Guide to Games.

[ze_arteests]

Games: An introduction.

Games are the competitions portraits run in Decollage. They can range from extremely simple and short, to multi-day long epics. There are two big categories in which every game falls: Memory/Skill games and Supply Games.

✏ Memory/Skill Games: These games are where teams compete against each other to regain their memories and skills, and these types of games form the majority of what is run in Decollage. Some are performance based, some are luck based, some are a mix, and they can be non-traumatic or traumatic, but they’re all competitive! Only some teams will win.

✏ Supply games: In a supply game, teams play for the chance to win goods they can’t otherwise get from the environment. Supply games can be non-competitive, or even allow all teams to take home some winnings. No memories or skills are awarded in supply games.

Inside those two big categories there are some special types of games:

✏ Loser games: Loser games are games where only the bottom-tier teams can play. It gives the teams with the least amount of memories and skills a chance to play catch up in a smaller competition. Just like normal memory/skill games, they’re competitive and only some teams will win.

✏ Partnered games: These are games where teams compete together as pairs (or, occasionally, triplets). For example: Team Blastoise and Team Charizard must work together to defeat Team Fennekin and Team Chespin. If they succeed, they both receive winnings. If they lose, they both receive nothing. You can run partner games as either supply or memory/skill games, depending on whether or not it’s competitive.

✏ Subjective games: Are games where you decide who wins and loses based on your opinion of who did the best, rather than an objective system of votes, points or luckiest. These sorts of games are best limited to being run as Supply Games or Loser Games to prevent feelings of unfairness!

✏ Important notice: Popularity-based games are temporarily banned to give teams time to form new alliances. Popularity-based games are games where teams win or lose based entirely on the behaviour of other teams, with no actions to take that will save them. An example of a popularity game is the War Room game, where teams vote to protect other teams, and teams that don’t receive a vote die. An example of what isn’t a popularity game is Cry Wolf: despite the fact it has voting, teams should win and lose based on their skill at the game and their own actions.

Trauma warnings: What do they mean, and how to tell what this game is?

No trauma games are games where violence is outright prohibited and will be prevented by the portrait, and the game doesn’t expect characters playing to be injured physically or pyschologically. Characters won’t have any permanent alterations done to them, and all tasks in the competition are harmless. These games should be entirely safe to play.

Bring Your Own Trauma games are games where characters won’t be expected to injure each other physically or psychologically, but players might organize to have that happen. Tasks in the competiton are harmless except if the player chooses to do something traumatic with it: For example, a memory-exposure game where one player might volunteer a horrible memory while others can volunteer two kittens playing, or an ‘I never game’ where two enemies might escalate the competition attempting to harm each other emotionally.

Trauma is generated by the players and isn’t required by the game in any fashion. Characters won’t have any permanent alterations done to them. Acting violently may or may not be probited, but violent actions should not be encouraged by the game as a way to win.

Trauma games are games where characters may be emotionally or physically traumatized. These games may encourage violence as a method of winning, or include suffering as part of losing. Characters may be maimed, murdered, psychologically traumatized or given permanent alterations in trauma games.

Rules for Games:

✏ You may not lie about a game’s goals.
If characters are told to do ‘x’ to win, you must actually plan on rewarding x. To tell them to do ‘x’ to win and then actually reward actions ‘y’ and ‘z’ leaves team ‘x’ wondering why they put so much effort into following the rules when they’re not going to be rewarded for it, especially when rules are unpleasant. It also makes it harder on future game runners, so avoid this.


✏ No “loopholes”.
A game cannot be designed with the intention of having characters win by refusing to play.


✏ Games cannot ask, require, or encourage characters to harm or betray their own teammates or their partners in partnered games.
Characters need to be able to trust that they can always protect members of their own team. Betraying that trust can result in accelerated burnout and refusal to even participate in games (because why bother if they have to hurt not only other teams, but their closest comrades?) which is not conducive to the longevity of the game.

This rule extends to any game mechanic that may result in a team being in any way encouraged to harm other members of their team. Even if the portrait isn't outright asking for a team to harm teammates, if they could have an easier time winning the game by hurting each other that too is unacceptable. Teams must be able to trust their own.


✏ You are not allowed to reward characters for self-sacrifice or self-sabotage.
Decollage is a game based upon competition and being willing to do anything to achieve the wish or desire that brought a character here. Awarding them for what is essentially self-sabotage, however noble or well-intentioned the act is, goes against Decollage's setting. Similarly, a team actually attempting to sabotage themselves may not be rewarded. If Team Rainbow is trying to lose, then they lose. It's unfair for Team Snowflake who was trying super hard to win to miss out on getting memories and skills because Rainbow doesn't know how to lose right. :(


✏ You are not allowed to punish characters for winning.
Again, the game is based upon being willing to do anything to achieve one's wish or desire. It is against the spirit and setting of the game to punish characters for doing so.


✏ Warn ahead for games with maiming or death.
This allows players to try and plan ahead for them, to clear their schedule and try and join in on the fun, or if their character has hit critical trauma peak, to avoid it. Games should be marked ‘No Trauma’, ‘Bring Your Own Trauma’ or ‘Trauma’.


✏ Only competitively based games award memories.
Free-form creation games and other similar games are allowed, but instead reward things like food, weapons, or additional things for the dorms.

If a game could hypothetically be run even if just one team showed up, it is not competitive. So most creation games which give teams things and expect them to make something do not count, and neither do exploration games, which also don’t require the presence of other teams. Since the increased power and re-acquisition of memories and skills in Decollage is powered by taking power from other team’s frustrated hopes, if the teams aren't set up to compete, memories/skills cannot be distributed.

