A Question Of Agency?

[Bedrockgames]

I think 'agency' where you have no guarantees and are always ASKING for something is at best a lesser sort of agency. In a game where the rules start with "rule 0, the GM can fiat anything." and then follows with a process where the GM is at least assumed, 'normally' as you put it, to narrate all facts about the world, that agency can be no more than 'bodily' in any real respect.

Yes, of course, the GM can even undermine the player's 'bodily agency' by making the choice of which door you open or which way you walk be utterly meaningless and lead to the same conclusion (and of course lesser degrees and sort of this). The fact that this sort of thing is almost always frowned upon and that the OP actually asked about it specifically in view of wanting to avoid it, says a lot. So I think all we have there is 'common ground' where we all have set an acceptable baseline (and I admit also that most of us have probably bent on this at times for whatever social reasons, or desire to experience certain games or whatever). So, yeah, there are 'degenerate states of little or no agency', but is there a point to even cataloging them, except as a gallery of shame? Not really.

I think you are painting in extremes here.

Degenerate is not a term I would adopt to describe play styles, art or any form of entertainment. For a host of reasons.

These sorts of things are not always frowned upon: they are prevalent gaming styles and many of them were dominant in different eras of the game. I remember the 90s, where the GM became the storyteller, and you regularly got GM advice to override the dice to make your story happen (and you say this at the tables in play). During 3E the standard way to make an adventure was around encounter levels, building a series of encounters that were supposed to happen. Not all tables played this way, but it seemed to be the default. And it was this style of play that led me to re-read the older books and look for alternatives until I found something suitable to my taste. Obviously it is easy to oversimplify the history. There is plenty of variety at any given time but these reflect he bulk of what I saw. But my point is these were and are common play styles. There is nothing wrong with them either if people are enjoying themselves. We have seen variations of some of these sentiments in threads here, where priority is given to pacing of encounters, or drama, and that might mean something like fudging a roll (even if it undermines a choice a player made about what attack to do). So I think I disagree with the assumptions in this post. Total freedom to explore the setting isn't the norm. And it probably shouldn't be in every campaign. Maximum freedom to explore means the players can completely reject an adventure the GM prepped and go in some other direction (that could mean exploring someplace else in search of adventure, or it could mean something like trying to build a salt empire in a nearby city------all kinds of possibilities). But most campaigns don't operate that way. Most at least assume there is an adventure the GM planned and all of the freedom we exercise will be within the context of that adventure (and there is nothing wrong with that). Many go further and have more narrow pathways within the adventure (like the encounter based adventures I mentioned). If you do adopt a more open style of play, where the players can do what they want in the setting, that isn't easy. It takes time to learn how to run a game that way. And it certainly isn't the norm (though I am glad to say it does seem to be growing in popularity). But it isn't the only way to play. It isn't the best way. But I would say it is a way that prizes agency. Now you can prize agency, and enjoy this style, but it doesn't mean those preferences will translate into wanting what some here are suggesting (a system or campaign where the players can shape the narrative). That is a different thing. There is nothing wrong with it. It isn't better or worse than the open style I just mentioned, but I don't think a player who enjoys what I am describing would see what you are talking about as giving them more agency.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think 'agency' where you have no guarantees and are always ASKING for something is at best a lesser sort of agency. In a game where the rules start with "rule 0, the GM can fiat anything." and then follows with a process where the GM is at least assumed, 'normally' as you put it, to narrate all facts about the world, that agency can be no more than 'bodily' in any real respect.

Well obviously I don't see it as a lesser form of agency, and obviously I would disagree with how you frame it. This is a very loaded description of the play style I and others are describing. I think there is just a fundamental difference in what we value in play here (and it doesn't mean those on my side like less freedom in play). Again, this is the problem with wrangling with a term like agency, which has moral connotations to it, in order to advance play style interests. If you want to argue that we should all be engaging in the stye of play where players have more control of the narrative, then I think you should argue for that (rather than doing so through the concept of agency)

 

[Lanefan]

Why do I want this stuff as GM? Because it lets me offload mental overhead that I don't want onto system and players

Interesting, in that both as GM and player I generally want as much of that mental overhead as possible to be left or put into the hands of the GM, so as to allow me (or the players, if I'm GM) to be better able to focus on playing/inhabiting their characters and imagining the situations and scenes they're in.

 

[pemerton]

If the hills are shown on the map then as both player and character I've no real excuse for not knowing they're there.

If that area hasn't been mapped (yet) it's on me as player to ask (not tell) the GM whether there's hills there; and if she throws the question back in my lap IMO as GM she's abdicated her responsibility over setting elements, which immediately starts me wondering what other responsibilities she's going to evade as the game/campaign goes on.

What you say here is an abdication of responsibility is what Gygax presents as the norm in his discussion of stronghold placement.

You're welcome, of course, to play a game that departs from Gygax's principles. But I don't know on what basis you are presenting that as some sort of moral imperative!

