What makes an TTRPG a "Narrative Game" (Daggerheart Discussion)

[Paul Farquhar]

I don't cite Edwards because of faith. I cite it because it is insightful.

It may be insightful, but is it TRUE?

Citing something as true, without evidence, is faith.

 

[pemerton]

Have you heard of D&D? It managed to be somewhat successful, despite very rarely being played the way it's original designers intended.

Some tail-waggers are dogs. This will not show that all tailp-waggers are dogs. Nor that all dogs are tail-waggers.

You asserted that the essay from which, as Vincent Baker puts it, the entire game design of Apocalypse World follows, is counterproductive. And then, in reply to @hawkeyefan you asserted that AW (and games influenced or derived from it) are not played as intended by their designers, and seemed to imply that if AW is played as intended "it will all go wrong".

I ask again, what is your play experience with any of the RPGs that Edwards discusses in his essay? Or with AW, or other PbtA games? Or with BitD, or other FitD games? Or with Burning Wheel, or other games that have come out of BWHQ? With any game that has been designed to support, and is widely regarded as supporting, narrativist play?

So, you would consider D&D not an RPG? Since people regularly do funny voices for their characters, and it doesn't affect the outcome. This is a good example of dogmatic definitions leading to ridiculous conclusions.

Some carnivores are doges. My cat is a carnivore. Therefore my cat is a dog. Oh wait, that's not a sound inference either . . .

What makes D&D a RPG is not that people do funny voice while resolving combat encounters to which those voices are not relevant. If D&D was nothing but a skirmish game that encouraged cosplay, it would not be a RPG.

But as it happens, D&D is a RPG because the fiction matters to resolution.

 

[pemerton]

It may be insightful, but is it TRUE?

Citing something as true, without evidence, is faith.

Actually, your second claim is false. I assume that you, like me, believe that some version of universal gravitation - along the lines that Newton first explained and that Einstein reworked with general relativity - is true. Although I very much doubt that you can adduce any of the evidence for it. (I certainly know that I can't, owning no telescopes and being unable to do tenser calculus.)

I believe it to be true not because I can adduce the evidence, but because I accept the testimony of the many scientists who can do so.

Likewise I believe that the Arc de Triomphe is in Paris, although I've never seen it myself.

But furthermore, on this particular occasion I have adduced some of the ample evidence, right here in this thread.

You are the one speaking without evidence, and on the basis - as best I can tell - of ignorance of the RPGs Edwards discusses and of the approach to play that he describes.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Maybe we should consider the possibility that this essay is simply wrong, and it's categorisations unhelpful and counterproductive?

Or even that the essay is simply more than twenty years old. Also that it is one individual's mission statement for a hobby that is larger than one person (there being creative agendas, such as emotional engagement/bleed, that do not fit easily or directly under GNS is a good example here) and that classification systems like this are always flawed but frequently still be useful.

Many, many individuals know more in 2024 about how to write games to encourage story than Ron Edwards did in 2003 - and they know that in part because the results of Ron Edwards mission statement that there should be better Narrativist games included games like My Life With Master developed with it in mind and Fate 3.0 enabled by the Forge's other purpose - developing more Indy games.

 

[soviet]

Or even that the essay is simply more than twenty years old. Also that it is one individual's mission statement for a hobby that is larger than one person (there being creative agendas, such as emotional engagement/bleed, that do not fit easily or directly under GNS is a good example here) and that classification systems like this are always flawed but frequently still be useful.

Many, many individuals know more in 2024 about how to write games to encourage story than Ron Edwards did in 2003 - and they know that in part because the results of Ron Edwards mission statement that there should be better Narrativist games included games like My Life With Master developed with it in mind and Fate 3.0 enabled by the Forge's other purpose - developing more Indy games.

I know that my game Other Worlds owes a lot to that Narr essay and other forge stuff. Myself and my group were all just regular D&D players before, with no concept of much else, but we found this new way to play that hadn't meaningfully existed before.

Testify!

 

[lolsworth]

Who could have predicted a thread about GNS would go off the rails.

I say that although Daggerheart claims to be a narrative game, it doesn't have any narrative focussed mechanics. It is in fact far more of a gamey aka crunchy or tactical game

 

[Paul Farquhar]

What makes D&D a RPG is not that people do funny voice while resolving combat encounters to which those voices are not relevant. If D&D was nothing but a skirmish game that encouraged cosplay, it would not be a RPG.

But as it happens, D&D is a RPG because the fiction matters to resolution.

The fiction does not matter in resolution. It's quite possible to play D&D as a skirmish game without any roleplay, and many people do. People roleplay because they enjoy roleplaying, not because it helps them win the battle.

Actually, your second claim is false. I assume that you, like me, believe that some version of universal gravitation - along the lines that Newton first explained and that Einstein reworked with general relativity - is true. Although I very much doubt that you can adduce any of the evidence for it. (I certainly know that I can't, owning no telescopes and being unable to do tenser calculus.)

No. I'm a scientist, I don't believe anything. Newton was wrong, although this theories are useful within a limited set of parameters. Einstein was also wrong, but unlike Newton he was wise enough to admit it. Gravitation is a work in progress, we are a long way from a definitive answer.

Or even that the essay is simply more than twenty years old. Also that it is one individual's mission statement for a hobby that is larger than one person (there being creative agendas, such as emotional engagement/bleed, that do not fit easily or directly under GNS is a good example here) and that classification systems like this are always flawed but frequently still be useful.

I agree absolutely. It can be useful when seen in it's correct light. But when the 20 year old flawed thesis starts to be cited as proof, then it becomes more of a problem than a solution.

F = Ma is still useful, even though it is not TRUE. But if you try to use it in the wrong circumstances, it can lead to catastrophic error.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

The most common element or throughline of those who have no experience with narrative games seems to be, "Any game where I cannot directly infer a discrete chain of fictional world causal processes that map directly to a game mechanic, its inputs, and its outputs."

The latter is what I would call simulationistic. But is any game that isn't simulationistic necessarily narrativistic? I don't think so.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

"Narravitism" isn't the same word as "narrative".

And very few posters on ENworld who actually talk about "narrativist" or "story now" play use the adjective "narrative". For instance, you'll notice in this thread that all those posters are pushing back on your post about The Forge!

Isn't this is just nit-picky semantic pedantry though? (Which I appreciate to certain degree.) But surely it is clear that even though people might not use the exact same word ending they are attempting to refer to the same thing?

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Well, it’s hard to answer the question if there is no consensus on what “narrative “ means!

But my answer to the original question is “the people who play it”.