A Question Of Agency?

[Fenris-77]

Finding your lost brother is a cool character drive, but it's going to be a huge pain in the butt in a lot of games if the player wants it to be front and center all the time. That drive is actually easier when cooperative setting building is going on because there's a chance to braid that idea right in, rather than trying to shoehorn it in because some swanky hipster wasn't happy with "blood and gold" as a primary character drive. If we assume that A) the player isn't going to be a suppurating sore about this and that B) the GM sees some reasonable way to fit it in, then it could be fine. My experience is heavily salted with players who want a drive like this in a game where the pitch is sailing across the uncharted ocean to explore new lands. Oh yeah, sure, your brother is going to hanging out under a palm tree, no sweat bro... why don't you just pencil in crippling agoraphobia as a flaw while you're at it? It's all about engaging in good faith on both sides.

 

[Campbell]

Finding your lost brother is a cool character drive, but it's going to be a huge pain in the butt in a lot of games if the player wants it to be front and center all the time. That drive is actually easier when cooperative setting building is going on because there's a chance to braid that idea right in, rather than trying to shoehorn it in because some swanky hipster wasn't happy with "blood and gold" as a primary character drive. If we assume that A) the player isn't going to be a suppurating sore about this and that B) the GM sees some reasonable way to fit it in, then it could be fine. My experience is heavily salted with players who want a drive like this in a game where the pitch is sailing across the uncharted ocean to explore new lands. Oh yeah, sure, your brother is going to hanging out under a palm tree, no sweat bro... why don't you just pencil in crippling agoraphobia as a flaw while you're at it? It's all about engaging in good faith on both sides.

I think generally you should be very careful about mixing up techniques that serve different play priorities. Creating characters you really care about with meaningful dramatic needs and placing them into a cruel sandbox is a recipe for emotional bleed in the wrong way in my experience.

 

[pemerton]

@Manbearcat, I'm starting to work through your epic posts. I won't respond to everything because of (i) time and/or (ii) nothing useful to say.

I want to clarify (for others but also myself) when, at the actual game machinery/interface level, Character and Setting are just conceptually discrete things...but not actually discrete things. When is it not possible to "pick up the Character Piece" without simultaneously "picking up the Setting Piece".

It appears that in these conversations we've had over the years that some believe that its possible for "on the Venn Diagram of the Vector/Piece/Medium" that (at the actual GAME LEVEL) a player can nearly always just exclusively pick up the Character Piece and make a move without picking up Situation or Setting pieces.

I'm confident that isn't true

On this we're agreed. I think I push this harder then you do. It's what my example of the defeated/dead Orc has been about: the player declares an action (I attack the Orc) and the outcome is a change in the fiction that goes beyond the character - ie now the Orc is dead.

Off the top of my head, the only exceptions I can think of are what I have called, upthread, exploration-type actions that don't produce any change in the fiction beyond perhaps the mental states of the PCs, but only prompt the GM to share information with the players (so that what was a private or secret or unilateral fiction becomes shared).

I would add that there is a classic flash-point here: the player declares the action wanting nothing more than information from the GM; but the GM adjudicates it in a way that also changes the fiction beyond the PCs' mental states. The best-known example is the look for traps action that the GM adjudicates as triggering the trap, but there can also be other forms of this - eg the player has the PC "hang out" (in a bar or whatever) to gain information/rumours and the GM responds with a substantive move (eg thugs turn up at the PCs' hotel room).

As far as "is it possible to not pick up the Character Game Piece (and again, this includes the here and now provisos) when you pick up the Situation or Setting Game Piece", I would say (a) its not terribly common and (b) some cases for it will be more tenuous than others.

Here are a few cases that I'm confident in.

* FitD Flashbacks always violate the now proviso and often violate the here proviso of Character. So those are always grabbing the Situation Game Piece and sometimes grabbing the Setting Game Piece (more on that below).

<snip further examples>

Thoughts (anyone)?

No dissent in relation to any of the snipped examples. I'm not fully persuaded by the [i[flashback[/i] example, though maybe I don't know the system well enough. I think that narrating something the character did in the past can still count as manipulating the character in the shared fiction.

I was going to add: suppose that via a flashback you can bring it about that your valet left the useful widge at such-and-such a place, that would be a clear example. But now I want to canvass the possibility that valets, gangs, henchmen etc are in a sense "extensions" of the character. If so, that also picks up some of the snipped examples (eg maybe Khan of Khans, maybe also though perhaps less so Lover in Every Port). Given the discussions in this thread about Circles etc I think this question of where the PC boundary lies can be quite interesting. In my Classic Traveller game, too, there are characters who are listed on the PC sheets, are - in D&D terms - something like henchmen, and who in play move very fluidly between PC status (players narrating what they do) and NPC status (me as GM narrating what they do).

