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

[Aldarc]

As a tongue-in-cheek aside, I am beginning to believe that D&D's "gamist" character can also be evidenced in how D&D is seemingly discussed by its more fervent fans in terms of "winning" and "popularity," which is likewise used to deflect unwelcomed criticism of the game or subject it to the discomfort of theoretical analysis. This is to say that there is an underlying sentiment that any and all game analysis doesn't matter because "D&D won."

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Why? Why is it "narrower" to want play to be about authoring fiction with a "point", rather than to want it to be about "winning"? I don't even know how one would begin to judge what is broad or narrow here.

Because it is actually about authoring fiction in very specific manner about very specific type of points.

Simulationism means enjoying the fiction for its own sake. This is not the goal of story now play.

I mean I really wouldn't describe trying to accurately model the functioning of several weapons as enjoying the fiction for its own sake. Also, what even "for its own sake" means? I'm sure we could dissect various way and reasons people enjoy fiction. Also, what happens if during a Story Now game the participants enjoy the resulting fiction for it's own sake? How it is measured whether they do? Frankly, the whole sentence seems vague and meaningless.

And high-concept sim may have a point.

I see. So it actually is not enjoying the fiction for its own sake? It can actually be about making a point?

But that point is not authored via play.

It is not? It certainly can be explored via play.

It is introduced prior to play, as @niklinna (I think I'm remembering right) has posted about already in this thread.

Like in Story Now game you establish your character's dramatic needs before the play.

Edwards has used various sorts of descriptions.

Here's one:

Narrativism is expressed by the creation, via role-playing, of a story with a recognizable theme. The characters are formal protagonists in the classic Lit 101 sense, and the players are often considered co-authors. The listed elements [character, system, setting, situation, colour] provide the material for narrative conflict (again, in the specialized sense of literary analysis).​

Pretty much everything in this apart the players being co-authors (if we understand this in brad sense as authoring significant setting elements rather than merely the actions, words, thought and feelings of their characters) can happen in character focused traditional game. Now what degree the system contributes to the narrative conflict of course depends on the system and what sort of conflicts you feel are narratively significant is a matter of taste.

A year or two later he tried it this way:

Story Now requires that at least one engaging issue or problematic feature of human existence be addressed in the process of role-playing. "Address" means:​

​

• Establishing the issue's Explorative expressions in the game-world, "fixing" them into imaginary place.
• Developing the issue as a source of continued conflict, perhaps changing any number of things about it, such as which side is being taken by a given character, or providing more depth to why the antagonistic side of the issue exists at all.
• Resolving the issue through the decisions of the players of the protagonists, as well as various features and constraints of the circumstances.

Can it really be that easy? Yes, Narrativism is that easy. The Now refers to the people, during actual play, focusing their imagination to create those emotional moments of decision-making and action, and paying attention to one another as they do it. To do that, they relate to "the story" very much as authors do for novels, as playwrights do for plays, and screenwriters do for film at the creative moment or moments. Think of the Now as meaning, "in the moment," or "engaged in doing it," in terms of input and emotional feedback among one another. The Now also means "get to it," in which "it" refers to any Explorative element or combination of elements that increases the enjoyment of that issue I'm talking about.​

​

So explore significant issue via character drama. Yes, a lot of games do this.

There cannot be any "the story" during Narrativist play, because to have such a thing (fixed plot or pre-agreed theme) is to remove the whole point: the creative moments of addressing the issue(s). Story Now has a great deal in common with Step On Up, particularly in the social expectation to contribute, but in this case the real people's attention is directed toward one another's insights toward the issue, rather than toward strategy and guts. . . .​

​

Narrativist role-playing is defined by the people involved placing their direct creative attention toward Premise and toward birthing its child, theme. It sounds simple, and in many ways it is. The real variable is the emotional connection that everyone at the table makes when a player-character does something. If that emotional connection is identifiable as a Premise, and if that connection is nurtured and developed through the real-people interactions, then Narrativist play is under way.​

What is the difference between the premise and the theme? How is the premise not a theme? How are the dramatic needs we establish for characters at least directly informing the them if if not themes themselves?

In the same essay, he also endorses this drawing of the contrast between high-concept sim and narrativism:

in Simulationist gaming, a long and complex story might come about and be part of play, but only for the express purpose of bringing about all the appropriate genre elements in the game as part of the internal consistency of the Dream. . . . their inclusion in the game, part and parcel as they are to the Dream, isn't Narrativist because no one is creating a theme that isn't already there. In other words, it's just played out as the Situation part of the Exploration; because the Dream calls for it, there just so happens to be a kind of intricacy involved.​

​

In Narrativism, by contrast, the major source of themes are the ones that are brought to the table by the players / GM (if there is one) regardless of the genre or setting used. So, to sum up, themes in Nar play are created by the participants and that's the point; themes in Sim play are already present in the Dream, reinforced by the play, and kind of a by-product.​

So the difference is whether the there is theme of campaign or whether players bring the themes via their characters? But certainly in most games both of these things are present?

