Game Mechanics And Player Agency

The concept of player agency is a central pillar of all role-playing games. It is a balancing factor against the omnipotent, omniscient Game Master. For the purposes of this article, we will be focusing on the smaller-scale application of player agency and the role of game mechanics that negate or modify such agency.

View attachment 95347​

From the very first iteration of Dungeons & Dragons in 1974, there have been mechanics in place in RPGs to force certain decisions upon players. A classic D&D example is the charm person spell, which allows the spell caster to bring someone under their control and command. (The 1983 D&D Basic Set even includes such a possible outcome in its very first tutorial adventure, in which your hapless Fighter may fall under the sway of Bargle and "decide" to let the outlaw magic-user go free even after murdering your friend Aleena!)

It didn't take long for other RPGs to start experimenting with even greater mechanical methods of limiting player agency. Call of Cthulhu (1981) introduced the Sanity mechanic as a way of tracking the player-characters' mental stress and degeneration in the face of mind-blasting horrors. But the Temporary Insanity rules also dictated that PCs exposed to particularly nasty shocks were no longer necessarily in control of their own actions. The current edition of the game even gives the Call of Cthulhu GM carte blanche to dictate the hapless investigator's fate, having the PC come to their senses hours later having been robbed, beaten, or even institutionalized!

King Arthur Pendragon debuted in 1985 featuring even more radical behavioral mechanics. The game's system of Traits and Passions perfectly mirrors the Arthurian tales, in which normally sensible and virtuous knights and ladies with everything to lose risk it all in the name of love, hatred, vengeance, or petty jealousy. So too are the player-knights of the game driven to foolhardy heroism or destructive madness, quite often against the players' wishes. Indeed, suffering a bout of madness in Pendragon is enough to put a player-knight out of the game sometimes for (quite literally) many game-years on end…and if the player-knight does return, they are apt to have undergone significant trauma reflected in altered statistics.

The legacies of Call of Cthulhu and King Arthur Pendragon have influenced numerous other game designs down to this day, and although the charm person spell is not nearly as all-powerful as it was when first introduced in 1974 ("If the spell is successful it will cause the charmed entity to come completely under the influence of the Magic-User until such time as the 'charm' is dispelled[.]"), it and many other mind-affecting spells and items continue to bedevil D&D adventurers of all types.

Infringing on player agency calls for great care in any circumstance. As alluded to at the top of this article, GMs already have so much power in the game, that to appear to take any away from the players is bound to rankle. This is likely why games developed mechanical means to allow GMs to do so in order to make for a more interesting story without appearing biased or arbitrary. Most players, after all, would refuse to voluntarily submit to the will of an evil wizard, to faint or flee screaming in the presence of cosmic horror, or to attack an ally or lover in a blind rage. Yet these moments are often the most memorable of a campaign, and they are facilitated by behavioral mechanics.

What do you think? What's your personal "red line" for behavioral mechanics? Do behavioral mechanics have any place in RPGs, and if so, to what extent? Most crucially: do they enhance narrative or detract from it?

contributed by David Larkins

 

[TheSword]

Also don’t forget inspiration as a reward for good roleplay. I use it liberally and it works wonders.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Just a point. The character isn't the issue here, the player is. It's the PLAYER that doesn't want to do something. The mechanics of the game say that the character does actually want to do it, or rather will reluctantly go along or something to that effect.

The issue isn't about the character. It's about the player refusing to accept that there just might be something that might convince the character even though the player remains unconvinced.

This ous the secind time you've said the mechanics say what the character thinks. I missed that in my rulebook. Where was it again? You can pick which rules, any will do.

 

[Aldarc]

Primarily on the "don't" side is that NPC and PCs are equivalent structures and should be impacted by mechanics in the same way. They should not, and aren't, even in the systems you're referencing (Cortex+, Fate, etc.).

If this is the primary point on the "don't" side, with most of the rest expounding upon this point of contention, then I hope you do not mind me cutting out most of your post. I will cut out some key snippets. You raise a number of excellent points, and you elucidate them well, so I hope that I can respond to your post in a manner that does your excellent post respect and justice.

First on this point, I would not say "that NPCs and PCs are equivalent structures and should be impacted by mechanics in the same way." This position is too extreme of one that I hold nor I do appear to have said as much in what you have quoted. I would say that they are often similar structures and that there are in-game occurrences when they should be impacted by mechanics in the same way or perhaps an appropriately similar way.

This is clear in 5e play, if you assume Diplomacy single checks can force PC actions -- the DM sets the stage for the scene, introduces the challenge, has the NPC declare actions to resolve the challenge, and then narrates the results to the players. No room for the players, here.

