The Dramatic Question is a term that originated with playwriters.

The dramatic question of a story is the central thematic idea that drives the action of the characters. It is the central conflict of the story.

Usually, the question isn’t stated. It is implied. In the best stories the dramatic question is exciting, and emotionally charged. The dramatic energy of it drives our curiosity.

What are the rebels going to do about the Death Star?

Can Conan’s iron determination and pantherlike agility overcome treachery and Thoth-Amon’s demon ape?

Is a replicant that looks human, behaves like a human, and believes that it is human, a human?

Each scene in a story has a dramatic question.

Will Jules and Vincent get out of the diner without killing Ringo and his girlfriend?

Each beat of a scene has a dramatic question.

What is the executioner going to do with that knife?

In RPGs we use story to set up the situation and give it context. We use the tools of storytelling to create a dramatic question the same way any storyteller does but we don’t resolve it the same way. The critical difference between stories passively received by an audience and role-playing games played at the table is the method by which we determine resolution of the dramatic question.

The storyteller imposes the resolution of the dramatic question on the audience.

In a tabletop role-playing game, the decisions of the players combined with the rules and mechanisms of the game, interpreted by the game master determine the resolution of the dramatic question.

What makes each game system unique is the combination of what questions are being asked and how they are answered.

What’s the question?

The dramatic question is entangled with everything else in the game.

The setting influences what dramatic questions are interesting. An investigation game set in ancient Rome is going to have different dramatic questions than an investigation game set in Weimar Berlin.

The game designer must select or create a rules, procedures, or mechanisms to resolve the dramatic questions of the game.

The basic dramatic question of the original fantasy adventure game was, “Will the adventurers survive the dungeon and bring loot back to town?”

As new possibilities were explored, more complicated questions were asked, “Will the adventurers kill or drive off all the hill giants?” “Will the adventurers figure out what Kalak is up to and prevent it from happening?”

Each encounter has a dramatic question. Will the party overcome the cultists? Will the thief steal the noble’s purse without detection?

Every time players make a decision, there is a dramatic question.

Much of game play in an RPG is dependent on what questions the designer is asking. If the designer wants to know, “How will the player characters resolve a situation where fighting is unwise or counter productive to the objective?” A good designer creates a situation where fighting is a bad choice but leaves a range of possible solutions open to the players.

House Rules can be the result of a game master disagreeing with the game designer about what dramatic questions are interesting. Some groups consider the following question to be boring, “Does the archer have any arrows?” Some referees don’t bother tracking ammo and assume the character always has it. Others have the player roll a die to find out. Some groups think that tracking gear, ammo, and encumbrance is interesting because it requires strategic planning and forethought and they like that sort of thing.

The game master and the game designer may disagree that this is a question worth asking or that the system used is producing an acceptable answer. If the GM doesn’t think it’s important, they ignore the ammo problem and move on. If they don’t think the system answers the question in an acceptable way, the GM creates or borrows a different mechanism.

“Systems”

When most people talk about RPG systems, what they think they are talking about are the dice mechanisms, the rules, the procedures. This is not true and it is the least interesting part of tabletop role-playing games.

01

20

12

17

Exciting! Tell me more!

12

74

82

Thrilling!

“Make a DC15 Will save.”

“Roll a D6 and tell me if you got a 1.”

“I want to spend a bennie for a re-roll.”

Awe inspiring!

The mechanisms are meaningless without the context. A game’s mechanics are attached to the setting of the game, the non-player characters, conventions of genre, and expectations of people playing the game.

Contextual framework is where the Dramatic Question comes from.

The mechanisms of the game are what make the whole thing a game. Without the mechanisms, you have a story prompt, or improvisational exercise. The combination of the mechanisms and a contextual framework create a game.

Dice mechanics without context are an abstraction. Backstory and maps without a game system are narratives disconnected from play. The situation that creates a dramatic question is “act one” of a story. These elements must be integrated for a game to exist.

How you get the answer is less important than the acceptability of the result.

The mechanism the designer uses to answer the dramatic question must meet the expectations of the players.

The spectrum of possibility is another way to differentiate between games. If you are emulating 1970’s Hong Kong Kung-Fu movies, then its perfectly acceptable for a character to leap through the air and knock his opponent off a charging horse with a flying kick to the chest. A game that is modeling real world physics would punish a player attempting a flying kick to the chest. Both results are acceptable in the context of their specific game worlds.

Once you understand the range of possiblities you want to include in the game, the rules employed have to match.

If a game’s rules produce a result that you find unacceptable, there is a problem. The game master is trying to do something the game wasn’t intended to do. An edge case that the game designer did not consider has emerged, or the game has some critical flaw.

Implications and Applications

The main differentiators between RPGs are:

1. The context of the setting, characters and situations.
2. The dramatic questions being asked.
3. The mechanisms for answering the dramatic question.

The big implication is that the mechanism is important but, for many of us, far less important than context and the dramatic question.

There are some gamers that only play the WEG D6 version of Star Wars. They probably aren’t big Star Wars fans as much as they are D6 system fans.

A Star Wars fan doesn’t care what version of Star Wars RPGs you are playing. What’s important is that the characters are Star Wars characters, in the Star Wars galaxy, facing a Star Wars dramatic question with an outcome that feels like a Star Wars story to the people playing the game.

This framework can be a way for you to assess whether a game is right for your group or how to fix a game that doesn’t seem to be working.

What dramatic questions are the core of this game? Does the combo of characters, setting, and mechanics resolve those questions? Are the possible outcomes satisfying to me and my group? If there is something that doesn’t work, can I change it without breaking some other expected outcome in the game?

If something seems off during a campaign or session, observe how the characters are coming into conflict with non-player characters or the setting itself. Am I producing a dramatic question that the group finds interesting? Are outcomes satisfying? Is the process of getting to the outcome boring or frustrating? Once you’ve framed the problem properly, you can fix it.

This applies to adventure design and prep. I design most of my adventures and encounters in reverse order. I want to know what the dramatic question at the end of the adventure is before I start creating encounters that lead to that question. Will the adventurers save the village? Will the party kill the dragon and haul away its loot? Will the party defeat the skeletons guarding the entrance to the dungeon? Do I need to create a special mechanic to resolve this or can I use rules as written?

This applies to making a ruling at the table or improvising a die mechanic. Before you roll dice, consider the possible outcomes of the roll. What is the dramatic question? Will the range of possible results produce a resolution the players will find acceptable? Notice the word “acceptable.” Character death, maiming, or a bad situation can be acceptable given the right situation and expectations of players.

That’s what dice mechanics are for. You roll the dice because there is a moment of uncertainty. Uncertainty is an emotionally charged moment when there are stakes that have interesting consequences. That emotion is what makes RPGs unlike any other kind of game.

Conclusion

Most of the time, a great game or a bad game comes down to one or more of these three elements.

Is the setting and non-player characters presented interesting to the players?

Are the dramatic questions posed by the conflicts between the PCs and NPCs exciting and emotionally stimulating?

Does the system used produce a resolution that the players find acceptable?

When you are choosing a game to play, preparing an adventure, or trying to get the most out of the game; you will get very good results if all three of these questions are satisfactorily answered in a way where each concern is aligned with each other.