I mean, if I am playing Burning Wheel or Dungeon World and the GM unilaterally starts deciding all this stuff without asking questions/looking for suggestions (DW) and without calling for player input via Wises and similar checks (BW) then s/he is breaking the rules of the game and I am going to want to stop playing.

The topic of this thread is, which one involves more player agency? I think the answer is obvious.

It's independent of both you-as-player and you-as-character if Evard's tower is already noted on the map as being in location X.

It's the same as if I-as-real-person find myself in a strange city looking for, say for whatever reason, a Walmart. I've good reason to suspect there's one around here somewhere, but my act of looking for it doesn't materially change where it is: assuming half-decent perception on my part my act of looking for it is going to succeed solely on the basis of where I happen to be at the time in relation to its location.

It's not the same as that, because playing a game is not the same as wandering around a strange city.

In the fiction, the character is wandering around a place and looking for things. That doesn't make them appear: Evard built his tower some time in the past (relative to the action of my PC and his sidekick).

In the real world, it would be independent of me as a player if the GM makes the decision unilaterally. Obviously that would be a sign of me not having agency in respect of that matter. To me that would not be a good thing; hence that's why I tend not to play or GM games in that fashion.

 

[pemerton]

So do posters here believe that they have agency in the real life? Just asking to calibrate some agency standards.

Focusing on my experience as a RPG player (not GM): I believe I have agency when I play my BW game. I believe I didn't have agency in many of the 2nd ed AD&D games I played back in the day. I've played RM games with agency and also that were railroads. Likewise for BRP-type games. All the White Wolf, Cyberpunk and other 90s-era games I've played have been low-agency.

The only low-agency games I've played that were nevertheless fun for me were CoC one-shots. The fun one-shot Stormbringer, Elric or RQ games were designed a bit like the BW intro adventure The Sword: they had pre-gens designed to interact with the situation to create a moment of crunch, and then the players had agency in the resolution of that crisis.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Focusing on my experience as a RPG player (not GM): I believe I have agency when I play my BW game. I believe I didn't have agency in many of the 2nd ed AD&D games I played back in the day. I've played RM games with agency and also that were railroads. Likewise for BRP-type games. All the White Wolf, Cyberpunk and other 90s-era games I've played have been low-agency.

The only low-agency games I've played that were nevertheless fun for me were CoC one-shots. The fun one-shot Stormbringer, Elric or RQ games were designed a bit like the BW intro adventure The Sword: they had pre-gens designed to interact with the situation to create a moment of crunch, and then the players had agency in the resolution of that crisis.

That's not what I meant. I didn't mean the games you play, I meant real life you living your real life. How would you rate that level of agency?

 

[Lanefan]

Focusing on my experience as a RPG player (not GM): I believe I have agency when I play my BW game. I believe I didn't have agency in many of the 2nd ed AD&D games I played back in the day. I've played RM games with agency and also that were railroads. Likewise for BRP-type games. All the White Wolf, Cyberpunk and other 90s-era games I've played have been low-agency.

The only low-agency games I've played that were nevertheless fun for me were CoC one-shots. The fun one-shot Stormbringer, Elric or RQ games were designed a bit like the BW intro adventure The Sword: they had pre-gens designed to interact with the situation to create a moment of crunch, and then the players had agency in the resolution of that crisis.

I think @Crimson Longinus was asking about you-in-real-life-in-Australia pemerton rather than pemerton-as-RPG-player.

EDIT - insta-ninajed! Well played!

 

[pemerton]

In the last decade the systems I've primarily (with stray exceptions like Ten Candles, My Life With Master, Sorcerer, Beyond the Wall, Masks, Scum and Villainy, Monsterhearts, 5e, The One Ring, 13th Age) run are

For me that would be:

* Lots of 4e D&D;

* Plenty of Burning Wheel, Classic Traveller, Prince Valiant, MHRP/Cortex+ Heroic;

* Bits-and-pieces of Cthulhu Dark, Wuthering Heights, The Dying Earth and AD&D.

Much of it is documented on these boards as actual play reports.

In that time I've played (as opposed to GMed) 4e, Dungeon World and Burning Wheel.

Why do I want this stuff as GM? Because it lets me offload mental overhead that I don't want onto system and players (thereby investing them in the responsibility for the trajectory of play), therefore reducing unwanted stress and allowing me to be mentally fresh and focus my cognitive horsepower on optimizing my creativity and industry for the particular role of the GM in that game

This is the opportunity for me to post some ideas I was tossing around in my head while out running earlier this morning.

If you go to a casino and ask the players at the tables what's the difference between tossing the dice or spinning the wheel and the house just deciding the outcome?, I think the answer you get will be pretty clear! (Once people get over the weirdness of even asking the question.)

That's one reason for me to favour non-GM-decides systems.

