Judgement calls vs "railroading"

[Ilbranteloth]

I think directly correlating just playing your character to actor stance involves a pretty narrow conception of what playing your character means and the various ways to approach roleplaying games.

I can play my character by making decisions for my character based on pursuing the objectives of the game whether stated or not. This is the way D&D was mostly originally played. This is pawn stance play.

I can play my character by making decisions for my character based on on my conception of my character's knowledge, motivation, drives, intuitions, and goals. This is actor stance play.

I can play my character by making decisions for my character based on my desires for where the narrative should go and what I believe would be best "for the story". This is author stance play.

I can play my character while describing their inner thoughts, things that go unsaid, describing their actions in visual terms, describing dialog in broad strokes, and describing their intent. I can also talk about their connections to the fiction, say how they view the situation, and provide gaps for other players to play off of. This is director stance play.

No matter the stance you are still playing your character and making decisions for them.

I think talking in terms of stance can be a fruitful to tease out player motivations and play techniques. However, there are significant issues with the stance model that I believe can lead us to draw the wrong conclusions about Actual Play. Time to put my beefs out on open display.

• It can often lead to conversations where we talk around issues of player motivations and play techniques instead of directly addressing them in a real way.
• It assumes that we are in a particular stance at any moment and that the stances are mutually exclusive. Actual motivations and human behavior are far more complex than all that. We actually make decisions based on a multitude of considerations that we actively prioritize. We also often justify our decisions after the fact.
• It can serve to limit our discussions of player motivations to the 3 primary stances: actor, author, pawn. It ignores social considerations, aesthetic considerations, and many other factors. Additionally distinctions are not normally made within the particular primary stance. Am I pursuing the objectives of the game because I am motivated by challenge, achievement, status, power to affect the game world, or completion? Is it a combination of these things?
• Director stance depicts a set of techniques, not player motives. These techniques are overly broad. Some instances may be acceptable where others may not. It basically describes any instance where you are not using first person description.

This is very interesting. Don't have time to really digest it right now, so I'll just comment on it to save it for later...

 

[Sadras]

I feel like the pertinent question here is "Does your game procedure allow for the framing of scenes by the DM that are not in response to explicit player declaration?" For example, to use the advisor concept introduced previously, let's say that the advisor is enraged by the PC's success at reducing his status in court. He is so enraged that he performs an arcane ritual in secret to summon a malevolent extraplanar entity, which he commands to attack the PCs.

I think having said demon attack the PCs in retribution would be a natural and expected consequence in "living world"/"NPC agenda" play procedure games. The PCs have angered the advisor, having the advisor retaliate is a second-order consequence of their actions. But this framing would be problematic in a BW/Cortex style game, as the advisor's action aren't a direct consequence of any PC's failure to mechanically reach their intent. Now, being attacked by a demon could be a consequence of a hundred other possible future failures on the PC's part, and tying the demon's appearance back to the spurned advisor would make a satisfying narration for that consequence. But ultimately, you wouldn't introduce a summoned demon simply as something for the PCs to have a conflict with without player input.

No... I think you have it wrong... mainly because I see the advisor as being capable of having an agenda that can be pushed via narration (by the DM/GM of course just as the players narrate the agendas for their PC's). you say this isn't possible but unless we're getting caught up around the pedantic point of the fictional advisor not being able to narrate (which I think is minor in the realm of the bigger picture)... I've yet to see you posit why the advisor having an agenda (and it being narrated by whoever is playing the advisor) isn't possible as opposed to not preferable to you.

...(snip)...

In a player driven game, as far as I have been able to tell only the players through their characters ever act as protagonists and the NPC's, setting, color, history, etc. only exist and are only necessary when facilitating the goal of allowing that protagonism to be expressed, they are only ever reactive (whether as a success or consequence) to the players actions.

This reminds me of the time where we were discussing consequence of a character's actions and the possibility of a DM narrating a consequence of said action without being a result of a success/failure mechanic. @pemerton brought up an example where a decision by a PC to side with the Raven Queen instead of Vecan, resulted in Vecna (without a roll) hurting said PC's familiar. It appears in that instance the NPC (Vecna) had an agenda, which was pushed by GM narration. If I recall correctly, @pemerton did not feel this was a real consequence as the 'damage' to the familiar was only temporary (and therefore colour).

