posting it anyway. neener neener neener.
A kicker is a player designed story element that propels their character into action at the start of the game, and defines something that will be (or lead quickly to) the crux of their protagonist conflict for the current story arc. Basically, it’s a plot hook, but rather than being something set by the GM to lure the character into his story, its set by the player to blast her character into action.
Thus, in Star Wars, Luke’s kicker might have been (and I say might, because when dealing with cinema there are many possible places to “start the action” and take the kicker) “My aunt and uncle have just been slaughtered by the Empire because of the two droids I’m with, and they’ll come for me next. I also found out my dad was a Jedi, a dead mystical order that was exterminated by the Empire, and one of his old friends wants to train me to follow in his footsteps.”
A few of the tricks about kickers are that you can’t have a kicker that necessitates a specific action in response, and that it should be inherently tied up with what makes the character a protagonist. The kicker should make you move, but it should give you some choices as to how you move, and be flexible enough that the GM is going to be able to use it to mix in your story with the stories of the other PCs. “My dad killed my mom, and now I’m going to kill him” might not be such a great kicker, where as “I came home and found my mom beaten to death and my dad gone, now I’m tracking him down to find out what happened and avenge my mother” might work – it gets you moving the same way, but doesn’t trap you into one course of action with an overly limited scope.
Someone, here or on the Forge, once gave a great example of a kicker for a swords and sorcery game. He was playing the Crown Prince of a small, religious kingdom with strong traditions. His father had died and he was about to become king, when his father returned as an intelligent undead. The church stepped in at that point and basically seized the throne by claiming that they had to come to a decision about what this meant for inheritance and the kingdom. So the character, at start of game, was faced with his father’s living ghost – maybe evil, maybe not, but certainly his father – a kingdom in turmoil, and a church trying to seize his power and turn him into a puppet. There were a lot of ways he could go with it, a lot of potential for story, but whatever he was going to do he had to do it now.
A bang is basically an event that the GM sets up in order to spur action in the game. It’s something that forces the characters to react and to make hard, important, and character revealing choices – without determining what those choices should be or setting up a single path the characters have to follow in order to get to that choice.
When using bangs its important to remember those last two points. If, when designing a bang you’re saying, “Hopefully the characters will do that, so that this can happen” you’re not making a bang, you’re making a channel. Bangs should be able to happen regardless of character choices – there is no “well I had a plot, but you guys went off it and now I don’t know what to do” with bangs. It shouldn’t matter if the PC decides to marry the princess or not (which could be a bang of its own) the next bang down the road shouldn’t depend on him having married or not married her. (Note, this doesn’t mean that every bang will be used in a game, or that some won’t become obsolete because of character choices. It simply means that they don’t depend on characters making a specific choice in order to make the bang doable.)
A classical cheesy super-hero game type bang would be the Green Goblin’s devil’s choice for Spiderman – hanging the children off one side of the bridge and his lover off the other. Of course, the movie soft-shoed this a little by letting him save both, but that moment of tension, that choice when we saw Marry Jane in one eye and the kids in the other – that’s a bang. You know, in that moment, that the hero must react, and that his reaction will forever after mark what kind of person he is.
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- Brand Robins
Last edited by Brand_Robins; 05-18-2004 at 04:47 PM..
Alright, so a Kicker is just a dramatic hook (to use the Feng Shui term), and a Bang is just a plot point that screws the character over (note: the character, not the player).
[grumble]Terrible terminology, in my opinion - neither term evokes any sense of its meaning. If I'd had to guess, and if I'd guessed those two meanings, I'd have assigned them in the opposite order (associating Bang with a starter's pistol, getting things running, and associating Kicker with the phrase "and here's the Kicker...", as used to introduce how a character is screwed.[/grumble]
Originally posted by James Ojaste Alright, so a Kicker is just a dramatic hook (to use the Feng Shui term), and a Bang is just a plot point that screws the character over (note: the character, not the player).
Yea, close, but not quite exactly. Let me see if I can sort out why I read the two as being different things.
A melodramatic hook, as explained in Feng Shui, is often a reason for the character to get involved in the GM's adventure. The GM says, "You are at XXX doing YYY -- now tell me why." The players then make up reasons that they're there, tying their characters into the situation the GM has given them.
A kicker takes that one step farther -- it isn't that the GM gives the PCs a scene and the PCs decide why they are there, it makes up the first scene for the GM. So the player says, "I am at XXX doing YYY -- now (through the course of the story) tell me why."
In the first case the GM sets the stage, makes the opening story bit (usually a fight, in Feng Shui), and then the players tie themselves into it. In the second the player set the stage, make the opening story, and then the GM ties it all together. So the two things are very close but reversed -- almost mirror images, really.
As for a bang, it depends how you mean 'plot point" and it doesn't have to screw the character. A bang is something that happens to move the plot, but the general definition of plot point doesn’t quite fit. It isn’t the bang that is the plot point; it is the characters reactions to it that is the plot point. You could have something that is a plot point that is certainly not a bang. For example, “After they get tricked by Lord Dumbleass, the PCs will be thrown into a pool of snot” is certainly a plot point – it is not, however, a bang as it assumes the PCs will be tricked (or even talk to Dubleass in the first place). So a bang is more like something that forces the PCs to create a plot point than a simple plot point.
Also, it doesn’t have to be a screw job – it just has to be dramatic. A lot of example bangs tend to be screw jobs because it’s easy to show the melodrama of a screw job when thinking of bangs. However, an equally good bang could be when the PC has to choose between marrying the princess (good) and becoming a king by his own hand (good). It isn’t the screw that is important, it is the PC making a choice that impacts play that is important.
Originally posted by James Ojaste a Bang is just a plot point that screws the character over
it's got little to do with screwing the character. a bang is when you put the character into a situation where they HAVE to make a choice. the situation is often dramatic and will relate to the idea of the game. it CAN involve screwing the character, but it doesn't have to.
edit: also, what Brand said there at the bottom.
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