I want to discretize Tactical and Strategic Agency and how this system/design actuates this in play. Yes, there will invariably be interdependence, but there are enough degrees of freedom at the design level that games like 4e D&D, Mouse Guard, and Dogs in the Vineyard (both predominantly Tactical games) are (a) meaningfully different than games that feature both (either in equilibrium like Blades in the Dark, elegant crawl games like Torchbearer, or wildly out of equilibrium at any given time like 1e/2e/3.x D&D)

I agree that (i) the tactical/strategic boundary is blurred and (ii) it is real. 4e has almost no strategic aspect to it - which is part of what makes it great!

Alright, a move in play to take apart. I think the Dungeon World Spout Lore move shares a lot in common with a Blades in the Dark Flashbacks, so I want to discuss that move.

My thought here is that you are treating GM is obliged to take suggestions seriously as a manifestation of player agency. I don't object to that; I just think it's worth calling out as a distinctive technique which (to the best of my knowledge) reaches its high point of realisation in PbtA games.

If I were to evaluate exactly what is happening here based on the matrix (no matter how fallible) I've devised, it would look like this:

THE IYLLIC D&D SANDBOX

* Protagonist Agency for players is either (a) non-existent or (b) its relatively diffuse.

<snip>

For these games (like the one BRG seems to be representing), diffuse Protagonist Agency (which means both in total and for any given unit of play, PC Protagonist Agency is diminished or non-existent because resolution of Setting Dramatic Need is the apex play priority) is "a feature, not a bug."

BLADES IN THE DARK SANDBOX

* Protagonist Agency is central to every unit of play and the entirety of play in total.

<snip>

The skirmish over, let's call it, "Haunted Painting Incident" is a perfect example of this realized in play. Its also a perfect example of a player "grabbing The Situation Piece (and possibly grabbing the Setting Piece depending upon how the action resolution mechanics/fiction resolves)" in a way that isn't present in the Classic D&D Sandbox (again, hence the "scandal" over this).

<snip>

This is a HUGE pivot point of this conversation. One side is saying that (to take this exact example) that the Blades Sandbox approach invests the Players with more Protagonist Agency. The other side is either (a) disputing this differential in Protagonist Agency (for reasons that aren't clear to me <snippage> OR (b) the other side is saying that a Sandbox (or play in general) that orbits entirely around Player Protagonist Agency is not desirable for them.

To me (a) is not defensible, but (b) is 100 % defensible.

Further, I'd say that another HUGE pivot point of this conversation is a player "Grabbing Situation Piece or Setting Piece".

One side says that a more prolific ability for player to grab those pieces means (a) more breadth (at least) of Tactical and/or Strategic Agency and (through this) (b) an amplification of ability to positively resolve Protagonist Agency (because you can advocate harder and better for your dramatic need...your dramatic need doesn't become more relevant because its at optimum relevance already...but your ability to have your advocation for it result in positive affirmation becomes more potent).

The other side (a) disagrees with this (one reason is because of a misappropriation and misapplication of The Czege Principle...which the intent is to substantiate the claim "Tactical or Strategic Agency is subordinated by the Schrodinger's Painting") or (b) doesn't feel this is desirable.

To me (again), (a) is not defensible, but (b) is 100 % defensible.

<snip

(b) in both of the above (x is not desirable) is precisely because it makes those people feel like it negatively impacts their play priority of experiencing this particular variety of Sandbox play. And if it does negatively impact their experience, that is 100 % defensible! But just say that!

All I would add to this is that the "profilicness" (maybe proliferation) of player agency over situation and setting is constrained, in part, through topic or subject-matter based constraints: like if the GM has already announced that a bit of the setting exists, then players can work on that; but otherwise they can't. And if the work the players do can be correlated pretty directly to work their characters do, then it's OK; but otherwise it's suspect.

The independence of Protagonism and Tactical and/or Strategic Agency is a real thing. And I'd like us to recognize it and discuss it.

<snip>

Take the following two game realities:

1) 5e Adventure Path:

<snip>

No Protagonist Agency for the Players + the apex priority of play is the Protagonist Agency of the metaplot/setting (because when that makes "contact with the enemy" - the Players' Tactical and/or Strategic Agency - one survives...one is subordinated).

