A Question Of Agency?

[pemerton]

You really should read Burning Empires. It establishes just how little the GM is needed in the system - because the GM is little more than the head of the opposition side when you have 4-5 players. It even has GMPCs as GMPCs, and is otherwise the same character mechanics as BWR. (different lifepaths, different races, but the same methods.)

From Revised pp 75, 268:

It is the GM's role to set obstacles. By presenting obstacles where he sees fit - by calling for tests - he builds the mood of the game. For example, making even simple things difficult can give game an air of oppression and weight. This isn't a bad thing, and sometimes that's the mood necessary for conveying the situation. Setting obstacles low, or only asking for tests at moments of high drama, gives the game a "heroic" and grandiose feel.

The players have some role in setting this mood, but by far it is the GM's job to sculpt, pace and nudge the atmosphere in a certain direction. And not just through beautiful descriptions, but by using the game mechanics to reinforce those descriptions . . .

Also, the GM is in a unique position. He can see the big picture - what the players are doing, as well as what the opposition is up to and plans to do. His perspective grants the power to hold off on one action, while another player moves forward so that the two pieces intersect dramatically at the table. More than any other player, the GM controls the flow and pacing of the game. He has the power to begin and end scenes, to present challenges and instigate conflicts. . . .

Most important, the GM is responsible for introducing complications to the story and consequences to the players' choices. . . . Once play begins, as players choose their path, it is the Gm's job to meaningfully inject resonant ramifications into play.​

My own view and experience is that this account of the GM's role is accurate, and is part of the play of the game. Different methods would be needed to do without the GM - for instance, there'd have to be some sort of allocation or turn-and-turn about for framing situations. And it would have to be determined who gets to say "yes" to an action declaration.

 

[pemerton]

Someone either said or strongly implied that the characterization and personality of one's character, and things done as a result of that, are either not agency or not enough agency (I forget which); and either that same person or someone else ran with this and got to - the term used was 'play-acting', I think - isn't a valid part of the game, as that person defined 'game'.

Needless to say, this was - and is - being challenged.

In what RPG can that "play-acting" not take place?

It's a baseline.

It's not affected by "quantum ogres".

Do you really think it's relevant to what the OP was asking about?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

In what RPG can that "play-acting" not take place?

It's a baseline.

It's not affected by "quantum ogres".

Do you really think it's relevant to what the OP was asking about?

None of this has been relevant to what OP was asking about at least for fifty pages! Now you're worried about it?

 

[pemerton]

None of this has been relevant to what OP was asking about at least for fifty pages! Now you're worried about it?

What I've been posting has been relevant to the OP's post, except for the small number of posts about empiricist philosophy of knowledge.

I'm frankly surprised that you, @FrogReaver and @Lanefan assert that a campaign can be a total railroad and yet players have all the agency that is appropriate - ie the ability to characterise their PCs, say stuff in character, and declare actions.

That doesn't seem like a very useful way of approaching the idea of agency. And it seems to affirm and even encourage an approach to RPGing where the function of the GM and his/her "plot" is to provide a stage or setting for the players to perform their PCs in ways that are largely detached from that "plot".

In one other active thread (the "last session" thread) we see a GM complaining about the player in Curse of Strahd who won't just go up to the castle and fight Strahd even though everything points in that direction. In another active thread we have the OP of this thread asking about whether or not the GM should allow an Elf into his/her GoT-inspired campaign. To me, these all seem to be manifestations of the approach you are affirming.

It's a long way from the game Gygax created, from the Foreword of Moldvay Basic (which promises something quite different from what his system actually delivers, but that's a separate point for the moment), from Classic Traveller. One of the differences: it's very unclear what the role of mechanics even is in this sort of game!

 

[Crimson Longinus]

What I've been posting has been relevant to the OP's post, except for the small number of posts about empiricist philosophy of knowledge.

You started to push your pet systems from the get go and talk about mechanics that were not relevant to the game OP was using.

I'm frankly surprised that you, @FrogReaver and @Lanefan assert that a campaign can be a total railroad and yet players have all the agency that is appropriate - ie the ability to characterise their PCs, say stuff in character, and declare actions.

No one has said that, what are you even talking about?

 

[Aldarc]

You started to push your pet systems from the get go and talk about mechanics that were not relevant to the game OP was using.

As nearly everyone does in these forums. Most of the time, however, people don't usually care when people are pushing D&D as their pet system because D&D is often presumed as the norm on this forum. But this thread was also posted in TTRPGs General, where people may be expected to have a greater deal of experience, knowledge, or familiarity with games outside of those norms, so...

 

[Crimson Longinus]

As nearly everyone does in these forums. Most of the time, however, people don't usually care when people are pushing D&D as their pet system because D&D is often presumed as the norm on this forum. But this thread was also posted in TTRPGs General, where people may be expected to have a greater deal of experience, knowledge, or familiarity with games outside of those norms, so...

With D&D it often is not that people are pushing it, but that it is useful to use as an example as most people have at least some passing familiarity with it.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Work equally well for what? If the purpose was to have an action adventure with an interesting set of fun characters, then I'd argue that roleplaying an unresponsive mute who has no emotion does not work equally well than playing a character who has emotions and expresses them in an interesting manner and quite likely elicits responses from other characters in turn.

