D&D General Supposing D&D is gamist, what does that mean?

[Lyxen]

Outside of 4e, I can't bring up a single instance of a narrativist element in D&D.

I'm sorry, can you please elaborate (including your definition of narrativism) ?

 

[DND_Reborn]

Every game is all of them, but vary on the 1-10 scale begun by @Oofta. While D&D is maybe a 3 on the simulation scale, it is probably a 6 or 7 on the gamist scale, etc.

Where it lies on any scale depends on your perspective I suppose.

 

[Staffan]

As I understand the terms:

• The main purpose of a gamist mechanic is to provide a fun/balanced/engaging game. You may or may not have justifications for them in the narrative, but those are fig leafs. 4e was likely the most gamist version of D&D, with encounter powers, healing surges, splitting magic into combat magic (various class powers) and rituals, and having monster stats unapologetically based on level and role, and the narrative aspect being reverse-engineered from that).
• The chief role of a simulationist mechanic is to convert a thing in the game world into mechanical terms. 3e is probably the edition that leaned the farthest in this direction, by detailing things like how monster stats are built (a crocodile has AC 15 because it has Dex +1 and Natural armor +4; which also means it has AC 11 against a touch attack or AC 14 when flatfooted – the croc's CR 2 is in theory the result of its AC among other things, not the cause of it), how to price and construct magic items, how long it takes to build an item, and assorted other things. D&D's never been very good at being simulationist though, but 3e made a strong attempt.
• And finally, the idea being a narrativist mechanic is to reflect something that happens because it makes for a good story. D&D generally doesn't do these. FATE aspects and associated fate points are a good example: Aspects are statements about a character that are generally true, and players can either call upon them to help at the cost of a fate point, or have the GM suggest that one will cause a problem, in which case the player can gain a fate point to accept or spend a fate point to deny it. This creates a situation where players are rewarded for getting into trouble in a way that gives them resources for future showdowns.

D&D has generally posited itself pretty strongly in the gamist section, with more or less simulationism baked in (mostly as justification for the gamist elements, but sometimes working the other way around as with the various combat maneuvers in 3e)..

 

[clearstream]

Now, some people consider that that balance of fun can only be achieved if people around the table have the same amount of power to influence the game. As an aside, I've met a lot of players who do not think that way, and who are perfectly happy to see other mostly influence the game, and to follow the adventure and the story, contributing only occasionally.

But on the other hand, there are certainly people who, unchecked, would dominate the table. And, not so curiously, these are also people who certainly don't want to have others dominate the table. So now we come down to the power of influence, and in the end, it sort of stems from what the characters are able to do in the game, because, apart from just talking, it's still your characters who have the power to act in the game world and therefore to influence the game. Hence the concept of balance at the level of the characters, technically.

At this stage, I'd like to point out that it's already a fallacy, because even with characters of equal "power", the ability to talk and influence others is personal to the players and you can have characters who are absolutely equal and still some players dominating the table, usually through personal charisma or intelligence (of any kind of intelligence, for example social one and not necessarily IQ).

That's interesting because if the concern is around dominating the table, as you suggest that isn't down to character efficiency alone. As well as matters of personal charisma, there is the distribution of authority to determine the world and narrate what happens. In that sense, D&D has always sustained a great inequality. (A balanced distribution of power has sometimes been needlessly conflated allocation with narrativism.)

It is a further fallacy when you consider that the game is extremely complex and that, if you only have a look at the three pillars, it's impossible to have characters that are absolutely equal in power for all pillars, therefore some will probably be more powerful in some pillars and others in other pillars, but then you see how artificial it is since it also then depends as to how much time the table spends on various pillars, etc.

So if balance is a fallacy, how can it possibly be appealing as a goal for D&D? Either it's not a goal, or D&D is unappealing. If as you suggest it's not really a goal, then on what grounds is D&D gamist? Is that down to the group?

But in the end, if you ask around, you will find that there are a lot of people elsewhere and around here who consider that D&D is a combat game (based on the further fallacy that there are, according to their count, more pages dedicated to combat in the rules). And in any case, balance in the other pillars is extremely hard to measure and enforce through rules, since it comes down even more than anything on the personal capabilities of the players.