Now another reason: there's an old Avalon Hill tile-based game I play with my kids, called Mystic Wood. It's not super-tight in its design (eg it's very possible for one player to get a run-away success through a bit of good luck), but it takes about half-an-hour to an hour to play and is light-hearted fun. Part of the fun is the surprise of finding out what you meet when a tile is turned over and the denizen card is drawn.

I don't think the game would become more fun if it was altered to introduce a referee to make the decisions about glade-and-denizen placement - either for the players or for the person who gets selected to be the referee.

This is another reason for me to favour non-GM-decides systems.

Non-GM-decides systems allow me as GM, as much as the players, to be surprised and excited by what happens. And they produce a shared fiction experience that is very different from just sharing my ideas with my friends.

 

[pemerton]

That's not what I meant. I didn't mean the games you play, I meant real life you living your real life. How would you rate that level of agency?

I don't get it. The me who plays games is the real life me. It's my major creative outlet outside of my work - and very different. from my work

In my work I exercise a high degree of intellectual agency, and there is certainly a significant degree of creativity, but it's very different from making up fictions. And there's also a lot of low-agency stuff (processing forms, marking students' work, etc).

 

[pemerton]

My point is that when (usually @pemerton but sometimes others) post words to the effect that the goal of the players is to make meaningful changes to the fiction, because players naturally are going to want those changes to be beneficial to their PCs it often comes across as saying the goal of the players is to make beneficial-to-them changes only.

An example: our goal is to rescue some people trapped in a mostly-collapsed mine. I'm playing the Hobbit. Can we all agree that "I try to squeeze through the remaining passage with two goals: one, to not bring the rest of it down and two, to tow a rope through by which supplies etc. can be got to those who are trapped." is a good and valid action declaration?

If yes, there's several possible outcomes one of which on failure is that I bring the rest of the passage down on myself. Yeah, I've made a material change to the fiction but in any way have I achieved a goal either meta or not? Hell no! I've made things worse for the trapped people, killed my character, and generally messed things up - even though technically I've met the meaningful-changes goal italicized above.

I don't know what your point is. As has come out over the past 10 or so pages of this thread, in the discussion of success-with-complications, different systems approach action resolution in different ways. There is nothing particularly striking or complicated about your example, at least that I can see.

In Dungeon World the action you describe sounds like Defy Danger based on DEX. From DW p 62,

✴On a 10+, you do what you set out to, the threat doesn’t come to bear. ✴On a 7–9, you stumble, hesitate, or flinch: the GM will offer you a worse outcome, hard bargain, or ugly choice.​

And of course the default applies for a 6-: "A 6 or lower is trouble" and "The GM says what happens" (p 19).

So in the context you describe, if the result is 10+ the halfling gets through as desired; if the result is 7 to 9 the GM will present some sort of trade off (the first thing I thought of is "a bit of passage looks like it's going to collapse; you can brace it, but you'll have to drop the rope"); if the result is 6 down the GM can go to town.

In Burning Wheel the action you describe would probably be a Speed check against an obstacle set by the GM to reflect the fictional circumstances; if the character has something like Tunnels-wise or Cave-ins-wise or Rescue-wise then they would be able to study the situation to get a sense of it (ie on a successful check adding a bonus die to their main check). If the check succeeds, the hobbit gets through with the rope; if the check fails, then the adverse consequences follow (which may be pre-established if the canonical process is being followed; or may have been left implicit if the GM's sense is that it's clear to everyone at the table). The lowest-hanging fruit I can see would be that the tunnel collapses and the hobbit avoids being crushed only by ending up trapped with those s/he was hoping to rescue.

In Prince Valiant this would play very similarly to BW (with Brawn being the relevant stat, boosted by Agility of the PC has that skill).

In 4e D&D the action would normally be part of a skill challenge to rescue the trapped people. The relevant skill looks like Acrobatics. If successful, the supply line is established and a successful rescue is one step closer. If failed, the GM can impose an immediate consequence (damage would be a default option here) as well as changing the fiction (if the damage is due to a cave-in that tells us how the fiction has changed!); and if the skill challenge fails altogether then it seems pretty bad for the trapped people.

In Cortex+ Heroic it's a bit more complicated and I won't try and spell it all out: but the short version is that the rescuees would be mechanically represented as a People Trapped in a Mostly-Collapsed Mine scene distinction; the action would be taken against the Doom Pool, and would have as its goal to either reduce/eliminate that distinction, or create a Lifeline to the Trapped people asset (there is a lot of plurality in the Cortex+ Heroic resolution framework, and so these details would have to be worked out by players and GM through further conversation); if the action were successful then the goal would be achieved in the fiction, with the concomitant mechanical effect; if the action failed then the GM would be entitled to spend a die from the Doom Pool to create an adverse consequence (eg a Trapped complication on the Hobbit, or physical stress from a cave-in, or maybe turning the Scene Distinction into something more serious like Trapped People Dying from Lack of Air, with an associated timer).

I have no real idea how the action declaration you describe would be resolved in AD&D.