Which I have neither assumned nor advocated for. In fact, I am not sure if this general scenario would be worth a skill check in the first place, given how - as nearly everyone in this debate has acknowledged - almost all groups will bite, at least as a courtesy to the GM. But if there was a scenario that required social skill checks with an NPC and the PC Party that would be suggestive of negotiations, my likeliest approach, both in the context of 4-5e, Fate, and potentially games like Pathfinder as well, would be to set up a skill challenge. (This touches heavily on your last three paragraphs on NPCs using social skills in the context of players, and I suspect would mostly agree here.) The players would roll their Diplomacy/Persuasion/Rapport skill check as part of a series of various rolls: e.g., Bluff/Deception, Insight/Sense Motive, etc. If the players roll a Diplomacy check, then I might treat this as a skill contest in which the NPC would then roll their Diplomacy bonus. If the NPC beat their roll, then the NPC would gain a "win" notch (or the PCs a "loss" notch) in these negotiations that would potentially affect the outcome conditions. See more below:

It sounds in some ways like a kind of reverse skill challenge where the NPC is trying to defeat the PCs to me.

Indeed, but I would frame this less as a "reverse skill challenge," but just a regular one where the NPC can. This is similar, for me at least, to an environmental challenge, such as escaping a dungeon that is collapsing around the players. In this case, the players are navigating the minefield of a potentially tense and precarious social situation. There should be stakes in the negotiations that amount to more than "we are going" or "not going." These are possible outcomes, as opposed to the stakes, of failed negotiations. In Fate, I would likely be more transparent about the stakes of the skill challenge, so that players could potentially leverage their resources at key moments, as you allude to in your post. Your final three paragraphs only reinforce my point more heavily: NPC skill checks should have mechanical weight, including when they are using social skills against the PCs. Skill challenges and contests are several ways in which there is mechanical weight to NPC skill use.

But, to return to the difference between PCs and NPCs, the NPCs don't have the same levels of resources or even the same options on how to expend resources that the PCs do. NPCs are bound tightly to the resolution, and rarely have the ability to swap to a different costing to avoid the resolution. This is because the point of the NPCs is not to be the focus of the story, but to aid in telling the story.

And that's the key, for me -- PCs are the ONLY way the players interact with the game. NPCs are one of many many authorities that the DM controls for the game. Claiming that PCs must be susceptible to the same mechanics as NPCs is saying that the PCs are unimportant in the game, because there are so many more NPCs and the DM has 100% control of them all. Rather, I subscribe to the idea that NPCs are just a tool to frame scenes for the game and are there to provide foils to the PCs, not usurp them. The Prince that wants his daughter rescued is a challenge to the PCs, not a controller of them. If the PCs decide this isn't a challenge they care for, why am I going to force them to go along using a mechanic when it's clear that the players don't want to do that? Do I, as DM, have the right to decide what the players want to play? Rhetorical questions, my answers are 'I wouldn't, that's bad' and 'No, I do not.'

I largely agree with your points apart from logical leap in the bold. I do not think that it says this at all. Or at the very least, it requires some additional assumptions, steps, and other attitudes to be present that are not inherently implied in the statement. And again, my primary point is not a unilateral subjugation of the PCs to the rules of NPCs, but when apt. And in this case, the primary point of contention has been over the use of NPC skills.

But since this post, more helpful examples have come into play than the farcical Prince rolls a Diplomacy check so you are forced to save his daughter, namely an NPC/PC using a Bluff/Deception check on a PC. This is a point where the player often seeks to use an argument that appeals to their character's "head space" to opt-out of their characters being deceived.

 

[Sadras]

Just a point. The character isn't the issue here, the player is. It's the PLAYER that doesn't want to do something. The mechanics of the game say that the character does actually want to do it, or rather will reluctantly go along or something to that effect.

The issue isn't about the character. It's about the player refusing to accept that there just might be something that might convince the character even though the player remains unconvinced.

When does one roll to see whether the PC is persuaded? Every time an NPC has a differing opinion with the PC or needs help and attempts to persuade the PCs to do them a favour? Can the DM use it to 'force' the character through mechanics to see (and do) things the way the NPC wants every time? It is tricky because the DM creates the NPC's stats. When is it fair and when is it not fair?

What you are suggesting is not at all alien to me, but it does have some rather large potential pitfalls.
I do find it strange considering in the past we have been on opposite sides of the alignment debate yet here you are pushing for DM control over characters (granted, control through mechanics), but nevertheless still control.

 

[TheSword]

Persuasion is an interesting example. However I think some of the things being discussed go beyond what I’d allow a PC to achieve against an NPC. To my mind persuasion doesn’t ‘make’ a person do anything. It just explains why it’s good for them. These same explanations apply both ways.

For instance if a player tries to persuade an NPC to do something that as the DM I think they would never do, then the roll is irrelevent (wouldn’t even ask for it). The same applies to players.

However there a lots of ways of making persuasion relevant.

Persuading a PC to lower the price of an item.You say “you don’t think you’ll get a better price than what the buyer is offering to pay.”