Hence that focus on technical combat balance for the characters, as a means to ensure overall balance of the game and, hopefully balance of fun for the players. Which is also why, if you look at all the elements above, I also find that technical balance way overrated, because it's such a miniscule factor in the potential fun at the table, and so easily overridden (if only in the fact that because the DM sets up the fights, the conditions of said fight have an even stronger influence than the characters' capabilities) by other factors that unless there is clearly something very wrong in terms of effects on the combat pillar, I won't even bother looking at it.

This argument as I note, primarily seems to resist the characterisation of D&D as gamist. Right?

 

[clearstream]

I'm sorry, can you please elaborate (including your definition of narrativism) ?

A feature often seen in narrativist games is player choice over whether an attempt succeeds. Fate points are an example. D&D has faint traces of narrativism in TIBFs and inspiration.

To me however, narrativism is better defined by premise and dramatic character development, and that seems very much down to the group to choose to opt into. One runs into the question of whether TTRPG can really be analysed on the basis of the game artifact (the game text) or only the interpretation (the game in play.) The former never really happens, because anyone supposing they are analysing on the basis of the game as artifact is really prospectively playing it (playing it in their mind) to decide what the game model and rules imply. That leads to some remarkably divergent intuitions about what a given game is about.

 

[JohnF]

Another way to look at this is to apply the terms more to the DM than to the books of rules themselves. I believe the D&D rules - particularly 5e - apply to all three categories, but the way some DM's might host sessions, present their scenarios, and apply the books' rules would reveal an inherent leaning into one category over another. (The players, too have a part in this, but I'm just thinking about DMs.)

Our regular DM and I both run 5e, but, if you eavesdropped on our separate sessions, you might think we were running two different systems. For example, I'm quite the gamist and love to follow the DMG's Adventuring Day structures. Our regular DM thrives on a narrative approach, eschewing rules for more a "table LARP" vibe that elevates personality traits, bonds, and flaws to a rather FATE-like degree. (Our combat encounters do look and sound the same for the most part.)

 

[clearstream]

Balance is appealing because D&D is a game played for fun. No one likes to feel that they're letting the group down or being sidelined. If one player's character gets to do twice as much stuff as another players', then that can lead to feeling left out, or dissatisfied/believing that they have made a mistake.

Do you feel that is distinctive of gamism? Would you say that narrativist and simulationist players don't mind feeling left out?

 

[Krachek]

So I call gamist the play with an important need to respect the rules and game mechanics. To this behavior I can add the expectation to have a sharp balanced experience for all players.

Does DnD incite gamist behavior in term of pushing the need to respect the rules and mechanics as a key to run the game?

The rules admit that they don’t cover all situation and the DM must make personal decision during the game play. The rules also allow the DM to choose the outcome of games situation without rolling dice. There is also the Ruling over rules attitude that is promoted, and we can also take a look a « Rule as fun » concept. Those two aim more to a smooth rather than rigid rule application. For the sharp balance of the game, I point out that the game first choice to determine ability score is rolled stat. To me that is a clear incentive that the game may be balanced but don’t care too much about it.

So I conclude that game by itself don’t incite gamist or can be qualified as gamist.

 

[Campbell]

Gamism is Step On Up. The core conceit of gamist design is that the game exists primarily to challenge the players. Mechanics are developed to reward players for navigating a challenging play space. In D&D's case (as it was originally designed) this means rewarding XP and magic items for separating monsters from their treasure. It also includes puzzle box monster design, wandering monster tables, exploration turns and the like to put pressure on the PCs to navigate the play space with skill.

One common sign you might be seeing a gamist design is large lists of discrete mechanical elements (monsters, magic items, spells, feats, etc) because they help to create an environment where knowledge of the game's overall meta is crucial to success. Classic D&D's monster and dungeon/module design is the prime example of the sort of play where high level knowledge acquired through experience in the game is rewarded.

Contrast this with a game like Marvel Heroic Roleplay where players are rewarded not for overcoming challenges, but instead for complicating their character's lives in character specific and thematic ways. Also has minimal discrete mechanics and does not require any knowledge of the game's overall meta to achieve character success.

Gamism is at heart all about rewarding skill at playing a game and overcoming challenges.

