What is the point of GM's notes?

[Ovinomancer]

The backstory I agree is ... at least negotiated ;-) and I don't deny that I have last word on the setting side of it (I think the players have last word on character side, if that distinction is clear).

The in-game events ... for me to nullify those--for me to have someone else (not previously established in the fiction) pick up with making Masked Ones after the PCs killed Steeltear and destroyed the Forge of Masks, or for me to decide that the Pelsoreen City Council listened to that impassioned, eloquent speech--I guess technically a DM could have done so, but I don't think I could have. Call that a distinction between the published rules and either the table's expectations or my expectations of myself.

Right, this is self imposed, though, and not a feature or constraint of the role. I think this is an important distinction -- to separate out what we ourselves might do and instead look at what the power structure allows. The game's structure (5e) clearly allows, even encourages this kind of thing. It's your implicit social contract with your group that imposes your limitations -- you'd view it as unfair, and your group probably might, too, so you just don't do it. This isn't codified, it exists in the great wooly mass of unspoken social dynamics.

 

[prabe]

Strictly speaking I'm not sure there needs to be a difference, especially if the GM/DM is keeping the published world malleable and using it for his own ends. Perhaps I'm missing the crux of your statement, if so could you clarify. Also... what style of game do you consider yourself to be running?

My point about using published settings was mostly that I think that the definition I was responding to will capture a lot of GMs who are using published material, even if they're not setting out to run a "living world."

As to my own style? I was OK with "dynamic setting." I wrote up the setting myself. I allow (as mentioned elsewhere) the players to add things to the setting in backstories. I allow the players to have their characters change the setting in play. I do occasionally keep track of things offscreen, and I do change/edit/invent the world both in response to the the PCs and independently. But, my experience with sandbox-style games has been very much of the "go and find the fun" variety, which ... I didn't find the fun in, so I pretty explicitly don't call what I do a sandbox or set out to run it as one. The PCs have at least one goal--frequently more than one--and they choose that goal and they choose how to accomplish it. I frame events and conflicts and opposition, but there is no overarching story.

I haven't really tried to come up with a pithy description of it. I typically just call it "DMing." ;-)

 

[prabe]

Right, this is self imposed, though, and not a feature or constraint of the role. I think this is an important distinction -- to separate out what we ourselves might do and instead look at what the power structure allows. The game's structure (5e) clearly allows, even encourages this kind of thing. It's your implicit social contract with your group that imposes your limitations -- you'd view it as unfair, and your group probably might, too, so you just don't do it. This isn't codified, it exists in the great wooly mass of unspoken social dynamics.

I agree that I am a greater constraint on my authority than the 5E rules are, and I understand that when analyzing a game one needs to look at the written rules and little else. While I agree, though, that the rules allow a DM to nullify character actions, I'm not sure they encourage it--other than, perhaps, in AP-style play, where one must from time to time negate character actions to keep the story on the rails. Outside of AP-style play, I can't imagine a table would have stood for my negating either of the two examples I gave upthread.

 

[Imaro]

My point about using published settings was mostly that I think that the definition I was responding to will capture a lot of GMs who are using published material, even if they're not setting out to run a "living world."

As to my own style? I was OK with "dynamic setting". I wrote up the setting myself. I allow (as mentioned elsewhere) the players to add things to the setting in backstories. I allow the players to have their characters change the setting in play. I do occasionally keep track of things offscreen, and I do change/edit/invent the world both in response to the the PCs and independently. But, my experience with sandbox-style games has been very much of the "go and find the fun" variety, which ... I didn't find the fun in, so I pretty explicitly don't call what I do a sandbox or set out to run it as one. The PCs have at least one goal--frequently more than one--and they choose that goal and they choose how to accomplish it. I frame events and conflicts and opposition, but there is no overarching story.

I haven't really tried to come up with a pithy description of it. I typically just call it "DMing." ;-)

Honestly your style of play sounds similar to mine. The main differences probably being that I ask my players to have goals and make sure to tie them into the setting which helps alleviate some of the problem of the "finding their fun" style since they already know what their fun is and just need to go find it. Also recently I've started using more randomizing tools (mainly from OSR games and supplements) to generate fiction in the moment (and sometimes, though rarely, in the past) along with creating some of it on my own. I also have factions with goals motivations, etc that I purposefully plan to create conflict, strife and drama but that's as close to an overarching plot as I tend to have.

