D&D General Story Now, Skilled Play, and Elephants

[AbdulAlhazred]

Except, of course, the system on the player side is never simply "tell a story". It is "you may propose a change in the fiction, within some parameters, possibly using some resources and/or having some risk of failing to get what you want" - which is a pretty typical game thing.



One of the unfortunate things that seems to have come out of a lot of RPG theorizing, is that you can think about role in the internalized/immersion sense ("Inhabiting the mind of my character, what is my next action?") or the tactical sense ("I am the tank in this party, my role in a fight is to soak up hits, so what is the optimal tactical choice for me here?") and folks say you are playing a role-playing game. But, if you think about role in terms of role in the fiction ("I am the Reluctant Hero, what is the best story development for me here?") and choose gameplay accordingly, you are suddenly not playing a role playing game, you are playing a storytelling game.

Is that necessarily true though? What if there are resources associated with 'being the Reluctant Hero'. So, for instance in my own game (which is kind of 4e based to an extent) there is the possibility of acquiring resources you can use later in the game, or of avoiding resource use now, by playing in character and moving towards your PC's avowed 'story' goals. I THINK that IS 'playing a game'. It isn't really a competitive oppositional type of game in any great sense, but there are 'measures of success' (IE you achieve story goals which also trigger mechanical benefits to your PC).

I think there are diversities here in terminology that inhibit clear discussion. What really IS meant by 'game' to start with? And if an RPG focuses on a heavy interaction of mechanics, and grants mechanical interactions primacy over certain other things, then is it more 'game' than one which doesn't? Does it have to have an element of competition or struggle? I mean, these are not even RPG questions, but far more general. Which activities deserve to receive the label 'game'? Does it even matter?

 

[clearstream]

What really IS meant by 'game' to start with? And if an RPG focuses on a heavy interaction of mechanics, and grants mechanical interactions primacy over certain other things, then is it more 'game' than one which doesn't? Does it have to have an element of competition or struggle? I mean, these are not even RPG questions, but far more general. Which activities deserve to receive the label 'game'? Does it even matter?

This is an excellent statement. I struggle with some of the discussion here in part because I have dug so much into what is meant by game to start with.

I believe it does matter, and can be answered to some degree. As well as the sort of descriptive definitions offered in the past by Juul etc, and the more anthropological studies by Huizinga and the like, which cast games largely in terms of human behaviours, I'd draw your attention to Aarseth's thought that games from an ontological perspective are mechanisms. I put it more as tools.

For me it is crucial to understand the player as coming into the game from outside it. Using the game most likely according to common ideas of use (just as we use a hammer to drive in nails, usually) but able to have other purposes (today, I need a paperweight). This leads to a less fixed perspective on what game is being played, and what ought to be in or out of that game. I don't agree with some posters emphasis on goals, for example, even though they do have a prominence in descriptive definitions of games.

 

[Campbell]

I think fundamentally a shared purpose (agenda), defined roles, and shared expectations (rules) are what separate games from play. Games are just structured play. So we can roleplay without any sort of defined roles or formal expectations, use mechanisms lazily when we want to, and all bring our own agendas to bear. To me that's play, but not a game because it lacks structure. In the same way there's a difference between playing around on a basketball court with some friends and playing a game of basketball, horse, or 21 all of which use the same tools, but are phenomenally different games.

 

[pemerton]

I don't think DW is fundamentally ABOUT skilled play in any mechanical sense, except maybe "I am good at maximizing our achieving of our mutual agendas by way of getting certain moves to happen." To go back to @Manbearcat's talk about 'win cons' in another thread, I don't think there REALLY are 'win cons' in a hard sense in DW. You may want to get XP, level up, and achieve the PC's goals, but you don't WIN by doing that. It may put some added tools in your toolchest by opening up some additional moves, or get you some gear, or something, but DW works fine without even leveling. I think the XP/Leveling system is useful, but it is not actually pivotal to DW like it is to D&D.

I agree with @clearstream's observation of the existence of a 'circle' of participation, a community of play into which we join when we engage in a game where, ideally, there is a mutually shared agenda and principles of play. This is generally not too hard in organized sport, where each participant engages in the unspoken agreement to play their hardest to win. Not because winning is really the ultimate goal, but because it drives forward the real agenda of the game, which in the end is its participatory nature itself. RPGs are just a bit more murky than sports, you can easily get lost in the weeds, and there are a lot of possible approaches to a game, but ideally it works the same way.

