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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7397075" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>No one has said that he is. To repost part of my post to which you replied, with some additional bolding:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px"></p><p></p><p>A point that <em>I</em> - pemerton, not Eero Tuovinen - made is that if you are playing along the lines of the standard narrativistic model (<a href="https://isabout.wordpress.com/2010/02/16/the-pitfalls-of-narrative-technique-in-rpg-play/" target="_blank">which Eero outlines</a>, nicely, but did not himself invent) then you have reason not to rely too much on secret backstory. I've just quoted my explanation of those reasons, and so won't repeat them again.</p><p></p><p>The first sentence is largely correct (although, given that he refers to games like DitV as illustrating his point, and DitV <em>does</em> allow the player to add to certain parts of backstory during play, it does need to be qualified in some fashion).</p><p></p><p>The second sentence is not correct. He says you can't have an "I am your father moment" if the GM <em>asks the player</em> if that would be cool. That is, as he says, "The correct heuristic is to throw out the claim of fatherhood if it seems like a challenging revelation for the character, not ask the player whether he’s OK with it," ie, to present the NPC as making the claim. This is GM authority over framing. </p><p></p><p>Eero doesn't talk about <em>this</em> at all. Eero says nothing about how the <em>truth</em> of the claim about parenthood might be resolved.</p><p></p><p>Nor does his discussion of the "I am your father" example have any direct bearing on the examples of finding a map, or a secret door: neither of these is the GM asking the player if it would be cool to find the map or find the secret door; both are the player declaring the search as an action. That is, the GM <em>has already thrown out the challenge</em> - "can you find the map", "can you escape your pursuers" - and the player is now declaring an action whereby his/her PC hopes to respond to the challenge.</p><p></p><p>Because that's the only basis on which one could think that Eero Tuovinen's objection to conch-passing shared narration could <em>also</em> be an objection to resolving a search for a map or a secret door by way of straightforward action declaraton without regard to shared storytelling.</p><p></p><p>No. Eero neither endorses nor rejects secret backstory. But some of the games he refers to, as illustrating his preferred approach, do. For instance, there is the following from DitV, under the heading "Actively Reveal the Town in Play" (pp 137-38 ):</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">The town you’ve made has secrets. It has, quite likely, terrible secrets — blood and sex and murder and damnation.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">But you the GM, you don’t have secrets a’tall. Instead, you have cool things - bloody, sexy, murderous, damned cool things - that you can’t wait to share. . . .</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">The PCs arrive in town. I have someone meet them. They ask how things are going. The person says that, well, things are going okay, mostly. The PCs say, “mostly?”</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">And I’m like “uh oh. They’re going to figure out what’s wrong in the town! Better stonewall. Poker face: on!” And then I’m like “wait a sec. I want them to figure out what’s wrong in the town. In fact, I want to <em>show</em> them what’s wrong! Otherwise they’ll wander around waiting for me to drop them a clue, I’ll have my dumb poker face on, and we’ll be bored stupid the whole evening.”</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">So instead of having the NPC say “oh no, I meant that things are going just fine, and I shut up now,” I have the NPC launch into his or her tirade. “Things are awful! This person’s sleeping with this other person not with me, they murdered the schoolteacher, blood pours down the meeting house walls every night!”</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">...Or sometimes, the NPC wants to lie, instead. That’s okay! I have the NPC lie. You’ve watched movies. You always can tell when you’re watching a movie who’s lying and who’s telling the truth. And wouldn’t you know it, most the time the players are looking at me with skeptical looks, and I give them a little sly nod that yep, she’s lying. . . .</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Then the game <em>goes</em> somewhere.</p><p></p><p>You, [MENTION=6778044]Ilbranteloth[/MENTION], are assuming that <em>GM authority over backstory</em> equals <em>secret backstory</em>. But it doesn't. Because, as Vincent Baker shows us in the passage I just quoted, the GM can author the backstory but <em>reveal it to the players</em>. This is how the "standard narrativistic model" works - the GM frames the PCs into situations. The elements of framing are <em>backstory</em>, but - just as DitV illustrates - they're not secret.</p><p></p><p>It's an important part of PbtA also - the GM establishes the fiction by performing narrations in response to player moves (both failed moves - 6 or down - and half-way successful moves - 7 to 9 - and in some cases even fully successful moves where the player's result is 10+).</p><p></p><p>That is not secret backstory. It is revealed backstory. It is genre, feeding into framing.</p><p></p><p>This may well be true, if you like that sort of RPGing. But it is completely orthogonal to Eero's discussion of why narration-sharing sucks in standard narrativistic model games. Because what you're describing here is not "standard narrativistic model" RPGing!</p><p></p><p>And just as you have assumed that GM control over backstory = secret backstory, so now you are assuming that the NPC "throwing out the claim of fatherhood" = the NPC <em>is</em> the father, and the GM already knows this. The first assumption reveals a blind spot for framing, the second a blinspot for "playing to find out", and seeing what fiction is established as players delcare actions in response to the challenges framed by the GM.