Unless @pemerton has changed his position since then, in @TwoSix's question and example, the answer would have to be no. The advisor's motivations do not enter the storyline at all which is in line with @Imaro's assessment of how pemerton treats NPC's.

 

[Ilbranteloth]

There is a lot going on here. I don't know that I'll respond sensibly to all of it, but will try to convey some of the thoughts I had.

You often respond more sensibly to what I write than I do! :>)

(2) Anyone could have been Obi-Wan's apprentice: Luke's name is Skywalker; his father was a great pilot and a great Jedi who left him a lightsabre as an heirloom; his father was killed by Darth Vader. These are the things that make Luke the appropriate heir to the Jedi tradition, and cast him in dramatic opposition to Vader and the Empire. (In a very different way from Leia, whose opposition is political, not personal/spiritual in the same way, at least before the Death Star is used to blow up Alderaan.)

Yes, but as we now know, Vader killed a lot of Jedis. It didn't have to be Vader's son that became the hero (although that's the direction the story later took). In fact, one could argue that the entire Star Wars story shifted from a pulp/action story to something with more depth with that one line at the end of Empire. The series shifted from rebellion to redemtion.

There are multiple alternatives to random determination: railroading is one; what I have been referring to as player-driven RPGing is another.

A living sandbox is another. I'd say random determination is between 10-40% of what's going on at any given point. Although many of those randomly determined things are options for a placed encounter.

But consider using (say) the Stormtrooper massacre at the farm as a framing device. I think it would be harsh for a GM to just do that willy-nilly! It makes sense, rather, as the consequence of a failure. (Say, a failed Navigation roll to travel from Obi-Wan's house back to the farm, having realised the threat posed by the Empire's hunt for the droids.) But to know that that would be an appropriate consequence for failure, one needs to understand what is at stake for the player in declaring that action for his/her PC. This is what I'm saying I couldn't judge without knowing what is motivating the action declaration, which was the trigger for this particular discussion.

So part of the problem I'm having, is that when I look at a scene (like this) I read it as I would run/experience it in my game.

The "failure" on Luke's part was to purchase the wrong (right) droids and follow the one that ran away. Those were the actions that led to the massacre at the farm.

If I'm the DM of that game, the stormtroopers are hunting down the droids, and killing all they encounter to avoid witnesses that the Empire was there. (To be honest, other than a plot element to free Luke from his home, I'm not sure why the stormtroopers killed the jawas or his family, as it's clear that the Empire is already on Tatooine once they arrive in Los Eisley). In any event, that's what the stormtroopers are doing, so if Luke's not there (by design, or he'd be killed too), they are.

The motivation of the action declaration? Again, the movie unfolds like a game session:

1) Uncle Owen (NPC) has dragged Luke along to get a droid that can help on the farm. Mission: Find droid.

2) DM describes scene at the jawa crawler. There's a bit of role-playing in selecting a droid. It smokes, the Luke PC picks out another one that the DM (as 3PO) points out as another suitable droid.

3) Return to home/bed/morning where the DM describes (via the NPCs) that R2 has disappeared. Luke's motivation? Find him. Could be others, but that's the only one that matters. Off he goes. (Naturally, because the adventure won't continue if he doesn't).

4) The DM describes the terrain, following the tracks, scenes with Obi-Wan, etc. until we get to Luke realizing that the stormtroopers would be heading to his home when they find the jawa crawler.

So I guess what I really don't understand is how that would play out differently if the players were writing more of what's going on in the world. How would this scene be authored differently at your table? The lines seem to be very obviously drawn at certain points in terms of authorship.

(4) The writer provides the world and the characters react to it: the writer of a fiction is a person in the real world; the characters exist only in imagination. So the two can never interact.

Of course they do. The imaginary characters react to the imaginary world. Whether it's the DM describing the world, or one of the players, it's ultimately the same thing:

One of the participants is describing what's going on, and then the rest of the participants react to that.

Whether it's one participant responsible for all but the actions of the characters (DM), or that's somehow divided amongst the group as a whole is the only difference.

