A Question Of Agency?

[FrogReaver]

No, you've missed the rhetorical flourish, here. It's specifically that the play can announce actions to try and find his brother -- that the GM can unilaterally decide the outcome of these actions is beside his point, he's just saying that they can try.

Again, why this is thought to be a mark of distinction is beyond me.

If you simply mean that the player in a sandbox has no input into the outcome of his action then we are in agreement. But if that's all you mean, why not just say it that way?

 

[Ovinomancer]

The lines of my post you copied were not related to agency but to DM permission. Why are you acting like they were about agency here?

Because these things are directly related.

If you simply mean that the player in a sandbox has no input into the outcome of his action then we are in agreement. But if that's all you mean, why not just say it that way?

Mostly because it confuses the heck out of me that you're making this argument, so I keep assuming you're making a different one. I should not do this, and accept that you're actually making the argument that the inability to have any say in how a thing is resolved but you can try anyway is somehow as much agency as being able to both try and have a say. My mind boggles, but you keep insisting.

 

[pemerton]

No, you've missed the rhetorical flourish, here. It's specifically that the play can announce actions to try and find his brother -- that the GM can unilaterally decide the outcome of these actions is beside his point, he's just saying that they can try.

Again, why this is thought to be a mark of distinction is beyond me.

In the sandbox the player was explicitly able to choose that he was looking for his brother. That didn't require DM approval. What you are presenting isn't a counterexample that players require DM permission do something in a sandbox. It's an example that players don't get to choose the outcomes of the things they do in a sandbox.

I don't understand. I didn't get to choose any outcome in my BW play. Nor did the GM. Just as in D&D combat, the outcome was resolved via a standard, dice-based action resolution process.

I don't understand why you keep denying this. In the BW game it was possible for me (as my PC) to find my brother, without the GM having to write that possibility into the fiction in advance. In your sandbox that is not possible. That is a real, concrete difference in what the player can have his/her PC do.
.

I'm not denying that there is not a real difference there. There is. Whatever gave you the impression I was denying that? Heck, no one has denied that.

The difference is that in one approach the possibility of success is gated behind a prior, unilateral, secret decision made by the GM about the fiction. And in the other it is not.

Again, I don't understand why you deny this.

 

[pemerton]

If you simply mean that the player in a sandbox has no input into the outcome of his action then we are in agreement.

I very much doubt that this is true of how you resolve attacks upon Orcs, attempts to avoid blasting fire, attempts to find secret doors that the GM has already noted on his/her map-and-key, and all the other traditional types of action that D&D play revolves around.

you are conflating the action with the successfulness of that action.

There is no such conflation. What is being contrasted is whether success is possible independent of a prior unilateral decision by the GM about the content of secretly-authored fiction.

 

[FrogReaver]

I very much doubt that this is true of how you resolve attacks upon Orcs, attempts to avoid blasting fire, attempts to find secret doors that the GM has already noted on his/her map-and-key, and all the other traditional types of action that D&D play revolves around.

When a player attacks an orc he has no input the outcome of that action.

 

[FrogReaver]

There is no such conflation. What is being contrasted is whether success is possible independent of a prior unilateral decision by the GM about the content of secretly-authored fiction.

And now you are trying to change subjects.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Definitions and philosophy aside let's talk specifics. In your mind what I or any other participant are able to do that my take doesn't offer? What agency they have?

For example under my approach,

Player A: "Hey wouldn't be cool to have a campaign where everybody is part of a temple?"
Me: "Yeah that sound cool. Everybody good with that"
Group: "Yeah that sound fun."
Me (to Player A): "Do you have any ideas on what kind of religion the temple is part of?"
Player A (and Group): Have a discussion about which religion I have in my setting would be fun to roleplay. Settles on the Goddess of Justice.
Me (to Group): "OK here the material I have currently on Delaquain. It a bit thin in these area especially on temple life. If you have any ideas this a good time pitch them."
Player A and C: "We have some idea, we will work on it over the week and get with the group to see if it works out."
Me and the Group: "Sounds good"

Following that we hash out those details and then the players generates characters and their background. I answer any questions they may have. I in turn will generate the specifics of life around the temple incorporating the details the player come up with along with my own ideas. Then after the backgrounds are done, I incorporate those details.

Then the next session we start playing and I describe the initial circumstance and we go from there using the process I described in earlier
posts on this thread. Incorporating feedback from the players and the group along the way.

The "product" of doing things this way is some background on the setting, background on main locale the temple, background on the religion, and each of the character background which will have elements involving temple and religion and elements that involve the larger setting.

Contrast this with an example of the other approaches you talk about. If it helps it doesn't have to involve character centered around a temple.

Well, essentially there might be a similar discussion. Dungeon World is the ready example, technically everything can be done during 'session 0', but more likely this discussion has already happened, some people want to start a game, an agreement is reached as to the basic parameters. Now, where the temple discussion would probably differ slightly is only in that, generally speaking, DW assumes a 'zero myth' kind of arrangement. So the GM might start asking questions, or be asked questions and turn them back on the players.
Player: "What kind of god is this a temple of?"
GM: "I don't know, what do you think?"
Player2: "Maybe the god of justice."
GM: "And what is the name of this god?"
Player: "Oh, lets name him Atur!"
...
This can go on for a while, but we don't want to flesh out too much all at once. Just enough so the players can describe a bit of backstory, a few bonds, describe their characters in setting terms, and then the GM will be able to frame the first scene (which is suggested, but not mandatorily, in the midst of some action).

