Buy-In

The term "buy-in" is seeing more and more use, but I feel like it's being misunderstood. Take your favorite fantasy or science-fiction movie. Think of the coolest parts of it. Now think of arguments you've read on the Internet about how those parts of the movie (or the whole movie) are completely ridiculous: contrived, fake, redundant, nonsensical. Imagine the arguments you have that shoot down every one of those objections. One popular one is The Lord of the Rings and the "Why didn't they just have the Eagles fly the Ring to Mount Doom and drop it in?" One group thinks it's a glaring hole in the story: even taking into account that such a plan, if successful, would have made for a less epic story, the idea was never even floated by the characters, almost as if that option had slipped the minds of the author (and director) entirely. Another group can come up with dozens and dozens of in-story reasons why such a plan couldn't work and was probably dismissed out-of-hand. The latter group is exhibiting "buy-in." They have a strong personal interest in seeing the story make sense, and be cool, and they are willing to go to great lengths to rationalize apparent oddness or inconsistency. This is common fan behavior. The former group is not "bought in." They don't care if the story is cool and they don't care about the explanations people provide. They might still like the story, but on some level they're removed from it and don't take it very seriously. They are primed to be more critical of other aspects of the story. In short, if you're "bought in" to something, you want it to work and you try to help make it work, first by making it work for you, and then by showing others how it can work for them. If you're not "bought in" to something, it has to work entirely on its own merits without any support or benefit from you. You can see this in roleplaying games. Dragons and faster-than-light travel are impossibilities, yet when they are key aspects of the game we want to play we are bought into their existence and we can easily spout off how they are able to exist, or at least agree that they "need" to exist and stop poking at the issue. Then there's some other aspect of the game that we're NOT bought into, even if it's "allowed by the rules." Monks and psionics in our European fantasy world. Characters that can heal themselves without a spellcaster. Aliens that can reproduce with humans. The fact that some item or technology COULD be used in a way that would introduce sweeping changes to a world yet somehow our character is the first. Whatever it is, we don't look for reasons why that thing is true and makes sense, we demand others to give us an unassailable reason why it is true and makes sense. Since we're dealing with fiction rather than reality, there probably isn't a reason a reason that no one could come up with a valid argument against (remember those Internet arguments about your favorite movie), which means the game is at an impasse. If we were bought in, and had a vested interest in those things being true we might not need any reason at all, but our threshold for what makes a "good" answer would certainly be lower. That's where some of us are coming with buy-in: using our creativity to make things work, rather than keep them from working. That's very powerful - anything can work, if there's buy-in - and that's the reason why it's so important to obtain it.

The problem, in my opinion, is the difference between a literary work and an RPG. In the book, even if no reason is given for events to unfold how they do, I can easily call it artistic license, and as you say, it makes for a more epic tale. In an RPG, as a player, many people treat the situations as though it were happening to themselves. The response to having the One Ring and how to dispose of it becomes, "how to do it as quickly as possible to minimize the danger and the fallout of taking our sweet time." You have multiple heads working together with the goal of disposing it, not the goal of having an epic journey. Especially if you happen to have a character with a high enough intelligence that he should reasonably see the easy solution, there's often no reason given NOT to take it.. A good GM can prepare for this, or even spontaneously handle it. "As you start flying toward Mount Doom, you pass over an Orc Camp, and spot them loading catapaults. As none of you have had much experience flying before now, it doesn't take long for rocks to connect. A beak goes flying, shattered off one unfortunate avian. Another gets pegged in the stomach, vomiting up a series of bloody wormlike guts before immediately spiraling toward the ground. Within short order, enough rocks to connect to bring down a few birds, and then the rest. As each of you sails downward, crashing into various parts of the orc camp, the sickening crunch of your mount's brittle and hollow bird-bones shattering upon the earth shakes any notions you may have had of a peaceful ending. You look up to see you're each surrounded by Orcs. Now what?" If you want a tale to be epic, it seems to me that the GM may need to do this from time to time, and find ways to let you overcome it. The situation I just came up with reminds me a lot of Dresden, who often finds himself in impossible situations that absolutely should kill him, and one tiny sliver of information he has is what barely lets him survive. Maybe the person holding the ring is quick-witted enough to use it. Maybe someone speaks enough Orc to talk them down. Maybe the group actually is capable enough in combat to escape, but that's when it becomes an epic tale. When the odds are stacked the highest against the hero. I'm rambling, and I may be off your topic's point. sorry.