2) My Life With Master (if you're not familiar, think of it as a game of Cthulu where (a) the game is actually about the PC's dramatic need and (b) instead of just characterizing your PC's descent into madness, you actually have an extremely small, but persistent, profile of Tactical and Strategic Agency that will actually affect the end state of the game).

* Players have total Protagonist Agency.

* The footprint of Players' Tactical and Strategic Agency is miniscule (particularly compared to every moment of 5e where GM Force isn't deployed)...BUT...it is never subverted by GM Force.

There are vast differences between (1) and (2) above. Then you get to Blades in the Dark and Torchbearer where all 3 are in extraordinary equilibrium and "play priority warfare (where someone has to exert Force)" never manifests. That is, as much as anything, why I think a matrix like this is helpful.

This is interesting. Using your matrix/schema, 4e D&D, Burning Wheel and Prince Valiant all tend to downplay strategic agency (ie the GM is in charge of scene-framing) in order to allow tactical agency and protagonist agency to co-exist. Of the three systems, BW puts the biggest pressure on this because it does have some long-term stuff (recovery of injury, recovery of resources, training) - unsurprisingly, you would probably say, this is the bit which in the Adventure Burner/Codex discussion has the highest degree of GM, sort it out in a fair way!

Prince Valiant is at completely the other end from BW (to the extent that the two systems probably illustrate two ends of a continuum within the high tactical, high protagonist, low strategic agency cluster of RPG designs) - even injury and healing, which is sacrosanct in so many RPGs, is almost entirely at the GM's discretion. And of course I've already described upthread how irrelevant map-and-key resolution of travel is in this system.

 

[pemerton]

Again, you can set up a concept, but in sandbox, you don't set up outcomes (and going on a series of adventures to find your lost brother, or simply finding your lost brother, are both outcomes).

Not finding one's brother because he's dead is clearly an outcome. And you are saying that in your style of sandbox the GM is free to set up that outcome.

 

[pemerton]

By your description of the PbtA approach, it sounds like the setting detail (the brother being alive or dead) is being baked into the player setting that as a goal for the relevant check.

Not really. That might be how it works in BW, but wouldn't have to be. In PbtA checks don't have "goals" - PbtA is not intent and task resolution in the way that (say) Burning Wheel or MHRP/Cortex+ Heroic is.

My point is, in a sandbox, framing this way, is setting up the outcome, and something you wouldn't do.

I don't understand what you mean by "framing it this way". What's the it, and what's the way. I simply suggested some failure narrations that would be fair game in PbtA-type resolution that might result in the brother not being found because he's dead. But that outcome wouldn't be "set up" because if the checks at issue succeeded than the GM would not be in a position to make those moves.

In most sandbox games a player saying he or she wants to look for their brother isn't going to be distilled into one roll or action.

Nor is it likely to be in PbtA play. It might be in Burning Wheel play, depending on the context.

What makes it exciting is it is an unknown on the player side. One possibility is he is dead. Another possibility is he is alive and waiting there to meet his brother again. Another is he is alive but filled with resentment towards his brother.

All these things are true in most RPGs, I would hope. They are certainly true in Burning Wheel - as you can see from the actual play account I've given.

There are all kinds of potential outcomes to "I go look for my long lost brother" in a sandbox. But as a player in that kind of campaign, I don't expect to shape the outcome.

<snip>

I really do think the brothers status as alive or dead, would be something that players would expect the GM to decide, and they wouldn't see that decision as infringing on their agency.

I would say that, in the context, "shaping" is a synonym for agency. It is making or doing something. I believe you that you would not expect this sort of agency when you play in your preferred sort of sandbox. I can equally tell you that the absence of such agency would be one reason for me not to play in, or GM, such a game.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

The issue is the action of the player is looking for the lost brother. Whether he succeeds at that or not, is a separate question from whether the brother is alive, living it up somewhere, or asleep in a gutter. Those are questions I would expect the GM to answer, independent of the PCs success in finding him. I would also expect the search to be the product of more than say a single roll of a skill. Again this is dependent on the campaign. I am talking about sandbox, living world adventures. In that style, it is entirely expected that the GM has purview over the brother's status. Going in search of him, and finding a grave somewhere, wouldn't be a problem for most people in this kind of game. On the hand, if I was playing in a savage worlds campaign, where we usually expect to have more input into where are characters are going, it might be a problem for the GM to decide the brother is dead if the party was expecting to go on a series of Kung Fu like adventures.

As I said before, I can't entirely judge "the brother is dead" in a vacuum. There are probably numerous ways this could come about which would be perfectly solid. I think @pemerton is expressing the same sentiment when he talks about hard and soft moves.

