A Question Of Agency?

[prabe]

First, and for clarity, the PCs do something that makes it happen means, in this context, the GM decides that something happens in the fiction.

I flatly reject this premise. "The PCs do something that makes it happen" can absolutely include "Someone rolls a Success-with-complication on a relevant check." If you think the GM deciding which move to make in that context is "the GM decides that something happens in the fiction" then you're not really arguing with me.

Second, and following on, and as you point to in the first sentence, the GM decides that something happens in the fiction in response to something the PCs do.

Again, this is, as I understand it, exactly the mechanism by which complications accrue in BitD or PbtA games. The PCs roll either a failure or a success-with-complications, and the GM makes a move in response to that--and the GM decides what that move is.

Third, and assuming that it is the players who are narrating what it is that their PCs do, we therefore have the GM decides that something happens in the fiction in response to the players deciding that something happens in the fiction.

This is what GMs do, whether it's choosing which move to make in a PbtA game, or something less ... regulated, or maybe constrained, like D&D. It neither specifically follows from nor contradicts your other points, that I can see.

That cannot count as player-driven. Because if it did, then every time the players declare an action for their PCs in response to some framing or event or situation that the GM narrates we would have something that is GM-driven! And no one in this thread has been arguing for that.

It looks to me as though you just said that PbtA games aren't player-driven, and I know you don't believe that. Heck, I don't believe that--at least, I don't believe that so many people who experience it differently are either lying or deluded.

The bigger picture: for the players to effect the fiction by prompting the GM to narrate stuff is a minimum condition for their being a RPG at all. Without that, it's just a monologue from the "GM" - and I use the inverted commas to signal that such monologuing wouldn't really be GMing at all, as there would be no game taking place.

I don't disagree, actually.

For such prompting to actually count as player agency to any meaningful degree, the player needs to be exercising some influence over what it is that the GM narrates. There are 101 ways that can be done - as per my post 355 not far upthread - but all of them put constraints, informal or formal, operating in respect of both timing and content, around the GM's decision-making process.

Again, I don't disagree. I think I disagree that the constraints must (or at least strongly should) be mechanical in order for there to be player agency, the way you seem to strongly prefer, but I believe that GM constraint is a strong indicator of good (or at least good faith) GMing. Heck, much of how @Lanefan describes their games is radically different from how I play/run, but I'd say that sticking so meticulously to extensive prep is a form of constraint, just not one that you prefer (it's closer to my own preferences, I'll admit).

 

[zarionofarabel]

Many of the posts on the thread make me wish I could understand Blades In The Dark. I read it through a couple of times but it still makes me go, huh?

 

[prabe]

If you want to talk about the psychology of a complicated success, I would say that I often feel that I have a greater deal of agency when it comes to PbtA games than in traditional D&D games. This is because (1) success still happens, (2) complications are often negotiated from the fiction, and (3) a number of PbtA hand players the ability to decide (in part) what happens when it transpires. In DW I may decide what ongoing effects or issues may wizard is facing as a result of the complicated success when casting a spell. This is not dictated to me by the GM. Even though it triggers a GM soft move, there is also a player-facing component. That's often more psychologically satisfying to me than the GM dictating my character's errors or incompetency.

I don't doubt you for a moment, but looking at the rules for AW (and BitD, which you don't mention) it seemed to me as though I'd be playing (not GMing, playing) in a metaphorical straightjacket. It just seemed as though everything was so tightly constrained, and there wasn't any world to push against or grab onto so reactions to my actions seemed wildly unpredictable--and if I can't predict the reactions, the actions themselves feel random to me.

All of that aside from my strong distaste for way games of that broad type lean so hard on complicated success, which I perceive as partial failure.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

So unexpected things never happen? The players do not come upon things that they didn't know about before? The people they meet are just blank robots with no motivations or goals?

Like I think I get what you actually mean, you let the players dictate the direction and generate things around that, right? But that still requires creating a lot of stuff that will have an enormous impact on how the campaign ultimately unfolds.

Right, so it is by no means the case that, in at least the stuff that has happened in 4e etc. in my D&D games, that I as GM am not a significant influence on what is happening. I think this would be true in a BW game, or a DW game as well. In all of these games the GM has a significant role in framing scenes. There are mechanical limits on GM authority in all of them though, and at least BW (and to a bit lesser extend DW) pass a lot of narrative influence onto the players. They express both intent and action, may actually introduce elements to the game world themselves, and certainly are expected to set out the basic elements to be used in play.