Steve S. said: The problem, in my opinion, is the difference between a literary work and an RPG. In the book, even if no reason is given for events to unfold how they do, I can easily call it artistic license, and as you say, it makes for a more epic tale. It's just as easy to do that in an RPG. The issue, which you touch on, is why people tend not to. In an RPG, as a player, many people treat the situations as though it were happening to themselves. The response to having the One Ring and how to dispose of it becomes, "how to do it as quickly as possible to minimize the danger and the fallout of taking our sweet time." And why is that? Danger and fallout can be fun and exciting. Presumably when we sit down to an adventure game we want adventure. My take on it is that they generally assume (and are generally correct) that if they risk doing the epic, adventurous thing, and fail, then their characters will be killed and the game will be boring. Therefore, there's no incentive to risk anything. I find obtaining buy-in is easier. You have multiple heads working together with the goal of disposing it, not the goal of having an epic journey. Okay, so what if the goal was actually to have an epic journey? D&D, to use a common example, sort tries to force this with the experience point system. You can't short circuit the adventure, because you start out as a nobody, with no resources who can be killed by a single lucky shot. You have to journey and have adventures and deal with other problems before you can finally overcome the main one. But what if we just got the players' buy-in to the idea that the point was not to complete the quest but to craft an epic story, or just a handful of cool scenes? Especially if you happen to have a character with a high enough intelligence that he should reasonably see the easy solution, there's often no reason given NOT to take it.. A good GM can prepare for this, or even spontaneously handle it. The Intelligence score is not inherently related by the rules to finding solutions to problems, but that is a discussion for a different thread. That "preparation" you mention is a common approach and it often amounts to punishing characters who try to short-circuit what was meant to be a cool extended situation. If you want a tale to be epic, it seems to me that the GM may need to do this from time to time, and find ways to let you overcome it. That's one way, but I think most players would see it as railroading. The players came up with a cool idea, and the DM blocked it to force them to jump through more hoops. If the players aren't bought in to hoop jumping, they're not likely to enjoy having it forced on them. What if the GM, instead of contriving a way to block their idea (which the players could probably successfully argue against anyway. "We're too high for catapults!" etc.), asked the players to contrive their OWN way to block the idea. If they're bought into the epic journey, or the chase scene, or whatever the GM is trying to accomplish, then they will be interested in coming up with reasons why their shortcut doesn't work. If they're not bought in, the it will be clear that they idea DOES work the way they want, and the next step is to talk to them to find out what sort of challenging, epic situation they WOULDN'T short circuit and play that.