And that fits with his earlier remark that

In Simulationist play, morality cannot be imposed by the player or, except as the representative of the imagined world, by the GM. Theme is already part of the cosmos; it's not produced by metagame decisions. Morality, when it's involved, is "how it is" in the game-world . . .​

Story now play involves the participants, in the moment of play and via the processes of play, conveying something that bears upon theme or dramatic premise. It locates the point of RPGing as being the same as most authoring in other media, ie having something to say and saying it. And doing that in the moment of play.

I have to say I find Edwards writing style extremely irritation and poor in conveying information. It is full of buzzwords and wishy washy vagueness. Probably a "me issue," but still.

If you're asking for examples of "points", well here are some (from my RPGing experiences): what/who will I sacrifice for my brother?; will I save my brother even though he is evil?; what will I do to get revenge?; what will I do to keep the Elven ways?; it's worth setting myself back to show up my rival!; I will destroy the evidence that shows I'm descended from an evil mage, even my mother's childhood letters; I will risk death to defend Aramina; I won't set aside my principles to reach accommodation with my brother; I will give up my own chaos-sourced power to seal the Abyss; I will marry to keep the peace and make an ally; I will choose my marriage over my love; I will redeem the Celtic undead; I will wield my power to defeat the Nazgul!; when forced to choose, I choose the Raven Queen over Vecna, even at cost to myself; "I feel really good about not having killed that bear", said after the PCs tamed it instead.

And these are questions that can come across in any RPG. Yes, characters in RPGs tend to have beliefs and make choices.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

This is an important point. What incoherence means is "doesn't align." When you have two different goals of play -- like high-octane challenging combat and a storyline where characters are tightly integrated -- you get competing agendas: challenge the players but keep characters alive. Usually, this incoherence gets resolved by choosing one or the other in play, so the fact you have these two competing agendas is most often solved without problem in play by the table choosing one or the other in the moment. They "toggle" as they need to. But the incoherence is pointing out that you cannot do both things at the same time -- there has to be a choice.

I don't think this is quite accurate. Agendas can conflict, but they can also be harmonised and support each other. For example people might desire a realistic challenge, so sim and gamism work together to achieve this. And of course GNS is poor in identifying agendas anyway, as the conflicting things can just as easily fall under the same GNS bracket than under different ones. For example dramatism, genre emulation and process simulation might conflict with each other, and often do, but in GNS they're all sim.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I don't think this is quite accurate. Agendas can conflict, but they can also be harmonised and support each other. For example people might desire a realistic challenge, so sim and gamism work together to achieve this.

What is a realistic challenge? If we're harmonizing agenda here, in the scope of what I said, then we need to identify and harmonize some version of "I want to experience the fiction for the sake of the fiction" and "I want to engage in a challenge I can leverage my skill to win." So, this sounds, at first blush, like it's trivial, right? But let's look at an example -- say 5e combat. We can do challenge, sure, but there's almost no fiction generated by the combat engine. The fiction only comes in with conditions and when creatures lose all their hitpoints and with some positioning and stuff. But we're not experiencing, really, the fiction of combat from the system because it's pretty thin on details of hits and damage and things. So, we "harmonize" and provide some flavor and details, and describe that hit as being stabbed in the leg. Sure, now we have fiction to experience, but then this nearly immediately gets challenged by the system as the PCs take a short rest, burn a hit die, and suddenly that stab wound in the leg is, well, not there? Ouch, experiencing the fiction is taking one in the face!

So, then, how can we harmonize? We toggle. In a given moment in 5e, we're concerned about the fiction, so we do that, but then we discard that fiction when we need to worry about the challenge part. And vice versa. It's not harmonizing, it's switching back and forth as needed. Hitpoints are so not about experiencing the fiction that anything that touches them becomes fraught from that lens. However, many of us have decades of experience in doing exactly this kind of toggle and most of those have never really thought much about it, so you get ideas that this is how it is, it's a harmonious whole, and it's perfectly easy to mesh these things. But, it's not, we toggle and don't notice. If you do not believe this, start another thread about hitpoints and see the argument between gamism and simulationism brought straight to the front.

And of course GNS is poor in identifying agendas anyway, as the conflicting things can just as easily fall under the same GNS bracket than under different ones. For example dramatism, genre emulation and process simulation might conflict with each other, and often do, but in GNS they're all sim.

Nope, and saying this is showing a lack of understanding about GNS. You don't have to agree with it -- I have points of disagreement. But I also find it best to actually understand something from it's own point of view so that I can best articulate my disagreements. Steelmanning and then disagreeing is far more persuasive that strawmanning and hoping no one notices.

