A Question Of Agency?

[Neonchameleon]

given the level of implication-of-badwrongfun as a continuous subtext in this thread? Probably not.

But, what the hell... most of the time, in my experience, success with complication is best handled by group suggestion rather than GM fiat, because it is too common, so more brains on it is better.

A key thing about success with complications is whether the game was designed around it. Apocalypse World and Blades in the Dark both are - and a common feature of both games that makes them different from D&D is that the GM never picks up the dice. Instead things happen round the PCs (no need to roll for NPC on NPC action). Also there are normally a list of suggested (abstract with the GM making them concrete) options for failure; a fail is always a hard move picked by the GM. Is it fiat if picking from a list and it only happens in response to a failed roll or the players being utter twits and "giving you a golden opportunity"?

 

[pemerton]

The thing about the flashback mechanic is that it is very heavily a genre convention and is about as appropriate to other genres as wizards getting to cast fireballs is appropriate to most genres. The only two and a half games I can think of with it (Leverage and Blades in the Dark with the half being some Fate settings) are very explicitly heist games. And if you watch almost any heist movie or series (such as Ocean's X or Leverage, the latter of which was licensed for the game) then you frequently see flashback scenes where the flashback explains what was really going on and how although our characters appear to be up the proverbial creek without a paddle instead that's just how they want to look to the bad guy.

The flashback mechanic is in some ways meta because it's doing things out of chronological order for the characters. But it's doing things in exactly the same order you'd see it if you watched a show or a movie of what the characters did. Is it authoring? In the same way that casting disintegrate (or even fly) to eliminate problems is, yes. But it's entirely expected for the genre and if I want to play a heist game that doesn't take ridiculous amounts of time in planning it's the best way to do it.

Flashbacks, in the sense of whole scenes recounting how a certain plan was made or a certain contingency anticipated, are - I agree - a heist movie thing.

But here is a weaker/looser sense of "flashback", in the sense of an appeal to past character experiences to explain something that occurs in the "present" of gameplay:

Gygax's DMG, p 20 This ability assumes that the language is, in fact, one which the thief has encountered sometime in the past. Ancient and strange languages (those you, as DM, have previously designated as such) are always totally unreadable. (Gygax's DMG, p 20)​

The move from this mechanic - where a failure seems potentially to imply something about what the PC doesn't or can't remember - to a Wises check in Burning Wheel - where a failure might have a similar implication, and where a failure success establishes something that the character does remember - is not a massive one.

There is the caveat about languages deemed by the GM as unreadable. It reminds me of the caveat on the Apocalypse World move open your brain (AW p 88):

When you open your brain to the world’s psychic maelstrom, roll+weird. On a hit, the MC will tell you something new and interesting about the current situation, and might ask you a question or two; answer them. On a 10+, the MC will give you good detail. On a 7–9, the MC will give you an impression. If you already know all there is to know, the MC will tell you that.​

On p 204, Vincent Baker adds the following commentary/advice: 'The “you already know all there is to know” clause is there, but I’ve never used it and I hope you never do too.' In other words, there is an issue here of GMing ethos/agenda. Gygax's advice is oriented towards the possibility that the GM will have "secrets" from the players, or puzzles that the players can't gain answers to by deploying ordinary abilities (eg an ancient and strange language will need magic rather than just a thief or assassin to read it). Whereas Baker's advice is oriented towards "playing to find out" and the idea of the fiction "snowballing" as the players declare their PCs' actions.

I think it's fairly obvious that Gygax's ethos is oriented towards the GM maintaining a high degree of agency in respect of the shared fiction, whereas Baker's ethos is oriented towards letting the players take much of the lead in this respect.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I disagree that speed has no moral value. As for measuring it objectively, I can legitimately say that for most of the journeys I take walking is faster than taking the plane and no amount of "but planes fly at 200mph" will make that incorrect.

Speed might be desireable, but it doesn't have the moral value that a concept like autonomy, agency or freedom has. When people talk about agency in literature, it is almost always in moral terms. When we talk about freedom or autonomy in society it is in moral terms.

And speed can definitely be measured objectively. Just because different modes of transportation have other factors to consider beyond speed alone, when deciding which is optimal for a particular journey, doesn't mean speed can't be objective, or that objective speed measurements are somehow meaningless. It is a lot harder though to objectively measure something like freedom in a game.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I think it's fairly obvious that Gygax's ethos is oriented towards the GM maintaining a high degree of agency in respect of the shared fiction, whereas Baker's ethos is oriented towards letting the players take much of the lead in this respect.

I'd add to this that it is not a zero sum game. In Apocalypse World every failed skill check is a hard move - which pulls the GM into tweaking things and controlling things much more than in D&D.

 

[Bedrockgames]

And as in this case we have all the people on side B showing how the player can have more agency with things like flashback mechanics or the effectiveness of things like the Fate approach or the GURPS approach or the D&D approach relating to playing a drunken character.

From side A we get back either attempts to understand, misrepresentations (and sometimes it's hard to tell the two apart), appeals to different values (such as "no metagaming") which are in and of themselves productive because they show a moral hierarchy, or frequently crickets.

No, both sides are making cases for their position. They are not doing a good job of persuading each other, but that doesn't mean both sides are not making arguments, some arguments are good, but not sound though. Asserting that you've demonstrated your position with examples, therefore people should agree, isn't how people work. I will say many of the arguments on your side are compelling. But many are also specious in my opinion (and I am sure the same goes for my side). But it is so easy in these discussions to have flawed premises, to equivocate (there has been a lot of this in my opinion) and to wrangle over highly subjective concepts. This is not the kind of discussion that can easily be distilled into cold logic and yield a result like "Game A produces maximum Z".

