Thread by @rdonoghue

Ok, hypothesis that has been bubbling around in my head ever since @Kiranansi started that thread on co-op.

Mechanical support for player interaction in a TTRPG can be very strongly driven with an emphasis on what characters cannot do.

Specifically, what *individual* characters cannot do but other characters may be able to.

There's an initial layer of this that's fairly obvious - if the group has differing capabilities, then coming together as a group allows that to be addressed. Roles, as it were.

But part of what has had me chewing on this is that the applicability to tactics and teamwork is obvious, but I got more curious as I thought about the interactions within a game like the Amber DRPG, which is *incredibly* lateral (player on player) in its experience.

And it struck me that Amber is *also* driven by unique distinctions. The powers system, yes, but also the nature of relationships drawn from a limited pool.

That is, in most games it's no big deal that people are from different families, but in Amber, your parent matters because all the parents are from one pool (the family) and are a fixed part of the landscape.

So your choice in family includes an implicit choice in what family you don't choose.

So, this thinking then comes back to the nature of skill design in RPGs, and whether they're yardsticks or gateways.

Yardsticks are skills that anyone can do, but some can do better or worse. Gateways are things you just can't do without the skill.

Most things we think of as standard skill systems are yardsticks, and Gateways are usually "powers" or the like. There are exceptions and hybrids (like systems where a big enough yardstick opens a gateway) but it's a good general distinction.

(Note, while it may not look it on the surface, but PBTA style moves follow this same pattern, but that's a bit of a sidebar)

Anyway, this gets interesting because in theory the things you design the game to do are the things that are fun to do in the game.

Sounds like a tautology, but there's a bit more to it.

But if you are creating a game of door smashing and monster looting, you want rules for door smashing and monster looting. And, presumably, you want them available to all players, because why wouldn't you?

This makes a lot of sense and is very player friendly, and it's a reason why D&D no longer has rigid, iron walls between what classes can do, especially with regards to thieves.

And that leads to an interesting question: SHOULD there be anything constrained to one character? For a lot of designs, the answer is "No, but you can't have EVERYTHING, so make tradeoffs"

And that's cool. It genuinely is. It allows a wider range of character ideas to be supported by the game, and that's more fun for everyone.

BUT

To bring it back to the initial topic, that means more satisfying individual characters, but less mechanical weight to teamwork. Why rely on someone else when you can spend a few points to fill the gap yourself?

And that idea of the gap is the rub, I think. We feel like the gap is bad. And it sometimes is. If the gap *feels* bad - makes us feel like our characters are less capable or less what we imagine - then it's natural we want to fill it.

But if it's all filled in and smoothed over, is the game providing any pressure to pull the group together? (Assuming that's a desired outcome, of course)

On paper, Fate (FAE especially) should have problems with this, because there's only so much strong differentiation. In practice, things like shared chargen provide a different set of drivers for lateral play

So, between that and Amber's approach, there are clearly other solutions that are not tied to capability, and that's good.

But I am still intrigued by the power of intentional capability gaps.

Now, this is not an argument for incompetence. I don't roll that way. Rather, I am pondering how to frame things characters can't do in a way that *doesn't* detract from their awesome.

The best way, honestly, is by reinforcing other people's awesome. Allow capability, but not excellence, and then reward excellence.

To hop to another example, Leverage, there are a lot of shared skills within the group, but they rarely detract from the capability of the person who specializes in it. If anything, when others use the skill, it's a reminder that it would be easier if the specialist was here.

But it's an interesting example because it's uneven. Everyone can steal, everyone can grift, everyone can fight, everyone can plan, but not everyone can hack.

Can probably find similar examples elsewhere, so I'm not sure how much weight to apply to that anomaly.

ANYWAY

Upshot of this is that my instinct is to design for maximum flexibility & Capability, and that I need to see what happens if I combat that instinct, and throw up a few more gates to forcibly spread around different flavors of capabilities.