So, for example, in DW (not so familiar with BW personally) the players establish BONDS between the PCs. These can be anything, although some 'canned' ones are provided which different classes can use. This establishes some level of social dynamics in the party. You get actual XP for acting on and 'retiring' these bonds. You would then establish new ones (there's not a detailed process for that, but logically each bond should emerge from elements of play). PCs can also have background, and the description of the process for starting play, the 'first session', heavily emphasizes player participation in both world creation and defining the characters place in it. DW then tells the GM to place the characters in the thick of things, even going so far as to advise that they might start in the middle of a fight or other action sequence. This is intended to immediately and forcefully test and refine their initial concepts.

Admittedly, you could run a DW game in which the GM came up with pretty much all of this stuff (except bonds, those are owned by players explicitly) and not entirely invalidate the DW principles of play, though the players MUST be informed before the fact of the gist of what is established canon and the general 'concept' of the campaign (which probably means at least some understanding of the Campaign Front). For example if the GM's concept is 'Zombie Plague' then that would be communicated to the players as part of the decision to start a game, potentially along with a description of parameters of the nature of zombies and how they will initially manifest. If the players like this, then obviously they can simply generate their own agendas on this basis. If they don't, then the GM is advised to adapt (IE maybe the zombies seem less interesting than political intrigue, and so get adjusted down to being a mere 'adventure front', a menace that disappears after a couple sessions).

 

[prabe]

Many of the posts on the thread make me wish I could understand Blades In The Dark. I read it through a couple of times but it still makes me go, huh?

At least it didn't make you actively angry. I think I would have preferred being puzzled to that.

 

[Manbearcat]

I understand what you're saying but, well, to be really blunt, I think a discussion of this topic that does not engage with the psychology of perception when it comes to these things is largely useless. After all, at the end of the day, this is not any more a case of biased perception than what leads to a concern or not for a degree of agency in the first place. Some people care a great degree; some people really, really don't. And what things draw the line where that happens are almost entirely internal and how it feels to them. Otherwise, as I noted, any improvisation whatsoever would be unacceptable, which is largely impossible outside a very narrow kind of game.

So I think the concern for agency and where someone sees it being impaired is an almost entirely internal matter, and ignoring where people draw these lines leave any analysis as pointless.

I think you've misunderstood what I'm saying here. Let me clarify:

I'm not remotely saying (and I would never say because its absurd) that game designers should not engage in understanding and leveraging well-understood cognitive fundamentals of humanity at large. They 100 % have to. In fact, one of the primary things that these (PBtA, FitD, et al) games do (which I often champion) is that their reward cycles are entirely Skinner Theory motivated:

- xp for failure or xp for very specific things you want to reward so they animate players to pursue in play (pursuing thematic interests, making Action Rolls in Desperate Position in Blades, etc).

Things like this are absolutely insightful and brilliant game design.

And "say yes or roll the dice", "follow the players' lead", "do NOT have a solution in mind", "drive play toward conflict", "no plot points/don't play the story/there is no story/play to find out what happens" (Vincent Baker's axioms from Dogs in the Vineyard that informed Apocalypse World and all of its offshoots and, in my opinion, are the most influential indie design tenants there is) are ALL about broad human psychology. They're about how to invest agency and provoke action within the players thus handing over a huge chunk of the responsibility for the trajectory of play.

What I AM saying in my post above is the following:

(a) Human neurological diversity is extreme.

(b) Among that diversity are absolutely niche cognitive frameworks.

(c) I've been running these games and talking to people about them (thousands of people) for 16 years now (since I first ran Dogs in the Vineyard). This is the FIRST time I've encountered it. I've never encountered people saying "Success With Cost/Complication" feels indecipherable from "Failure." That doesn't mean its not legitimate. I'm sure they/you feel that way.

(d) But because its niche its not something that is inferable by designers or something that can be uncovered via research (a la Skinner's research/experiments/theory).

(e) So they aren't going to design around the uninferrable.

That is unless they're intentionally creating niche design for a very specific subset of people. And don't get me wrong here either. I'm not remotely against niche design. I'm enormously encouraging of it. That is one of the absolute best aspects of the indie design scene of the last 20 years (focused, intentful design for niche themes/premise/crowds).

