Constructive Conflict

I have several stories about bad games I have both played and run. This is a result of three items that are unique to my case:

1. While I am a member of the D&D3 generation, I started playing at thirteen with my parents, who were individuals who grew up having adventures in real life and in old school RPGs, like AD&D. They were my first GMs and my first players, and a good half of the reason anyone wants to play in my games- I learned from awesome people.
2. I grew up in a crappy little town where there really was only one game in town, and the GM was an ass. Rather than put up with his shit, a started a new game on a different day, and people followed me, kept playing with the ass, or created their own groups that played with or talked to mine.
3. While I live in the Portland area, I do not have the means or inclination to go to convention games or gaming events. Instead, I played with my group in public settings for several years, and had a standing invitation to all spectators to join or watch. Thus, while I do have experience with gaming outside my regular group, I get a lot of newbies.

So, in enters this post, which led later to this post and this one. Understand that Alexis is incredibly intelligent, has had years (no, decades!) of game experience, and if he has not been declared so already I will stand up for his right to be known as an expert in the field. But I disagree with with his assertion that Player versus Player conflict is universally bad for RPGs.

To give an example, I have played one character that wanted to die. Fitz the Fighter (I was 17) was bitten by a werewolf, he turned, and the rest of the party woke up to me munching on the horses. This was back under the crappy GM, and he had a rule that if we were turned into a monster, that meant surrendering your character sheet when were we in monster mode (a fair rule that I use), but also that the change was irreversible after the first kill. We all knew this, so my fighter commissioned an expertly crafted silver sword he was going to throw himself on. The GM declared that I could not commit suicide. So I offered to bind myself in silver chains and have a fellow party member execute me. Everyone in the party volunteered, and the GM said they could not, not even the evil characters. When I noted that he said lawful characters could not murder someone, I challenged a paladin to a duel (which the GM made clear in previous games is not murder!), which he accepted. The GM said no still, and said under no circumstances were players to kill players.

Maybe the tale of Fitz is unique, and even if not it is an extreme case. But there are forms of PVP that are deemed acceptable out there and are not considered disruptive. Hell, if a GM charms a player and the charmer commands the player to fight, the only options are PVP or remove a player from play. And even if compulsion or manipulation are not factors, Player versus Player does not end only in death. Conflict between players scales and changes depending on context just like any other interaction. In the same category can include things like mind reading, athletic contests, dueling skills, sparring, and physical venting.

Sparring is an essential one to me. I run and play games where skills have to be learned in game, including combat skills. Most such systems require an instructor, but some of my favorite games (Anima, for example) just give students accelerated learning scales when a teacher works with them. For combat skills, these will include sparring matches. As someone who has taken martial arts classes and plays with martial artists and former military, I can say that sparring is a great way to learn with some bruising and minimal injury and death. I allow and have seen other GMs allow players to learn skills from each other, so why not include combat skills? More than that, we are talking about games here. Games with lots of fiddly rules and terminology that people forget. So if a group wants to run a mock combat with one another to work on tactics, I say let them. I learned so many tricks of the fight during sessions like this, because it is not just your fictional masterpiece of a character improving, but the player as well.

One thing of note that must be stated: I am not, and will never, advocate antisocial behavior in games. A party member harassed by his fellows will lash out. Granted, if I do not catch on to it in time I would prefer it to be in game rather than a flashed knife across the table. I had that happen a few times, and it was not fun. I have thrown people out of games for attempting to steal from players characters, let alone trying to kill them in their sleep. But I will allow inter party conflict if it flows from the story. Fitz was a good and heroic man who could not let a monster be a threat to others, even if the monster was himself.  Sometimes players actually want to act out a betrayal, for shits and giggles, just to move the game forward, or because what ever is in front of them is just not fun without it. And if everyone wants to participate, why not let them? If a players character is art, it is a story telling art, and tragedy can be just as compelling as heroics. RPGs are only strange in that the victim needs to give consent.

All I want to push is take a lesson from the BDSM community:
"Obtain consent from all persons involved, always ask if your partner is okay, and have a safe word for if things get too intense for 'stop' to make sense in context."

In the end, I will accept that Player versus Player is universally evil if someone who has experience with both RPGs and BDSM can provide me evidence that BDSM is universally evil.