I think fundamentally a shared purpose (agenda), defined roles, and shared expectations (rules) are what separate games from play. Games are just structured play. So we can roleplay without any sort of defined roles or formal expectations, use mechanisms lazily when we want to, and all bring our own agendas to bear. To me that's play, but not a game because it lacks structure. In the same way there's a difference between playing around on a basketball court with some friends and playing a game of basketball, horse, or 21 all of which use the same tools, but are phenomenally different games.

We can have sports where the goal of the moves the players make is to win; but the overall reason for making those moves is to participate in the game, and the reason for participating in the game is to have fun. (I think this is consistent with what @AbdulAlhazred says in my second quote above.)

I think the same thing is true in other sorts of game playing - eg when I used to play MtG with my friends who were much better at it than me, the goal of any individual move I made was to maintain or strengthen my position to try and win the game; but most of the time I didn't actually think I was going to win. I played because I enjoyed it.

There are some games where participation on its own is not much fun if you're not very good. I personally find chess tends towards this, and so does cricket. Conversely, there are games where participation can be fun even if you're not that good: I find touch football more like this, and some of the more light-hearted boardgames (eg New York Slice). Of course there's a high degree of personal idiosyncracy in these judgements.

In Gygaxian skilled play, each move should (ideally) be made to improve the position of the party vis-a-vis extracting the loot from the dungeon. Is playing it's own reward? Gygax clearly thought so - that comes out clearly, especially in his DMG advice around how to integrate new players into an existing game. My own view is that this sort of RPGing can tend a bit more towards the chess/cricket end of the spectrum!

What I enjoy when I play Burning Wheel is making moves as if I were my PC, via imaginative projection/inhabitation. This is a bit different from the examples of game play I've given above: not only is participation its own reward; but at the moment of the individual move being made there is no orientation towards winning or strengthening one's position. I'm happy enough to still call this a game, but it's obviously a bit different from some other games, and probably not a standard case. There's a reason that the word "gamism" was used by The Forge to describe one particular orientation towards RPGing, ie, one where the ideal is that each move is oriented towards success (whether in the fiction, in the competition among the players, or both!).

 

[Campbell]

@pemerton

So I think the objective of a game does not need to be competitive or challenge oriented. Once Upon A Time and For The Queen are games of collective storytelling. There is still a shared purpose and like objective to play. So like games like Sorcerer and Dogs in the Vineyard ask you to advocate for your character and collectively we see what happens when they are under pressure. That's still a game to me because there are clear expectations and a shared agenda for play.

Fundamentally for me to view an activity as a game it has to be something you can become more skilled at in a way that is clear to everyone at the table. Skill here does not necessarily mean positive outcomes for your character. Part of being a skilled sorcerer player is leaning into your kicker the conflicts which can actually lead to more adverse consequences for your character.

 

[pemerton]

I think the objective of a game does not need to be competitive or challenge oriented. Once Upon A Time and For The Queen are games of collective storytelling. There is still a shared purpose and like objective to play. So like games like Sorcerer and Dogs in the Vineyard ask you to advocate for your character and collectively we see what happens when they are under pressure. That's still a game to me because there are clear expectations and a shared agenda for play.

I've got no objection to that. I think concepts like game are pretty capacious.

I think trying to distinguish standard from less typical cases can be helpful for communication; but they're not normative in any linguistic sense (Wittgenstein plays on the lack of correlation between linguistic and social normativity when he imagines someone who is told to teach the children a game teaching them gaming (ie gambling) with dice).

I think it's also easy to push intuitions in one way or another by choosing particular examples. Eg I think everyone would agree that Pictionary is a game. Now what if a group of friends drop the board aspect, and the teams aspect, and just sit around guessing what one person is drawing based on the cards s/he pulls from the box? Is that still a game? I think a lot of people might say "No", and then we might ask how it is different from some pretty freeform RPGing?, and then they might change their mind. Normally I don't see there being a lot at stake in these sorts of bouncing around of intuitions as different features of what is going on become more or less salient, depending on other contrasts and comparisons being drawn.

Fundamentally for me to view an activity as a game it has to be something you can become more skilled at in a way that is clear to everyone at the table. Skill here does not necessarily mean positive outcomes for your character. Part of being a skilled sorcerer player is leaning into your kicker the conflicts which can actually lead to more adverse consequences for your character.

This will mean that games of pure chance - Snakes & Ladders, say, and some gambling games - cease to count as games. I don't think that's a big deal - again it just shows that these boundaries, on any occasion of use, tend to be sensitive to purposes or orientations that make some things salient and not others.