The first thing that I am going to say is a bit of topic but, The reason why they didn't just: Fly on the eagles, give the ring to Glorfindel/Elrond/Aragorn so they can try and fight their way inside Mordor when stealth stopped working ( seeing as, especially the first, was capable enough to slay the king of the Balrogs... or his past reincarnation was, but whatever ), give the ring to Gandalf, join it with the 3 rings gifted to the elves and use the power to defeat Sauron.. etc. The ring has power, but it also corrupts, I won't write to wall to text page about how power work in Tolkien's world but if you really want a deeper understanding of it read the Silmarillions, basically magical items are more of a burden rather than a source of power in many situations. So if any creature that already had enough power to "comprehend" the ring's own power it would be easily corrupted ( see Boromir, one of the greatest warriors and commander, arguably only bested by the 3 people listed above, of his age... or see Feanor son's as the best example of how powerful magic, even from a distance, corrupts ). Thus, the hobbit had to take the ring alone to Mordor and flying atop eagles would mean a great rings, seeing as the eagles could at any point decide to take the ring for themselves, they are a dangerous combination of very smart+ very powerful but very "primal" in essence from what we have gathered and thus easily corrupted by the ring's power. Also, nazgul and especially the Witch king of Angmar posed a great threat to the eagles. To get to the actual point I wanted to make about "buy-in" I agree with the idea of buy-in to some degree, for example I agree that GM might want to ask his players how "realistic" he wants to make weapons before the game starts because some groups might prefer the immersion of having 100 different weapons and work in different ways vs different armor and some player might want to have "classical" dnd weapons whereby bows are strapped to someones back and bastard sword/longswords are separate things yet spears and pikes are not. Buy-in can also work for things like deciding how magic intensive the world is, what races/classes are allowed... etc. However, this is not necessary something you need "buy-in" for as you can simply find player that fit with your ideal of how you want to run the campaign before starting the actual campaign. Buy-in as a form of play, however, is something that I don't agree with. Why ? Because it removes tension and mystery from the game, and even more than that... it basically removes choice. Let's take the eagle example and assume that all I wrote above is not true, a "buy-in" GM would simply ask the players "Ok dods, I think it's not cool to ride the eagles there and thus I want you to walk on land and have an epic adventure" The party would agree and they would have an epic adventure. Let's take the eagle example once again and assume no buy in, well now the player have the choice of choosing between the "eagle" option and the "walk on land option", the second option might play out the same however the 1st option could also work even better: - Player consider what supplies to take - Should they find weapons/armor/armies to ride the eagle with them to help secure a landing spot in case they can't get in close enough to Mt. Doom - What altitude should they fly at, if they reach Mt. Doom the air might kill them if they are too high but if they are to low they are an easy target - How do we deal with the nazgul ? This is a good one, maybe instead of an epic journey to Mt. Doom our heroes have an epic journey to find the 3 long lost "X" to kill the nagzuls And then what ? A GM can do what you call "blocking" and I call "GM veto" and find a reason why their plan doesn't work, and if the players don't want to go along with it than the campaign is over and it's probably your fault as a GM for coming up with something to cheesy/bad for the player/uncalled for... etc. However if the player are into it than it's nice because "Oh shit, the fellbeast killed our eagle and we are now lost in the mountains" is a cool and unexpected plot, with "buy-in" you would simply ask player "Hey, would it be cool if a fellbeast killed your eagle and you got stranded ?" "Ok, where would you like to be stranded and how powerful would you like your foes to be until you reach Mt. Doom again ?". It just removes the element of surprise, it make the player fell like they are always in control instead of "playing", instead of trying to overcome something. Or maybe the plan can work... so what ? That is the beauty of DnD, player finding creative ways to overcome problems not "Telling an epic story". A good GM should have no problem with players destroying the ring because he can always create another adventure that will continue being fun. A good GM makes it seem that he is working against the player, that he is the bad guy... it give the player and enemy that he can be happy when he "defeats", he is always aware that his job is to make the players enjoy the game and not work against them when it's uncalled for but he needs to hide that from player, otherwise the game doesn't fell like a game anymore, player are not trying to "beat" something or to "play" something they are simply co-writer for a story. And I do agree that "buy-in" might work for some systems, especially more RP focused system where the GM is "cooperating" with the players instead of "working against them", FIASCO or AW or whatever might be perfect for your whole "buy-in" thing... for all I know even Pathfinder and 4e might be, I didn't play those enough to know. But as far as AD&D goes I fell like "buy in" certainly removes a huge chunk of the felling of accomplishment, fear and suspense felt by the player and even limits some options that you might have never though of before because you and your player "buy in" the most "fun" one instead of forcing yourselves to think. This "no buy in" vs "buy in" fells like a black beer vs blond beer argument, It has not real answer ( black beer is the best, just fyi, and everyone telling you otherwise doesn't have common sense or a soul ), one side might drop the argument once he is converted to the other side but more often than no that never happens, it produces some intelligent discussion but at the cost of a lot of dumb stuff and I never participate in it unless I am drunk or bored. That said I rest my case, if you think "buy in" is the best way to go and believe no counter argument is valid than I am more than happy you can some other GM's found the perfect system.

