Privileged Abilities

Abilities that let players perform actions that are not readily available to other players.

Many games have different sets of actions possible for different players. The actions one player has, or possibly a few players have, are Privileged Abilities in that they allow different tactics during gameplay, and allow different forms of goals to be sought.

Examples

Class-based Tabletop Roleplaying Games such as Dungeons & Dragons and Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay limit abilities so that they are privileged to specific classes. Computer roleplaying games, such as the NetHack, Torchlight, the Dragon Age series, the Neverwinter Nights series, and the Diablo series, continued to make use of Privileged Abilities by making certain actions only available to specific classes, for example, only allowing wizards to cast spells. This has also been carried over to some Massively Multiplayer Online Games, e.g. World of Warcraft.

Many First-Person Shooters, e.g. the Doom and Quake series give players a sort of Privileged Abilities in the various weapons they have access to. Half-Life 2 does likewise but also includes a gravity gun while the Portal series only lets players use a portal gun that can create inter-spatial portal between different parts of levels. The Legend of Zelda series, and to an even greater extent the Just Cause series, gives players the possibility of doing movement by using grappling hooks that nobody other inhabitants can do. One type of Privileged Abilities revolve around manipulation of game time: the Max Payne series gives players the possibility of slowing time for all enemies through engaging in bullet time while Braid and later installments of the Prince of Persia series lets players rewind time.

Online multiplayer First-Person Shooters such as Return to Castle Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory or the Battlefield series use the same method of dividing special abilities, such as repairing vehicles or providing air strikes, to specific classes. Return to Castle Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory further provides new actions as players gain experience in various activities.

The Board Game History of the World uses cards with special abilities that can be played only on certain turns in order to loosely follow the historical development of civilizations. In Battlestar Galactica: The Board Game each player gets special actions they can perform based upon which character they are playing. The Card Game Race for the Galaxy gives players different starting positions by randomizing starting cards and this give players Privileged Abilities, at least to begin with.

Using the pattern

The design choices regarding Privileged Abilities can be divided into three main categories: the actual nature of the actions they provide, how the actions are made available, and which players have access to the actions.

Privileged Abilities can take many different forms. Privileged Movement is a common example, which can include being able to ignore certain Obstacles, use grappling hooks, do special types of Jumping such as double jumps or wall jumps (both found in the Super Mario series), use Quick Returns, drive Vehicles, initiate Quick Travel, or being able to use or create Warp Zones. Giving players special actions in Combat, such as Combos, are also common. Others, somewhat more uncommon include Construction, Crafting, and other ways of creating or manipulating Resources. Games with Drawing Stacks are Discard Piles can have Privileged Abilities in letting players look through them, pick Cards or Tiles from any place within them, or take from the Discard Piles when in ordinary cases one should have taken from the Drawing Stacks. On a very general level, being allowed to treat actions as Interruptible Actions, being given Extra Chances, or the power to create Fudged Results are all examples of Privileged Abilities. In some cases, even the option of performing No-Op actions can be a Privileged Ability.

Some Privileged Abilities, for example being in control of Player-Decided Distribution of Rewards & Penalties, are not direct actions during gameplay but rather let players affect the evaluation functions of a game. Privileged Abilities can also be passive, in which case they do not give players new actions they can perform but rather let them do actions they already have in situations where other could not do them. The most common of this type of Privileged Abilities is probably to have lessened effects or complete Invulnerabilities to Penalties or Environmental Effects such as Damage.

Some Privileged Abilities relate to the availability of information: being allowed to look at another players' Card Hands or having Units with less Fog of War or different Line of Sight rules than other Units for example. These may be designed to be either active in the sense that getting the information is a gameplay action or passive in that they can always be accessed and mainly affect how players can perform other actions.

Privileged Abilities that are present from the beginning of the game allow players to perform extra-game activities in planning strategies if these actions are known or can be chosen. Those Privileged Abilities that are gained during gameplay can provide Stimulated Planning, including Planned Character Development and Team Development, and gaining the abilities is often done through some form of Investment. Privileged Abilities that only can be used or are useful during certain parts of the game put players under a Time Limit and strengthen the importance of Timing the actions.

Entering Chargers, Environmental Effects, or Installations, or taking Power-Ups that give New Abilities, or have Area Control over Territories can be used to activate Privileged Abilities. In this case, gaining the Privileged Ability can become a question of knowing Strategic Locations, and the activation of Privileged Ability is tied to a specific location in the game. As the effects of Chargers and Power-Ups usually are under a Time Limit or otherwise bounded, the effects on Player Balance can more easily be controlled than for other types of Privileged Abilities.

Privileged Abilities may also appear due to Penalties inflicted on other players; the effect of losing your knights in Chess while your opponent still has them can be seen as if your opponent has the Privileged Ability of making knights move.

The question of who has access to Privileged Abilities can be split into the questions of what Focus Loci provides the action and which players have access to the action. When using Avatars representing Characters as players' Focus Loci, the Privileged Abilities can be represented by Skills to allow further modulation of the abilities. Making Privileged Abilities depend on the access to Equipment, Tools, and Weapons can provide thematic explanations to introducing the abilities during gameplay can motivate Gain Ownership goals.

Neighbors,

Technology Trees Unlocking

Transferable Items and Units allow the Privileged Abilities to shift between players by different forms of Transfer of Control, e. g., stealing.

The affect of which player has the Privileged Abilities depends heavily upon whether the game involves Team Play. In Team Play, the Privileged Ability of a player can be matched by the same Privileged Ability in the other teams to create Player Balance. This makes the teams have symmetric abilities while providing Asymmetric Abilities within the team and allows individual players to have game-controlled Competence Areas. In games without teams but with Cooperation, the pattern can also support Competence Areas, while in games with Conflict, it is more likely to affect Player Balance.

Possible affects on Player Balance by Privileged Abilities can be mitigated somewhat if they are part of the set of actions selectable by Budgeted Action Points.

In fact, Privileged Abilities do not have to be given to players but rather to their Enemies, and this can be used to create Boss Monsters.

Diegetic Aspects

Interface Aspects

Narrative Aspects

Consequences

Privileged Abilities give players Empowerment in games since they have abilities that others do not. This is especially apparent in Self-Facilitated Games that make use of Game Masters, since the entire game state is controlled by them and all events in the game must be approved by them. When they are instead applied on Enemies, they can make these into Boss Monsters and can provide both Varied Gameplay in that they can behave differently than ordinary Enemies and require Puzzle Solving since ordinary tactics may not be feasible.

By their very nature, Privileged Abilities create Asymmetric Abilities between players (Asymmetric Starting Conditions they are present from the beginning of gameplay) and modulate the value of New Abilities. This easily affect Player Balance negatively. When unsupervised by the game system, this can create greater and greater imbalances as gameplay progresses, but by actively modifying what Privileged Abilities players have and when, e. g., by deciding the nature of Power-Ups due to the positions of players in a racing game, the pattern can instead be used to create Handicap Systems to support Player Balance. In games with Team Play, this naturally can also affect Team Balance and can strengthen the strive to have Competence Areas as well as give them Game-Induced Player Social Status. Further, it can support stimulated Social Interaction, as players usually need to engage in Coordination to take full advantage of the set of actions they have. If the Privileged Abilities are matched between the teams, Team Balance can be achieved even though Player Balance may not be.

Red Queen Dilemmas can occur if players engaged in Competition can gain access to the same or balancing Privileged Abilities, especially if there are series of Privileged Abilities that have each other as prerequisites.