I WOULD say that, if the premise advanced by the player is that his PC is on a quest to save his brother, and the GM's response to that is to lead up to a scene where it has all just been worthless from day one, and the GM's response to that is "well, I set it up that way at the start, you don't have control over (fake) reality." My next response would probably be to ask who wants to take over GMing at this table...

Again, not drawing any conclusions, but flat out denial of the validity of a player's agenda simply on the basis of "I'm the DM and I get to decide." That is the DM being a dick, period.

 

[pemerton]

And that is fine: you can run a sandbox however you like. But there is also nothing wrong with running it the way I am taking about

there is nothing wrong wrong with this preference, but it isn’t the preference I bring to mort of my sandboxes

We aren't saying that cannot be done. All that's being said is that these techniques have consequences in addition to whatever pros you see in them.

All this normative language! Who is saying things are wrong? Where does the power come from for anyone to say what others can or can't do i RPGing?

Anyway, the main consequence I've seen pointed to is a burden on immersion/characterisation and a "hampering" of roleplaying. I know from lived experience that those consequences are mythical. Are there any others I've missed?

 

[pemerton]

In the Vampire game I am a player in my recently turned Vampire is still married and absolutely loves his wife. If she randomly decided to divorce him or something happened to her where as a player I had no chance to intervene I would check out of treating my character as a person.

Personally I tend not to have anything happen close family NPC's of the characters, and it's because some I know some players have a serious adverse reaction to it. But it's technically a possibility in true sandbox play. I view it as there are endless possibilities, why pick the one that may adversely affect the players investment in their character.

I think I quoted some of this actual play report upthread. I'll repost it here:

The characters continued on, and soon arrived at Auxol,. The GM narrated the estate still being worked, but looking somewhat run-down compared to Thrugon's memories of it. An old, bowed woman greeted us - Xanthippe, looking much more than her 61 years. She welcomed Thurgon back, but chided him for having been away. And asked him not to leave again. The GM was getting ready to force a Duel of Wits on the point - ie that Thurgon should not leave again - when I tried a different approach. I'd already made a point of Thurgon having his arms on clear display as he rode through the countryside and the estate; now he raised his mace and shield to the heavens, and called on the Lord of Battle to bring strength back to his mother so that Auxol might be restored to its former greatness. This was a prayer for a Minor Miracle, obstacle 5. Thurgon has Faith 5 and I burned his last point of Persona to take it to 6 dice (the significance of this being that, without 1 Persona, you can't stop the effect of a mortal wound should one be suffered). With 6s being open-ended (ie auto-rolls), the expected success rate is 3/5, so that's 3.6 successes there. And I had a Fate point to reroll one failure, for an overall expected 4-ish successes. Against an obstacle of 5.

As it turned out, I finished up with 7 successes. So a beam of light shot down from the sky, and Xanthippe straightened up and greeted Thurgon again, but this time with vigour and readiness to restore Auxol. The GM accepted my proposition that this played out Thurgon's Belief that Harm and infamy will befall Auxol no more! (earning a Persona point). His new Belief is Xanthippe and I will liberate Auxol. He picked up a second Persona point for Embodiment ("Your roleplay (a performance or a decision) captures the mood of the table and drives the story onward").

Turning back to Aramina, I decided that this made an impact on her too: up until now she had been cynical and slightly bitter, but now she was genuinely inspired and determined: instead of never meeting the gaze of a stranger, her Instinct is to look strangers in the eyes and Assess. And rather than I don't need Thurgon's pity, her Belief is Thurgon and I will liberate Auxol. This earned a Persona point for Mouldbreaker ("If a situation brings your Beliefs, Instincts and Traits into conflict with a decision your PC must make, you play out your inner turmoil as you dramatically play against a Belief in a believable and engaging manner").

This, for me, is the sort of thing I am looking for in RPGing.

Here are things that would make it suck: my character can't encounter Xanthippe; the GM just decides that Xanthippe joins Thurgon's cause. The GM just decides that Thurgon can't persuade Xanthippe either by word or by prayer. The GM objects to my narration of Aramina's response because he doesn't think it is what she would logically do.

The game system (Burning Wheel) has systems in place to mean that those suckitude-causing events can be avoided: Relationships as a component of PC build (Xanthippe is in Thurgon's list of relationships); Duel of Wits; Faith checks; player freedom to decide how a character under their control is affected (in terms of Beliefs and Instincts) by the events they experience.

Insofar as I am being told that these elements of BW are not compatible with a "true sandbox", this reinforces my lack of enthusiasm for "true sandbox" play.

