Narrative Space Options for non-spellcasters

[sheadunne]

As I said eariler, I cleary interpreted your "finality" to be more "final" than you intended. I think "binding", rather than "final", might be a more appropriate term. Your successful use of Diplomacy (whatever mechanics we adopt for same, be they the present one skill roll &D model, or some more granular social combat system) does not make the target your loyal friend for life, come what may, but it does mean the immediate objective of your diplomacy attempt is successful, and not either vetoed as "out of character" or eliminated before the benefits are realized (ie the guard does not have second thoughts and raise the alarm as you enter the camp) by a change of heart that effectively renders the initial success irrelevant.

Yea, I think [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] was referencing the finality of the scene rather than finality of a longer period of time such as a day, week, or forever. It's funny how we all have different language and forget that others may not be thinking about events using that language, especially those of us who never went on with 4e and don't think of the game in scenes and encounters, even though we may use the idea instead of the language. It takes a bit getting used to, at least for me. I almost wish there was an easy guide someplace, like I have to use as a reference for text speak

Binding is a better term and more accurate I believe.

 

[Warbringer]

If you're talking about flexibility over a period of time, I'd say yes. Between spell memorization (for your divine casters and wizards) and the ability to acquire scrolls and such.

Pretty much, and especially with 3e item creation.

Rogues do have more in scene flexibility for sure, but there seems to be strong anecdotal evidence that spellcasters can quickly steal their (rogues) thunder

 

[Starfox]

Fun as this discussion has been, I have to leave it - leaving for vacation (and bad internet) tomorrow. Have fun all!

 

[Ahnehnois]

Fun as this discussion has been, I have to leave it - leaving for vacation (and bad internet) tomorrow. Have fun all!

Clearly you have a greater ability to control your own narrative than I do.

 

[pemerton]

In Maid, my character for some time had Luck as her highest attribute. As any stunt in Maid can be based of any attribute the GM agrees to, even in combat, this meant that her combat actions became stuff like "I dodge the falling tree, but he doesn't", stipulating a tree would suddenly fall on us. My character didn't really do much - she was just stupidly lucky

First, let me say I am cool with a player doing these kinds of stunts.

The example of the lucky PC is classic director stance! The PC is not making the tree fall down, so the player - in stipulating that the tree falls down - is doing something different from simply engaging the fiction via his/her PC's declared actions.

About "director stance", it is an interesting point. Not sure I see "director stance" as clear enough to stand on it's own tough. Instead I see cases of director stance falling under either author or actor stance.

The terminology I'm familiar with comes from The Forge:

• In Actor stance, a person determines a character's decisions and actions using only knowledge and perceptions that the character would have.
  
  
• In Author stance, a person determines a character's decisions and actions based on the real person's priorities, then retroactively "motivates" the character to perform them. (Without that second, retroactive step, this is fairly called Pawn stance.)
  
  
• In Director stance, a person determines aspects of the environment relative to the character in some fashion, entirely separately from the character's knowledge or ability to influence events. Therefore the player has not only determined the character's actions, but the context, timing, and spatial circumstances of those actions, or even features of the world separate from the characters.

Is your "Locus of Control" the same as my recently picked up "Golden Box"? I'm not really familiar with either term.

I think I picked up the phrase from [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION].

I'm using it to try and get at what some people mean by saying "I only want to play my character" or "I only want to change the gameworld by acting on it in character".

That a tree should fall over in combat due to a freak windstorm or some other coincidence is an example of something outside the PC's locus of control. That the PC should be bending over to tie her shoelaces at that very moment (so that the tree misses her but hits her enemy) is within the PC's locus of control.

 

[Warbringer]

Fun as this discussion has been, I have to leave it - leaving for vacation (and bad internet) tomorrow. Have fun all!

Call yourself a gamer!!

Enjoy your vacation

 

[Manbearcat]

Originally Posted by Starfox
Is your "Locus of Control" the same as my recently picked up "Golden Box"? I'm not really familiar with either term.

I think I picked up the phrase from @Manbearcat .

I'm using it to try and get at what some people mean by saying "I only want to play my character" or "I only want to change the gameworld by acting on it in character".

That a tree should fall over in combat due to a freak windstorm or some other coincidence is an example of something outside the PC's locus of control. That the PC should be bending over to tie her shoelaces at that very moment (so that the tree misses her but hits her enemy) is within the PC's locus of control.

Could be. But I suspect, given your erudition and your field of work, that you were well aware of the term before I started applying it to metagame mechanics and actor vs author vs director stance.

Starfox, its a theory in personality psychology developed in the 1950s. Roughly, the concept declares a person's "locus" (Latin for "location") is as either internal or external focused. Internal locus of control means the person believes that they are empowered to make decisions of which the outcomes are the primary output of their life's body of work/story; eg they can control their life/destiny. External locus of control means that the person believes that their decisions and life are controlled by environmental factors (entropy or interactions far, far beyond 1st or 2nd order with respect to their own decisions) which they cannot influence either at all or in any meaningful way; eg external factors control their life/destiny.

Pemerton's above is a great encapsulation. I'll try another. Consider a door in an infiltration challenge:

Actor Stance - I interact with (open it/pick the lock/disarm the trap) the door.

Author Stance - I know the guard on patrol. He owes me a favor for clearing his debt with a dangerous bookmaker. I call in the favor and have him leave the door unlocked and unguarded (this is either mechanically available to him now when it wouldn't have been otherwise or it automatically happens).

Director Stance - I skulk up to the entryway. I hear the sounds of rambunctious revelry down the hall. The guards are in a drunken dice game and the sentry must have joined them. In his haste he forgot to lock the door!

As you move down the stance track, character locus of control moves further from inner to outer while player locus of control moves further from outer to inner; and further toward metagame mechanics.

 

[Starfox]

Perhaps I ought to read up on the Forge, but I hear just as much bad as good about it.

NN now!

 

[Warbringer]

[MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION]

example explanation of the different stances in play impact

 

[Warbringer]

Perhaps I ought to read up on the Forge, but I hear just as much bad as good about it.

Indeed, but definition of terminology is at least common ground