Agency is the objective and subjective capacity to exercise self-determination through action and effort. In the context of an RPG, agency is the objective and subjective capacity to perform actions and make decision that have a meaningful impact on the outcome of the game. Note that the perception of what constitutes outcome and meaning differ between individuals.
As long as we grant that it has
both things--that the presence of subjective elements does not
refute the presence of objective elements--I have no reason to quibble here.
I think it is important to not reduce agency to simply concern itself with the decision space of the player in the context of the game. One has to consider the effect of the decision. In order for agency to exist, the player must not only have a meaningful and open-ended freedom of choice in what actions to perform and which decisions to make. to act. The actions and decisions must also be able to have the desired impact.
Yes. I have tried, or at least
intended, to emphasize this exact point. The
feeling that you are having the desired impact is important. But so is
actually having the desired impact. If you are unable to have the desired impact because you don't actually have any impact at all, just the
feeling of having that impact, then agency isn't really present, just the illusion of it (hence, "illusionism.") Should that illusion break, most players respond negatively, some by becoming disheartened, some by becoming angry. That's why so many places that advocate illusionism do so only with vehement reminders not to allow players to find out, because it is likely to upset them.
Freedom without agency is a very common pattern within sociology, and it repeats within RPGs. For example, if all roads lead to Rome, and I don't want to go to Rome, then it doesn't matter how many roads there are. But on the other hand, if what matters to me is the journey, then the choice of road is highly relevant.
Alright. Where are we going with this, counselor?
But if we return to how agency can relate to other concepts than shared narrative authority and Story Mechanics, another example is GM discretion. Some players consider GM discretion that goes beyond a certain threshold a violation of their agency. This could be a player who wants a simulationist approach to the game - where the GM has authority to define the pre-game state of the fiction (some would use the terms world or scenario, but I hope it's clear what I'm referring to), but where the GM is purely an arbiter and mediator once the game session starts. Other players have a concept of agency where they are open to the GM changing the (unrevealed) state of the fiction, within certain limits.
Here, I must quibble: You have (perhaps unintentionally) implied that objections to "GM discretion" arise from simulation but not really anything else. My objections are almost wholly rooted in what are usually called "gamist" concerns, not simulationist ones. That is, I've often said that it is essential to me that D&D is Roleplaying, AND it is a Game. It needs to have Roleplaying or it isn't really worth my time; I can get bare Game almost anywhere. But I can also get bare Roleplaying almost anywhere (and, in fact, I did so for several years before I ever touched D&D.) As part of the Game aspect of D&D, I very strongly believe that players need to be able to make
reasonably informed decisions, from which they truly do merit serious consequences, that they then get the chance to
learn from those earned consequences (good AND bad), and then feed that new learning back into making new decisions. "GM discretion"--secret intrusion into the gameplay loop--disrupts this process. Informed decisions become impossible, even in principle, because there is no "information"--only what is conditionally true right now, which the players are denied any possibility of learning whether that wasn't true before or won't be true later. Their actions are secretly divorced from the consequences, because in every case, the chain becomes "Player acts -> GM decides -> consequences result," not "Player acts -> consequences result -> GM responds." This then means no
learning can occur, because what they would be "learning" is the things the GM permits to happen,
but they are not allowed to know that it really is the GM permitting it.
Hence, my issue here is almost purely "gamist," and yet it is very much an issue with "GM discretion." At least as I am interpreting the phrase. Perhaps you have meant something different, in which case, I apologize for the non-sequitur.
To an observer they may seem devoid of agency when playing with like-minded individuals, but that's not the case - because there is a decision space and a meaningful ability to impact the outcome of the game.
I personally would not consider those forms of agency relative to
gameplay. Those are forms of agency relative to the social group, IMO. Certainly still a subject worthy of its own analysis, but not really relevant to discussion of
player agency. If you'll permit me an analogy: consider the difference between "restaurant agency" and "menu agency." A group of people discussing which restaurant to go to are not, in that discussion, deciding which dish they want to eat. They are deciding which
group or
type of cuisine they can subsequently pick from. It is quite possible to have huge latitude when it comes to restaurant agency (picking from dozens or hundreds of genuinely distinct restaurants) but subsequently have zero agency when it comes to the dish you eat when you get there (e.g., they only serve one thing.)
It is important to consider this "restaurant-type" agency when talking about, for example, Session Zero, picking a system, setting a tone, etc. These things can have huge impact on the experience of play. But they are not of interest to me, in this discussion. What interests me is "menu-type" agency, the difference between (say) McDonald's, a buffet, a fancy-dining restaurant, a multi-course-meal type thing, etc. That is, I'm interested in how to foster, support, and encourage "menu-type" agency once you have a menu in front of you. I'm not (currently) interested in a discussion about which restaurants diners would want to dine at.
For the character progression crowd
Again, not really sure what is being said here, other than (perhaps) that the existence of different kinds or flavors of agency means that a game which fails to deliver on kind X, but does deliver on kinds Y and Z, offers less agency than one which delivers on Y and Z equally to the first game but
also delivers on X.
In reality, people don't fall into single categories, and groups of players will often have idiosyncrasies that impact agency.
I don't think anyone here disagrees, and in fact, I would argue several have explicitly addressed this, with things like "lines and veils," the X-card, Session Zero, and other tools for both addressing the individual needs and peculiarities of specific players, and dealing with the problems caused by socially dominant players, wallflowers, etc.
Now, I know that many here don't like to include subjective feelings as part of agency
I have negative interest in
excluding subjective feelings. I think they are extremely important. What irks me is when the presence of subjective factors in agency is then used to argue that
therefore, the objective factors are non-existent, irrelevant, or negligible. Which is a thing that actually happened in this thread; I was told, point blank, that the feeling of agency is all that matters, and that there either simply wasn't a fact of the matter at all, or that that fact of the matter was genuinely irrelevant so long as the feeling was present.
This kind of meta-agency can make it easier to enjoy the game, if one is in the situation of having to compromise.
Sure. I would also consider that the very reason you refer to it as "meta-agency" is why it's not really of interest to me in this discussion context. It is a form of agency; it's just not a form of agency
related to currently being a player playing a game.
But as for the GM asking the RPG community at large - "What is player agency (to you)?" - I hope the take away is that agency means different things to different people, and if a player is complaining about lack of agency, you need to focus on what matters to this particular player (and whether you are even compatible participants), not on what agency means to other people or what a possible theoretical definition of agency may be.
Alright.