George, I had a long reply written, but what it boils down to is that you don't understand the term. I may not have been clear. "Buy in" doesn't mean "getting what you want." "Buy in" to a thing means "wanting to see that thing work and make sense." For example, you want to see the fact that the Eagles weren't used in the destruction of the Ring make sense. You are bought in. That's the definition. That's not really something that can be argued about, though there are probably other ways to phrase it. What we can debate about is how one goes about getting buy-in. A GM can hunt for it, by finding players who just agree with the GM. That's possible, with a big enough player base. Or you can work with players to find what they will buy into (or are already bought into) and give them that experience. But giving the players the experience they want can apply to any experience. Some players want to offer no input and to be surprised. If the GM gives them that experience, then it is likely to work, because they want it to work and will make it work. They're bought in. Make sense? If not, please ask questions, rather than assuming I don't know anything about how players like to play, and what's going to work.

My two cents are that with most Collaborative RPG systems I've played is that there is a certain amount of give and take with the players and the GM/DM/Storyteller etc, so whilst a certain amount of "buying-in" is required on both sides, there generally are, and possibly should be limits, for example the DM has stated that the world is based on a late medieval fantasy at the start of gunpowder for siege weapons although not firearms, and a player wants to play a cyborg who dual wields rocket launchers, now whilst this could possibly work, its understandable if the DM doesn't buy into that particular scenario, at the same time the players need to buy into the DM's world with whatever quirks etc it may have. Generally though its the onus of the players to buy into the DM's world rather the other way round simply due to the fact that its easier to find a new player for a DM, than it is for the player to find a new DM. However it always works best when everyone is happy and suits eachother.

Rob, buy-in isn't something that can be required or forced. You're right that the GM and players might not buy into each others ideas. They're not required to. If we want buy in, we have to make an effort to obtain it. We can just ask for it, but it's easy to get if people like our ideas. GMs and players CAN, by default, decide to like and work with any ideas they hear. Most, admittedly, don't, but they CAN.

"GMs and players CAN, by default, decide to like and work with any ideas they hear. Most, admittedly, don't, but they CAN." "decide to like" I don't think this is really true. You can't really decide to like something. Liking or disliking something is not a decision. You can certainly decide to work with any ideas you hear and not poop on ideas that don't appeal to you though, and if everyone is willing to do that... awesome. I think being that open requires certain tastes though, in particular you can't really have a strong dislike of any particular story element / setting / character archtype just in case someone decides to bring that element into the game.

Lewis W. said: "GMs and players CAN, by default, decide to like and work with any ideas they hear. Most, admittedly, don't, but they CAN." "decide to like" I don't think this is really true. You can't really decide to like something. Liking or disliking something is not a decision. You can certainly decide to work with any ideas you hear and not poop on ideas that don't appeal to you though, and if everyone is willing to do that... awesome. I think being that open requires certain tastes though, in particular you can't really have a strong dislike of any particular story element / setting / character archtype just in case someone decides to bring that element into the game. Ok, fine. "Yes, and..." doesn't mention anything about liking an idea, just accepting and adding on to it. I sometimes say "like" because that's usually what I see happen: someone reflexively says "Yes" and suddenly find reasons why something is great. If you do have a strong dislike of something, just tell the players. If you don't, and if when that something is brought forward you still don't but instead try to turn it away with rules and fiction, then you're blocking. By all means express preferences, but if you don't then you need to be able to work with whatever is brought up. Fortunately, the "and" gives almost unlimited power to mitigate any suggestion anyone doesn't like right off the bat.

