A Question Of Agency?

[FrogReaver]

Well, the 'Lusting After the Queen' example for instance. The character's resolve to not act on the feeling would be tested if he came back to court. He's now going to be directly tempted. The GM would follow his principles, which probably includes bringing these choices to play. So, surely, Launcelot will run smack dab into Guenevere at some fairly fraught point. The player might have a choice to just give in, lets see what story that entails, or maybe he has to make an Honor check or something, a test of honor. If he passes, then he leaps back on his horse and rides off again, or goes to the king and confesses his dilemma, or something. If he fails, then his honor is stained, the Fellowship of the Round Table is broken in spirit, etc. I mean, this is a very 'cut and dried' genre, so its pretty easy to spell out what happens in these different cases. Most games will not be so clear cut. Even in this example Launcelot could then lie to the King, try to usurp the throne, etc. How this 'alternative story' would play out would be the meat of the game.

Your way the player alone has all the choices of how to play this. There's no test. There isn't an ACTUAL conflict, it is 'color'. It may be used to describe WHY you decided to overthrow Arthur, or whatever, but the logic is not salient to how the game is played. The action can be entirely described in game mechanical terms without ever referring to the character's mental state.

Why isn't being presented with the hot queen and either lusting or not lusting after her not considered a test?

 

[Aldarc]

This discussion has gotten super bizarre. People who are purportedly concerned about the player agency think that the player being able to decide the desires and motivations of their character is 'mere colour...' What is this I don't even...

It's not bizarre if you refrain from implicitly equivocating on what is meant by "player agency." It's only 'bizarre' if we use your restricted understanding of 'player agency' rather than the sense in which it is understood by these "purported people." But when you refuse to accept any definition of "agency" apart from your own, then it's little wonder that you can't process the actual discussion.

 

[prabe]

Why isn't being presented with the hot queen and either lusting or not lusting after her not considered a test?

How is it resolved? If it's entirely up to the player, I don't believe your interlocutors would call that a test.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Though you can hit cases where you have to decide at that point "Time to not run (or if everyone else is interested, play in) that campaign"; I suspect you'd have to play at a really surface level not to hit some elements of slavery in game set in even a near-expie of ancient Rome for example (and that'd probably come across as whitewashing it, sooner or later).

Yeah, well, if you were to depict any milieu based on Medieval Europe in anything like a realistic fashion you'd have to also depict an almost complete lack of gender equality too, amongst other things. The fact is, we don't do that, we just project our modern values back onto the economic and technological conditions of the past and then we can act like modern people with modern problems, but in this pretend world.

This is a whole other swamp that arises when people start talking about verisimilitude and whatnot, but in the current context it is irrelevant. Suffice it to say that practical play pretty much necessitates this in order to comport ourselves in a way which we find ethically acceptable (speaking for myself at least).

 

[FrogReaver]

How is it resolved? If it's entirely up to the player, I don't believe your interlocutors would call that a test.

Let's say it's entirely up to the player. Why wouldn't that be called a test?

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

How is it resolved? If it's entirely up to the player, I don't believe your interlocutors would call that a test.

Right. Lets say that at the very least it is not considered ideal game play/design practice to both propose a test and adjudicate its solution yourself. This is the nut of the Czege Principle. It also plainly is at odds with some of the ethos of Gygaxian play (you wouldn't have the players design the traps in a dungeon for instance).

 

[prabe]

Why?

I'm sure someone else can (and likely will) say that if the player alone is deciding how to resolve [thing] then there's nothing keeping the player from choosing a preferred outcome. I think they don't consider it a test if there's not a chance of an undesired outcome.

 

[FrogReaver]

Right. Lets say that at the very least it is not considered ideal game play/design practice to both propose a test and adjudicate its solution yourself. This is the nut of the Czege Principle. It also plainly is at odds with some of the ethos of Gygaxian play (you wouldn't have the players design the traps in a dungeon for instance).

Well the player didn't propose the test in this case. The DM did by introducing the hot queen. But I think you mean, it's not ideal for a player to choose whether the test is passed or failed regardless of who introduced it.

I'm not convinced that the Czege principle it is universally true - especially not in relation to roleplaying. So outside citing that principle is there any other reason not to have the player decide whether his character lusts after the queen?

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I'm sure someone else can (and likely will) say that if the player alone is deciding how to resolve [thing] then there's nothing keeping the player from choosing a preferred outcome. I think they don't consider it a test if there's not a chance of an undesired outcome.

It certainly doesn't seem like very engaging play. It is less like a game and more like play-acting. That was why I called it 'color' and not salient to the play of the game. Again, I think it is fine RP and not to be disparaged on that basis. I would like to point out that something like Burning Wheel wouldn't inhibit this type of play either. Launcelot could have a "Lusts after the Queen" belief, that could be established at the start of play by the player.

Of course, in BW such things WILL be tested, that's part of the expected flow of the game, so even if the player doesn't do something on that basis, the GM will surely act on it soon enough! I guess even in that game you could simply have an undocumented 'urge' that your character acts on, it isn't like its against the rules. It would simply be less likely that a scene would arise where it would become possible to act on.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Well the player didn't propose the test in this case. The DM did by introducing the hot queen. But I think you mean, it's not ideal for a player to choose whether the test is passed or failed regardless of who introduced it.

I'm not convinced that the Czege principle it is universally true - especially not in relation to roleplaying. So outside citing that principle is there any other reason not to have the player decide whether his character lusts after the queen?

I noted that it is basically the same as the Gygaxian principle that the players don't devise the 'traps in the dungeon'. I would say this IS the Czege Principle, but clearly Gygax understood this concept long before Czege came along. I think it is in fact antecedent to D&D, the reason the referee existed in Chainmail was to dissociate the enforcement of the conditions of play from the interests of the players. Boardgames do this by simply having a complete set of rules that govern all game actions.