A Question Of Agency?

[Ovinomancer]

It is interacting how with that Blades examples all the subjective calls the GM must make are described to 'be dictated by the fiction' etc by the same people who think that in GM driven game players have no agency if the GM decides things, though of course in such game too the GMs decisions are equally dictated by the fiction present.

So, yeah, there's a pretty big difference here that you've papered over. In Blades, the fiction is "what has been established in play." Further, the GM is constrained by what the player wants. The "subjective" GM decisions present in the play example are really whether or not to call for a check and then how to enact consequences on the failures.

For whether of not to call a check, this is "subjective" (scare quotes intentional) but not arbitrary. It's subjective only in the fact that it's a judgement call, but one strongly guided by the game's rules and principles. @Manbearcat posted the relevant rules sections above. Here, the player was declaring an action that was important to the character -- it was an opportunity to make steps along the hard change in vices. The rules tell you this is a good point for a check because just saying "yes" robs the import from the action and turns into the GM waffling to make life easy on the characters. This is NOT what you are supposed to do in Blades -- you are supposed to be a firehose of adversity turned onto the characters. Why? Because you're a fan of the characters and want to see them shine! To look at a different example, we don't watch Die Hard to see John McClain relax comfortably at home, we watch because we're fans of seeing how he overcomes the avalanche of adversity turned upon him. This is the play that Blades is designed to develop -- there are very few calm moments in Blades.

The second "subjective" thing is the consequences leveled. And, here, yes, the GM is absolutely using their authority. There are walls to this though -- the "follow the fiction" restriction means that the consequences have to make sense within the fiction as already established in play. This is different from 5e in that there are no GM's notes, or established fiction that has yet to be presented in play. IE, there's no GM note that this painting is a soul-sucking painting anywhere. Instead, the Blades GM has to either play up an established part of the fiction or something that flows directly from the establish fiction, or make a "soft" move to introduce a new threat but can't pay it off, yet. The GM is further constrained in consequence by the nature of the action -- the consequence should flow obviously from the action taken. You Attune the ghost field? Ghostly problems. You Wreck something? It's very noisy, guards come to investigate or you accidentally damage or break it. Etc, etc. Actually, Wreck is a good example, because it allows my to point out that characters have special ways to affect these actions with their playbooks (think class). The Leech in my game chose a playbook option that allows xer (the character is non-binary, the player is a her) to Wreck quietly, so I can't level "it's very noisy" as a consequence when xe Wrecks things. Finally, the GM is constrained by the agreed to risk, or position, of the action. I can't level a Harm 3 on a Controlled action, and I can't level a Harm 1 on a Desperate action, for example. These positions require that the consequences be in line with the danger of the action.

So, yeah, there are judgement calls in Blades. However, these are pretty tightly constrained by the rules of the game. Compared to 5e, say, the GM in Blades has many, many fewer places they can exercise authority, and in every one of those cases that authority is constrained in ways that they are not in 5e. Some of these constraints are generated by the system, others are generated by the players. The effect of this is that the GM in Blades has much less agency than the GM in D&D. The players in Blades have more agency because they can do pretty much all of the things players in 5e can do, but now many of those same choices are binding on the GM. The constraints on players exercising control over their characters is the same as to D&D -- any cases where you might feel this agency is impinged (ad argumentum) I can point to similar cases in 5e, many of which are even more severe. And, again, in my Blades game, these impingements are things like being confronted with an angry manifestation and having to make a Resist check to not lock up or flee in fear. That's something that's extremely common in D&D. And, that's really the only point that's come up in my Blades game. I suppose that if you're up against some of the more occult horrors, other things might also happen -- a vampire might charm you on a fail, frex -- but this also isn't any different from D&D.

I know that the response to this will be to wave vigorously at the caricature of Monsterhearts, and to be fair, I haven't read the rules but I have read it's concept and I am familiar with the rules it's based on. I understand how it plays, and yes, the players do choose to have less agency to determine their character's emotional state when they choose to play the game, but this isn't comparable in general to 5e. The point of the game is to explore your character's untrustworthy feelings as they navigate adolescence as a monster. This is a fundamentally different focus of play, and the players are given additional tools to enact this that are missing in 5e. When we say, "you have less agency in this specific area I'm going to argue about," we're running straight into my argument that there are no "types" of player agency and that saying so obfuscates things. Here, you're trying to claim a victory by narrowing the discussion to a specific point you think you have a good case for (it's iffy, but let's say okay). However, when you do this, you're completely ignoring the other areas where agency is increase with these additional tools or the constraints placed on the GM, or... etc, etc. When looking at agency in a game, this is a bad evaluation. If you're saying what you like, then it's relevant -- but that's an argument about what you like, not an analysis of the game.