Because I know what buy-in is and how much it can make the game run more smoothly and be more engaging, yes, I can decide to like something if only for the reason that someone else happens to like it . An offer comes with inherent buy-in on the idea from the person making the offer. It's a gift to them to use that idea, even if (and sometimes especially) if you add onto it with your own ideas in a way that doesn't negate the original offer. That's a very simple yet powerful way to immediately increase player engagement because they will now want to see where their ideas goes in play. It also creates a lot of trust at the table.

Headhunter Jones said: Because I know what buy-in is and how much it can make the game run more smoothly and be more engaging, yes, I can decide to like something if only for the reason that someone else happens to like it . An offer comes with inherent buy-in on the idea from the person making the offer. It's a gift to them to use that idea, even if (and sometimes especially) if you add onto it with your own ideas in a way that doesn't negate the original offer. That's a very simple yet powerful way to immediately increase player engagement because they will now want to see where their ideas goes in play. It also creates a lot of trust at the table. You like the opportunity to obtain Buy-In from you players by implementing their ideas, not necessarily the ideas themselves. You cannot choose to like something in the same way you cannot choose to believe something, you either do or you don't. Whether disliking an idea effects your attitude towards it varies from person to person, though I'm pretty sure everyone has a limit.

Lewis W. said: Headhunter Jones said: Because I know what buy-in is and how much it can make the game run more smoothly and be more engaging, yes, I can decide to like something if only for the reason that someone else happens to like it . An offer comes with inherent buy-in on the idea from the person making the offer. It's a gift to them to use that idea, even if (and sometimes especially) if you add onto it with your own ideas in a way that doesn't negate the original offer. That's a very simple yet powerful way to immediately increase player engagement because they will now want to see where their ideas goes in play. It also creates a lot of trust at the table. You like the opportunity to obtain Buy-In from you players by implementing their ideas, not necessarily the ideas themselves. You cannot choose to like something in the same way you cannot choose to believe something, you either do or you don't. Whether disliking an idea effects your attitude towards it varies from person to person, though I'm pretty sure everyone has a limit. Perhaps I'm not clear on the point you're trying to make. So what if there's a limit? In any case you'd be surprised how far down that limit is once you've developed the reflex of saying "Yes, and..." to every idea.

Oh, and: if you reach that limit, all you do is explain that you're having trouble buying in. No problem. Everyone has preferences. Once they're know, something that is more likely to get your buy-in can be offered.

Paul U. said: Lewis W. said: Headhunter Jones said: Because I know what buy-in is and how much it can make the game run more smoothly and be more engaging, yes, I can decide to like something if only for the reason that someone else happens to like it . An offer comes with inherent buy-in on the idea from the person making the offer. It's a gift to them to use that idea, even if (and sometimes especially) if you add onto it with your own ideas in a way that doesn't negate the original offer. That's a very simple yet powerful way to immediately increase player engagement because they will now want to see where their ideas goes in play. It also creates a lot of trust at the table. You like the opportunity to obtain Buy-In from you players by implementing their ideas, not necessarily the ideas themselves. You cannot choose to like something in the same way you cannot choose to believe something, you either do or you don't. Whether disliking an idea effects your attitude towards it varies from person to person, though I'm pretty sure everyone has a limit. Perhaps I'm not clear on the point you're trying to make. So what if there's a limit? In any case you'd be surprised how far down that limit is once you've developed the reflex of saying "Yes, and..." to every idea. My point is just that you can't choose to like something. Not strictly related to the original topic, but then again the posts I'm responding to aren't either.