 

[Maxperson]

I haven't really tried to come up with a pithy description of it. I typically just call it "DMing." ;-)

Psh! If you aren't Turbo Boutique DMing, you aren't DMing.

 

[Ovinomancer]

The Vornheim book. But aren't we concerned with whether the fiction is generated by the GM or not. Another example is in a PBtA game does this mean that when a GM is creating a consequence the players are playing to find out what's in his head/notes as well concerning the fiction?

I don't understand the question. Of course when the GM is narrating a consequence they're telling the players what their concept of the fiction is. They are granted the authority to do so in this regard, but only in this regard. Well, they also have authority to do so when framing a scene. Both, though, are much more tightly constrained in that you can only narrate within the scope of the stakes and/or actions of the PCs.

Let's imagine that the PC needs to cross a square patrolled by guards. In Blades (switching from PbtA because I'm more comfortable with Blades), this scene is framed by the GM -- the GM has the authority to imagine and tell the player about this challenge. However, this challenge is in direct response to a player stated goal -- it didn't exist until it was needed/thought of by the GM to provide an obstacle in response to a player stated need. So, the GM here is absolutely telling the player what they think, but they couldn't think of it before this moment, or could only have thought of it loosely as a possible aid if such a situation arose as it would be useful. The patrolled square isn't part of notes, or prior conjecture, but it is imagined and related by the GM. The player then declares how they want this to work. They can sneak across, and stakes will be set and a check made. If a success, they sneak across and this is what happens. If a failure, the GM, once again, gets to imagine something and tell the player about it (although, in Blades, the player has ways to defuse this). However, once again, this failure must follow from what the player actually declared, and stick within the scope of the scene as established. If the player decides to draw steel and slash their way across, that's also fine, and stakes are set, and now the consequence won't be being spotted, but attendant to the PC action. Maybe they talk their way across -- same proceedure. There's nothing outside of the initial framing to prevent or modify these actions -- nothing hidden to be discovered, and nothing about how the GM thinks the guards will react that impacts the success/failure of these approaches. The GM has to wait until a failure state occurs to tell the player how they, the GM, thinks about the fiction.

Contrasted with a more traditional style, where the guards all have combats statistics ahead of time, the number and placement of guards is established, potentially hidden information exists which can be discovered by the player. Here, if the player wants to sneak across, the GM will look at their notes on the situation, or how they imagine the scene to be, and then decide if this is possible or not based on their concept of the fiction. Same for fighting across, which now depends on the combat stats and positions of the guards. Or talking, which depends on if the GM thinks the guards can be chatted up or bribed. Any of these details might be able to be revealed to players by them asking questions, like "I observe the square from the shadows and see if the guards leave any gaps in their patrol routes," which prompts the GM to provide their answer to this question. Or investigate guards to see if they're bribable, which prompts the GM to tell the players what they think about this.

This is what I'm talking about, and what "playing to find out the GM's conception of the fiction" means.

 

[Imaro]

I don't understand the question. Of course when the GM is narrating a consequence they're telling the players what their concept of the fiction is. They are granted the authority to do so in this regard, but only in this regard. Well, they also have authority to do so when framing a scene. Both, though, are much more tightly constrained in that you can only narrate within the scope of the stakes and/or actions of the PCs.