</p><p></p><p>Those blindspots obviously don't matter if your goal is to run a game of the sort that you and your players enjoy. I'm not pointing them out to be critical of you as a GM. What I'm saying is that, because of those blindspots, you are failing to understand (i) how "standard narrativistic model" RPGing actually works (which is what Eero Tuovinen talks about), and (ii) why "secret backstory" doesn't sit easily with that sort of RPGing (which is what I have been talking about for a good part of this thread).</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 7397075, member: 42582"] No one has said that he is. To repost part of my post to which you replied, with some additional bolding: [indent][/indent] A point that [i]I[/i] - pemerton, not Eero Tuovinen - made is that if you are playing along the lines of the standard narrativistic model ([url=https://isabout.wordpress.com/2010/02/16/the-pitfalls-of-narrative-technique-in-rpg-play/]which Eero outlines[/url], nicely, but did not himself invent) then you have reason not to rely too much on secret backstory. I've just quoted my explanation of those reasons, and so won't repeat them again. The first sentence is largely correct (although, given that he refers to games like DitV as illustrating his point, and DitV [i]does[/i] allow the player to add to certain parts of backstory during play, it does need to be qualified in some fashion). The second sentence is not correct. He says you can't have an "I am your father moment" if the GM [i]asks the player[/i] if that would be cool. That is, as he says, "The correct heuristic is to throw out the claim of fatherhood if it seems like a challenging revelation for the character, not ask the player whether he’s OK with it," ie, to present the NPC as making the claim. This is GM authority over framing. Eero doesn't talk about [i]this[/i] at all. Eero says nothing about how the [i]truth[/i] of the claim about parenthood might be resolved. Nor does his discussion of the "I am your father" example have any direct bearing on the examples of finding a map, or a secret door: neither of these is the GM asking the player if it would be cool to find the map or find the secret door; both are the player declaring the search as an action. That is, the GM [i]has already thrown out the challenge[/i] - "can you find the map", "can you escape your pursuers" - and the player is now declaring an action whereby his/her PC hopes to respond to the challenge. Because that's the only basis on which one could think that Eero Tuovinen's objection to conch-passing shared narration could [i]also[/i] be an objection to resolving a search for a map or a secret door by way of straightforward action declaraton without regard to shared storytelling. No. Eero neither endorses nor rejects secret backstory. But some of the games he refers to, as illustrating his preferred approach, do. For instance, there is the following from DitV, under the heading "Actively Reveal the Town in Play" (pp 137-38 ): [indent]The town you’ve made has secrets. It has, quite likely, terrible secrets — blood and sex and murder and damnation. But you the GM, you don’t have secrets a’tall. Instead, you have cool things - bloody, sexy, murderous, damned cool things - that you can’t wait to share. . . . The PCs arrive in town. I have someone meet them. They ask how things are going. The person says that, well, things are going okay, mostly. The PCs say, “mostly?” And I’m like “uh oh. They’re going to figure out what’s wrong in the town! Better stonewall. Poker face: on!” And then I’m like “wait a sec. I want them to figure out what’s wrong in the town. In fact, I want to [i]show[/i] them what’s wrong! Otherwise they’ll wander around waiting for me to drop them a clue, I’ll have my dumb poker face on, and we’ll be bored stupid the whole evening.” So instead of having the NPC say “oh no, I meant that things are going just fine, and I shut up now,” I have the NPC launch into his or her tirade. “Things are awful! This person’s sleeping with this other person not with me, they murdered the schoolteacher, blood pours down the meeting house walls every night!” ...Or sometimes, the NPC wants to lie, instead. That’s okay! I have the NPC lie. You’ve watched movies. You always can tell when you’re watching a movie who’s lying and who’s telling the truth. And wouldn’t you know it, most the time the players are looking at me with skeptical looks, and I give them a little sly nod that yep, she’s lying. . . . Then the game [i]goes[/i] somewhere.[/indent] You, [MENTION=6778044]Ilbranteloth[/MENTION], are assuming that [i]GM authority over backstory[/i] equals [i]secret backstory[/i]. But it doesn't. Because, as Vincent Baker shows us in the passage I just quoted, the GM can author the backstory but [i]reveal it to the players[/i]. This is how the "standard narrativistic model" works - the GM frames the PCs into situations. The elements of framing are [i]backstory[/i], but - just as DitV illustrates - they're not secret. It's an important part of PbtA also - the GM establishes the fiction by performing narrations in response to player moves (both failed moves - 6 or down - and half-way successful moves - 7 to 9 - and in some cases even fully successful moves where the player's result is 10+). That is not secret backstory. It is revealed backstory. It is genre, feeding into framing. This may well be true, if you like that sort of RPGing. But it is completely orthogonal to Eero's discussion of why narration-sharing sucks in standard narrativistic model games. Because what you're describing here is not "standard narrativistic model" RPGing! And just as you have assumed that GM control over backstory = secret backstory, so now you are assuming that the NPC "throwing out the claim of fatherhood" = the NPC [i]is[/i] the father, and the GM already knows this. The first assumption reveals a blind spot for framing, the second a blinspot for "playing to find out", and seeing what fiction is established as players delcare actions in response to the challenges framed by the GM. Those blindspots obviously don't matter if your goal is to run a game of the sort that you and your players enjoy. I'm not pointing them out to be critical of you as a GM. What I'm saying is that, because of those blindspots, you are failing to understand (i) how "standard narrativistic model" RPGing actually works (which is what Eero Tuovinen talks about), and (ii) why "secret backstory" doesn't sit easily with that sort of RPGing (which is what I have been talking about for a good part of this thread). [/QUOTE]
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