A Question Of Agency?

[Bedrockgames]

I was not aware that I said I was a scientist or assuming that I was the expert. That's your own assertion. Not mine. My assertion is that the coherence of your position remains contentious regardless of how coherent you believe it to be.

Then why bring up the experts and the shifting meaning of terms in relation to agency at all?

I have defended the coherence of my position. I am not going to engage you on that topic any further.

 

[Campbell]

I have no problem with two terms either. What I have a problem with is presenting a more obscure useage, as if it is the norm (or using it to equivocate), and with being told my useage is flat wrong or doesn't apply. This is also like the third or fourth thread where a term very common to sandbox play, feels like it has been co-opted by in order to make an argument like "Burning Wheel does it better". So I am trying to take things stated here in an even handed fashion, but it isn't easy because there is a history of discussion that has always gone a certain way

Please consider the possibility that nothing nefarious is going on. That people are using the best language they know to describe their perspectives. That when we value different things in the play of roleplaying games we might similar language in different ways in a manner that reflects what we value.

 

[Ovinomancer]

First, no, you can talk about the characters having agency while also understanding they are not real.

Sure, which is an incoherency -- you have tea and no tea at the same time. Only, this isn't the zen you think it is. It's why the concept of literary agency is incoherent -- it's an appearance of agency, not actual agency, just like fiction is an appearance of reality, not reality. If we're going to talk about actual agency, the kind wielded in play, then any discussion of literary agency is incoherent, because that applies to reifying non-existent things but we're talking about real agency wielded by real people.

You can say, for the purposes of agency, I am going to think of them as real. Which is fine. But that is also what i am doing with the setting and keep getting push back from your side (for the purposes of character agency, we are going to treat this setting like it is real).

Yes, because we're not treating any of it as real because we aren't using literary agency. We're talking about actual agency, by real players, over the fictional aspects of the game which have the reality of being expressed in the group. The events aren't real, but the expression is. And that's what we're saying we have agency over -- the expression. You're still trying to argue that the character has agency, which requires thinking of that character and setting as real to evaluate, but we are not.

No it isn't incoherent at all. Not if you understand what I am saying. I am trying to describe how I think the term came to be adopted by most RPGers. I agree with Frogreaver, it was a response to railroading, and the literary term agency was adopted, but obviously adapted to the roleplaying conversation. It wasn't an 1-1 import of the term, and I wasn't ever saying it was. And when I made that statement I was just trying to make sense of the split in use here.

Agency is not a literary term. Literary agency is a reificaiton of the fiction so that it can be evaluated in the lens of agency. This idea you're proposing that there's a difference in how the term is used is false -- it's used in the exact same manner. The only difference is that literary agency requires that reification. And, if that term is unfamiliar, reify means to treat an abstract concept as real and concrete. To evaluate a character's agency within a fictional setting and situation, we need to treat these things as real and then look to see if agency applies to the reified fiction. There's not different meanings to agency, there's different conceptual spaces -- one in real life and one where we treat unreal things as if they are real life.

One side is using agency to mean power in the game (including your power to narrative things and impact play through mechanics). The other is using it to mean your ability to freely act in the setting through your characters. I think the latter feels like it comes more from the literary useage (and my memory is that is where it was coming from when I started seeing it).

And this is a second incoherency -- these things are not opposed. There's no less free acting in the setting through your character in any actual play example given in this thread where the player is also using the power to either narrate a thing or impact play through mechanics. These are not competing.

 

[Bedrockgames]

You are already wrong. My assertion is that self belief is not the arbiter of coherency. As to where one goes from there, the solution seems obvious: debate the merits of the position itself. But simply declaring your position as being coherent isn't exactly a foolproof assertion.

Here is the real issue Aldarc: I don't take your judgement of coherency seriously enough to feel like it warrants more than a single post. It basically felt like more like an ad hom from you than an actual argument that I was being incoherent.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Please consider the possibility that nothing nefarious is going on. That people are using the best language they know to describe their perspectives. That when we value different things in the play of roleplaying games we might similar language in different ways in a manner that reflects what we value.

I have. And I think there are posters who are not doing this. But I have also been in enough of these threads to see the pattern and be wary (because I've been down the road of honestly answering questions only to discover they were traps for example). There are a handful of posters who do this, and it is known, and I am not going to pretend they aren't doing that. I think I've made clear though, I have not had this impression of you.

Also, wouldn't say nefarious. I would use a much weaker word than that. We are only talking about games, so the stakes are pretty low.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Sure, which is an incoherency -- you have tea and no tea at the same time

....

 

[Manbearcat]

There's a piece i want to respond to but can you elaborate more on what you mean by protagonist agency. Is it like the agency to place your character in drama filled positions?

Its the ability to (a) have an explicit Dramatic Need, (b) have play (macro) orbit around that Dramatic Need, and then (c) have your Tactical and Strategic decision-point menu and their attendant fallout (micro) pivot around your advocation for your Dramatic Need.

Dramatic Need is not a meta-concept. Its not "to have fun with friends" or "to tell a compelling story" or "to get xp, treasure/gold, and levels" or "to win."

Its literally to address and resolve a character premise like "my brother is my hero...I want to be just like him." So play would challenge these concepts. "Is he your hero...really?" "Do you actually want to be like him or just think you do?" "CAN you be like him?"

 

[Bedrockgames]

Sure, which is an incoherency -- you have tea and no tea at the same time. Only, this isn't the zen you think it is. It's why the concept of literary agency is incoherent -- it's an appearance of agency, not actual agency, just like fiction is an appearance of reality, not reality. If we're going to talk about actual agency, the kind wielded in play, then any discussion of literary agency is incoherent, because that applies to reifying non-existent things but we're talking about real agency wielded by real people.

Again, all you are trying to do here is insist we adopt your language. The term agency isn't incoherent at all as we are using it. It refers to a player's ability to move freely in the setting through their character. That is consistent and clear. You are playing word games to say it isn't

 

[Bedrockgames]

It's why the concept of literary agency is incoherent

I think this is a pretty contested assertion. But I will leave it to the literary professors to tackle as it isn't my area at all

 

[FrogReaver]

You are already wrong. My assertion is that self belief is not the arbiter of coherency. As to where one goes from there, the solution seems obvious: debate the merits of the position itself. But simply declaring your position as being coherent isn't exactly a foolproof assertion.

So I was wrong, it was actually Ovinomancer that stated his position was incoherent. Bedrock then said he thought it was coherent. Then you jumped in, but instead directing your comment toward both of them (since it does equally apply), you directed it entirely toward bedrock, which had the effect of coming across as an agreement with Ovinomancer since you weren't equally spending your time pointing out that he could be mistaken.

Moral of the story, be careful when you jump mid discussion to criticize one person with a comment that also equally applies to the other.