✏ Locked rooms are only for games that need secrecy.
Games with each team in their own private locked room should be reserved for games that require them, and games that do not require secrecy should be held in public. If it’s a game where part of the strategy is not knowing what other teams are doing, or what they have, they should be held in locked rooms! For example, a trust game where you have to choose to betray or trust another team without knowing that team’s identity should definitely be held with each team in a locked room. But if it’s a game where teams have to build a plaza and knowing what other teams are doing doesn’t change the outcome in any way, it should be held on the main community.

How to claim your game:

Once you have a game designed, you’ll need to choose a date. Some important things to keep in mind:

✏ No games can run in the first week of every month. The 1st-7th are a breathing period for the game.

✏ You need to claim the day at least 24 hours in advance of your game. This is to give all players notice that there will be a game, and time to adjust their plans. It’s a good idea to book a couple of weeks in advance so you don’t lose the date you want!

✏ You can’t double-book dates. If there is a game already booked on the day you want to do yours, you’ll have to run it another time!

✏ You should be reasonably certain of what you’re running, how you’re running it, and that you can run the game on the day you choose before you claim! Emergencies do happen, but don’t book if you’re unsure you can even make the date, or don’t even have a game ready!

✏ You should check what other games are running in the month, and consider the game tone and balance. Having two weekends of gory trauma games in a row without a break might lead to burn out, and an entire month of soft hugging games might end up boring. It’s up to your judgement where to place your game!

Once you’ve done all that, pick a date and time, and make a post to the OOC community, remembering to use the game claim tag.

You must include the trauma levels of your game when you post. Make sure to mark it no trauma, bring your own trauma, or trauma. If you’re not sure what type of game yours is, double-check this post where those terms are described. If you’re still not certain? Email the moderators with a description of your game and its rules. If you fail to warn for trauma and then run a trauma game, it’s a highly unpleasant surprise for players and the moderator team may contact you!

As long as you have the trauma levels accurately labelled, you can make the contents a surprise and just include the date and time, or you can give a detailed explanation of what people should expect.

How to reward Memory/Skill games:

✏ How many can win?
Depending on the turnout for your game, anywhere from 2-6 teams can win. Winners shouldn't exceed more than half of the teams that were present for the game, though exceptions may be made if you are awarding partner wins and still need to select a final single team for a pity win.


✏ Pity Wins
For choosing winners, choose the top one-five winner(s) according to whatever scoring rubric you have in place. But once you are done with that, for the last winner look at the win record document and please choose a team that has gone a month or more without winning a game. If all teams have won recently, then choose whichever of the bottom tier teams performed the best. Bottom tier teams of the last five non-supply games will be highlighted. Additionally, please label pity wins. We want to be sure people continue to remember to give these wins out, and keeping them visible in this manner will help avoid them being forgotten in the future.

✏ If someone has set a memory or ability to priority, give them it.

✏ Try and choose memories from whichever category they’ve received the fewest of so far!
If they’ve gotten a whole slew of trivials, give them a significant, if it’s nothing but neutrals and positives, go for a negative!

How to reward Supply Games:

✏ In supply games, any amount of teams can win! However, there must be actions to take and a general goal or some form of 'win' criteria: You can't give them everything they want just for showing up! It must still be a game.

✏ You may choose to either select rewards from the supply game requests or to choose your own items to give out.

✏ Items are to be rewarded within reason. Characters should not be receiving libraries of books or entire racks of weapons.

✏ Modern luxuries such as appliances, entertainment systems, or magical equivalents to these items are not acceptable items, and are simply not available from any portrait. For example: Refrigerators, iPhones and televions are forbidden. So are magical ice boxes, communicators and ponds that show plays.

✏ Regarding food, instead of rewarding with items that can be found in the environment (animals and raw animal products, fully matured plants, poisons/drugs found in Decollage's plantlife) keep to convenient or special food items like instant ramen, cookies, soda, instant rations, etc. Things that can't be acquired directly from the environment. Seeds to be grown into edible plants are also acceptable, however any seeds given out should only be natives to Decollage. A list of plants available for farming can be found here.

✏ Chargers: as a few people have brought in small electronic devices as their personal items, Decollage does have a charger that is available to quest for. The Charger counts as a minor quest item, and is what appears to be a modified hare, aluminum and copper mechanisms integrated into its organics. A port is half-hidden underneath the ears, and it generates enough charge to charge a cellphone or a gameboy, but not much more than that. It must be kept fed and taken care of as a regular pet would be.

✏ In general, avoid giving out any items that will make the setting easy to handwave. The goal of the setting is to give characters something to interact with and overcome, so if they all get things that render the setting a non-threat, that's defeating the purpose. If you are ever unsure on any item, feel free to ask a mod for an opinion.

F.A.Q.

✏ Help, I have a tie!
In this case, you can award both of the teams that tied as long as the total amount of teams winning doesn’t exceed seven.

✏ What’s an ‘exploradora’?
A game about exploring an area! The runner sets up a location that characters can travel through: A maze, a forest, a volcano.

✏ Can I run a game based on a holiday?
Sure, but you’ll need to scrub the labels off! Magical portraits don’t know anything about Christ, so Christmas would be odd, but maybe their people’s traditional winter solstice celebration includes candy canes. Feel free to mix and mash holidays to fit your portraits tone, but keep from name-dropping Earth things!

✏ Can my portrait have grudges and favorites?
Your portrait is welcome to opinions on the teams, whether negative or positive, but these musn’t change a game’s outcome. They can’t give advantages to a team they like, or make a team they dislike lose just because. Games must be fair!