A Question Of Agency?

[Campbell]

I am not going to defend the veracity of the big model, but there is tons of useful stuff in the essays. The discussion of kickers and bangs utterly changed the way I ran games back in the day. It's full throated defense of looking at roleplaying games as games at a time when we really needed it helped me to embrace D&D again. It was my experience in the indie spaces that cultivated an interest in OSR play.

More than that the actual Forge forum provided a wealth of useful actual play techniques in a number of spaces. Ron's threads about his RuneQuest and Champions games along with some Sorcerer Actual Play experience formed the basis of my present NPC constellation prep techniques. Keys and the way they made you think about your relationships with other characters was also fairly game changing for me personally.

My time at the Forge and Story Games got me to embrace games as games. While I do think Ron and others had some interesting things to say about Right To Dream the project was about other ways to play. I can see it not being useful to running those games, but I think at least understanding the ways other people play should be useful at least for discussion purposes.

 

[Campbell]

I think the distinction he was making in that article was a perfectly coherent one, but I definitely would have not called the two categories 'roleplaying games' and 'storytelling games'. Saying that something is not a real roleplaying game just is not an argument that will be perceived as neutral.

I think there is useful work and research on what immerses us. I think where Alexander lands on what corresponds to our experiences of being immersed and what does not is extremely flawed. I might see more value if the analysis would have pointed to the subjective nature of what is associative instead of making wild claims about particular games not providing an immersive experience.

 

[generic]

The food existed before my check. It's just a matter of if I was able to locate it.

The person existed before your check, it's just a matter of realizing they were there.

 

[FrogReaver]

The person existed before your check, it's just a matter of realizing they were there.

Not the same thing.

 

[generic]

Not the same thing.

Explain why.

 

[FrogReaver]

Explain why.

Food, game animals, etc all exist as part of the fictional world whether they are enumerated or not. They are part of the meidieval fantasy setting. If one goes looking for food then one goes to where the food/game are (the forest in this case), they then spend time searching for them, or actively go set up a hunting blind in an opportune location. Either way the person's skill impacts whether they can find and bring home food/game and whether they can do it in a timely manner.

I'll go out on a limb and say that a fictional friend also already exists in the setting even if he's not been enumerated. The difference is that having him show up at your location for a chance encounter doesn't involve you really doing anything. I mean there's not anything in the fiction you are actually doing that's causing that to happen. There is with foraging.

Now if it's not a chance encounter. Say you were sending letters or other communications and that caused your friend to come help you... well that's another matter entirely. As I said, I'm focused on the chance encounter aspect of "look for friends" - and the objection isn't about randomness there, it's about the lack of a coherent fictional action. I mean, if the mechanic dropped the pretense of being an in fiction action I wouldn't be making this objection to it. But it is and I've been assured that "looking for your friend" is a fictional action a character can take, even in the context of a chance friend encounter (despite no one having a clue what such an action actually looks like).

 

[generic]

Food, game animals, etc all exist as part of the fictional world whether they are enumerated or not. They are part of the meidieval fantasy setting. If one goes looking for food then one goes to where the food/game are (the forest in this case), they then spend time searching for them, or actively go set up a hunting blind in an opportune location. Either way the person's skill impacts whether they can find and bring home food/game and whether they can do it in a timely manner.

I'll go out on a limb and say that a fictional friend also already exists in the setting even if he's not been enumerated. The difference is that having him show up at your location for a chance encounter doesn't involve you really doing anything. I mean there's not anything in the fiction you are doing that's causing that to happen. There is with foraging.

Now if it's not a chance encounter. Say you were sending letters or other communications and that caused your friend to come help you... well that's another matter entirely. As I said, I'm focused on the chance encounter aspect of find your friend - and the objection isn't about randomness there, it's about the lack of a coherent fictional action. I mean, if the mechanical dropped the pretense of being an in fiction action I wouldn't be making this objection to it. But it is and I've been assured that "looking for your friend" is a fictional action a character can take, even in the context of a chance friend encounter.

I suppose it rests on how much you actually cling to a notion of integrity in your gaming. A check to find someone in a crowd, which, on a success, retroactively makes that person exist there, might not seem very realistic, but it's as plausible within the fiction as finding food from nowhere.

Let's say that the check retroactively makes you do something, in the past, like writing letters to said friend.

It's a very non-linear method of check resolution, but it's equally as valid in certain games as foraging.

 

[FrogReaver]

I suppose it rests on how much you actually cling to a notion of integrity in your gaming. A check to find someone in a crowd, which, on a success, retroactively makes that person exist there, might not seem very realistic, but it's as plausible within the fiction as finding food from nowhere.

Let's talk about a check to find someone in a crowd.

Is this structured as a character action?
Is that action something that is able to be fictionally described?
Is there plausibility that the person you were looking for was always there and the check was just to see if you would perceive him?

The answers to these kinds of questions are what makes foraging and certain instances of finding someone in a crowd and certain instances of looking for someone and finding them all be okay, while other instances like a chance encounter have different answers to these questions.

It's really not that hard to see the difference when you stop trying force all these things to be the same.

Let's say that the check retroactively makes you do something, in the past, like writing letters to said friend.

That would alleviate the current objection. There might be a different one to be had there.

It's a very non-linear method of check resolution, but it's equally as valid in certain games as foraging.

At least you are calling in non-linear. I'm not saying these aren't valid game mechanics - games have them so of course they are valid game mechanics. The question I'm asking is how do non-linear mechanics affect roleplay and agency? I think they can have an affect on it. Do you?

 

[FrogReaver]

Another thought:
Making a pie and making a casserole are mechanically the same process.
1. Gather ingredients
2. Follow recipe
3. Enjoy pie/casserole

"So how can you say you like pies but not casseroles - it's the same mechanical process!"

Because the mechanical process being the same, especially at the high level, doesn't mean everything about the processes are the same, and especially not the end results.

 

[Campbell]

Another thought:
Making a pie and making a casserole are mechanically the same process.
1. Gather ingredients
2. Follow recipe
3. Enjoy pie/casserole

"So how can you say you like pies but not casseroles - it's the same mechanical process!"

Because the mechanical process being the same, especially at the high level, doesn't mean everything about the processes are the same, and especially not the end results.

I never objected to the idea that there were substantial differences in process. I just disagreed as to what they were and how they manifest themselves. I think the players' part is almost identical, but the role the system and GM play is remarkably different.

In my estimation those differences have a strong impact on play.