 

[pemerton]

Eh, they show up in System A on their way to you in System B. Someone will see them drop out of hyperspace and start refueling. If that someone is sitting at jump radius in a scout (or one of the 100 ton Jump 6 courier ships), you could get news a good bit before they showed up. Worst case they'll have to drop down from 100 diameters (about 15 million km for Jupiter), scoop and process fuel (I forget the exact times required for all this, but it is certainly time-consuming) and then torch back out to jump distance again. I'd think you would get a solid day's warning, although there may be enemy scouts which show up sooner.

There are a few complications.

(1) The PCs are spread over two worlds Jump 3 apart, and in each case have multiple teams (on world and in orbit).

(2) The PCs are in the vicinity of a "galactic rift". The world closest to it is underdeveloped and not a source of information. The world jump-3 away from the rift is the one where they are getting intelligence, from the Navy Commander who has returned to her base there.

(3) The PCs crossed the rift via misjump when fleeing a naval armada and making a jump with a dodgy drive and (I think) unrefined fuel. That armada is the one looking for them (it's an anti-psionics thing).

(4) It's already been established that some news of their flight crossed the rift and reached worlds in their current neighbourhood some weeks ago, which was weeks (months? I'd need to check my notes) after their misjump.

(5) It's also been established that while the Commander was further riftward with the PCs, an X-Boat alerted her base to the pending arrival of the armada.

I need to plot out something that (i) is consistent with the above and (ii) makes a modicum of sense and (iii) doesn't require me to do too much more starmap work.

I would think that, generally speaking, military tactics would indicate SOME degree of caution. Fleet Brevet Admiral Von Kramnitz MIGHT not want to blind jump right on top of where he expects you are. He might even want to wait 2 weeks, send in a scout, get it back again, and THEN pick a spot. There's plenty of reasons to believe you might have some time to breath. Also, Traveler never tried to explain the possibilities of predicting exactly where someone jumped to, is it possible to determine exactly/approximately/not at all based on, say, the exact trajectory and such of the vessel that jumped? If not, then pursuit is more like hunting a needle in a haystack.

The issue of jump arrival point is not canvassed in any detail in any book I've read. I take the view that it can be somewhat random. It followI s - and have told the players as much - that when you jump you need to be stationary (unless happy to take the risk) because your arrival is somewhat random and it would be awkward not to be able to decelerate in time to avoid that asteroid or small moon or whatever . . .

My armada has only a limited jump distance and relies on a tanker to supply refined fuel which itself has only a limited jump distance, so before I get to the issue of where it arrives, I want to work out a plausible account of when that fits with what I've already established.

 

[innerdude]

The GM deciding something about a detail in the setting, even something related to your character, or what you might be interested in, isn't railroading. Railroading is when the choices you make in the setting are being thwarted, so you are railroaded towards some adventure or outcome the GM wants.

See, this is where I get confused, because this is a contradiction.

How does the GM unilaterally making this decision---the brother of Player X's character is already dead---not, by its very instantiation, thwart any and all possible choices Player X might make that relate to the player's desire to explore the relationship between the character and the character's brother?

Any and all choices Player X makes to explore that component of the fiction are now diversionary at best, and meaningless wastes of time at worst. It's indicative of a mindset and decision-making process by the GM to basically say, "There's no story here, stop looking for it."

@pemerton noted the exact same thing:

Not finding one's brother because he's dead is clearly an outcome. And you are saying that in your style of sandbox the GM is free to set up that outcome.

How is this not an instant negation of player agency with respect to protagonism? The player has clearly expressed a desire to explore a dramatic need / protagonistic drive, and the GM has unilaterally altered / created a fictional state in opposition to that expression.

This falls in line with @pemerton's post that probed the notion of "shared fiction." I liked his explanation that the descriptor of "shared" can only be applied to the fictional state in RPG play after it had some other descriptor. Until such point as it is brought forward to the group, the fiction exists as a "secret" or "unilateral" fiction controlled by some other participant (in nearly all cases the GM). If the fiction is not "shared," then it is necessarily something else.

From what I gather, for those in favor of "sandbox" play, secretly declaring the brother dead unilaterally is wholly acceptable, because the player still has the freedom to direct their character's actions such that the GM may eventually reveal this secret---thus changing this predetermined fictional descriptor from "unilateral" to "shared."

So even though this unilateral decision denies the player the capacity to meaningfully interact with their desired protagonistic goal---before the player declares a single action related to its pursuit---the GM has not meaningfully reduced "agency," because the player has the freedom to direct play in such a way that will eventually reveal this information.

Am I reading this right?