And the last thing that I'm saying is that I don't know that all of this isn't a perception of "Success With Complications" as consistent with "Failure" is something that is actually native to all (or even much) of these people. I have to wonder (like SO much that happens with D&D) how much of this is cultural or cognitive conditioning due to nearly exclusive exposure to one play paradigm (and its action resolution mechanics) for a long period of time.

 

[pemerton]

I flatly reject this premise. "The PCs do something that makes it happen" can absolutely include "Someone rolls a Success-with-complication on a relevant check." I

I think you missed my phrase "in this context". The context was your post which was about an alternative to "someone rolls a Success-with-complication on a relevant check."

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Right, so it is by no means the case that, in at least the stuff that has happened in 4e etc. in my D&D games, that I as GM am not a significant influence on what is happening. I think this would be true in a BW game, or a DW game as well. In all of these games the GM has a significant role in framing scenes. There are mechanical limits on GM authority in all of them though, and at least BW (and to a bit lesser extend DW) pass a lot of narrative influence onto the players. They express both intent and action, may actually introduce elements to the game world themselves, and certainly are expected to set out the basic elements to be used in play.

So, for example, in DW (not so familiar with BW personally) the players establish BONDS between the PCs. These can be anything, although some 'canned' ones are provided which different classes can use. This establishes some level of social dynamics in the party. You get actual XP for acting on and 'retiring' these bonds. You would then establish new ones (there's not a detailed process for that, but logically each bond should emerge from elements of play). PCs can also have background, and the description of the process for starting play, the 'first session', heavily emphasizes player participation in both world creation and defining the characters place in it. DW then tells the GM to place the characters in the thick of things, even going so far as to advise that they might start in the middle of a fight or other action sequence. This is intended to immediately and forcefully test and refine their initial concepts.

Admittedly, you could run a DW game in which the GM came up with pretty much all of this stuff (except bonds, those are owned by players explicitly) and not entirely invalidate the DW principles of play, though the players MUST be informed before the fact of the gist of what is established canon and the general 'concept' of the campaign (which probably means at least some understanding of the Campaign Front). For example if the GM's concept is 'Zombie Plague' then that would be communicated to the players as part of the decision to start a game, potentially along with a description of parameters of the nature of zombies and how they will initially manifest. If the players like this, then obviously they can simply generate their own agendas on this basis. If they don't, then the GM is advised to adapt (IE maybe the zombies seem less interesting than political intrigue, and so get adjusted down to being a mere 'adventure front', a menace that disappears after a couple sessions).

What you describe here seems like a perfectly normal traditional RPG, except perhaps some things that are more codified in the rules. GM frames the scenes. Characters have backgrounds and motivations and relationships. The GM creates a campaign premise and a get's a buy in for that from the players. And of course players can come up with agendas for their character's in any game. Now I am still even more perplexed what your objection was with my claim that the GM has to make up and decide a lot of stuff, because nothing in this precludes that.

 

[chaochou]

?

 

[pemerton]

And the characters are not going to investigate any of those? They were not dropped there to possibly characters to that direction? That no one at the moment doesn't know exactly know where they lead doesn't change that they're plot hooks. In improvisational game the GM often drops plot hooks and only after the players decide to follow some of them they decide where exactly they lead. Same thing here.

<snip>

When the thing was determined really has nothing to do with point.

This makes no sense to me.

If I walk randomly through a town, drawing a map as I go to record where I've travelled, it makes no sense to say that I undertook a walk by following a map. Rather, I undertook a walk and in the process I created a map.

By fairly close analogy: if me and my Burning Wheel GM play some BW, and at the end of the session, or of the campaign, have a record of all that happened as a result of play, it doesn't follow that play was led by that record. That record was created out of the process of play.

"Plot hook" is not a synonym for "interesting thing in the fiction". No one disputes, as far as I know, that the GM has a job to present interesting things. That doesn't mean the GM has a job to present "hooks" that lead into "plots" that the GM is the sole or primary author of.

So you as a player used a meta power to summon a setting element you had invented into the existence and then had to roll whether that meta power actually works.

<snip>

I have not ever player Traveller, but it seems to me that the GM setting up difficulty is the same thing than the GM determining what is possible.

This makes no sense to me either. The BW mechanic and the Traveller mechanic are almost exactly the same:

In Classic Traveller: I'm looking for someone who will sell me illegal guns at a good price. Referee: OK, if you make a Streetwise check at <insert throw required> you find such a person.