You've smuggled in what you like instead of looking at agency, here. Your argument here has nothing to do with the agency to choose a thing and everything to do with what you prefer.

Yes, different games place limits on agency in different ways we already know that. Like how some games with personality mechanics place limits on players agency to roleplay their character.

I have no idea what games you're talking about, here. You keep arguing against an imaginary construct because you have no experience with the games your imagining here, much less the ones you've assumed do this. Let's look at two instances from my games that "do this." In my 5e game, a character has a background with Mindflayers and Cranium Rats. Both have charm/dominate abilities, so in engaging the player's background in the game these effects have come into play, including directing a character to do specific actions and keep them hidden from their friends. This is an absolute imposition on the player's ability to roleplay their character. In my Blades game, the closest thing to this that has happened was when a character was indulging their vice (the way you reduce Stress) and ended up overindulging (this is a risk if you recover more Stress than you can hold). We agreed to roll to see what happened, and it the result was that the character was cut off from their vice purveyor -- they could no longer satisfy their vice with that purveyor, meaning they need to locate another. As this was an interesting result, I asked the player what their character did to get cut off (this is how the game directs the GM to do such things). Yes, the player had an required result, but their ability to describe that result was no less than the Charmed character in 5e. The main difference here is that the player initiated the risk in my Blades game -- the player understood that the indulge action could result in binding negative outcomes on their character and chose the action. The player in the 5e game had much less choice -- it was my choice as GM to initiate a Charm effect on the character, not the player. Both involve a mechanical check -- indulge roll versus a saving throw, and the outcomes are somewhat analogous if looked at as a binding resolution that the players have some leeway in how they are presented (although I'd argue the Blades player has more leeway, it's not enough to matter). So, agency-wise, both game have do the thing you're denouncing here, but in one it was initiated by the player and in the other it was initiated by the GM.

Or, in a simpler form, what your denouncing here is absolutely present in your games as well and they are always initiated when the GM wants. In the games you think you understand (but don't), the GM has very limited ability to initiate these things -- the player initiates and the GM only gets the say when the action fails. And, then, the results look very similar -- binding outcome but the player has leeway to roleplay with it.

OK...


What? This is a complete non sequitur.

I find it very strange to be told that a reference to real world agency is a non sequitur by the very poster that introduced it to the thread. Very strange.

At this point I don't even know what you think my claim is.

Well, this is somewhat true -- it dances all over the place. At the core, though, it appears that you want the ability to roleplay in-character to be attached strongly to agency, such that if it is present so is player agency. You further wish to refine this to say that agency is actually defined as being able to role play in-character and not have the game have any say in this role play.

The problems here are, as oft mentioned, that the game you champion doing this often violates these principles, but these are ignored because you're used to them. You accuse others of reinventing definitions while gleefully moving goalposts, strawmanning play you don't understand, and engaging in special pleading (by dint of ignoring). So, yeah, at any given moment it's a bit hard to tell exactly what you're arguing.

I'm not a mind reader.

This is avoiding the issue -- you clearly have no problem accusing me of nefarious motives ("NewSpeak," etc) when they suit you, but when asked how you reconcile those nefarious motives with the fact that I act in ways that belie them, you claim a lack of ability to read minds. It's a very odd ability you have to be so selective -- it works when you need to accuse others of bad faith, but fails you when called out.

The difference here is that I don't think you're acting in bad faith at all. I don't think this because I wasn't when I held similar opinions. It's literally a matter of experience.

 

[FrogReaver]

I believe this. To me it has constantly seemed that logical end point of the methods @pemerton is advocating is collective storytelling where the dice are used to determine who has the authority to tell the story at the moment. And that is a fine thing if that's what one wants to do. Now one doesn't need to take it that far, and that is a matter of preference, just like it is a matter of preference to not to take it even the point Pemerton is taking it.

To me story telling games imply agency over outcome. However, @pemerton's and others gaming philosophy does have a certain principle keeping the players from having agency over outcome - the Czege principle and it's why framing that principle as an absolute whereby one cannot even have a game without it is so important to their conversation. It's the one thing holding back their framework from being collective storytelling.

And that's why the concept of different types of agency matter, even though a lot of people do their darnest to fight against it and pretend there is no difference. People experience these differences and have different tastes regarding different categories, and trying to obfuscate this merely makes discussing these things impossible.

Yep. There's always a question of - "agency over what?"

Setting
Framing
Outcomes
Making checks
Character Actions
Character mental states
Character motivations
Etc.

 

[FrogReaver]

What I've been posting has been relevant to the OP's post, except for the small number of posts about empiricist philosophy of knowledge.

I'm frankly surprised that you, @FrogReaver and @Lanefan assert that a campaign can be a total railroad and yet players have all the agency that is appropriate - ie the ability to characterise their PCs, say stuff in character, and declare actions.

Not all the agency/types of agency important to me. But the point was that railroads are still not 0 agency games.