Lewis W. said: Paul U. said: Lewis W. said: Headhunter Jones said: Because I know what buy-in is and how much it can make the game run more smoothly and be more engaging, yes, I can decide to like something if only for the reason that someone else happens to like it . An offer comes with inherent buy-in on the idea from the person making the offer. It's a gift to them to use that idea, even if (and sometimes especially) if you add onto it with your own ideas in a way that doesn't negate the original offer. That's a very simple yet powerful way to immediately increase player engagement because they will now want to see where their ideas goes in play. It also creates a lot of trust at the table. You like the opportunity to obtain Buy-In from you players by implementing their ideas, not necessarily the ideas themselves. You cannot choose to like something in the same way you cannot choose to believe something, you either do or you don't. Whether disliking an idea effects your attitude towards it varies from person to person, though I'm pretty sure everyone has a limit. Perhaps I'm not clear on the point you're trying to make. So what if there's a limit? In any case you'd be surprised how far down that limit is once you've developed the reflex of saying "Yes, and..." to every idea. My point is just that you can't choose to like something. Not strictly related to the original topic, but then again the posts I'm responding to aren't either. Alright. For all practical purposes, and a whole lot of impractical ones, I disagree, but your point is noted. Whether someone can't buy-in to something or just won't, the point is that they aren't bought-in and if you're trying to engage them in a game, you'll probably have to try something else. I recommend asking them for ideas.

I don't disagree. Just bear in mind collaboration doesn't work for every GM or (more importantly) every player, and it doesn't have to.

Lewis W. said: I don't disagree. Just bear in mind collaboration doesn't work for every GM or (more importantly) every player, and it doesn't have to. This goes without saying, so I'm not sure why you felt the need to say it. I'm hoping we can continue this via private message.

Paul U. said: Lewis W. said: I don't disagree. Just bear in mind collaboration doesn't work for every GM or (more importantly) every player, and it doesn't have to. This goes without saying, so I'm not sure why you felt the need to say it. I'm hoping we can continue this via private message. The way you've talked about the concept in this thread makes me believe that it does need saying. Perhaps I should have said "will not"instead of "does not"? But anyway, yes lets continue this in private.

Ok - I'll bring this up since I just found out about it myself (although it has been around for some time) - Dawn of Worlds. Google it. Download the PDF. Play it with your gamers. BAM. Buy-in. Just did this with my gamers and they loved it. If you don't know what Dawn of Worlds is - basically each player helps BUILD the entire world from zero. Each of my gamers became heavily invested in a continent and a race (or two). They basically set the stage for the upcoming campaigns to follow. Wunderbar!

For buy in I use a psychological trick. When players learn new and weird information, I make them explain it to other characters. If people say something, they tend to own it. So if they just learned that daemons can be summoned by invoking their name, they may soon end up in a situation where they have to explain this to a world that doesn't think daemons are real. I make the world skeptical of them!

Paul S. said: Ok - I'll bring this up since I just found out about it myself (although it has been around for some time) - Dawn of Worlds. Google it. Download the PDF. Play it with your gamers. BAM. Buy-in. Just did this with my gamers and they loved it. If you don't know what Dawn of Worlds is - basically each player helps BUILD the entire world from zero. Each of my gamers became heavily invested in a continent and a race (or two). They basically set the stage for the upcoming campaigns to follow. Wunderbar! I haven't tried that game, but I have built worlds or sections of them with my players and, yes, that is a path to instant buy-in. I've never seen my players remember and reincorporate facts about a city better than when they themselves helped create the city.

Bryan W. said: For buy in I use a psychological trick. When players learn new and weird information, I make them explain it to other characters. If people say something, they tend to own it. So if they just learned that daemons can be summoned by invoking their name, they may soon end up in a situation where they have to explain this to a world that doesn't think daemons are real. I make the world skeptical of them! I don't exactly see how this is "buy-in," but it's on a good path. People remember some of what they hear, more of what they repeat (especially if explaining it to others), and almost all of what they themselves create or help create.