Let's imagine that the PC needs to cross a square patrolled by guards. In Blades (switching from PbtA because I'm more comfortable with Blades), this scene is framed by the GM -- the GM has the authority to imagine and tell the player about this challenge. However, this challenge is in direct response to a player stated goal -- it didn't exist until it was needed/thought of by the GM to provide an obstacle in response to a player stated need. So, the GM here is absolutely telling the player what they think, but they couldn't think of it before this moment, or could only have thought of it loosely as a possible aid if such a situation arose as it would be useful. The patrolled square isn't part of notes, or prior conjecture, but it is imagined and related by the GM. The player then declares how they want this to work. They can sneak across, and stakes will be set and a check made. If a success, they sneak across and this is what happens. If a failure, the GM, once again, gets to imagine something and tell the player about it (although, in Blades, the player has ways to defuse this). However, once again, this failure must follow from what the player actually declared, and stick within the scope of the scene as established. If the player decides to draw steel and slash their way across, that's also fine, and stakes are set, and now the consequence won't be being spotted, but attendant to the PC action. Maybe they talk their way across -- same proceedure. There's nothing outside of the initial framing to prevent or modify these actions -- nothing hidden to be discovered, and nothing about how the GM thinks the guards will react that impacts the success/failure of these approaches. The GM has to wait until a failure state occurs to tell the player how they, the GM, thinks about the fiction.

Contrasted with a more traditional style, where the guards all have combats statistics ahead of time, the number and placement of guards is established, potentially hidden information exists which can be discovered by the player. Here, if the player wants to sneak across, the GM will look at their notes on the situation, or how they imagine the scene to be, and then decide if this is possible or not based on their concept of the fiction. Same for fighting across, which now depends on the combat stats and positions of the guards. Or talking, which depends on if the GM thinks the guards can be chatted up or bribed. Any of these details might be able to be revealed to players by them asking questions, like "I observe the square from the shadows and see if the guards leave any gaps in their patrol routes," which prompts the GM to provide their answer to this question. Or investigate guards to see if they're bribable, which prompts the GM to tell the players what they think about this.

This is what I'm talking about, and what "playing to find out the GM's conception of the fiction" means.

I guess IMO both are playing to find out the GM's conception of the fiction... Is one constrained and made up in the moment, sure I'll give you that but ultimately it is the GM who is creating the lions share of the fiction in both instances... right? Contrast this with something like Polaris... where there is no traditional DM and the players have specific roles to generate fiction in the moment as one player takes on the protagonists role.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I guess IMO both are playing to find out the GM's conception of the fiction... Is one constrained and made up in the moment, sure I'll give you that but ultimately it is the GM who is creating the lions share of the fiction in both instances... right?

I think you've missed quite a lot. In one, the GM imagines the whole thing and the player navigates it. In the other, the GM imagines specific and limited things in direct response and constrained by player prompting, and at least half the time the player gets to say what happens and the GM cannot modify that.

 

[Imaro]

I think you've missed quite a lot. In one, the GM imagines the whole thing and the player navigates it. In the other, the GM imagines specific and limited things in direct response and constrained by player prompting, and at least half the time the player gets to say what happens and the GM cannot modify that.

But the game itself is hyper-focused... that means all of the fiction is constrained by player prompting... but the majority of the fiction is still ultimately created by the GM.

 

[Aldarc]

Aldarc. The issue with Fiction and the term story, is both of them are particularly problematic when it comes to RPG discussions. And this is going to be doubly the case when many of the posters invoking The Fiction as their preferred term, both come from a GNS background and have a preference for story now approaches.

Ah, yes. I see. The qualifications of the people arguing for "the fiction" is all wrong. They come from the badwrongthink of GNS. Is that right? We all know that @Ovinomancer and @Fenris-77 are both big fans of GNS.

In terms of ambiguity, if a term has two or potential meanings, then its ambiguous. Fiction even in its first definition includes both the idea of imagined stuff and a story. That it is used pretty interchangeably in regular speech to mean novel, I think also demonstrates the issue here. And then I would add the fact that it tends to get used in a way in this discussion where the fiction applies not just to what happens, but to the setting the stuff is happening in (which I would say is very much a literary mindset, and bringing in some of that literary meaning, even if it isn't proper equivocation)

@Bedrockgames, in my prior post, I have explained to you how several of the assertions you repeat here display some fundamental misunderstandings of terms, particularly in regards to 'ambiguity,' and we aren't going to get anywhere if you just repeat them for your arguments here. If you're just going to repeat those assertions again without taking time to correct your argument, then I'm going to assume that you haven't bothered reading those explanations. Any argument that relies on falling back on those sort of misunderstandings of the terms is frankly a crap one.

