D&D General The History of 'Immersion' in RPGs

D&D historian Jon Peterson has taken a look at the concept of 'immersion' as it related to tabletop roleplaying games, with references to the concept going back to The Wild Hunt (1977), D&D modules like In Search of the Unknown, games like Boot Hill, and Forgotten Realms creator Ed Greenwood speaking in Dragon Magazine.

Immersion and Role Playing in the 1970s

The idea that role playing involved a property called "immersion" occurred to the early adopters of the 1970s fairly early. The earliest e...

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[Hussar]

I would think the way my character is established as having a below or above average intelligence is by the rate at which s/he succeeds or fails at intelligence related tasks.

But there are a number of things that your character does that are based on intelligence that are not checks. Tactical acumen, for example. Being able to remember details. If you are playing a low Int character, do you forgo taking notes? Do you make bad tactical decisions? So on and so forth.

There are far more ways to demonstrate and illustrate a character than simply through random die checks.

 

[Hriston]

Not according to the book. The book clearly tells you what intelligence represents, so if you have a low intelligence, you also have a low ability to reason, remember, etc. Nothing forces you to roleplay that out, but in my opinion it should be roleplayed out.

I reject the idea that things outside the game-world, like the text of a rulebook, establishes anything about my character. I think we might be working with different definitions of what it means for fiction to be established. Again, I prefer to roleplay in a “non-scripted” fashion which, for me, is more immersive than “roleplaying out” preconceived aspects of a character. Honoring established fiction, i.e. events that have been revealed to have happened in the game-world during the course of play, is also important in my view.

 

[Hriston]

So let's say, then, that you're playing a new character who due to evil dice pretty much blows her first six or eight or fifteen intelligence checks.

This, by your rationale here quoted, starts to strongly establish her in the fiction as having less than stellar intelligence.

My question is: how does this get "locked in" going forward? Does she now start taking a penalty on future int. checks, or roll at disadvantage, or something similar? Put another way, in what way will that now-established-to-be-low intelligence be mechanically reflected?

This is relevant in that her low int. won't be very believable or consistent if the dice turn around and she suddenly starts succeeding on all the same sort of int. checks she failed last week.

I’m not sure I understand why it needs to be “locked in”. I mean, it’s locked in to the extent that that’s what happened. If something different starts happening, then that creates some new fiction about the character. Maybe she’s not as dumb as we all thought.

 

[Maxperson]

I reject the idea that things outside the game-world, like the text of a rulebook, establishes anything about my character. I think we might be working with different definitions of what it means for fiction to be established. Again, I prefer to roleplay in a “non-scripted” fashion which, for me, is more immersive than “roleplaying out” preconceived aspects of a character. Honoring established fiction, i.e. events that have been revealed to have happened in the game-world during the course of play, is also important in my view.

That's fine, but your rejection constitutes at the very least a home brew view of the game. Your home brew of what intelligence means in D&D doesn't invalidate what I've said here regarding how the game uses low stat numbers.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

That's fine, but your rejection constitutes at the very least a home brew view of the game. Your home brew of what intelligence means in D&D doesn't invalidate what I've said here regarding how the game uses low stat numbers.

You said yourself: “Nothing forces you to roleplay that out, but in my opinion it should be roleplayed out.”

so, yeah, there’s that.

 

[Maxperson]

You said yourself: “Nothing forces you to roleplay that out, but in my opinion it should be roleplayed out.”

so, yeah, there’s that.

You aren't forced to follow what the game says intelligence is, no. That doesn't stop intelligence from being what it is as laid out by the game. Here's an example. Just like the game tells me what intelligence is, the game also tells me what an orc is. The game does not force my character to roleplay it as an orc, though. I can choose to roleplay that orc as a goat. However I choose to roleplay, though, it's still an orc. However you choose to roleplay intelligence, in the game intelligence is low reasoning ability, low mental acuity and low memory.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

You aren't forced to follow what the game says intelligence is, no. That doesn't stop intelligence from being what it is as laid out by the game. Here's an example. Just like the game tells me what intelligence is, the game also tells me what an orc is. The game does not force my character to roleplay it as an orc, though. I can choose to roleplay that orc as a goat. However I choose to roleplay, though, it's still an orc. However you choose to roleplay intelligence, in the game intelligence is low reasoning ability, low mental acuity and low memory.

Point is: @Hriston is not violating RAW if that is what is so important to you. But your presentation is confusing since you say it is not “forced” then you turn around and say they are homebrewing how to roleplay.

You’re good at finding and quoting rules: show us where it is prescribed how one must roleplay according to stats.

 

[Maxperson]

Point is: @Hriston is not violating RAW if that is what is so important to you. But your presentation is confusing since you say it is not “forced” then you turn around and say they are homebrewing how to roleplay.