Persuading a PC to let a minor infranction slide. You say “it makes sense to let this mans theft go unpunished because of xxx”

Persuading a PC to render assistance. You say “you think it would be beneficial to you to help this man because xxx”

If the NPCs rolls were good enough I would use my knowledge of the player to tailor this to something their character would be motivated by. After all a person can convince you of something without knowing exactly what it was that made you eventually agree.

The player can choose to act irrationally in these situations. They still have that right. However persuasion is more about convincing a person to do something rather than coercing it.

 

[Sadras]

For instance if a player tries to persuade an NPC to do something that as the DM I think they would never do, then the roll is irrelevent (wouldn’t even ask for it). The same applies to players.

So are you suggesting that the player decides if what the NPC says to the PC is irrelevant or not, and therefore informs the DM if a roll is required?

 

[TheSword]

To a point yes. If the DM says the NPC wants to persuade the character to jump off a cliff, and the player says there is no way I would do that then I wouldn’t roll.

 

[TheSword]

It comes down to the age old question of match the role-play to the roll or the roll to the roleplay. If I’m honest, do whichever makes most sense at the time.

 

[Sadras]

To a point yes. If the DM says the NPC wants to persuade the character to jump off a cliff, and the player says there is no way I would do that then I wouldn’t roll.

Of course in-game examples are never that black-and-white.

So I recently had a stand-off between NPCs and PCs in a variation of the module B10 Night's Dark Terror whereby the NPCs were requesting the immediate assistance of the PCs in helping them locate the stolen horses and rescue any survivors from the nearby villages. It was a strong argument by the NPCs. But equally compelling was a lead the PCs had uncovered which if followed would take them in the opposite direction. In-game the discussion between the two groups got very heated.

The PCs made the argument to the NPCs that they should abandon their homestead and return to the nearby city for safety given that many (if not all the nearby homesteads) had been destroyed and the goblin threat still loomed in the area. This was a decent argument by the PCs.
The NPCs were not willing to abandon all they had (their homes, their horses and their recently kidnapped loved ones). They were going to form a search party (with or without the help of the PCs). They believed the goblins were in full retreat given their failed attack on the homestead.

At what point do I call for a roll? Both the PCs and the NPCs had valid arguments. I preferred not to resolve this through mechanics and I think it was the right call for the emerging storyline.

It would have been detrimental to my table if I as DM had forced the PCs into a contested persuasion roll and the PCs had lost. @Hussar can you not see the dilemma one could possibly face with your solution?

 

[Ovinomancer]

Sure, but depending on the first and last parts, the middle part may or may not entail actual agency. If the players' declared actions make no difference to the resolution, for instance, or if the scene gives them only one viable choice. Yet 'depriving them of agency' like that may be critical to keeping the campaign on track and/or the experience 'immersive,' or whatever else it might be the table values that the game couldn't deliver by itself, at that point.

The first and the last parts are there to enable the middle part. If you're removing choice, then what you're doing is just narrating to the players, not playing an RPG. And, honestly, sometimes it's fine to narrate things, depending on the game and the social contract, but we should pretend that we're doing anything else by pretending we're following the play procedures. In other words, sure, you can remove agency, but that's exactly what I'm saying is a problem. Pointing out that you can still remove agency when my entire argument is that you shouldn't and the game is built in a way that if you use it's procedures with integrity you will not is rather... unhelpful?

And, for the last part, this is noble cause corruption -- I believe I'm doing this thing for a noble cause, therefore my means are reasonable to achieve that cause. It's circular thinking and not valid. You, as DM, have no special insight into what a better game is, you only have your bias towards your anticipated outcomes. Any steering you do will be to achieve your anticipated outcomes, which isn't the same thing as a good game. It may be, but that's accidental rather than given using this framework. That some DMs see success is foiled by the huge number of anecdotes on this board alone of DMs forcing play in ways that players hate. Yet, using your construction here, the DMs are justified to do so and it's the player's fault for having a bad time because they're not going along with the DM's whims. You're justifying the worst of railroads alongside the hypothetical noble use that has a good result.

I'm not aware of an objective metric, but it's not /that/ hard (also not as easy as one might think) to tell if players in a campaign are generally finding it fun or not. Experience as a player & DM, of course - decades of it, in some cases. No good one's I've ever seen. DMs must exercise their own judgement in these matters. It's what separates RPGs from boardgames and MMOs and the like, where there's no DM - a DM can adapt to the circumstances and the players, a boardgame is just the rules & the board it is what it is, an MMO is just it's programming until the next update.

"I can't tell you how you can tell, but I'm certain that it's not hard to tell?" Really. :|

And yes, the role of DM is to provide flexibility in the situation, to create where the game leads. This doesn't also imply that the role of the DM is to occasionally override player moves and instead play the PCs for a bit so that the game works better.