The writing of a fiction includes the writing of the actions of persons who are elements within that fiction. The question about RPGing is who gets to write which bits, according to what sorts of procedures. Eg does the GM frame Luke (as a PC) into a confrontation with the Empire because the GM wants to run an Empire-oriented game, or the table as a whole does, or the player has written something about opposition into the Empire into the PC's backstory, etc.

The same sorts of considerations apply to the farm massacre. Who wrote in these family members of Luke the PC? Is the killing off of the farm providing the player/PC with something that s/he wanted (freedom from farming) though at a high cost (death of family members)? Or is it undesired through-and-through?

These are all questions about authorship, not about in-fiction events.

And as I've said, the players get to write their backstory, with my setting certain boundaries. They'll give me their backstory, and I'll let them know if anything is out-of-bounds, and usually give them some ideas of my own (which are almost always tied into the world). They work those together, and it's up to them if they like what I propose or not and incorporate it if they do. Sometimes we'll go back and forth a bit. But in the end, they have as much freedom as I can give them in the setting, and they have final approval for anything that falls within those boundaries. Obviously, I'm aware of these motivations, goals, etc. at this point.

So the player would have detailed the family and the farm. The killing of the family is an event. In my campaigns it would have been an event dictated by the course of action in the story created by the players - that is, Luke purchased the wrong (right) droids, which then put him, and his family, in the path of the Empire that is looking for the droids and killing all witnesses.

As the DM, that course of action is put into play from the goals of the Empire, the mission of the stormtroopers, and the fact that the trail of the droids leads to Luke. How Luke feels about it is irrelevant in regards to the Empire and the actions they take.

Once the event has occurred, you're asking if there is a silver lining - that's not my decision to make. The player decides how Luke feels about it. He might share how he feels, he might not. Obi-Wan has to react to it, but he reacts to it in character, that is, only with the information at hand, what he can see, and what Luke does and says. If Obi-Wan feels compelled to ask about it, then I'd ask about it, but in character as Obi-Wan. Otherwise, the next decision is still up to Luke - are you with me or not?

Certainly, the more the player reveals about their feelings, the more it gives me to work with. But my knowing the character motivation isn't a requirement. There's no known character motivation in many published adventures. They often give several hooks to help the DM pull the characters in. Sometimes there are specific ones, but then you have to ensure somebody fits that mold. Otherwise the motivations are usually the same - kill the evil monsters, get treasure, save who/whatever.

In many campaigns, they never get past the kill monsters, get treasure (and gain levels and abilities), as the basic motivation. I like to tie them into the world better. They are people, who would prefer to have more than a peasant, probably have some family, probably eventually would like a family, a home, stuff they like, etc. In fact, that's really my primary focus initially - to point out to the players that the characters are people and should act like it. Once again, though, that's instruction and insight provided outside the gaming table, not during the session.

If Luke decides he's free from the farm and his Uncle, might have an inheritance, and go off to university with his friends, then that's where the story leads. Of course, the droids are his too, which might lead the Empire back to him again.

Does the GM frame Luke (the PC) into a confrontation with the Empire? Well, I make it possible. I create the story arc - that is the plans, goals, and actions the NPCs/organizations/monsters/world will be taking unless something changes it. In this case the stormtroopers are after the droids. If Luke doesn't pick these droids, then the stormtroopers find them with the jawas, kills them, and takes the droids. Meanwhile, Luke is still farming. Not as interesting a story perhaps (at least so far), but as I said, it's the players that are writing the story. It's certainly very likely that his path will cross with the Empire's, but it doesn't have to.

In my campaign, the PCs are actively involved in 14 different story arcs right now, if I recall. Some of those are individual personal ones, others are group ones. And some of the group ones are shared by a few of the characters, some by all. They've probably completed as many, and ignored probably 10 times that by now. Because I don't want to be reliant on them picking the "right" one, nor do I want to set up the scenario where they are picking one particular option because they know the DM needs them to.

Luke has to buy those droids. That's really the only option in that story.