I don't mind having disagreements. I don't mind someone telling me they think I am wrong about something (I think like most people, I realize I can be wrong about stuff). I do mind some of the ways people on the other side have made their point (especially when it basically sounds like they are saying me, or others taking the position I am taking are stupid). People don't like being called idiots. Most of us have explained very clearly we don't play a lot of the games you do, and rely on your reports of those games to give our responses (and most of us have also declared an interest in trying such games; and we've pointed to some games in that orbit we've tried and liked).

The other issue is jargon. Your side of the debate uses a lot of jargon, that my side of the debate simply doesn't use and has very little understanding of. We might be familiar with them, because we've had to look them up following conversations like this one. But we haven't internalized them the way you do. So this jargon often produces misunderstandings, but it also sometimes comes across, and in some cases I do think this is what its purpose is, as just being a way to make the other side capitulate a point (you see this all the time in arguments where people use some specialized language, and it has an intimidating effect, or makes the speaker sound more informed and thoughtful than they really are).

I get that your side has a model of analysis it uses. That is find. But this model, and penchant for analysis, is routinely invoked to suggest you guys are saying something that is therefore objectively true and can't be disagreed with (and to disagree is to be illogical or non-analytical. No, we just don't live by the same model of understanding RPGs as you do. This is why, for example, I have never adopted some of the language you (like calling stuff that happens in the setting, 'the fiction').

 

[Neonchameleon]

Speed might be desireable, but it doesn't have the moral value that a concept like autonomy, agency or freedom has. When people talk about agency in literature, it is almost always in moral terms. When we talk about freedom or autonomy in society it is in moral terms.

I'm trying to avoid responding to this with a real world 2020 political example. So I'll respond with a real world 1860 example. One of the justifications behind slavery was freedom for people to do what they chose with their property. "Freedom" has never been an unquestioned good free from checks and balances.

And speed can definitely be measured objectively. Just because different modes of transportation have other factors to consider beyond speed alone, when deciding which is optimal for a particular journey, doesn't mean speed can't be objective, or that objective speed measurements are somehow meaningless. It is a lot harder though to objectively measure something like freedom in a game.

An absolute player freedom scale is impossible. But you can say A > B if A can do everything that B can and then some other things.

Plenty of text has been spent showing how in some of these games the players have more freedom than in a D&D sandbox. However so far as I can tell there is not one single sentence showing that players are freer in a D&D sandbox than they are in a game of Apocalypse World. If you think you can do this I'd be delighted to see how. Because literally nothing has been brought forward as a possibility here that I have seen. (I'll admit I've probably missed about 50 pages in this thread and if it was in there I apologise).

And on the latest post I don't think that there's been a lot more jargon brought by one side than the other. On the contrary I'd say that my side has a clear and detailed understanding of your side's games (and, for that matter, play and run some of them) and the same is not remotely true of your side. It's not one side bringing more jargon, it's a huge knowledge gap.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think it's fairly obvious that Gygax's ethos is oriented towards the GM maintaining a high degree of agency in respect of the shared fiction, whereas Baker's ethos is oriented towards letting the players take much of the lead in this respect.

Gygax certainly believed in giving the GM authority in the game as a referee. But I would say that isn't the same as agency. And I don't think Gygax was viewing it as something where the players lost agency just because the GM had said authority. It isn't a finite resource being divided. Again though, it depends on the view you take of agency. If you view agency as your ability to control the setting, then sure. But like others here, we are viewing agency as the freedom to explore the world and make meaningful choices in that world. Different points of view.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I'm trying to avoid responding to this with a real world 2020 political example. So I'll respond with a real world 1860 example. One of the justifications behind slavery was freedom for people to do what they chose with their property. "Freedom" has never been an unquestioned good free from checks and balances.

That is still moral language (and that it is a morally flawed argument because uses the idea of freedom to take freedom away from someone). But in your example both sides see freedom as good and are vying for it. Possibly the main reason we detest slavery is it is considered a near total loss of freedom.

Without getting into real world politics though, I think it is fair to say that freedom is something many people value as a concept and as an ideal, and that it is not a morally neutral idea.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Plenty of text has been spent showing how in some of these games the players have more freedom than in a D&D sandbox. However so far as I can tell there is not one single sentence showing that players are freer in a D&D sandbox than they are in a game of Apocalypse World. If you think you can do this I'd be delighted to see how. Because literally nothing has been brought forward as a possibility here that I have seen. (I'll admit I've probably missed about 50 pages in this thread and if it was in there I apologise).

No there are plenty of sentences on both sides showing more agency in each. We are just not persuading each other. Look, I am not going to sit here and discount all the posts on the other side. Some great posts have been made. Doesn't mean I agree with them, but I recognize a strong argument when I see it. But great posts have been made on this side as well. Plenty of people have explained why there is more freedom in a sandbox. You might not find those arguments persuasive because you take a different view, but those arguments have been made, and they have been made well.

 

[Bedrockgames]

.

And on the latest post I don't think that there's been a lot more jargon brought by one side than the other. On the contrary I'd say that my side has a clear and detailed understanding of your side's games (and, for that matter, play and run some of them) and the same is not remotely true of your side. It's not one side bringing more jargon, it's a huge knowledge gap.

On point one: no, your side has been using lots of jargon. Not everyone has. But there is a lot more jargon on your side of the debate by any measure. On the second point, I am not so sure. I think some people understand it. It is clear a number don't. It is also clear most don't have the same response to it, or come at it from a slightly different angle (or required an 'aha' moment to grasp it at some point). For example one poster suggested they liked the sandbox style, but then elaborated that they came to it for very different reasons (so it was clear we were coming to these from very different perspectives).