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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7556558" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>Well, yes. But, I think it's not stretching the term to any breaking point to say that the transcript of an RPG is a story, or to say that one possible goal of playing an RPG is to produce a worthwhile story. After all, I think if you will reflect, you'll recall that you have over the years produced many a memorable story while playing an RPG, and while hanging out with friends from time to time you'll even recount those stories, much as veterans or long acquaintances will recount times had together. Except, these times will be entirely works of fiction. So yes, I think that RPG play counts as story making, and that the RPG counts as a narrative medium.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I've never had much respect for critics. I think you might say that if the story wasn't worth recounting, that it probably wasn't a very good story. But then, it seems like to me that "just a bunch of people messing around in town" doing things that weren't worth recounting, wouldn't strike many players as a good RPG for very long. Certainly, if this continued for more than a single session, I'd start to question whether we ought to call this an adventure much less a campaign. Technically it might be one, but unless we are manufacturing stories worth recounting at a more rapid rate than that, I'll have a similar experience that I might have reading a tedious novel were nothing seems to happen.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Now you are listening to the critics again. It's more accurate I think to say that it is widely agreed that when writing a novel or a screen play, that everything should advance the story. However, this rule is regularly broken and sometimes there is even a good reason for it.</p><p></p><p>What you are talking about is not whether something has a story, or whether it is a novel, but the sort of artistry involved in telling a story in the medium of a novel. It's generally good artistry to tell a tight story, where everything in someway is necessary to the story, and to do nothing that isn't necessary to the story.</p><p></p><p>What I'd say is that there is an artistry to telling a story in an RPG, and that while it had some things in common with the artistry of a novel, the two mediums were different enough (ensemble, improvisational, nondeterministic, etc.) that if you tried to apply the artistry of a novel to an RPG (or visa versa) you probably wouldn't tell a great story.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I agree that on many levels we are just having a semantic argument. We I think agree quite strongly regarding the underlying problem. But we have a difference of opinion over the words we should use to describe that problem. It may seem pedantic on my part to hold to such fine distinctions of language, but I do it because I don't think we can describe the cure to the problem until we very precisely describe the problem itself. To say that the problem is that RPGs shouldn't (or don't) have a story is not only objectively false, but it is highly misleading. It leads to people inventing cures that aren't actually cures and condemning practices that aren't actually problems.</p><p></p><p>So I think what you are getting at is that a DM should not prepare for a game using the same techniques that they would prepare to make a movie, or to write a novel. There is a little bit of overlap here and there, but if you misapply the techniques of movie making or novel writing to a medium that is very different than cinema or books, you're going to not make a very good RPG. RPGs have and require an artistry all of their own.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I don't actually agree with any of that. I think there is an underlying idea somewhere down in that I could agree with, but I will just repeat myself in saying that there is nothing objectively better about a well run sandbox than there is about a well run adventure path. That's a chocolate versus vanilla sort of argument, that comes down to subjective preference. However, just because your preferences for one or the other type of narrative might be subjective, doesn't mean I concede that there aren't objectively better ways to run in or participate in a game.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 7556558, member: 4937"] Well, yes. But, I think it's not stretching the term to any breaking point to say that the transcript of an RPG is a story, or to say that one possible goal of playing an RPG is to produce a worthwhile story. After all, I think if you will reflect, you'll recall that you have over the years produced many a memorable story while playing an RPG, and while hanging out with friends from time to time you'll even recount those stories, much as veterans or long acquaintances will recount times had together. Except, these times will be entirely works of fiction. So yes, I think that RPG play counts as story making, and that the RPG counts as a narrative medium. I've never had much respect for critics. I think you might say that if the story wasn't worth recounting, that it probably wasn't a very good story. But then, it seems like to me that "just a bunch of people messing around in town" doing things that weren't worth recounting, wouldn't strike many players as a good RPG for very long. Certainly, if this continued for more than a single session, I'd start to question whether we ought to call this an adventure much less a campaign. Technically it might be one, but unless we are manufacturing stories worth recounting at a more rapid rate than that, I'll have a similar experience that I might have reading a tedious novel were nothing seems to happen. Now you are listening to the critics again. It's more accurate I think to say that it is widely agreed that when writing a novel or a screen play, that everything should advance the story. However, this rule is regularly broken and sometimes there is even a good reason for it. What you are talking about is not whether something has a story, or whether it is a novel, but the sort of artistry involved in telling a story in the medium of a novel. It's generally good artistry to tell a tight story, where everything in someway is necessary to the story, and to do nothing that isn't necessary to the story. What I'd say is that there is an artistry to telling a story in an RPG, and that while it had some things in common with the artistry of a novel, the two mediums were different enough (ensemble, improvisational, nondeterministic, etc.) that if you tried to apply the artistry of a novel to an RPG (or visa versa) you probably wouldn't tell a great story. I agree that on many levels we are just having a semantic argument. We I think agree quite strongly regarding the underlying problem. But we have a difference of opinion over the words we should use to describe that problem. It may seem pedantic on my part to hold to such fine distinctions of language, but I do it because I don't think we can describe the cure to the problem until we very precisely describe the problem itself. To say that the problem is that RPGs shouldn't (or don't) have a story is not only objectively false, but it is highly misleading. It leads to people inventing cures that aren't actually cures and condemning practices that aren't actually problems. So I think what you are getting at is that a DM should not prepare for a game using the same techniques that they would prepare to make a movie, or to write a novel. There is a little bit of overlap here and there, but if you misapply the techniques of movie making or novel writing to a medium that is very different than cinema or books, you're going to not make a very good RPG. RPGs have and require an artistry all of their own. I don't actually agree with any of that. I think there is an underlying idea somewhere down in that I could agree with, but I will just repeat myself in saying that there is nothing objectively better about a well run sandbox than there is about a well run adventure path. That's a chocolate versus vanilla sort of argument, that comes down to subjective preference. However, just because your preferences for one or the other type of narrative might be subjective, doesn't mean I concede that there aren't objectively better ways to run in or participate in a game. [/QUOTE]
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