It's not forced, but if you are going against what the game lays out(forced or otherwise), it's a home brew. Most people play the game the way game says it should be played. The key there is should, not must.

"Is a character muscle-bound and insightful? Brilliantand charming? Nimble and hardy? Ability scores define these qualities - a creature's assets as well as weaknesses."

The game does not leave it open. It doesn't say, "You can play stats any way you feel like. You want to be a genius with a 3 intelligence, go for it." Nor does it say, "You must play a PC with a 5 intelligence as stupid." However, it does very clearly define that a character with a low intelligence is stupid. If you want to change that, you have to go against the game definition of what stats mean. That qualifies as home brew in my book.

 

[Hriston]

Chicken-and-egg, I suppose. Once I've got all the relevant bits and pieces together to inform my roleplay - including the various choices I've made during char-gen plus the numbers the dice have given me to work with - I'll then come up with the basics of a personality and outlook for the character. Then, once the character comes into play, the in-game decisions it makes (or that I-as-its-player make for it) will ideally be made through the character's eyes and as extensions of that personality and outlook.

To me this is more immersive, in that - again ideally - I can "inhabit" the character right from square one and make decisions as if I was the character.

More immersive than what, though? I think there's a difference between making decisions based on what I think my character would do (which I don't find very immersive at all) and making decisions as my character. Is that the sort of difference you have in mind?

What ends up happening there is you get two characters in one: the character that the sheet seems to suggest, and the character you're actually playing. If-when these get too far apart, as either fellow player or DM I'm likely to raise a squawk.

All I can say is I agree with @Campbell's statement up-thread (if I'm remembering/paraphrasing correctly) that any perceived discrepancy between my character as established by in-game events and what's written on the character sheet should be settled in favor of the former.

I see it more as in RPGing you don't have to worry about reaching the point of the script and blocking restraints disappearing from your consciousness, because they're already gone to begin with. From there, it's easy enough to just inhabit the character and have it do what it would do.

The character doesn't do anything without the player deciding what it does. I find that my immersion depends on those decisions closely resembling the decisions people make about what they themselves do. I don't think most people's decisions hinge on ideas of what they would do. I think people are more concerned with doing what they want to do or what they think they should do. I mean, who makes decisions by thinking about themselves and what type of person they are and then asking themselves what that type of person would do?

Semantics, perhaps, but when I think of "authoring" what comes to mind is preparing something ahead of time; as opposed to improvising where nothing is authored and it just happens. Sure, after the fact one can look back in hindsight and say things were authored, but in the moment I don't see that as what I'm doing (and I'd think it somewhat pretentious if I did).

Improvised authorship is still authorship, but I think I get the distinction you're making. I don't think of myself as an author when I'm roleplaying (unless I happen to be roleplaying an author). I think of myself as the character. What results, however, is an act of authorship. I made something up about my character.

I certainly do, as one of those underlying game-based processes is - within reason - to play to your numbers.

Would you say that, in your games, and seeing that this thread is in the D&D forum, that this is seen as an unstated rule of the game? It certainly isn't in my games, but I think if it were a rule or had some mechanical backing in the rules, I might be more tolerant of it as a resolution process. For instance, if I as a player had to succeed on an Intelligence check for my character to make the "come up with a plan" move, I wouldn't find it nearly as un-immersive as trying to gauge my character's plan making to its Intelligence score.

 

[Lanefan]

This...

I reject the idea that things outside the game-world, like the text of a rulebook, establishes anything about my character. I think we might be working with different definitions of what it means for fiction to be established. Again, I prefer to roleplay in a “non-scripted” fashion which, for me, is more immersive than “roleplaying out” preconceived aspects of a character.

...is quite different from this:

Honoring established fiction, i.e. events that have been revealed to have happened in the game-world during the course of play, is also important in my view.

The latter is very important.

As for the former, and going back to the difference between stage acting and RPGing for a minute, just because the character's your own and doesn't have to follow scripted lines doesn't excuse you-as-its-portrayer from paying attention to the guidelines established (in the script notes///on the character sheet) for/around said character and having those guidelines inform your portrayal. Wilfully ignoring those guidelines falls, IMO, into pretty much the same bucket as wilfully ignoring the dice on those occasions when you don't like what they roll.

Put another way: honour what's on the character sheet as established fiction, because it is. It's backstory, in a way, and falls under the same aegis as the backstory the DM has established for the setting: that being a reflection of what was in place before play began. It's kind of a brute-force mechanical summation of the results of what you'd have got if you had long-form-roleplayed this character through all of the x-many years of its life before joining the adventuring crew.