"Illusionism" and "GM force" in RPGing

[pemerton]

On some level though - introducing new content for your players to interact with is itself a foreordained goal. You placed the content there with the goal of them interacting with it.

I would call that the goal of playing a RPG. It's what everyone turned up to do - have their PCs do stuff in the fiction, which at the table means the players engaging with content presented by the GM.

That doesn't mean the outcome of play - the resulting content and trajectory of the fiction - is foreordained.

 

[pemerton]

Now if instead everywhere the PCs go, they hear the same rumours about the plots and the plots keep trying to engage the PCs despite the players signaling they don't care and the PCs keep finding themselves at the entrance to the dungeon ("sleepwalking" or "random teleport accident" or "space curves weirdly here") then force is being applied.

I would see this as a variant on the dragon armies driving the PCs before them to Pax Tharsas (sp? again).

 

[pemerton]

Reading this thread, it is hard to distinguish it from it from the many others before it except that we’re replacing “railroading” with “force”.

<snip>

I can’t honestly see this discussion being any different

My OP pointed to a particular piece of text from a revised version of a classic RPG, which was quite absent from the original version, as (i) showing a very clear statement of what it means to use force ("guidance", "manipulation") in an illusionistic way ("properly done, the players never know"), and (ii) illustrating a trend in design and understanding of RPGs and RPGing.

@Doug McCrae's excellent posts with excerpts from other relevant texts have, in my view, added support to (ii) by showing various versions and variants of (i) in those texts.

I don't think most ENworlders would regard what the Traveller Book calls a "choreographed novel" as railroading; at least, no more railroading than a typical AP. I would regard it as railroading, but most other posters seem to find my use of that term over-inclusive. I am simply pointing out that advocating that sort of play is a real thing that emerges at a particular time relatively early in the RPG hobby, but not immediately.

 

[Manbearcat]

Don’t have time to respond to other stuff, but I can say this for clarification:

Force is a singular instance of a thing.

Railroading is what happens to a campaign over time when Force is used sufficiently to co-opt a game’s trajectory for an extended duration.

This is why I like talking about Force rather than Railroading. Railroading has more variability/subjectivity involved whereas “1 unit of thing” is much easier to analyze.

 

[GrahamWills]

Force is a singular instance of a thing.

Railroading is what happens to a campaign over time when Force is used sufficiently to co-opt a game’s trajectory for an extended duration.

So if I run a scenario where I force the players to go to a certain town, force them to fight an enemy and force them to lose and be captured, and then force them to escape, but then I go back to my regular style of play afterwards, that would not be railroading in your definition?

Pretty sure most people would consider railroading a thing that can happen during a single session, and I'm not excited about re-defining well understood existing concepts to fit new ones, so I'll stick with the normal definition of railroading, and then the simplest definition of GM force would be a "a small unit of railroading".

 

[GrahamWills]

it is hard to distinguish it from it from the many others before it except that we’re replacing “railroading” with “force”

My OP pointed to a particular piece of text from a revised version of a classic RPG, which was quite absent from the original version, as (i) showing a very clear statement of what it means to use force ("guidance", "manipulation") in an illusionistic way ("properly done, the players never know"), and (ii) illustrating a trend in design and understanding of RPGs and RPGing.

Yup, no arguments there. Your OP showed, as you state (i) using force in an illusionistic way, and (ii) illustrating a trend. I'm not arguing with that. I'm just stating that I cannot distinguish between your OP and this:

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These things - illusionism, railroading - are recurrent topics of conversation.

Here is a passage from The Traveller Book (1982, p 123); it is found in a description of types of scenario/adventure:

The choreographed novel [my emphasis] involves a setting already thought out by the referee and presented to the players; it may be any of the above settings [ship, location or world], but contains predetermined elements. As such, the referee has already developed characters and setting which bear on the group's activities, and they are guided gently to the proper locations. Properly done, the players never know that the referee has manipulated them to a fore-ordained goal

The "gentle guidance" and "manipulation" referred to here are exactly instances of what gets labelled railroading. The aspiration that the players not know about it, if it is "properly done", is exactly what gets labelled illusionism. (It is consistent with illusionism that the players know, in general terms, that it is going on - eg it won't be spoiled by a player having read this passage in The Traveller Book. The aspiration for player ignorance is not in respect of the general phenomenon, but rather at the point of application of railroading.)

This passage has no equivalent in the 1977 version of Classic Traveller. The fact that it appears in this early-80s version of the rules is one instance of a more general trend: the 80s saw the beginning of the idea that this sort of approach is what it means to play a RPG (especially to roleplay rather than "rollplay"); this idea was largely consolidated in the 90s. White Wolf/Storyteller system's "Golden Rule" is the most famous statement of it.

Some people like it as an approach to RPGing. Some don't. The point of this post is to try and show, by reference to a rather canonical piece of RPG text, that it is a real thing that emerges at a particular period in the history of RPGing.

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I'm not arguing here that there hasn't been development of thought over railroading. I'm just seeing no difference between "railroading" and "gm force". Manbearcat suggests that the difference is that "railroading" must be campaign-affectign (which I reject as contrary to common usage), and that "gm force" is an instance of railroading, which seems fine, but not worth defining a term for.