You are talking about what is referred to as "lexical ambiguity"* or polysemy but then you (likely unintentionally) equivocate on different meanings of "ambiguity." Let's go through the equivocation process. To paraphrase:

(1) "Ambiguity exists when a word has multiple meanings."
-- This refers to "lexical ambiguity." There are generally two different types: polysemy or homonymy.
(2) "The word 'fiction' has multiple meanings."
-- Taking this assertion as true, we would need to understand what kind of lexical ambiguity we are dealing with for "fiction."
-- Homonymy is when lexical ambiguity in a semantic unit derives from two words spelt the same way: e.g., bank and bank. This is obviously not the case for "fiction."
-- "Fiction" is polysemous. Its meanings, despite the distinctions one can draw, are clearly interrelated conceptually and derive from a singular semantic unit or morphology. This constitutes polysemy. For the record, most words in English (if not most languages) have polysemy. Linguistic feature, not a bug.
(3) "Ergo the word 'fiction' is/can be ambiguous when used in discussions (and people can/will equivocate between these meanings)."
-- Herein is the problem because it's construing "lexical ambiguity" (multiple meanings exist for a word) as "semantic ambiguity" or "pragmatic ambiguity" (it's difficult to decipher which meaning is intended). This equivocates the senses of "ambiguity." This is to say, just because a word is technically lexically ambiguous (possesses polysemy) doesn't mean that its meaning or use is pragmatically ambiguous in an utterance, and context plays a key role here. Moreover, the problem exists in asserting that since ambiguity exists (in whatever form) that people will equivocate with the term.

Secondly, I don't understand the problem with "fiction" applying to both what happens and the setting, because, yes, they are both aspects of the imagined fiction. I'm also not sure why or how this is a bad thing or even "sorta equivocation." I think that people such as @pemerton and @Manbearcat have been consistent in their use of "fiction." As you will see below, even Kevin Crawford uses "fiction" in reference to the setting.

* E.g., "I saw bats." There is lexical ambiguity regarding both the sense of the verb saw (i.e., saw as 'vision' or saw as 'cutting') and the object bats (i.e., bats as 'a type of flying animal' or bats as 'wooden club').

Look, you can mention your background. I am not as educated as you clearly. But I know what equivocation is. And unless you are arguing seriously that Fiction is not an equivocal terms in the way described (that one can shift from meaning 'imaginary stuff' to 'a story' or even 'a novel' quite smoothly and easily, then I think you are just drawing on advanced knowledge in a field to dismiss what is pretty hard to deny: fiction is highly equivocal; in RPGs especially this is going to be the case (it is a short leap from fiction to story). It isn't bullying.

Let me read what you are saying here back to you: If I don't agree with your conclusion that the term 'fiction' is "highly equivocal" then I am just using my advanced knowledge to dismiss your conclusion without any merit. Now tell me, @Bedrockgames. How is that not utter presumptuous nonsense? Do you truly not get how insulting and dismissive your own words are here?

The ability for a word to have different meanings or for people to shift between meanings does not mean that a semantic unit is "highly equivocal." It means that the word is "polysemous" or displays "polysemy." This can also mean that the word is multivalent, in the sense that it can be used in different linguistic constructions and combinations of meaning. Intentional use of polysemy occurs frequently in literature, often for purposes of subversion of expectations and humor (e.g., the character Bottom in Midsummer's Night Dream). Again, multivalency, polysemy, and lexical ambiguity are key factors in the word that is the focus of my study. It's not a "highly equivocal" word or term. It's a polysemous one that is used in a wide range of contexts and meanings. The fact that the term "fiction" includes distinct, but clearly interrelated, meanings as part of its semantic field does not mean that it's somehow "highly equivocal." That a word can be ambiguous in a hypothetical given utterance does not mean that it is inherently or always ambiguous in every utterance. It means that some further context is generally needed by interlocutors to decipher the meaning in utterances where it's difficult to decipher which sense or meaning of a word is likely intended.