Also in the Blades example the player getting to choose the flavour of doodah they poke and the flavour of bad stuff being tangentially affected by that is seen as player being able to direct the fiction yet the same people see characters talking, having emotional reactions etc as inconsequential flavour.

I'm sorry, but the player decided the painting was potentially important to something that was very important to the character -- this isn't flavor. Further, the kind of consequence was also chosen by the character, and they chose to engage in an area they have little to no ability because it fit their character's agenda, personality, and drives. They really wanted to repair their relationship with the University and overcome their disgraceful exit from the University that was caused by his gambling problems (all player defined). So, the player wanted this opportunity to help his character's cause, and knew that a quick route would be to deliver occult items, even though that wasn't his character's forte. And, he could have waited for the Whisper to do it better (the Whisper is good at the occult), but felt his character wanted to keep this on the down low because he hadn't opened up to the Crew about his disgrace or gambling habits. This was entirely in-character motivation, very deep, and involved complex motivations. I didn't expound on this before because the example was to show how foreshadowing works, not an examination of why the players have chosen what they chose. But, this wasn't flavor or flavour, it was assigning importance to things because the character cared about them.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Thank you but it’s not necessary and wouldn’t suffice then anyways. This thread is about analysis of rpgs and rpg play. Examples and mechanics were cited and analysis made. I countered that Analysis with my own using the same mechanics and examples provided.

One doesn’t need to be intimately familiar with the whole game to counter analyze an example and mechanic listed by someone who is.

Sure, sure. Are you familiar with Bell's Theorem? It stipulates that if a hidden variable is local it is incompatible with quantum mechanics, and if it agrees with quantum mechanics, it cannot be local. Can you please analyze this in the context of quantum mechanics versus classical mechanics theory?

No? Do you need more context to make this make sense? Maybe more knowledge? Yes, I agree, it's ridiculous as a concept to state that you can analyze a whole with only one part. It's even more ridiculous when you're imagining some or all of that part as it relates to the whole and stating you can analyze this.

 

[Umbran]

The reason you and other look like complete morons

Mod Note:

You're done in this thread. Treat people better.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I just want to be clear... I'm not arguing that the steps of play didn't make logical sense. I'm asking whether the player in that moment had sufficient information to weigh what he would get from delivering the portrait to his friend vs. the consequences he would suffer for failing...to determine if it was magical I guess. That's my hang up. Yes a soul sucking painting, is perfectly reasonable in an immortals haunted mansion... but was there enough information given for the player to understand that was a possibility? Otherwise how is it any different form the D&D traps that were being disparaged earlier in this thread?

Well, I suspect that in BitD the value of things is either mostly narrative, and/or defined in milieu/genre terms. So like you can 'develop a contact' or an 'ally' or something like that and it is a resource that can be invoked as part of the mechanics of the game at a later time with some fiction to validate it. Like later the PC could go back to whomever he gives the painting to and ask for help on something, and that would translate into some kind of benefit in the next 'job'.

I mean, D&D has this very concrete 'value system' where EVERYTHING is worth 'X gold pieces'. A player can say "well, a 10 gp painting is not worth much, I won't risk anything to get it." OTOH if you don't know what the gp value is, then there's no way to evaluate the risk in D&D. There could be 'narrative value' to something, but that's entirely undefined and can't easily be related to other things.

Likewise consequences. Classic D&D has no real way to measure that. There could be a poison trap, that's save or die. If there's a monster, the danger posed is hard to know for sure, a 4+4 hit die Ogre is a lot less dangerous than a 4 hit die ghoul, unless you're an elf or a cleric... BitD runs on clocks to a great extent, so that also adds a lot of concrete scaling of costs, ticking a clock is pretty straightforward.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Yes but even here they are choosing to engage with it. In both situations there is a choice to engage. That is agency, especially if we are agreeing that types of agency are either irrelevant or don't exist.

But this is just setting goals and even in an adventure path, once the players have agreed to play it they can choose goals for their characters in line with said adventuring path. Again I'm stumped by what the actual difference is unless we are now positing that in a traditional AP the olayers are being forced to play and engage with things they don't want to... I don't think that's what is being argued.