I'm sure there would be another context in which you'd happily explain that Snakes & Ladders is a game because it has as a structured process for participants that produces an outcome at which they are aiming in their play even if they have no control over how they get there. (And I don' think Snakes & Ladders is a degenerate case here - the old board game Pay Day is close to pure chance, takes an hour or more to play, and has a board and cards and play money and tokens ie all the standard apparatus of a 1970s kids' boardgame. My kids still makes up play that from time to time - groan!)

 

[Umbran]

Is that necessarily true though?

Is what necessarily true?

I'm a little confused. You are asking me as if I think story-focus and RPG are necessarily separate, when I say right in the quote that I find it unfortunate that they get talked about as separate. I then went on for several posts supporting them as being fine together.

So, why are you asking me?

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I guess I don't like the terminology 'constraining', as if the players and the GM are really wrestling for leverage on the narrative.

I mean, when I'm told I have to answer truthfully, I don't really see how there's any way to speak about it that isn't synonymous with "constraining." I'm obliged, compelled, required, etc. to do a thing, by the rules. I voluntarily submit to these rules, sure, but that's still a submission; I'm agreeing to my absolute creative freedom as GM being restricted by something more than merely "best practices."

Yes, the players presumably want to see the PC's goals achieved, and to earn XP and thus advance in level. However, the GM isn't at all opposed to this.

Well, I didn't say they weren't, and am not entirely sure where you got that notion. Just that the rules directly tell me both things I'm not supposed to do (like speaking the names of my GM moves), and things I am supposed to do (like truthfully answering questions or providing information that is explicitly "useful and interesting," etc.) That's a constraint, which rises above the not-quite-rules "best practices" notions like Agendas and Principles.

but given the GM's agenda of being a fan of the players and play to see what happens, this doesn't seem like CONTROL

Honestly no idea where you got this notion of "control" from. The only thing "controlling" behavior is the system itself; I'm assuming every participant is engaged purely to have a good time, and makes use of moves because they're interesting, useful, or relevant, not because they're trying to dominate.

There is clearly skill here. It could take a couple of forms, but I don't think DW is fundamentally ABOUT skilled play in any mechanical sense,

I guess I just disagree. I see plenty of skill in knowing how to advance the fiction, which is impromptu/improv theater, and further skill in both (a) knowing when the fiction has actually triggered a move, and (b) how to make wisest use of the moves you have. Plenty of moves, for example, give Hold that can be spent when you choose to, or have options to choose from, like Discern Realities with its "choose one(/three) questions from the following five" or Bend Bars, Lift Gates with its "choose two(/three) things from the following four" (and thus don't get the one or two things you didn't get to choose).

It's absolutely a VERY different skillset compared to basically any version of D&D (except possibly OD&D when things were still heavily in flux and new rule-systems got added all the time in rather ad-hoc fashion). You're much more an improv performer, and instead of tactical choices you have to make qualitative choices as to which things are worth having vs. forsaking. But that's still totally a set of skills, for exactly the same reason that someone can be skilled at improv theater or skilled at distributing military materiel without having perfect knowledge of the battlefield and enemy's plans.

I'm reminded of that quote from Sun Tzu's The Art of War: "If I determine the enemy's disposition of forces while I have no perceptible form, I can concentrate my forces while the enemy is fragmented. The pinnacle of military deployment approaches the formless: if it is formless, then even the deepest spy cannot discern it nor the wise make plans against it." A perfect demonstration of how superlative logistical skill is in fact an AWESOME power for any military leader. A Dungeon World character may not have armies at their command (though some might!), but making sound vs. unsound qualitative judgments about what objectives are worth fulfilling IS a skill, and DW play strongly benefits from it. The two skills--improv acting and sound qualitative judgment--do not always go hand in hand though, which can lead to really fascinating character development no matter which one wins out. Producing a great story, which I completely agree is the goal of DW play, benefits from both elements in different ways, and the non-commensurate nature of these two skills can add some delightful tension.

 

[clearstream]

@pemerton

So I think the objective of a game does not need to be competitive or challenge oriented. Once Upon A Time and For The Queen are games of collective storytelling. There is still a shared purpose and like objective to play. So like games like Sorcerer and Dogs in the Vineyard ask you to advocate for your character and collectively we see what happens when they are under pressure. That's still a game to me because there are clear expectations and a shared agenda for play.

Fundamentally for me to view an activity as a game it has to be something you can become more skilled at in a way that is clear to everyone at the table. Skill here does not necessarily mean positive outcomes for your character. Part of being a skilled sorcerer player is leaning into your kicker the conflicts which can actually lead to more adverse consequences for your character.

