A Question Of Agency?

[Fenris-77]

And this is good in my opinion. And I would agree it is a spectrum. I was mainly talking in terms of what people think of as the iconic sandbox, and the iconic OSR campaign. But my style is probably best described as OSR adjacent, because I don't typically use D&D based rules systems. The element that is most important to me in a sandbox, is the living adventure aspect. And my understanding of that comes from Ravenloft (and particularly Feast of Goblyns) so my views are already a bit unorthodox here. I definitely wouldn't hold up my campaigns as reflecting the standard OSR sandbox. But I do draw a great deal from that sector of the hobby

Seems like we're on the same page. What I'm looking for in a discussion of agency is to look at that spectrum, set next to other play styles, and all of them run using a variety of systems, and see where all those combinations fall on the agency spectrum and to discuss why certain trade offs, say of agency vs constraint, are important to various genres and also to different types of player, or table expectations.

 

[Campbell]

The point is, Sandboxes are not just a menu of adventures to select from. And the reason is the living world/world in motion component. The players actions, particularly with NPCs and factions, but with other elements of the setting, generate adventure content that the GM never considered, thought of, or would have come up with. This is very important. And it is something that doesn't happen in a lot of games. The players are constrained by being locked inside their character. They don't have power over the setting. But like a person in real life, they are free to go about and do what they want within those constraints (and those are constraints but I think constraints that are meant to approximate real world ones, a pretty reasonable boundaries for agency)

I think it is entirely reasonable to have a preference for games where players have no more agency than they have in real life over how things go. I do not think it is reasonable to constrain discussion only to that band of agency and treat agency that extends beyond your personal tolerance as not actually being agency. It makes damn near impossible to have a broader discussion.

I also do not think you are being consistent if you speak in terms of real world constraints, but also consider mechanisms that speak to your character's feelings or internal state as limiting your agency because from where I am standing that is also a constraint on our personal agency that we must all deal with in real life.

Basically it feels like you only want to consider the agency you personally value as agency. This makes it almost impossible to have a discussion that crosses the boundaries of play preferences.

I would say that people with other play preferences do also make somewhat similar mistakes in their framing where they fail to see the constraints of those play priorities as meaningful constraints. Like in most Story Now play a player is free to decide what their character wants, but there is a shared expectation that they will push hard for that once established. We all have expectations for their play. This means players are not free to explore for the sake of exploring. There's nothing to explore besides character. Setting is built in a lazy fashion. We often do not see this as a constraint because it's what we want.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Seems like we're on the same page. What I'm looking for in a discussion of agency is to look at that spectrum, set next to other play styles, and all of them run using a variety of systems, and see where all those combinations fall on the agency spectrum and to discuss why certain trade offs, say of agency vs constraint, are important to various genres and also to different types of player, or table expectations.

I think in that case, for the kind of sandbox Rob and I were talking about, the key constraint is you are limited by what your character can do in the setting. Other than that, you want maximal freedom. So if the player announces out of the blue, I walk over and kick the county magistrates son, that is where things are going to go (even if it seemed like they were on their way to help the magistrate deal with a local threat). So I think this is a style that embraces interruptions of flow and takes pleasure in the players surprising you. Personally that is what I like about it because it makes my job easier. This kind of sandbox is very hard to run, if the players are not taking initiative (to solve that problem, Estar often talks about applying training wheels if the players are having a hard time finding a direction). But when they do take initiative you are able to sit back and react to it, which I find enjoyable. It is sort of like, well I didn't think we were going to have a session about the players becoming local bullies trying to take over a little frontier town, but I guess that is what is going to happen (and it forces you to think on your feet in interesting ways----i.e. does that mean I should put together a party of heroes who hears about this and comes to take them on? Things like that).

 

[Bedrockgames]

I also do not think you are being consistent if you speak in terms of real world constraints, but also consider mechanisms that speak to your character's feelings or internal state as limiting your agency because from where I am standing that is also a constraint on our personal agency that we must all deal with in real life.

It is possible I weighed in on this. But I generally don't take a very hard line on this particular issue. For example I am a big fan of fear and insanity mechanics. One thing I don't like to disrupt in my games is a player's ability to RP and interact with NPCs or other players, so I try not to have mechanics mediate that. But I don't think that is a matter of agency. That is a matter of my own personal preference (I just like having direct interaction with setting and characters because I find it immersive and I find it creates a vibe in the room that I like).