So, I think that there's a question of just how flexible are D&D DMs? They need not have any flexibility really, you're the (hopefully benevolent) dictator of all your table! There's nothing saying you have to give players much freedom to do things, and if you just don't particularly have a taste for something a given player is trying to do, there are a dozen easy ways to quash it, and they're well-supported with rules right out of the book (rule 0 if nothing else).

Now, obviously there can be fairly basic 'unobtrusive' goals that players can easily adopt for their PCs that will probably 'just work'. "I want to collect weird looking daggers." or whatever. But I've found over the years that AP type play is going to be pretty much about the AP. There's a set sequence, or a small set of possible paths, that can be taken through it. Any significant player agenda is mostly going to be in the way, it isn't adding directly to the main thrust of the game, and thus tends to get minimized. That's just how these things work.

Part of the problem that I see here is that I say "A narrative type game system works like X." and then someone says "Well, I could do X in my D&D game too!" and that's TRUE, but will it actually happen that way? I can guarantee that in a Dungeon World game that the action will center on the PCs as major protagonists doing the things that are written in their alignment, bonds, and the statements made by the players when asked questions by the GM. It is 100% assured! Maybe the DM in a D&D game might maybe accommodate some element of plot to interact with something I wrote on my character sheet, maybe. Maybe not. Maybe I will have some idea what the plot is about, assuming their is one, and maybe it will just be some sort of thing hidden away in the DM's notebook and I never even figure out why something happened in game or what the consequences of any random action I take might be. Again, this is all guaranteed in a DW game to consistently put the characters at the center of the story and create a consistent narrative that the players can help to direct, along with deciding what sorts of 'stuff' go into it.

So, yeah, D&D can do a lot of stuff. But its not really a fair comparison to say "I could do this" in one game and "this IS what will happen" in this other game. They are worlds apart in fact.

 

[prabe]

Thank you but it’s not necessary and wouldn’t suffice then anyways. This thread is about analysis of rpgs and rpg play. Examples and mechanics were cited and analysis made. I countered that Analysis with my own using the same mechanics and examples provided.

One doesn’t need to be intimately familiar with the whole game to counter analyze an example and mechanic listed by someone who is.

I disagree. It might be possible to understand a game you read but don't play, or a game you play but don't read, but I don't believe it's possible to understand a game you neither read nor play.

EDIT: And I don't believe it is possible to analyze what you don't understand.

 

[FrogReaver]

I disagree. It might be possible to understand a game you read but don't play, or a game you play but don't read, but I don't believe it's possible to understand a game you neither read nor play.

EDIT: And I don't believe it is possible to analyze what you don't understand.

Why do I need to understand the whole game though?

why can’t I just understand the parts being presented by others?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

So, yeah, there's a pretty big difference here that you've papered over. In Blades, the fiction is "what has been established in play." Further, the GM is constrained by what the player wants. The "subjective" GM decisions present in the play example are really whether or not to call for a check and then how to enact consequences on the failures.

For whether of not to call a check, this is "subjective" (scare quotes intentional) but not arbitrary. It's subjective only in the fact that it's a judgement call, but one strongly guided by the game's rules and principles. @Manbearcat posted the relevant rules sections above. Here, the player was declaring an action that was important to the character -- it was an opportunity to make steps along the hard change in vices. The rules tell you this is a good point for a check because just saying "yes" robs the import from the action and turns into the GM waffling to make life easy on the characters. This is NOT what you are supposed to do in Blades -- you are supposed to be a firehose of adversity turned onto the characters. Why? Because you're a fan of the characters and want to see them shine! To look at a different example, we don't watch Die Hard to see John McClain relax comfortably at home, we watch because we're fans of seeing how he overcomes the avalanche of adversity turned upon him. This is the play that Blades is designed to develop -- there are very few calm moments in Blades.

