Wouldn't that be schizophrenic though? Kinda like playing chess with yourself. You would know everyone's motivations and plans; when you enact them you'll already know the reaction of some other character because it's you, while all the while knowing that this outcome was wanted by a third character with whom you orchestrated it. It's more like playing with a doll house than chess now that I think about it. Bashing figures into one another, screaming "look they are having sex!". Ugh, weird.
Someone else made the chess comparison before.
On one hand, arguing that you want your characters to fight eachother is pretty dumb (it's like playing chess with yourself)
The difference is that chess is a 100% deterministic game with a completely predictable outcome. If I say John and Jane are both trying to steal the gold, and John picks dialogue option #6 and Jane picks #4, who will win? You don't know, I don't know, it's interesting to see what happens because we don't know all the rules. Maybe Jane will die, maybe John will die, maybe they'll both die. There's much more suspense there than with "John wants to steal the gold and Jane helps him and he will succeed no matter what" which is what every Chosen One story boils down to.
Lucky is correct that part of the fun is the uncertainty. It's similar to any movie or book with multiple protagonists - you don't really know who's going to survive or triumph in the end, and who is going to fail. You control action and intention but not the laws that govern everything. So what will happen?
As far as bashing action figures goes, that comparison is also inapt, because there's only one "rule" in playing with dolls: you hit them into each other until you are bored and that's it, and the reason that's boring is there's nothing to it. In a CRPG there are thousands of substantial rules and many interesting systems. You tease them with input, watch them interact, and enjoy the outcome. This is not the "Achiever" mentality - the one focused on getting
past the systems to the end credits as efficiently as possible - it's more of an "Explorer" approach, which is just as valid a reason to play games. Only here what is being explored is not the content but the game systems themselves.
Going back to the question of control - and again this is just for some of us - despite what I said above about unpredictability, it
is also fun to have a high level of control over story conflicts. This is why writing fiction is fun. When you're authoring both the hero and the villain (or better yet an ensemble cast without simple "winner/loser" roles), you can create a great story
even if you've already decided on the outcome you want. And even when an author
does have 100% control over a story, he can still be surprised by what happens - many authors cite the experience of a book "writing itself". They establish characters and situations and then use their imaginations to logically and dramatically follow a course of events to its conclusion, creating thrilling and entertaining scenes along the way. How does that not sound fun?
What happens depends on you because you control them both, that's the point. Who wins the stat check isn't important. You control both their reactions and their choices, so there's no conflict in general. Or, should I say, there are no consequences? The consequences are what you choose them to be.
Of course there is conflict, and of course the consequences are not always hand-chosen. Even the most basic example obviously disproves what you're saying here. I have Grey Knight and Purple Knight attack each other. Each uses the simple attack button which has a 60% chance of hitting every turn. First one to 5 hits wins. Grey Knight goes first. Who will win? Odds look good for Grey, but what if he misses his very first attack? The whole tenor of the fight changes.
If the Grey Knight is the Chosen One,
that is when the fight becomes boring, because
that is when we know the outcome is already determined. If Grey loses, we'll just reload a save and do it again until he wins, because Grey winning is "canon". But what if it's just two knights fighting over something? Neither one touched by God, neither one with "HERO" tattooed on his face? "What happens if Purple wins?" becomes a legitimate question. That's when you see real drama.
Now explode that example out into the complexity of a typical CRPG, have 4 characters fighting instead of 2, give them asymmetrical abilities and tactical positions, and different victory conditions for each one. In fact give them all different reasons for fighting in the first place. Are you starting to see how this can be fascinating to play out, even as a single player? Yes, if you "want" character #1 to win, you can have the other 3 drop their weapons and stand there and be killed, but even a 5-year-old knows that's a lousy story. A good author (or "role-player") will portray each character faithfully in opposition to the others, and what unfolds can be more compelling than any prescripted outcome.
. Many people in beta are looking for fights in arena.
).