 

[prabe]

I'm not arguing here that there hasn't been development of thought over railroading. I'm just seeing no difference between "railroading" and "gm force". Manbearcat suggests that the difference is that "railroading" must be campaign-affectign (which I reject as contrary to common usage), and that "gm force" is an instance of railroading, which seems fine, but not worth defining a term for.

I think "railroading" is more like "illusionism," in that the story is always going to end up in the same place (which is different than deciding the story is going to begin in a specific place); "GM Force" is an instance of overriding either a player/character decision or a mechanical outcome. Fudging a roll is, I think, GM Force, but not (necessarily) railroading.

 

[Manbearcat]

So if I run a scenario where I force the players to go to a certain town, force them to fight an enemy and force them to lose and be captured, and then force them to escape, but then I go back to my regular style of play afterwards, that would not be railroading in your definition?

Pretty sure most people would consider railroading a thing that can happen during a single session, and I'm not excited about re-defining well understood existing concepts to fit new ones, so I'll stick with the normal definition of railroading, and then the simplest definition of GM force would be a "a small unit of railroading".

To me, Force that controls an entire session of a campaign is absolutely railroading.

But others may have a different litmus test for how much Force is sufficient, x Force over interval y, for a game (plenty of games are one-shots, so a session can certainly equal campaign), which is why I talk about Force.

And you can call it whatever you’d like. You can call it Burgleymurgenfurgers. I’ve got no problem with whatever you want to call it.

I just think distinguishing Force from Railroading is useful and I think that the ability to have a functional conversation about the former is much easier than the latter.

 

[GrahamWills]

Regarding the OP's premise, based on examination of the differences between 1977 and 1981 traveler:

This passage has no equivalent in the 1977 version of Classic Traveller. The fact that it appears in this early-80s version of the rules is one instance of a more general trend: the 80s saw the beginning of the idea that this sort of approach is what it means to play a RPG (especially to roleplay rather than "rollplay"); this idea was largely consolidated in the 90s. White Wolf/Storyteller system's "Golden Rule" is the most famous statement of it.

I have quite a few older systems, and the main trend I see is actually saying anything at all about the GM's job! In the 1977 Traveller book 1, there is less said about the GM than about adapting the rules for antique weapons. It doesn't even require a GM to play the game (p2 suggest using random tables to replace the referee). So it can be hard to disambiguate the difference in quality of advice with quantity of advice.

Traveller though, is a good example for change -- the original system is clearly all about simulation. The minimal description of the GM's role is to adjudicate rules. The statement is madethat a mechanical generator could replace them. Their role is clearly to adjudicate rules and create setting.

So I do strongly agree that there became a change. But I don't think the change is one of introducing railroading as a concept. Rather the concept of story and narrative came into play, and the 1981 quote demonstrates that. The GM's role has broadened from creation and running a simulation to creating and running a story. One of the tools of that transition is railroading, as the quote displays, but rather than casting railroading as the primary change, I would say that's something that came along with the change to view the GM as having a role in creating story.

Here's another quote from 1981 on how to run the game, this time from Call of Cthulhu:

Charts for random encounters, wandering monsters and/or similar things are the bane of Call of Cthulhu. In this game, each adventure should be carefully crafted to give players the maximum amount of thrills and chills ... The Keeper should have firm control over what is happening, though he should remain flexible and capable of adapting to the circumstances of his players' plans and abilities. A good Keeper will always modify his original plan to accommodate his players" (emphasis in the original).

This advice from Sandy is still excellent and is the way I like to play: Prepare scenarios to maximize the fun; be in charge, but always adapt to the player's actions. It stands as a contrast to the Traveller 1977 advice ("run the simulation") and as far less heavy-handed than the 1981 Traveller advice ("move the players to the fore-ordained goal").

Call of Cthulhu was revolutionary because it got this shift right. Traveller clearly didn't -- it was trying to evolve to become narrative, but it chose a poor tool. Notice that the focus of the Traveller advice is on the GM -- the GM's plans, goals, etc. In Sandy Petersen's advice the focus is on the players -- design scenarios to maximize their fun and adapt to the player's plans.

I don't think Sandy would change his mind on this advice now. He's GM'd for me a few times in the last couple of years and this is still his approach's and it still works. For me, this is what changed in the 80s, and I'd credit CoC with being a major force: The GM's role was expanded beyond setting creator and rule adjudicator to also include the responsibility of helping the story be fun.

Railroading can help the story be fun, but it very often has the opposite effect. The Traveller 1981 advice is straight-up bad advice. It will rarely help. Fortunately other companies were able to articulate what makes a good GM much better, and our hobby evolved. I still have occasional fun playing the full "old school simulation" approach, but it's very much a retro-throwback thing. I'm happy with our evolution and glad that Sany's approach won out over Traveller's

 

[Manbearcat]

I think the other reason why I think we should separate the terms is this:

Is it possible to have an instance of GM Force (even just a singular one) without the session/campaign being an all-out Railroad?

It appears to me (given the other thread), that the overwhelming number of posters would say “yes” to that question.

If the answer is indeed “yes”, then isn’t it useful to have distinguishing terms?