A Question Of Agency?

[FrogReaver]

No one is trying to stop you from having those preferences, and considering the hegemony this approach over gaming, it's not exactly being threatened here.

Whether intentional or not the very nature of the chosen language being advocated for to compare and contrast my playstyle with others is doing that very thing. It is diminishing my chosen style while exalting those other styles I dislike.

This seems needlessly hostile, FrogReaver. I don't see what's wrong with simply acknowledging that one prefers a more restricted or particularized form of player agency. Why "go to war" about this issue? It makes you sound like you are scared about the mere existence of other games or preferences, which is absolutely silly.

This is not an okay comment if you expect to have an actual discussion. Calling others hostile or scared or wanting to "go to war" is not okay.

 

[hawkeyefan]

That is fine. That is your taste. And it is good if you know what you like. But I can't stand this personally. I like for there to be details about the NPCs, that are real details, that I don't know, but the GM does, and that guide the NPCs behavior and actions. That to me feels like a much more real interaction with a living character. Obviously there shouldn't be a total cloud around these details. I should have ways of discerning some of them (like if the NPC is motivated by the death of his wife, and in conversation that naturally comes up). But I am fine not knowing things about an NPC that my character doesn't know.

My issue here is not that there may be hidden details of a NPC.....that's fine, in and of itself. My issue is when that is the case, but there is no means for me to learn those details, and then the knowledge of those details would be key to resolution. It's kind of a catch 22, right?

In my experience, a GM far too often holds fidelity to these pre-established facts as too high of a play priority.

Again, this is fair if it is your preference. But I will say one of the reasons I think it is so important for GMs to understand their NPCs motivations, relationships and desires, is because it reduces the likelihood of there being one magic thing to say to that character. Also NPCs shouldn't act like living obstacles, they should act like people. Real people rarely, except on forums like this , behave in a way that makes you feel you are smashing your head against the wall to get answers. Obviously this very much depends on the specifics surrounding the adventure and the interaction, but I never go into an encounter with NPCs thinking "they need to say this one thing". I try to be open minded when I run my NPCs and that open-mindedness is aided by knowing what my NPCs want.

Sure, that's all fine. Again, my dissatisfaction in this area is when this is all left up to the GM and I as a player cannot act on it without the GM basically deciding "okay, that seems like a reasonable approach". If actions such as Intimidation and Persuasion and Diplomacy and Bluffing are in play, then I'd like to be able to use one or all of those in some manner that I as a player can understand.

Because ultimately, the GM's judgment isn't something I can predict. And I know your view is that "well in real life you wouldn't be able to know what another person is thinking" and yes, that's true. But in real life, I'd likely be able to bring a lot more resources to bear other than what a GM tells me.

The player's understanding of the world relies on what the GM can share. That is, by nature, going to be incomplete. For me, rules and play processes can help bridge that gap.

part of the problem for me may be the language you are using. I don't see this as creating a work of fiction. And I don't think we are collectively telling a story. When I run a wuxia campaign, I am not trying to create a contained wuxia story, with the plot beats, pacing, and drama you expect. I am running a game where the players can do what they want and we don't know what will happen. I will introduce dramatic elements, but it is all character driven. I would call it more genre emulation.

I use the term fiction when talking about this because that's what the player and GM are collectively doing.....they're pretending. The world of the game is a fiction. I don't like to use terms like "the setting" or "the adventure" or "the story" because I feel those terms are actually much less clear. I'm not talking about the craft of storytelling or dramatic needs of story or any of that. The events of the game are collectively a fiction.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I use the term fiction when talking about this because that's what the player and GM are collectively doing.....they're pretending. The world of the game is a fiction. I don't like to use terms like "the setting" or "the adventure" or "the story" because I feel those terms are actually much less clear. I'm not talking about the craft of storytelling or dramatic needs of story or any of that. The events of the game are collectively a fiction.

The problem I have with fiction is people use it to equivocate all the time (it happens regularly in these enworld threads). So I just can't embrace that term in this conversation. It always seems to be used to promote one playstyle (personally I have nothing against the term itself, it is just in the contexts of these discussions)

 

[Bedrockgames]

My issue here is not that there may be hidden details of a NPC.....that's fine, in and of itself. My issue is when that is the case, but there is no means for me to learn those details, and then the knowledge of those details would be key to resolution. It's kind of a catch 22, right?

In my experience, a GM far too often holds fidelity to these pre-established facts as too high of a play priority.



Sure, that's all fine. Again, my dissatisfaction in this area is when this is all left up to the GM and I as a player cannot act on it without the GM basically deciding "okay, that seems like a reasonable approach". If actions such as Intimidation and Persuasion and Diplomacy and Bluffing are in play, then I'd like to be able to use one or all of those in some manner that I as a player can understand.

Because ultimately, the GM's judgment isn't something I can predict. And I know your view is that "well in real life you wouldn't be able to know what another person is thinking" and yes, that's true. But in real life, I'd likely be able to bring a lot more resources to bear other than what a GM tells me.

The player's understanding of the world relies on what the GM can share. That is, by nature, going to be incomplete. For me, rules and play processes can help bridge that gap.

This is all fine. But the point is we both want very different things and have much different expectations at that able. I think we have also probably have different attitudes towards games and allowing a person to act as a referee. That is all fine again. I don't begrudge your style. All I can do is mine has worked well for me (and I also have no problem venturing into other styles of play from time to time).

 

[hawkeyefan]

But for me, in a typical campaign, I rather enjoy the traditional line between players and GM (and I don't see it as being as limiting as you seem to find it).

