What is *worldbuilding* for?

[AbdulAlhazred]

Ditto. It's way over at the 'collaborative storytelling' end of the spectrum.
You'll definitely get a sense of authorship, and I can see how this could absolutely rock as a one session one-off with a decent group. But in a continuing game or campaign I'd sure hate to be the poor schlub who has to remember or write down everything said and done and authored this session so it'll be consistent when we come back to it next session...or next month...or next year...

There are some games I've read about which have a more structured approach to who gets to invent the narrative, what they can do with it, etc. which probably are much more RPG-like, but still provide some fairly significant opportunities for players to 'write a story'.

You could add some elements like this to 4e probably (though this is beyond what I've experimented with so far at least). For example you could let the player describe the narrative consequences of defeating an opponent (4e already allows a limited version of this by RAW). So you could let the player state something like "the orc is utterly disheartened and gives up as I hold my dagger to his throat. He throws down his weapon and raises his hands." This is a SMALL example, but it could be expanded to things like describing the narrative consequences of victory or defeat in an SC (this might not work in a DM-centered mode of play, but it COULD work in a Story Now type of game). You'd probably put some hard constraints on exactly what the player can describe (perhaps there would need to be a formal staking of assets at the start for instance). In fact I could imagine a sort of 'bidding' type of SC where the players could be authoring as much content as they want to 'buy'. Of course the GM will be enriched or the player's become poor in some sort of plot currency in this process. I think it would work pretty well in 4e though without a lot of reworking of the basic mechanics of the rest of the game.

 

[Aenghus]

I don't know that's correct, still. It might be better to say that meaty questions the players have are guaranteed to be the focus of play in player facing ganes. Resolution of those questions can be pretty equal in both styles, but focus of play isn't.

Good point re focus of play, that's a better way of putting it. IMO there are more potential distractions that might prevent a resolution satisfactory to the players in GM-focused play e.g. secret backstory, uncooperative plot deadlines etc

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

No, they aren't. This is obvious because all RPGs limit choice. It's a design feature. But, even further to that, player choice in player facing games is more limited, in that they really only have choices on how to deal with GM introduced crisis. That's the design goal: go to the action. This isn't a design goal in DM facing games, where action occurs when out dies and thers a heavier focus on the logistical and tactical choices available to the players. Or, some DM facing games, as pure railroads are pure railroads. Still, those kinds of choices are absent in player facing games -- by design.

I don't agree that this is true in practice. As a player you're going to engage with your character, it has SOME sort of backstory, some preferences, likes, dislikes, SOMETHING will be expressed in play, even if the GM has to elicit it. I mean, in D&D, EVERY character has a race, and a class, presumably a gender and a name as well (I guess maybe those aren't literally required, except in 1e you must have a gender defined in some cases for mechanical reasons). So, AT WORST, you've defined SOMETHING about your PC.

Once that happens the GM has what is needed in order to start framing some kind of conflict around what the character, at least implicitly, needs. A truly uninspired and passive player might require a skilled GM to use all their tricks to push things forward, but the point is that the choices which drive this are all PLAYER choices.

Beyond that, there is nothing in a sandbox which lets the players off the hook in this respect! If they simply want to sit in the tavern and drink until their gold is spent and then lie in a gutter and starve, nothing prevents that. It will NOT be a very interesting game for 99.9% of us. Its true, in Story Now, the character's desire to do this will be confronted and a conflict will develop. Maybe he'll be swept up by a press gang and find himself an unwilling soldier. Does he risk death by trying to desert? Or does he make do? Maybe he learns to like it! An endless series of conflicts can arise from this player 'choice of no choice'. We could let the character rot in the ditch, but what is the point?