In addition, while I think it makes sense and is prudent to have several choices lead in the same general direction, to the same long-term possibility, I don't think all choices should lead there. But I also want them to learn and see, at least sometimes, that their choices have consequences. There is rarely a "right" choice. For example, you know that there is a hit out to assassinate 3 people. You don't have time to alert the authorities, and you can't save them all. There will be consequences related to the one you save, and consequences related to the two you didn't. You might not always see them, but I'll consider them anyway in case they might come into play later.

To what I am seeing more and more as my "simulationist" brain, this is what makes the most sense to me. When you walk out your door in the morning, you could meet somebody you haven't seen in years, you could be in a car accident, you could witness a crime, or there could be an act of nature. You have no control over any of that and, for the most part, none of that gives a crap what your motivations are for the day. The car accident doesn't care if you were on the way to save drowning puppies, or off to rob a bank. All the accident cares about is that you happened to be in that place at that time.

My dramatic fiction brain thrives on seeing how people react to the world around them. Particularly in difficult situations, moral dilemmas, matters of life and death, things like that.

I frame the situation: Stormtroopers killed your family.

The next question is, "what do you do?" and not, "how does that make you feel?" The players handle the emotional and psychological reactions, along with their actions. Usually all three of those are fairly evident at the table).

 

[BryonD]

When one side flatly states that they can't perceive the other sides position, doesn't that mean it is time to stop trying to reach a meaningful resolution?

 

[Ovinomancer]

When one side flatly states that they can't perceive the other sides position, doesn't that mean it is time to stop trying to reach a meaningful resolution?

Which side is that, exactly?

 

[Campbell]

When it comes down to the adviser example put forth by [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] my own concerns would be entirely focused on the fiction. Was the defeat significant? Did he pay an appropriate social cost? I would have no issues with attempts to mitigate that defeat as long as they came from a place where the GM was playing all their NPCs with integrity and giving the players the victory they have earned. Don't be a weasel are words to live by whether you are a GM or another player. I absolutely believe in maintaining a spirit of fair play. That being said I believe [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] made the right call for the game he was running. If I was running 4e I would have made the same call. Part of playing any game involves taking on its own interests.

All that being said I am not really a fan of of games in which player intent becomes a fixture of play. I think it can lead to all sorts of perverse incentives that allow players to protect their characters and drive outcomes through manipulation of the rules in ways that have nothing to do with the interests of the fiction. In a game with explicit stake setting players have a powerful release valve to mitigate consequences to what they would be willing to accept, run around fictional positioning, and create emotional distance between them and their PC. In particular deficient forms you might even see situations where players stop advocating for their characters and use intent to guarantee that what they really want to happen will happen regardless of the results. It also often means that we cannot have consequential success.

This passage from Play Passionately cuts through to some of the core issues I have with this sort of play for my interests.

Stake Setting is a technique that has become fairly popular over the last few years. At its most basic Stake Setting is simply clearly articulating before the core mechanic is deployed what will be resolved in the fiction by that mechanic. In the earliest games that used this technique it was pretty clear that Stakes were about the in-fiction intentions, goals and wants behind the actions of the in-fiction character. However, over the years Stakes Setting has slid down a slope that is actually detrimental to playing passionately.

The slope takes Stakes away from being about the immediate in-fiction character concerns about an in-fiction conflict and shifts it towards a focus on the player’s desired outcome. For example, we may see players strategizing for character failure. “If I win, the villain kills my guy.” Sometimes the group resorts to hashing out in full what will happen for BOTH success and failure. “If I win she marries me, but if I lose she marries Joe.” At its most extreme sometimes Stakes will concern things wholly outside the character. “If I win the monster is really the ghost of Captain Roberts!”

Most often what the trip down this slope is about is protecting the player’s vision of how the story “should” go. The simplest form this takes concerns pre-deciding whether the character should succeed or fail at the conflict at hand and then Stakes become about negotiating what the consequences of that are. This is done in the name of avoiding “disappointing” outcomes when the players are clearly invested in how things “should” go.

When this happens, Stakes stop being concerned with short-term resolution of at-hand conflicts and become about resolving huge chunks of story all in one go, so that players start competing over how much story they can carve out for themselves. It’s no longer about whether NPC Alice right here and now is receptive to my character’s flirting. Instead it’s suddenly about whether or not Alice marries my character. Soon that becomes, if she doesn’t marry my character then she has to marry NPC Joe because then at least my character can fight him and so on and so on.