 

[Campbell]

Yep. I’ve seen games as games talked about. But then I think about games like Minecraft and I cannot reconcile those kinds of positions to that game.

I do not think you can really talk about what we do when we sit down to play with Minecraft or Sim City as a game. Pretty much the entire body of thought around games and game design has no bearing on it. Something like Heavy Rain is similar for different reasons.

Last night we did some structured freeform based in the Abberant setting. Our play was very focused around the narrative we were building together and there was a lot of collaboration on setting elements. No rules were involved. There was no real objective to play other than exploring who our characters were. I do not think I would call it a game. We cannot approach designing the experience in the same way.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think it is entirely reasonable to have a preference for games where players have no more agency than they have in real life over how things go. I do not think it is reasonable to constrain discussion only to that band of agency and treat agency that extends beyond your personal tolerance as not actually being agency. It makes damn near impossible to have a broader discussion.

I get that, but that is what was also being done to me in this conversation. I was being told my definition, is not valid (and I found this stunning, and maybe overreacted at times, because it is literally one of the only definitions I've encountered in the hobby). That doesn't mean there are not other ways to talk about agency. But I do get cagey around linguistic rhetorical techniques (because I think they can get abused and they can promote specious argumentation). That said, I agree with Frogreaver that we should probably talk about different modes of agency, because at the end of the day, the only line separating us in this discussion is the one between what your character can do in the setting and what the player can do in the setting. That aside, both sides seem interested in maximizing the players sense of freedom in the game

 

[Bedrockgames]

I would say that people with other play preferences do also make somewhat similar mistakes in their framing where they fail to see the constraints of those play priorities as meaningful constraints. Like in most Story Now play a player is free to decide what their character wants, but there is a shared expectation that they will push hard for that once established. We all have expectations for their play. This means players are not free to explore for the sake of exploring. There's nothing to explore besides character. Setting is built in a lazy fashion. We often do not see this as a constraint because it's what we want.

I am not trying to say you don't have agency in your style of play. I think it is a different variety of agency. I agree with Frog Reavers earlier point that it is more like apples and oranges. And I think you are hitting on a key reason here. I don't think me, Estar or anyone on my side is saying our approach is the best or a cure all. And definitely for the preferences posters like Pemerton have laid out, I don't think our approach would give them a satisfying play experience.

 

[Fenris-77]

Agency is just a way to talk about and understand the games we all love, not some sort of ranking system about who's doing it better.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I do not think you can really talk about what we do when we sit down to play with Minecraft or Sim City as a game. Pretty much the entire body of thought around games and game design has no bearing on it. Something like Heavy Rain is similar for different reasons.

Last night we did some structured freeform based in the Abberant setting. Our play was very focused around the narrative we were building together and there was a lot of collaboration on setting elements. No rules were involved. There was no real objective to play other than exploring who our characters were. I do not think I would call it a game. We cannot approach designing the experience in the same way.

Defining game is pretty tough. I am not even weighing in on this one, but I once wrote a history paper on boxing, and I had to define sports at the beginning of it. I had to read like three books to get a working definition.

 

[FrogReaver]

I do not think you can really talk about what we do when we sit down to play with Minecraft or Sim City as a game. Pretty much the entire body of thought around games and game design has no bearing on it. Something like Heavy Rain is similar for different reasons.

Last night we did some structured freeform based in the Abberant setting. Our play was very focused around the narrative we were building together and there was a lot of collaboration on setting elements. No rules were involved. There was no real objective to play other than exploring who our characters were. I do not think I would call it a game. We cannot approach designing the experience in the same way.

A game is a game. To the rest of the world when you say you approach a game as a game and that they do not approach it as a game, it comes across as you calling them crazy or delusional for not approaching something as it actually is.

Your term playing a game as a game isn't illuminating the conversation. It's needlessly making it contentious. Which is what @Bedrockgames was getting at earlier with creating terms when plain language could suffice. If you just said what you mean plainly, that Minecraft is a game without any preset objectives - where the players can set their own objectives and change their objectives anytime, you would have found unanamious agreement.