OTOH if the players decide that their desire is to go exploring and have the world described to them, and then react to it or continue on to new destinations, or whatever, then why would a Story Now GM fail to deliver on that agenda? He might threaten the PCs ability to get to point X which they have set out for, but then again that isn't a given. There's no specific way that Story Now HAS to play out. I think this gets back to the whole pacing question we talked about back a few pages.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

How I respond to the player's statement will vary depending on the circumstances, prior game play, etc. Usually there will be a roll involved. Sometimes it will just automatically succeed, such as if the player had previously spoken to a sage that had the specialty in question. Sometimes, very rarely, it will automatically fail, such as if the player wants to find a wizard guild in a city that hates arcane spellcasters. Sometimes there will be success with a consequence, or failure with a consequence. Outright failure is okay, since there are many avenues to success. A failure isn't a failure at the goal, but just at that step in the process.

...

One of the things that pre-authoring adds that your style doesn't have, is the ability for both the DM and the players to draw from that large pool of pre-authored content. I have been running primarily the Forgotten Realms since 1e. If the players are in Baldur's Gate, they know many of the pre-authored elements and can draw from those. The player might tell me, "I go find some Flaming Fists to take this lost girl back to her parents." He has drawn on the depth of the world as an aid to what he wants to do. That's not something that's really available in your game. Your game lacks that depth(though it adds in other areas). Your game has a very limited amount of pre-authored content(just stuff that you guys authored prior to that moment), so the player is either forced to use that or come up with a name on the fly.

These things go together. In Story Now there is only NOW, the non-existence of elaborate backstory and canonical setting means that there won't BE a situation where the player's need is met with "no, the world just isn't like that, its impossible" for no other reason than the GM authored it that way (or FR book XYZ says so, etc.). This comes right back to the central question of the thread, what exactly is this pre-authored content DOING? We KNOW its supplying these kinds of limitations on play, as you've stated this is the case (albeit you say 'very rarely' which is important in practical terms but not so much in a theoretical sense).

I don't think the 'Flaming Fists' example is really all that compelling either. I mean, [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] could invoke something like that in one of his games too, it just wouldn't be a pre-established thing. It might even BE pre-established in the sense of being a fixture of a particular genre or something. Its true, someone may 'come up with a name on the fly', and this is one of the various proposed uses of world building. I guess we could move forward into an analysis of exactly 'how much is too much' etc. That might be interesting.

 

[pemerton]

From a player point of view one of the big differences I see between GM-driven games and player-driven games is that conventional GM-driven games tend to encourage risk management and mitigation

Risk management and mitigation is clearly a big part of classic dungeon-crawling.

I think it's meant to be part of Expert-style sandboxing as well, but for the sorts of reasons I've described upthread this can often be illusory. For instance, in social interactions in a city what does risk-mitigation look like? Is turning up to the meeting fully armed and armoured risk mitigation (better protected against an ambush) or risk exacerbation (likely to irritate NPCs because contrary to social norms)? A verisimilitudinous, "living breathing" world gives rise to all sorts of questions like this.

Of course the players can ask the GM "Is it bad manners to turn up fully kitted out?", but (i) that is getting fairly close to the GM running the game on the player side as well as his/her own side, and (ii) it still doesn't help the players work out what the trade-off is (eg what is the risk of ambush?).

It's far from trivial to extrapolate dungeon-crawling play into the "living, breathing" world.

 

[pemerton]

player choice in player facing games is more limited, in that they really only have choices on how to deal with GM introduced crisis. That's the design goal: go to the action. This isn't a design goal in DM facing games, where action occurs when out dies and thers a heavier focus on the logistical and tactical choices available to the players.

The subject matter of the choices may well be different. But [MENTION=29398]Lanefan[/MENTION] was making an assertion about the quantity of choice.

Admittedly measuring quantity of choice is inexact, but if we think of it in terms of chances to make action declarations that matter to the direction of play - which probably correlates with something like situations that prompt the making of an action declaration whose consequence will shape future outcomes - then (as I said) the player in the player-driven game has as much choice as the player in the GM-driven game.

The particular claim about logistical/tactical choices is also not true. It depend on system. Cortex+ Heroic has almost no choices of this sort. 4e has a modest amount of such choice, mostly around magic item creation/acquisition. But Burning Wheel makes these sorts of choices quite important.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Risk management and mitigation is clearly a big part of classic dungeon-crawling.