Players will obviously, maybe somewhat before session 0, maybe during it, generate their characters and figure out what roles they play in the temple. The players will need to pick classes that fit into the theme, or at least explain how their choice relates to the theme, and in the process this will greatly help to define the direction that the game will go in (IE maybe one player makes The Barbarian, not an obvious temple dweller, but he asserts he came to seek justice for his father. Very well, we have one plot hook!).

Perhaps the GM now frames a scene in which the PCs struck out into the North Woods to find the bandits who supposedly killed the barbarian's father. They have found more than they bargained for! The game can be left on this cliff hanger.

Now the GM has to develop a 'front', which is some sort of ongoing danger/situation/circumstance which can threaten the PCs interests (the obvious one being the temple itself). This is an adventure front, it should be threatening, but something that can be concluded fairly soon. Perhaps in a couple of sessions it will be history. Maybe it is a bandit group lairing in the North Woods, that would be logical! The PCs manage to escape from them, now they may threaten the temple. That will start to engage us in the question of exactly what sort of place is this temple, is it located in a steading (civilized resting place)? That may have already been decided earlier, but if not then it will clearly loom as a question, since the town wall would obviously be a source of protection, if there is one.

The GM will also develop some degree of 'map with holes in it' that presumably indicates where the woods are, the temple, the steading (there should be one), maybe where the barbarians live, and it may have a couple other interesting locations. The GM might also start to work up another adventure front, and begin to outline the Campaign Front, based on more questions, feedback, and fiction established in the course of play in session 2. These don't need to be fleshed out entirely yet, perhaps they get names, maybe an omen and a danger?

DW is a 10 level game, experience is gained for a few things, mostly resolving bonds. It should run somewhere between 20 and 30 sessions, typically. It isn't generally meant to be a perpetual sort of campaign, but I guess that might happen. So you can make endpoints pretty concrete, the campaign front could be a demon or something like that, you kill it, you 'win', basically.

If I wasn't clear I get that. The issue I have is that traditional roleplaying have less agency when it comes to actual play. That the point I am disputing. To be clear, my contention both have it, it achieved in different ways. That the way the games you mentioned handle work better for a sizeable segment of our hobby. Enough that it now it own niche. That both are subject to the vagaries of small group dynamics. To points like "fairness", "impartiality", "sportsmanship", etc are equal important to both. Finally that system can't fix this.

But to resolve this debate we are at the point where we need to talk specifics. What people do in actual situations. Then we look at their behavior and see how it work with my thesis or yours.

Right. I think, theoretically, that 'agency' is kind of a slippery concept, and the real key is not so much "who gets more choices", but what do the different play processes produce. What is different about one sausage vs the other.

I disagree that my approach is the baseline. I get a lot of pushback on many of my points on sandbox play from traditional roleplayers. The baseline is the use of the tournament style adventure. It gotten better but the general expectation still appears to be that it is polite to stick to the adventure that the referee has chosen. Time and time again, I have to tell players do what your character would do, don't worry about what I have prepared. Sounds like I am not the only one that needs to get up to speed.


Is real life is limiting because we are bounded by the laws of physics? Yet people seemly achieve many things despite that.

I agree with you that 'AP' or at least 'module' play is pretty much the universal form of game nowadays. Only a very hard core group will play a long-running sandbox, and only a fraction of players really get enough of an interest to dig into things like narrative form game mechanics. I think Morris once stated in a thread I was in that only 2% of the people who read the news on EnWorld ever post. Most RPG players are pretty casual.

 

[FrogReaver]

Right. I think, theoretically, that 'agency' is kind of a slippery concept, and the real key is not so much "who gets more choices", but what do the different play processes produce. What is different about one sausage vs the other.

This 100%.

 

[pemerton]

When a player attacks an orc he has no input the outcome of that action.

That makes no sense at all: by choosing to attack the Orc, the player brings it about that the Orc might die from that attack. By choosing a weapon (or other attack mode) in games that care about such things, the player helps determine how likely the Orc's death is.

In 5e and some other versions of D&D, the player might choose for the attack to carry a special rider (eg by triggering a class ability, using a spell, activating a magical item, etc). Other systems (eg Rolemaster, HERO, I suspect GURPS, I believe modern versions of RQ) allow similar sorts of options.

More broadly, the whole point of "tactical agency" in relation to combat is to enable players to exercise influence over the outcome of the actions they declare. A well-known example in D&D play is the targeting of AOE spells.

And now you are trying to change subjects.

From what to what? You were talking about whether or not a player can have his/her PC do something. I am pointing out that in BW my PC has a chance of doing something that is independent of GM authoring of prior fiction. That's not a change of subject - that is the subject.

 

[pemerton]

I watched your play for a bit, and there's a strong aspect of the players asking the GM questions to determine what the GM thinks the situation is.

I also watched a couple of bits of @estar's video. The start seemed to have a lot of GM-led framing. And then the bit with the shooting of the person who was threatening (? I think, if I followed - it's around the 44 minute mark) the two women, seemed to be a GM-framed scene with GM-determined responses by the NPCs and no real player contribution that I could see beyond rolling for the fight as the GM appeared to expect.