That investment in outcomes and how the story “should” go is what I meant by player-side railroading in my previous article. What’s happened is that the players have cut off their ability to participate as an audience member (with no idea what’s about to happen) in favor of being pure authors (imposing what you WANT to happen).

Constantly coming to vigorous creative agreement about how the story “should” go and always going for what the players *want* to have happen means the players never challenge themselves. They never let themselves be surprised (in the audience sense) and are never forced to re-evaluate where they want to go next (in the author sense).

Playing passionately is a delicate two-step between being an author and being an audience. It’s about participating as an author in the short term while preserving all the excitement and anticipation of being an audience in the long term. That happens by being invested in the tension of the situation at hand and rolling with the outcomes the system delivers.

That being said, I don't like have a problem with it. I just find it can interfere with the fantasy of playing a character in the moment and really playing to find out what happens. There are techniques that can help mitigate this. We can be really disciplined about staying focused on character intent. We can call shenanigans when we feel players are attempting to railroad play towards the outcomes they want rather than advocating for their characters.

Story Advocacy vs. Character Advocacy and the effects it has on meaningful tension, emotive play, and player experience of the fictions is probably the longest and most contentious debate within the indie community. I do not expect to solve it today. I just wanted to throw it out there.

 

[BryonD]

Which side is that, exactly?

this

In my view this doesn't mark out any meaningful distinction.

There is no meaningful difference that I can see between the world exists for players to pit themselves against, as an antagonist (which is your characterisation of "player-centric") and the world and NPCs have their own agendas, that they force against players (which is your characterisation of "GM-centric"). Both describe relationships of opposition between the desires of PCs and the desires of NPCs/antagonists (or "the gameworld" in some more general, somewhat anthropomorphised, conception).

 

[Ovinomancer]

this

Thanks, I'm not fond of rhetorical questions. I tend to drive straight at them.

 

[Campbell]

I'm going to take another stab at the framing of play as either GM driven or driven by the other players. Previously, I have taken issue with presenting this as a binary, particularly in regard to my desire to not really have anyone driving for particular outcomes, but for everyone to simply bring it and play the game to find out what happens. I am going to attack it from another angle.

If player agency is not a thing that you either have or you do not have is it a spectrum? I do not think so. I believe we have agency over specific things. Historically, one of my major pain points with playing most mainstream roleplaying games is the tactical overhead view it tends to give you of your character, the setting, and their situation instead of the deeply personal view that we have of our own lives. We tend to have far more agency over our characters in a roleplaying game than we do over our own lives. Things like the weight of social obligations, the people we care about, our cultural traditions and practices, emotional safety, limits of perspective, our natural curiosity, our personalities, and our own intuitions and emotions hold far more sway over us than they do for our characters. This often results in a sort of Uber Rational form of play where Player Characters seldom seem like authentic people. Roleplaying games often do a good job of representing physical violence and consequences, but often ignore the vast and far reaching impact of other elements of the fiction.

One of the things that most indie roleplaying games push back against is the Walled Off Gardens we create when we play most mainstream roleplaying games. In Systems Design a Walled Off Garden is an information system where users can only interact and use data in pre-approved ways. Access is rigidly controlled. The ways in which we generally play most mainstream games function in very similar ways. We have Character Concepts, Visions For Our Worlds, and The Story to think of. We don't want to risk that anyone might get hurt, but we don't really want to talk about stuff so we construct these very elaborate webs of ways you are allowed to use my stuff.

I don't mean for that to come off super harsh. I just mean that we are generally very protective of the things that belong to us. Because play exists in this culture where my character wholly belongs to me and is not shared it is precious to me. Generally as a condition of play I accept that physical violence might happen to my character, but other forms of violence are generally off the table. This includes social violence, psychological violence, emotional violence, and can even include what I would call Conceptual Violence. Conceptual Violence occurs when the events of play redefine a character in a way that makes a player like them or identify with them less. So if I'm the Social Guy and I fail a crucial Diplomacy roll in a crunch moment I look over to the GM because I don't want the dice to define my character. Here's another example: I am playing a Paladin because I love the idea of playing a good guy with a Code of Honor. I don't really want my character to be put in situations where following the code is difficult for me as a player because I want to play a good guy - not a conflicted guy. This is a form of player agency generally expected in mainstream play, but not in most indie play. Fate is real big on protecting players from Conceptual Violence.