The second "subjective" thing is the consequences leveled. And, here, yes, the GM is absolutely using their authority. There are walls to this though -- the "follow the fiction" restriction means that the consequences have to make sense within the fiction as already established in play. This is different from 5e in that there are no GM's notes, or established fiction that has yet to be presented in play. IE, there's no GM note that this painting is a soul-sucking painting anywhere. Instead, the Blades GM has to either play up an established part of the fiction or something that flows directly from the establish fiction, or make a "soft" move to introduce a new threat but can't pay it off, yet. The GM is further constrained in consequence by the nature of the action -- the consequence should flow obviously from the action taken. You Attune the ghost field? Ghostly problems. You Wreck something? It's very noisy, guards come to investigate or you accidentally damage or break it. Etc, etc. Actually, Wreck is a good example, because it allows my to point out that characters have special ways to affect these actions with their playbooks (think class). The Leech in my game chose a playbook option that allows xer (the character is non-binary, the player is a her) to Wreck quietly, so I can't level "it's very noisy" as a consequence when xe Wrecks things. Finally, the GM is constrained by the agreed to risk, or position, of the action. I can't level a Harm 3 on a Controlled action, and I can't level a Harm 1 on a Desperate action, for example. These positions require that the consequences be in line with the danger of the action.

So, yeah, there are judgement calls in Blades. However, these are pretty tightly constrained by the rules of the game. Compared to 5e, say, the GM in Blades has many, many fewer places they can exercise authority, and in every one of those cases that authority is constrained in ways that they are not in 5e. Some of these constraints are generated by the system, others are generated by the players. The effect of this is that the GM in Blades has much less agency than the GM in D&D. The players in Blades have more agency because they can do pretty much all of the things players in 5e can do, but now many of those same choices are binding on the GM. The constraints on players exercising control over their characters is the same as to D&D -- any cases where you might feel this agency is impinged (ad argumentum) I can point to similar cases in 5e, many of which are even more severe. And, again, in my Blades game, these impingements are things like being confronted with an angry manifestation and having to make a Resist check to not lock up or flee in fear. That's something that's extremely common in D&D. And, that's really the only point that's come up in my Blades game. I suppose that if you're up against some of the more occult horrors, other things might also happen -- a vampire might charm you on a fail, frex -- but this also isn't any different from D&D.

The GM here needs to make judgement calls in many of the same situations than in more traditional games, and yes, obviously in Blades they've less freedom and flexibility to do so. Whether this is a good or bad thing is a matter of opinion, I don't feel it is a good thing. And of course in any RPG the GM is in reality constrained by the fiction and the consequences of the actions must logically fit to what was established before. But I have no doubt that the GM in Blades has far less agency than in one D&D. This is the thing you seem to be obsesses about and to what I referred earlier with my post about 'relative agency'. Whether player has more agency, I am not so sure about. In a certain sense they have more narrative agency, they can poke anything to make it important. Then again, this is rather illusory. How much does it really matter whether you poked a painting with a magic skill and it ghostified it and it tried to life-drain you, or whether you poked a door with a physical skill and it spawned a guard that bonked you in the head? How meaningful this is depends on how much value you place on these different flavours. To me this sort of agency seems rather fake. There is no objective reality, there are no mysteries to uncover, there are no right or wrong answers. This is Quantum Ogre, the Game, except you get to influence the skin of the ogre.

I know that the response to this will be to wave vigorously at the caricature of Monsterhearts, and to be fair, I haven't read the rules but I have read it's concept and I am familiar with the rules it's based on. I understand how it plays, and yes, the players do choose to have less agency to determine their character's emotional state when they choose to play the game, but this isn't comparable in general to 5e.

Holy crap! After twenty pages I got through!

The point of the game is to explore your character's untrustworthy feelings as they navigate adolescence as a monster. This is a fundamentally different focus of play, and the players are given additional tools to enact this that are missing in 5e.

Obviously. It is a game with completely different purpose. And yes, the players accept those limitations in their agency when they choose to play that game, just like they accept different sort of limitations on their agency when they choose to play D&D.

When we say, "you have less agency in this specific area I'm going to argue about," we're running straight into my argument that there are no "types" of player agency and that saying so obfuscates things.

Yes. Your claim that there are no different types of agency obfuscates things.

Here, you're trying to claim a victory by narrowing the discussion to a specific point you think you have a good case for (it's iffy, but let's say okay). However, when you do this, you're completely ignoring the other areas where agency is increase with these additional tools or the constraints placed on the GM, or... etc, etc. When looking at agency in a game, this is a bad evaluation. If you're saying what you like, then it's relevant -- but that's an argument about what you like, not an analysis of the game.

Different games offer different types of agency in different quantities. Recognising this is really important for analysing them and even more important for recommending them. Trying to count some ultimate total agency is of questionable value. If a game offers a player little the sort of agency they care about but 'compensates' is by offering a lot of the type of agency they do not care about, it will result the player feeling that they do not have enough agency. And whether the players feel that they have enough agency is ultimately the only agency question that really matters; everything else is just trying to find the best way to get there.

