A Question Of Agency?

[pemerton]

You keep replying to my posts and I continue to have trouble connecting your replies to anything I've said. I'm not saying the problem there is you, btw.

Edit: I think we may be working with some different definitions of what the diegetic frame is too. I'm using in it to refer to the "internal world created by the story that the characters themselves experience and encounter" which is to say mostly the same way the term is used in cinema, and also in most RPG theory I've read. Where are we getting our wires crossed here? Because both the orc and the door fit my definition.

I'm failing to make sense of how you're characterising the "frame" or the "world". The door is part of it. So is the Orc's death. I don't think cinema theory mandates that the world be defined in terms of things rather than events rather than states of affairs.

EDIT: My point being that the fiction - whether that is a composite of things and/or events and/or states of affairs and/or processes - has to be authored. Elements that make up the composite get introduced. In the context of a shared fiction that power will be distributed. It is - I assert - not possible to distinguish between the power to introduce a death of an Orc and the power to introduce discovery of a way through a wall in terms of authorial process. Reference to diegetic frames or internal worlds will not change that. (And the authorship obviously happens in the real world, not in the imagined world.)

The difference can only be explained in terms of subject matter/topic.

FURTHER EDIT: I agree that some people are happy to let the player be able to make decisions that oblige the whole table to accept that the Orc is dead, but want decisions that oblige the whole table to accept that the wall has a secret way through it to be under the purview of the GM.

My point is that those decisions aren't different in terms of "narrative power" or authorial/storytelling logic.

 

[Lanefan]

Don’t you think that player agency is at its highest when the players can direct the outcome through the game’s mechanics? When they know “if I attempt action X, I likely have these odds to succeed, and if I do, I will achieve Y”?

Only to the point that the same might apply in real life.

Amnd in real life there's countless examples where one simply doesn't know a) the odds of success, and-or b) what success or failure might in fact look like in the end. I prefer this be reflected in the game where it makes sense to do so, to indicate the character's similar lack of knowledge.

 

[Lanefan]

But railroading can happen in combat too. For example if you give an NPC plot immunity like the puppet maker in the Ravenloft module the Created had (where he literally can't die no matter what the Players do for plot reasons) that would be railroading in combat.

Not sure I 100% agree here; it depends on why the plot immunity is being given. If it's because the NPC can die but is supposed to die at some specific point or time later, then yes that's a railroad all day long. But if it's because the NPC is there "just because" and can't die ever, then I don't think it's railroading at all.

As an example: in an adventure I'm about to run there's a scene where the party (if they get there) enter a dining room and are served a "meal" by semi-ghostly wait staff who are simply going through the motions. There's no food. But should the PCs try to harm the wait staff they're wasting their time: each has infinite hit points and fully regenerates at the end of any round. They will never attack, and cannot be dispelled, turned, or otherwise prevented from going about their duties.

The point of them is that the PCs are supposed to not bother trying to kill them (and-or to waste some resources if they do) - it's just a somewhat-whimsical set-piece where the imaginary characters themselves get served an imaginary meal before carrying on with the adventure.

 

[Lanefan]

How do you seriously hold to this position when you yourself repeatedly use normative language when discussing your own long-ingrained habits of roleplaying? You represent your "side" as being a longstanding tradition

I don't think this is in question: the great majority of tables have played in a vaguely-similar style at any given time* all the way along, mostly because one system has for most of the time (late 2e-era and about half of the 4e-era being exceptions) greatly dominated the market. Thus yes, saying that a general style of play is/was normal for some time or other is valid.

* - though there's been some minor bends in the road that majority style has taken over the long run e.g. the difference between the majority of pre-Dragonlance 1e-era play and the majority of 2e-era play.

from which @pemerton and other advocates for player-facing gaming deviate, and yet you feel so aggrieved by our discussions on an online forum that you must defend your preferred gaming modality's honor from our "besmirchments"?!? I mean, really?

I'm not too concerned about besmirchments - hell, I can give as good as I take on that front if it comes to that!

But I do get frustrated by so often seeing corner case rules being pulled from older games and held up as examples of how the game was played overall; or niche games from some era or other (including now) being held up as an example of how the majority of tables played at that time. It seems very...well, lawyer-ly, for lack of a better term; and it grates.

 

[Lanefan]

When would you allow for a roll, set a DC or Target Number, see that it is a success per the dice, and then deny that success?

An example would be cases where the player's hoped-for success condition is impossible for reasons beyond the player's control or knowledge (in other words, exactly what pemerton doesn't like!) .

An example might be something as simple as trying to persuade (or maneuver) the Emperor to go for a walk in the sunny garden. Unknown to the characters (or players) the Emperor is in fact a Vampire thus going out in the sun would be a bad idea. But as DM I can't just deny the attempt without arousing undue out-of-character suspicion, so I let 'em roll (and secretly hope the roll fails, to get me off the hook!).

But let's say the roll succeeds handily. The Emperor still ain't going out in that garden, so I have to deny that success either by having the Emperor act in a manner that might give his secret away or by having him in-character try to deflect by granting the PCs something else they might like e.g. "Alas, I cannot walk with you this day but for such a kind and unexpected offer please accept my invitation to remain at court until the Highsun Ball at the end of next month". Then if the players/PCs get suspicious we can take it from there.

This is another reason I dislike social situations being decided mechanically: I'd rather rely on my own roleplaying ability to - as the Emperor - talk my way out of going for that walk, and if I mess it up and the players/PCs get suspicious, that means the Emperor messed it up too.