In Burning Wheel: Is Evard's tower around here? GM: If you make a Great Masters-wise check at <insert number of successes required> then yes, it's around here.​

Before the action declaration, the existence of someone who will sell me illegal guns at a good price or of Evard's tower is a mere genre-appropriate possibility (we know it's genre-appropriate in Traveller because the game includes worlds with specified law levels and includes characters with abilities like Admin and Bribery and Streetwise; we know it's genre-appropriate in Burning Wheel because the game includes characters who are sorcerers and summoners and witches and augurs and they have abilities like Great Masters-wise.)

And if the action is successful, in both cases it is established that there is, in a concrete sense known to the character, a person here who will sell illegal guns at a good price or Evard's tower in this general vicinity.

The difference is on failure narration: Burning Wheel gives very clear guidelines and principles for the narration of failure; Traveller doesn't, leaving it all as an exercise for the GM to work out.

why is immersion not ruined by the players "to hit" roll determining what the Orc does or doesn't do with it's shield?

Who physically rolls the randomiser or what exact sort of randomiser is used doesn't really matter here. The player is not introducing any significant setting details with their action declaration.

This doesn't make sense to me either.

The Traveller or Burning Wheel action declarations could instead be handled in the following way:

(1) Player asks the question: can I find someone who will sell illegal guns for a good price? or Isn't Evard's tower around here?

(2) The GM makes a secret roll to determine whether or not there is such a gun seller, or such a tower.

(3) The player then makes a check to determine if his/her PC knows the answer.

(4) If the player's check succeeds, the GM tells her the answer.​

(This is in fact pretty close to how Classic Traveller handles a hunt for branches of the Psionics Institute - they are not handled just by application of the general Streetwise rules.)

That would not change the range of possible outcomes in play, though it would change some of the play dynamics - eg if the player rolls a success but the GM says you can't find it, the player knows that that is due to the GM's secret roll, and so knows her failure reflects knowledge on the part of her PC; whereas if the player rolls a failure and the GM says you can't find it, the player doesn't know what the GM's secret roll said.

That change in dynamics is much the same as what one gets in systems that don't determine the issue of shield-blockage by reading it off a single roll by the attacking character. Eg in RuneQuest we can tell whether the PC's miss is due to being blocked by the Orc's shield (if the player rolls a hit and the GM rolls a successful shield parry for the orc) or perhaps for some other reason (if the player fails the roll to hit).

So anyway, what doesn't make sense to me is that you assert that in one case it makes no difference to who rolls the randomiser, but in the other your complaint only makes sense if that does matter.

I also don't really follow your remark about significant setting details. If my PC is fighting an Orc, and kills it because it fails to block with its shield, that failure seems pretty significant! And conversely, had it blocked and therefore lived to try and kill me, the significance would have been driven home even more! Evard's tower is also significant, but I don't see why it is more significant. Both get their significance from the fact that the player cares about them as elements of the shared fiction.

A dangerous demon is loose; maybe fight it guys? Pretty standard RPG plot. And in a good game this would probably be connected to something else (i.e. to a more complicated plot) instead of being a mere random encounter.

Well, I personally think the BW game I play in is a good game. The demon seemed to be connected to Evard. After some pretty demanding exchanges, it fled the battle (Thurgon doesn't know much about demons, but conjectures that this may be due to the conditions or constraints of its summoning). It hasn't turned up again, so I don't know what that connection was. I don't know what the GM had or has in mind for it.

Burning Wheel doesn't use random encounters as a device, so that possibility doesn't need to be considered.

Modules by their nature must present things differently.

That's not really true.

Robin Laws has some sample adventures in his Narrator's Book for HeroWars. They are not presented anything like H3 Pyramid of Shadows. One difference is that they don't prescript what the players have their PCs do.

Greg Stafford has many Episodes in the Prince Valiant rulebook. They present situations - all standard knightly stuff - but likewise don't prescript what the players have their PCs do. The Episode Book for Prince Valiant, which is much more recent than Stafford's book, is interesting in this context because some of the Episodes it contains are similar to Stafford's in design (eg the Bone Laird episode that I mentioned upthread) and others are much closer to H3 and hence need a reasonable amount of work to be useful (eg Mark Rein*Hagen's episode). So it is a concrete illustration of the quite different ways that GM-side prep can be undertaken.