But I know enough about logic and equivocation to know your argument is a bit specious. Probably not enough to defend my position against someone with that advanced level of understanding (but enough to know and understand the dynamic going on here: because it is something I can do, if I choose to, with History, which i don't).

If my argument is a bit specious, then I welcome critique or the chance for further clarification on these terms, but simply saying that "you know enough about logic and equivocation" to claim that my argument is specious is not going to cut the mustard. It's all bark and no bite.

Now none of this is a problem if you aren't equivocating. But there have been plenty of instances of the fiction in other threads where this happens; and the term story has a long, long history of being equivocated upon in this manner all the time (I think you would have to be very disingenuous not to see that: both in terms of equivocation to argue for railroads, but also in terms of the story game versus trad debates-----in the same way that people use specious arguments about the term RPG to argue that story driven RPGs are not real RPGs). Again, if we are talking casual use, its totally fine. But you guys are claiming to have precise and meaningful jargon here to describe stuff, and you opted for a term like "the fiction" in vacuum, now that it is coming into contact with other types of gamers, there is push back against it. I believe you haven't encountered the problems i am trying to bring to your attention, but believe me when I tell you this is going to be a line that gets equivocated on and it is going to be a problem for people coming from styles like sandbox (when they see a term like that, it is both going to raise suspicions and it is going to strike them as highly inaccurate).

Honestly, I think that your issue is not so much with the term "fiction," but, rather, with the term "story." I don't think that having a problem with the term "story" means that one should be forced to read "fiction" as "story" just because it exists as one possible meaning. Yes, that means you're essentially advocating for equivocating. In fighting the monster, you have become the very monster you hate. It's insisting that because "fiction" can be read as the "bad kind of fiction" (i.e., pre-authored story) and not the good kind (i.e,. emerging story*) or even the neutral sense of "imagined, invented, unreal, etc." then the term must be avoided at all costs. Obviously, I think that's a misguided approach.

Honestly, IMHO, as someone who doesn't really care about GNS, I find "the fiction" to be the most natural term for well... the fiction that's created as part of play, whether that applies to the play process or setting. From what I can tell reading through the Alexandrian, he does not have any hang-ups with using the term "the fiction" to describe "the fiction" of play. I can also not find any hang-ups regarding 'fiction' from Kevin Crawford, who writes in SWN and WWN, "No matter how finely-sculpted your world or inventive your fiction, if you can’t deliver a playable bit of fun at the table then your job as a GM is not done." Maybe I missing something about why "fiction" is so problematic for these pro-sandbox people who don't seem to have problems using the term.

If you have citations of the term "fiction" being problematic for sandbox gamers and the like, then I would gladly welcome reading those resources. Until then, any pushback I receive is not so much from those "other types of gamers," but, rather, with Bedrockgames himself. And from what I can tell it's mostly because Ron Edward and those other GNS people use the term "fiction" and we all know that it's badwrongthink, so the use of "fiction" is guilty by association.

* This seems to be a case where you have no problem with the use of "story," or at least OSR and sandbox circles do not. I raised this point earlier, but this was never addressed.

Yes, "fiction" is very loaded. It means "stuff you made up" and also "novels." I think this describes your play very well, though, as your above passage is clearly a fictional work that suggests a story similar to a novel. As such, the word is very loaded because it bears a large load in describing your games. I think that "loaded" is a good term here, because many gamers are going to see that as "bearing a large weight," and, indeed, it is doing so here for your games, as you've described them, at least in a metaphorical sense. I am unclear, though, does your "fictional world," as it's eating your players, also bear a large weight? This is a solid question that I think will better illuminate your approach to gaming.

Again, I don't think that this necessarily is what is meant by "loaded" terms. Loaded language does not refer to words having different meanings. It most often refers to terms that often contain emotionally-charged associations: e.g., "freedom" (good) vs. "fascism" (bad). Or even how something more positively framed like "homeland" is often used by nationalists. I don't think that "fiction" has those sort of high-inference loaded associations, even in RPG circles. Loaded terms in RPG circles are generally terms like "railroading" and "meta-gaming" on the more negative end or "living world" and "player agency" on the more positive end.