When has this come about in a game? Do you have any specific examples?

If I allowed more player-side rolling it would come up every time they rolled success on searching for a secret door in a place where none was to be found.

 

[Lanefan]

I tried to get @Lanefan to discuss this upthread and we had an exchange. But it wasn't particularly satisfactory to me (that is, to say, I decided by fiat that I was unmoved by his/her argument that he/she surely thought was robust and compelling)!

Fair enough; I've made some fiat-based decisions along the way in here as well.

And it's 'he', though I can see why there'd be confusion as I play - and thus reference here - so many female characters.

 

[Lanefan]

2) I'm specifically talking about "PCs asking for something hard and/or painful" which is pretty much every meaningful social conflict in a TTRPG. In those situations, the "hit rate" for Face PCs (and the players playing them) is absurd to the point of being more in line with "Down the Rabbit-hole Wonderland" than anything resembling fidelity to a reality featuring position-entrenched opposing parties.

Agreed. In my own defense the "hit rate" is generally quite low in my games if the PCs just talk to someone, but much higher if they act in that someone's interests and that someone finds out about it.

Try to talk the King into going into hiding to thwart an assassination attempt? Good luck with that, he's likely to run you out of his court.

Save the King by busting up said assassination attempt? You're his friend for life.

An old campaign of mine had, in a much more detailed and long-winded manner, pretty much just this sequence take place: the PCs learned there'd be an attempt against the King, but when they tried to warn him and get him to hide he told them - rather bluntly - to shove off before he threw them in jail. So they made arrangements to try and bust up the attempt when it occurred, and after many complications were ultimately successful. The King learned of this. Lavish rewards all round!

 

[Aldarc]

But then I think the question becomes what makes your logic preferable over a player’s?

So you go through your thought process for a NPC and you’ve calculated what you think is a plausible response. Let’s say the player does as well. They have an idea on what’s plausible.

What makes your idea somehow more plausible, or is it simply selected by default as the GM’s choice?

And either way, doesn’t this mean that the GM is steering things? “Faithfully” as it may be.

This is IMHO one of the most aggravating things as a player in such social encounters.

So I think that both economists and gamers greatly overestimate the degree to which human beings are rational actors.

I think if your aim is skilled play of the fiction not having meaningful social mechanisms makes a certain degree of sense. After all you want to reward a player's ability to build up evidence and make a compelling case. In my experience it's not a good model for the way like actual human beings behave. We are convinced to do many things we do not want to initially do. Seldom by a compelling argument. It also tends to make for fiction that resembles Star Trek far more than The Last Kingdom or Vikings.

I think if you want a game where characters have rich emotional lives that are somewhat removed from the rich emotional lives of their players (hence not LARP style drama) having some sort of mechanism to reinforce that is usually a good thing.

I suspect this attitude may come, in part, out of Gygaxian libertarianism. The Gygaxian approach to game agency, rational actors, "the invisible hand" of the GM, and meaningful decision-making that is prevalent in D&D's make-up seems to have vaguely libertarian underpinnings.* But being able to elucidate with any erudition the extent to which that hypothesis holds true is another matter.

* Possibly even accumulating gold as the currency for XP, randomly generated characters, etc.

 

[Lanefan]

Oh I think railroading is far harder to spot than nosepicking. I also think it’s a pretty poor comparison.

Railroading isn’t something that is actively discouraged. In fact, it is at times promoted as the standard by which the entire hobby functions.

Now, I think most of us here have enough experience to have a sense of what railroading is and how to avoid it. I expect the definition of what constitutes a railroad would be the big point of contention.

But if you think that having processes and rules in place to prevent railroading is a bad idea, or that doing so must in some other way handcuff a GM, then I don’t think we’ll agree.

Truth be told, anti-railroading rules would handcuff a GM; because sometimes a bit of railroading can be a good thing.

Like many other things, however, it needs to be used in great moderation and (usually) with a light touch*.

* - that said, sometimes the hamfisted approach can also work well: "You leave town intending to head for the coast; but about an hour out of town blip! your surroundings suddenly change: where before you were in open farmland you're now in a dark foreboding forest. What do you do?". Some of the best adventures I've ever played in have started this way.

Now, I know you’ll say “oh it’s about trust” but that’s not it. I may trust that the umpire has called each pitch exactly as he sees them. I just may not agree with his opinion.

FYI in the Majors they're going to robotic umpires either this season or next to get around just this problem.

 

[Bedrockgames]

So you go through your thought process for a NPC and you’ve calculated what you think is a plausible response. Let’s say the player does as well. They have an idea on what’s plausible.

What makes your idea somehow more plausible, or is it simply selected by default as the GM’s choice?

And either way, doesn’t this mean that the GM is steering things? “Faithfully” as it may be.

Both could be plausible. The point is simply the GM is supposed to be aiming for plausibility here. And because the GM is the one with the power to decide, that is where things go. If the player wants to run a campaign, I am more than happy to cede to their sense of the plausible. Ideally though, the GM is achieving the goal of plausibility and it isn't creating any issues. But this style does require that you make allowances for some differences and not fight over GM rulings (obviously if the GM does something quite boneheaded, it is worth discussing----but generally in groups i play with, we like to maintain flow of play, so any criticism would be reserved for after the game).

I don't think the GM is steering things. That term suggests the GM is guiding towards a particular outcome or storyline. But I am describing a GM who is much more reactive to what the PCs do, than a GM trying to guide things along a path or steer the course of the campaign.