Consider social mechanics in most mainstream roleplaying games. Generally players' characters are immune to being meaningfully influenced by other players' characters and NPCs except in ways that players allow. Additionally mechanisms for influencing NPCs are entirely under the GM's purvey. Let's contrast this with a game like Masks. In Masks there are no mechanisms to represent lasting physical harm, but there are mechanisms with teeth to represent who a character cares about, how they see themselves, and their emotional states. These mechanisms can be deployed from one player's character to another player's character, on NPCs, and as consequences applied by the GM. We are all required to follow the fiction, and the player character affecting mechanisms provide more room for decision making. Still this is a meaningful difference in player agency. When running Masks one of my hard moves is to say now you care about what this NPC has to say and there are mechanics that back that up. A player can also provoke someone susceptible to their words say what an NPC does and as long as it makes sense in the fiction and they succeed as the GM I cannot do a damn thing about it. I have to follow the fiction.

Let's say I am running Burning Wheel and two players' characters get into an argument about stuff that hinges on their beliefs. According to my principles as I GM if one player isn't willing to Say Yes to the other we are going to Roll The Dice. I would call for a binding Duel of Wits.

The same concept applies for things like character backstory. In the games I prefer to run and play you do not get to come to the table with a 2-3 page backstory or any backstory at all really. We are all collaborators. I want everyone to be interested in everyone's stuff. I also want this stuff to actually matter to play. The best way to encourage that is to work on it together in a meaningful way. I fully expect connections between various players' stuff and active and vigorous collaboration. This is a meaningful difference in agency.

Finally, let's take a look at the assumption that the players' characters are part of a group and can depend on one another. In many of the games I like to run and play this is not a valid assumption to make. I expect shared interests on the part of all players, but do not require it of their characters. Often a significant portion of the active adversity in a game like Apocalypse World can come from the other players' characters. If you want their help you generally have to actually earn it. Alliances are often temporary and tend to shift over time. I feel like this is also a fundamental difference in player agency.

 

[Maxperson]

I don't understand why you're trying to correct me on my understanding of an episode of play that I GMed and you didn't, using a mechanic that (as best I'm aware) you are not familiar with and that I am very familiar with.

I can only go by what you say here, and what you've described here is as I've stated it. As stated here, the advisor attempting mitigation would not negate the challenge the PCs won. If you have some other information you have not described here that would change that, please share it.

The players succeeded in a skill challenge which established that the advisor revealed himself in a way that did not undermine the PCs' standing in the eyes of the baron (and other worthies), but rather redounded upon the advisor himself. That's not up for dispute: it's what happened at the table.

Correct. It also would not be altered at all if the advisor was able to mitigate the damage.

The fact that you keep redescribing the outcome, by reference only to a narrow conception of the events in the fiction, rather than the actual outcome, doesn't change the reality of what actually took place. You say the challenge to out the advisor also prevents mitigation, even though one doesn't affect the other since they are two separate events. This assertion is an error. Success in the challenge established, in the fiction, the relationship (i) of the advisor to the baron and (ii) of the baron to the PCs.

Actually, I'm saying that it doesn't prevent mitigation. The success of the established challenge as you have described it was that the outing not affect the PCs. If he mitigates things, they are still not affected and he still outed himself.

I don't know what you mean by "separate events", but neither (i) nor (ii) is separate from the players' success in the skill challenge. They are the direct consequences of that success.

Event number 1 is the challenge to get the advisor to out himself. Event number 2 is the advisor attempting to mitigate the damage caused by event number 1.

Thus, when - in the next session - I started framing something that put that success into doubt, a player called me on it. He was correct to do so. The players are entitled to their victory, and it is not liable to being undone by GM reframing.

As you have described it here, you weren't actually putting the success in doubt.