Taking your view that "it has to be something you can become more skilled at in a way that is clear to everyone at the table". Games deliberately limit freedom of skill expression to a representative set, ensuring a common vernacular of play (players can parse and address one another's expressions). Limited that way, they are then able to formulate statements or scales for ranking expressions, and/or define states where some participants' skills are prevailing.

I wonder if the distinction you are drawing attention to in your second paragraph is one between skill-in-the-moment and aggregations of skill? What I mean is, that if I abandon concern for consequences to express skill in the moment, then down the line my aggregated skill might seem lower. Strategy typically envisions a cascade of skillful moves that will lead to a tipping of the balance decisively in one's favour. (That's not all there is to strategy, and the word has an elusive meaning, but that is often part of it.)

Say I call your distinction one between skill-in-the-moment and meta-skill. I have the skill of the act in the moment, judged now. And against that I have the skill as best possible move for the cascade, judged later. An interesting segue, is that those adverse consequences might amount to greater opportunities down the line for skill-in-the-moment - better prepared foes, fewer resources - harder fights!

To see how radical that separation of skill-concerns could be: one could come to the counter-intuitive idea that failing to husband resources evidences, and results in, greater skill. (Although that is rhetorical sleight-of-hand, because it is not showing greater meta-skill, only greater skill-in-the-moment.) That might then be taken to be an agenda of play: skill-now, i.e. maximise skill-in-the-moment!

 

[Manbearcat]

There is clearly skill here. It could take a couple of forms, but I don't think DW is fundamentally ABOUT skilled play in any mechanical sense, except maybe "I am good at maximizing our achieving of our mutual agendas by way of getting certain moves to happen." To go back to @Manbearcat's talk about 'win cons' in another thread, I don't think there REALLY are 'win cons' in a hard sense in DW. You may want to get XP, level up, and achieve the PC's goals, but you don't WIN by doing that. It may put some added tools in your toolchest by opening up some additional moves, or get you some gear, or something, but DW works fine without even leveling. I think the XP/Leveling system is useful, but it is not actually pivotal to DW like it is to D&D.

Here is the thing about me that may be making some of my commentary non-transferable or incomprehensible to others.

I come from an athletics and martial arts background.

I spent ages 4 through college ruthlessly committed to baseball (of which I played through college). I spent most of that time period also playing basketball, football, wrestling, tennis, golf, and various track/running.

I’m a Brown Belt and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (and I really have no excuse to not be a Black Belt other than losing interest primarily due to both rotator cuffs being torn multiple times and cervical injuries).

I now spend much of my physical time working on being as good of a climber as I can be.


My brain is absolutely oriented toward extreme focus on micro-goal-attainment. Part of this is genetic, but a HUGE part of the array of cognitive features that make that so is due to the mental demands of that physical life and the well-understood Best Practices approach to maximizing your capability (focus on what you can control and narrow your focus to the attainment of micro goals to the exclusion of the big picture).

This has very much helped me to focus intensively on the moment and run scene-based games with obstacles and objectives.

So when I look at any TTRPG tech, I look at it through that prism. When I run any scene, I look at it through that prism. If for whatever reason I don’t understand what players are trying to accomplish, I make it abundantly clear for all parties via direct conversation. We then set about mechanizing the test for “is this objective attained or not attained?” And I make that mechanical archetecture clear. I doubt players who come away from a game with me will ever be confused as to (a) what just happened or (b) how the gamestate was moved from here to there and how the content of the shared fiction was resolved.


Now will this be different in a scene of Dogs in the Vineyard where you’re confronting your traumatic past (and making decisions about when/how to martial Traits/Relationships/Things and how to manage your dice pools/potential Fallout…and maybe when/if you Give) with your abusive Aunt…the same Aunt that you’re now obliged to try to exorcise a demon from…vs a social conflict in DW using a Tug of War Clock where you’re a Paladin trying to adjure a demon from a non-relative (and you’re simultaneously dealing with the various tech and subtle thematic divergence that underwrites this scene in each game)?


ABSOLUTELY.

But my brain has a very particular focus. And if I had to guess (@darkbard can correct me on this if I’m wrong), that focus comes through in play as distilling moments of play and objectives of play in an extremely clear fashion.

That focus…that lack of murk and obfuscation…coupled with the clarity of ethos and mechanical effect of the games I run…we’ll, it feels very Win Con - ey to me!