I'm sorry, but the player decided the painting was potentially important to something that was very important to the character -- this isn't flavor. Further, the kind of consequence was also chosen by the character, and they chose to engage in an area they have little to no ability because it fit their character's agenda, personality, and drives. They really wanted to repair their relationship with the University and overcome their disgraceful exit from the University that was caused by his gambling problems (all player defined). So, the player wanted this opportunity to help his character's cause, and knew that a quick route would be to deliver occult items, even though that wasn't his character's forte. And, he could have waited for the Whisper to do it better (the Whisper is good at the occult), but felt his character wanted to keep this on the down low because he hadn't opened up to the Crew about his disgrace or gambling habits. This was entirely in-character motivation, very deep, and involved complex motivations. I didn't expound on this before because the example was to show how foreshadowing works, not an examination of why the players have chosen what they chose. But, this wasn't flavor or flavour, it was assigning importance to things because the character cared about them.

Right. Earlier a mocking example of character reminiscing their childhood as a motivation to walk towards the water was used. This is the same thing. And yes, I strongly feel that these sort of things matter, but they matter in any RPG. Drop your bizarre double standard.

 

[prabe]

Why do I need to understand the whole game though?

why can’t I just understand the parts being presented by others?

If you're reading a novel, can you understand Chapter Four without reading Chapters One, Two, and Three? And can you really analyze what the author is doing in Chapter Four if you haven't finished the novel?

(Sorry. English major. Starting with a comparison I'm comfortable with. Pick a different field and I'll try another comparison.)

 

[Ovinomancer]

I just want to be clear... I'm not arguing that the steps of play didn't make logical sense. I'm asking whether the player in that moment had sufficient information to weigh what he would get from delivering the portrait to his friend vs. the consequences he would suffer for failing...to determine if it was magical I guess. That's my hang up. Yes a soul sucking painting, is perfectly reasonable in an immortals haunted mansion... but was there enough information given for the player to understand that was a possibility? Otherwise how is it any different form the D&D traps that were being disparaged earlier in this thread?

I missed this, and can absolutely answer. Yes, the player was keenly aware that this action would further his action to switch vices from gambling (fighting) to obligation (University). To help, the nature of vices in Blades is a double edged sword -- they can be sources of comfort and sources of conflict. Vices can be extremely varied -- you might enjoy the finest fashions and so spend your time indulging in them. During downtime, a PC can indulge their vice and recover Stress. During scores, if the player chooses to let their vice be a complication, the can make XP. The GM has no authority to enforce vices -- they're player side only. In this case, to recap, the PC had overindulged and their vice and a complication was earned. I offered the player to choose how that went, and they chose to let a roll determine it. That came up "cut off from your vice purveyor." The character could no longer go to that purveyor to get their vice. Purveyors are important because they're the source of the vice and that relationship is important to the character. Here, the player was able to narrate how that cutting off happened, but this is flavor. Now the player has a choice -- they need to find a new vice purveyor. This is a challenge, but a pretty easy one -- the character could find a different gambling den to satisfy their vice which would cost some downtime actions and maybe some coin. However, the player decided this was "rock bottom" and it was time to find a healthier vice, so he elected to go through the more arduous process of changing their vice. We reviewed what that would take and set clocks (think progress tracks) for the necessary tasks.

So, in the score, when the player asked about the painting being something they could take to the University, it was absolutely in the context of these tasks and their clocks. I told the player that, sure, if the took this painting back it would be worth 2 wedges in their clock -- a lesser result -- or more if the check was really good. Why a lesser result? Because the action was controlled, and so the risk was low at that point. This was set, and the player was absolutely in the know about the value of the action.

What I find continuingly interesting is that there's this assumption that things are missing because it satisfies preconceptions. Usually, these things are holding the example in discussion to a different standard than the play being nominally defended (from what, I'm not sure). And, yet, these assumptions continually founder because the play they're trying to attack is robust and full and answers these questions easily. The issue here isn't that this play is better, but rather that you're asking the wrong questions because you fail to grasp the fundamental shift in play. You're charging headlong at the parts of this play that are the absolute strongest and are directed by the rules of play. It's a matter of not knowing what you're trying to critique, so your critique is badly grounded.

EDIT: I fixed my rapid typing problems of confusing their, they're, your, and you're. Probably still missed one, but there you go.