 

[Ovinomancer]

As I understand the terms:

• The main purpose of a gamist mechanic is to provide a fun/balanced/engaging game. You may or may not have justifications for them in the narrative, but those are fig leafs. 4e was likely the most gamist version of D&D, with encounter powers, healing surges, splitting magic into combat magic (various class powers) and rituals, and having monster stats unapologetically based on level and role, and the narrative aspect being reverse-engineered from that).
• The chief role of a simulationist mechanic is to convert a thing in the game world into mechanical terms. 3e is probably the edition that leaned the farthest in this direction, by detailing things like how monster stats are built (a crocodile has AC 15 because it has Dex +1 and Natural armor +4; which also means it has AC 11 against a touch attack or AC 14 when flatfooted – the croc's CR 2 is in theory the result of its AC among other things, not the cause of it), how to price and construct magic items, how long it takes to build an item, and assorted other things. D&D's never been very good at being simulationist though, but 3e made a strong attempt.
• And finally, the idea being a narrativist mechanic is to reflect something that happens because it makes for a good story. D&D generally doesn't do these. FATE aspects and associated fate points are a good example: Aspects are statements about a character that are generally true, and players can either call upon them to help at the cost of a fate point, or have the GM suggest that one will cause a problem, in which case the player can gain a fate point to accept or spend a fate point to deny it. This creates a situation where players are rewarded for getting into trouble in a way that gives them resources for future showdowns.

D&D has generally posited itself pretty strongly in the gamist section, with more or less simulationism baked in (mostly as justification for the gamist elements, but sometimes working the other way around as with the various combat maneuvers in 3e)..

No. Again, narrativism is very badly wrong, here, but in general the concepts get less useful when applied to individual mechanics because the Gamist/Simulationst/Narrativist model is about the agenda of the game -- what is the game, as a whole, trying to do. They're all games, RPGs are, so every single one of the has bits that are about playing a game.

To address your Gamist, this is defined in terms of not being simulationist -- it's a negative space, not a positive one. But, again, it's meant to apply to the overall creative agenda -- gamist agenda is about the it being a game, and approached and played from that concept space. You can absolutely play D&D from a gamist agenda, in that you're going to apply the rules as a game first and engage with skilled play to defeat the game. Early D&D was clearly an outgrowth of this agenda, and B/X is probably the purest version of it in any D&D edition. Here, the resolution system has to be clear and unchanging, otherwise the game becomes incoherent.

Simulationist means that the game is focused on an internal causality -- it's meant to present a world or concept to be explored and experienced. These games focus on consistency of presentation of the world. D&D clearly embraces this approach as well, but it does so both with the "sandbox" approach where the world is entirely independent of PCs and also the "big plot" games where the exploration is of a prepared plotline. Effectively, to quote Ron Edwards, "Internal cause is king." The system is again paramount here because the system is the causality created. That said, the placement of the GM over the rules is doing good work here because the GM can be the system in simulationist games.

Narrativism has nothing to do with narration or choosing a good story. Narrativism is hard to articulate because it bumps into terms people routines ascribe in vague and overbroad ways, but it's not really a hard concept. Once you get it, it's blindingly obvious what it's about. Simply put, it's about centering the PCs are the focus of play, having the PCs establish a premise to be explored, and then exploring that premise through play. It's critical that nothing be established prior to play, because everything is to be established in play. The Ron Edwards essay on narrativism is subtitled "Story Now" not because it's about creating story -- Edwards uses story to mean what happens during play -- but because it's entirely focused on the now. We don't know what happens next, or how the premise will change, or even how the characters will change because we're playing to find that out right now. This doesn't mean we're seeing if how the players overcome a prepared challenge the GM has -- it's not about uncertainty of exact detail. It's about only focusing play on what is happening right this moment, and then using that to feed into what happens in the next moment. You cannot predict how a Narrativst game will go because that's the point of the agenda -- to find out. System in Narrativist play is immutable like it is in Gamist play -- it's very important to have a system that isn't available to either side to put their thumb on the scale in any way. All inputs have to be clear and resolution clear so that we all have to react (players and GM) equally to the outcomes.

These are overall agendas, not specific moments. D&D is usually going to be gamist or simulationist as it plays, but most often it toggles and you can see this because the majority of posts about issues with D&D are issues attributable directly to the conflicts between gamist and simulationist play. D&D doesn't even pay scant tribute to narrativist play, with the clear exception of 4e, which functioned best as a narrativist game but never actually told anyone this. If you didn't already grok narrativist play, and didn't see it in 4e, you weren't going to really notice it overmuch. As such, it often reverted to gamist play most often and the majority of complaints you see about it all revolve around some offense to internal causality.