I think it's meant to be part of Expert-style sandboxing as well, but for the sorts of reasons I've described upthread this can often be illusory. For instance, in social interactions in a city what does risk-mitigation look like? Is turning up to the meeting fully armed and armoured risk mitigation (better protected against an ambush) or risk exacerbation (likely to irritate NPCs because contrary to social norms)? A verisimilitudinous, "living breathing" world gives rise to all sorts of questions like this.

Of course the players can ask the GM "Is it bad manners to turn up fully kitted out?", but (i) that is getting fairly close to the GM running the game on the player side as well as his/her own side, and (ii) it still doesn't help the players work out what the trade-off is (eg what is the risk of ambush?).

It's far from trivial to extrapolate dungeon-crawling play into the "living, breathing" world.

Yeah, the players can ask 1000's of questions about the reputation and background of the guys they're negotiating with, about social norms and etiquette, etc. but at what point do we just devolve down to the GM is making it all up on the fly in terms of all these details? At that point, why not just frame the situation to address the player's agenda? Its not really a 'sandbox' anymore at that point anyway! This is part of what I've been saying a while back in terms of causality. Real (or realistic) worlds are going to be so complex that every single situation can easily evoke 1000 questions. Once you get down into these weeds, either the GM is playing the tune by how he responds, or the game might was well just go for Story Now and be done with it. AT BEST it could turn into long sessions of contemplation and questioning with very little action and a darn slow pace (which I've seen pretty often in these types of games, and which in some ways [MENTION=29398]Lanefan[/MENTION]'s description of years-long largely low-mid-level games seems to evoke).

 

[Lanefan]

Risk management and mitigation is clearly a big part of classic dungeon-crawling.

I think it's meant to be part of Expert-style sandboxing as well, but for the sorts of reasons I've described upthread this can often be illusory. For instance, in social interactions in a city what does risk-mitigation look like? Is turning up to the meeting fully armed and armoured risk mitigation (better protected against an ambush) or risk exacerbation (likely to irritate NPCs because contrary to social norms)?

This may be something the players/PCs already know from prior information gathering or trial-and-error, or they may have to take steps to find out. Could be something as simple as making inquiries about local protocol.

A verisimilitudinous, "living breathing" world gives rise to all sorts of questions like this.

As it should - no problem there.

Of course the players can ask the GM "Is it bad manners to turn up fully kitted out?", but (i) that is getting fairly close to the GM running the game on the player side as well as his/her own side, and (ii) it still doesn't help the players work out what the trade-off is (eg what is the risk of ambush?).

Unless the players/PCs have contacts in town or are already familiar with the place the chances of them knowing that risk level is - and realistically should be - rather low in most cases. The town might have a reputation for lawfulness or danger, but beyond that? They won't know until they try...and maybe won't even fully know after that.

And the same is true with full-on dungeon-crawling - the players/PCs can mitigate some of the risks they're aware of but may never be fully aware of all of them - particularly if they avoid said risks by sheer ignorant luck, which happens.

It's far from trivial to extrapolate dungeon-crawling play into the "living, breathing" world.

From the player side it's largely the same, I find - gather what info you can and then decide what to do; there's just more info to sift through. From the DM side it's a LOT more work to do right, and to produce all the info the players might (or might not) ask for.

 

[pemerton]

There are some games I've read about which have a more structured approach to who gets to invent the narrative, what they can do with it, etc. which probably are much more RPG-like, but still provide some fairly significant opportunities for players to 'write a story'.

I don't have wide experience with story-telling games. I did post a play report of "A Penny For My Thoughts" upthread, and comparing that experience to RPGing I would say that one big difference is asymmetry in responsibilities in respect of content-introduction.

 

[pemerton]

This may be something the players/PCs already know from prior information gathering or trial-and-error, or they may have to take steps to find out. Could be something as simple as making inquiries about local protocol.

<snip>

From the DM side it's a LOT more work to do right, and to produce all the info the players might (or might not) ask for.

This is exactly the sort of thing I have in mind when I talk about play that involves the players making moves to trigger the GM to tell them stuff.