It's not limiting in enjoyment. It's limiting in player agency. That's all my point is. Is it without player agency? No. Does it have less than a game that give players more ability to influence the direction and outcome of the fiction? Yes.

And I'll reiterate that is fine. What amount of agency one enjoys is a matter of preference. You seem to think others are making value judgments about agency beyond our preference, but I don't think so. I think it's more that you don't want to acknowledge that your style allows for less agency than other styles may.

Yet it far too often does.

The moment a player thinks the chance of success is better via dice than via roleplay, or the moment a player (or GM, for that matter) doesn't want to spend the time required for the roleplaying element to happen, either that replacement or a table argument is going to happen.

If those mechanics aren't present these issues never arise.

How can a player make such a comparison to knw the chance of success is better if they went with the dice or just continued to role play a scene? How is the "required time" for a scene determined? Why would a table argument occur?

The issues never arising is not at all true......if I was playing in that game, the very lack of established rules or processes would be an issue for me.

Yes it is, but I think you're asking for a degree of player knowledge that exceeds your character knowledge if you expect this info about someone you've never in-game met or heard of.

Same as reality: if you meet someone (say, your new boss) for the first time and don't know what makes that person tick there's always a chance you're going to rub that person the wrong way for no reason you can figure.

Both in the game and in reality, the puzzle-solving bit lies in getting to know the person.

No, it's not the same.

In real life, I don't need someone else to present the information about my new boss to me. There isn't some imperfect filter between me and the real world that I have to reference in order to be able to figure things out.

In real life, my new boss may have every reason to hate me. All logic may say "this guy is awful and should probably be fired"....and yet, maybe I can click with him in some unexpected way. Maybe, despite logic (GM fiat), my boss turns out to like me (a successful Charisma roll).

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Whether intentional or not the very nature of the chosen language being advocated for to compare and contrast my playstyle with others is doing that very thing. It is diminishing my chosen style while exalting those other styles I dislike.


This is not an okay comment if you expect to have an actual discussion. Calling others hostile or scared or wanting to "go to war" is not okay.

When you accuse people of redefining terminology and 'seizing control' of something you implicitly declare to be 'yours' in essence (how else can seize control be interpreted) and then call it 'inherently derogatory', you are literally accusing those people of violating some 'right' you have and telling them to shut up, in no uncertain terms.

You may not have INTENDED it that way. We're all just having a friendly conversation here, but it sure was a pretty easy reading.

While I won't sit here and pretend I don't think that some level of 'narrative tools' and greater player participation in a game at multiple levels is not an advance over early 70's vintage techniques, nobody is claiming you can't play how you want. Nobody is even claiming that those techniques aren't perfectly OK if you want to run the type of game they were designed to run. I won't sit here and be told however that I cannot say that other techniques won't work better for most other types of play simply because you feel sensitive about that. Frankly I am not at all interested in what other people actually do, except in terms of how we discuss our experiences and what that says about the question at hand. Nobody is calling whatever you play badwrongfun.

 

[FrogReaver]

I think the fact that a fair number of folks have visceral reactions to the social mechanics in games like Monsterhearts or Exalted Second Edition does not suggest that system does not matter. I think it suggests that it matters a phenomenal amount and they prefer their personal encultured systems.

I'd say it's because those mechanics are contradictory to their play ethos. Agency over their character is the fundamental aspect to many players play ethos. Social mechanical like the ones in those games you mentioned take away agency over their character and it's exactly what those mechanics are designed to do.

When you introduce someone to mechanics that don't align with their play ethos you are going to have visceral reactions toward those mechanics.

 

[Bedrockgames]

It's not limiting in enjoyment. It's limiting in player agency. That's all my point is. Is it without player agency? No. Does it have less than a game that give players more ability to influence the direction and outcome of the fiction? Yes.

We have covered this point numerous times

 

[FrogReaver]

And I'll reiterate that is fine. What amount of agency one enjoys is a matter of preference. You seem to think others are making value judgments about agency beyond our preference, but I don't think so. I think it's more that you don't want to acknowledge that your style allows for less agency than other styles may.

It's less about amount of agency and more about type of agency. Player agency has traditionally referred to player agency over a character. It's a relatively new invention that player agency has come to refer to player agency over the fiction.

I'm not saying one type of agency is actually better or worse than the other. But to talk about player agency without acknowledging this distinction or the fact that many forms of granting the players agency over the fiction actually take away a players agency over their character - well I don't see how this discussion will ever productively progress until those points are acknowledged and considered.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I'd say it's because those mechanics are contradictory to their play ethos. Agency over their character is the fundamental aspect to many players play ethos. Social mechanical like the ones in those games you mentioned take away agency over their character and it's exactly what those mechanics are designed to do.

When you introduce someone to mechanics that don't align with their play ethos you are going to have visceral reactions toward those mechanics.

Agreed, if you have simple mechanics, along the lines of 3.x or 5e's skill checks, which simply produce succeed/fail on the specific material action taken and don't consider intent, then social skills in that context replace players acting out the part of the character and basing success purely on what the GM thinks would happen in that situation with the results of a toss of dice based on some abstract statement of what the character's action is.

As I said to @Bedrockgames that is a presupposition. It is kind of a pretty classic one that historically stems from the evolution of early 'Gygaxian' play into 2e 'story teller' play. We have all long contended that 2e's model (and thus 3.x and 5e) are incoherent. They lead to these problems. Some people are OK with that, others would rather play in an older model, and some people have adopted newer techniques which focus on intent instead of just the resolution of the action itself.