 

[Ovinomancer]

@Crimson Longinus

I find that D&D only works inside a very narrow point. You always have the GM presenting the fiction and then the players respond to it. There's nothing else going on, really -- it's just very narrow.

I'm sure you disagree with this statement, but you may want to consider how it's as accurate about your play as your statement about Story Now being narrow. You've picked this point of view -- very high level -- for SN and claimed it's too narrow because everything fits in that little dot 10k feet below, but you won't look at anything else from the same vantage point -- you want to get up close and note how, from here, it's very wide. It's a poor rhetorical device.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

What is a realistic challenge? If we're harmonizing agenda here, in the scope of what I said, then we need to identify and harmonize some version of "I want to experience the fiction for the sake of the fiction" and "I want to engage in a challenge I can leverage my skill to win." So, this sounds, at first blush, like it's trivial, right? But let's look at an example -- say 5e combat. We can do challenge, sure, but there's almost no fiction generated by the combat engine. The fiction only comes in with conditions and when creatures lose all their hitpoints and with some positioning and stuff. But we're not experiencing, really, the fiction of combat from the system because it's pretty thin on details of hits and damage and things. So, we "harmonize" and provide some flavor and details, and describe that hit as being stabbed in the leg. Sure, now we have fiction to experience, but then this nearly immediately gets challenged by the system as the PCs take a short rest, burn a hit die, and suddenly that stab wound in the leg is, well, not there? Ouch, experiencing the fiction is taking one in the face!

So, then, how can we harmonize? We toggle. In a given moment in 5e, we're concerned about the fiction, so we do that, but then we discard that fiction when we need to worry about the challenge part. And vice versa. It's not harmonizing, it's switching back and forth as needed. Hitpoints are so not about experiencing the fiction that anything that touches them becomes fraught from that lens. However, many of us have decades of experience in doing exactly this kind of toggle and most of those have never really thought much about it, so you get ideas that this is how it is, it's a harmonious whole, and it's perfectly easy to mesh these things. But, it's not, we toggle and don't notice. If you do not believe this, start another thread about hitpoints and see the argument between gamism and simulationism brought straight to the front.

Whilst I disagree that 5e combat system generates "almost no fiction," I agree that as sims go, it is not great. But it probably also wouldn't be a choice of people who wish "realistic challenge" in the first place. I was not talking just about D&D. Having more robustly simulationistic system doesn't need to conflict with providing an interesting challenge (though of course this depends on the sort of challenge you desire) and it can even support it. Basically the desire in such a simulation would be for the system to create simulation of the challenge the action being simulated would have in reality (or in the source fiction.) Like how the purpose of some wargames is to realistically to simulate the sort of command challenges the general leading a real army would face. In such a situation sim and gamist agendas have intertwined to basically become one.

Nope, and saying this is showing a lack of understanding about GNS. You don't have to agree with it -- I have points of disagreement. But I also find it best to actually understand something from it's own point of view so that I can best articulate my disagreements. Steelmanning and then disagreeing is far more persuasive that strawmanning and hoping no one notices.

Nope what? What part of what I said you actually disagree with? You do not think thank that different creative agendas that GNS places under one banner can conflict with each others? You don't think that process sim and genre emulation desires can conflict? Because like the discussion about superheroes in some recent threads show, they absolutely can.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I find that D&D only works inside a very narrow point. You always have the GM presenting the fiction and then the players respond to it. There's nothing else going on, really -- it's just very narrow.

In absolute sense that is true. (Though of course further fiction the GM presents is informed by the player responses, albeit not in same degree than in story now.) And I actually think typical story now play has a significant difference in the process here. How the participants contribute to the shared fiction is different. It is just that Edward's waffling doesn't seem to focus on, or highlight this difference in the process, but focuses mostly on subject matter (dramatic needs of the characters etc) which actually is something that can and is explored in other styles, nor it is the only thing one can do with this sort of a process.

I'm sure you disagree with this statement, but you may want to consider how it's as accurate about your play as your statement about Story Now being narrow. You've picked this point of view -- very high level -- for SN and claimed it's too narrow because everything fits in that little dot 10k feet below, but you won't look at anything else from the same vantage point -- you want to get up close and note how, from here, it's very wide. It's a poor rhetorical device.

Narrativism seem to be defined by what and how, whilst other categories are just defined by what. This to me seems inconsistent.

 

[soviet]

Or is it just that they're defined by a 'how' you are already used to? That you (and many others) simply take as read?

 

[Scott Christian]

Its more that the term agreement is not strong here, which is always a problem outside of formalized settings. There's not much help for that, but with terminology at least some of the participants are talking about the same things. Without it, you have to go back to first causes on everything every time, and even hobbyists rarely have the energy for that.

I'm not sure. In my opinion, some of the participants is what causes fractures. Don't get me wrong, I get the need for classification, I just think sometimes classification forgets the need of most of its participants.

 

[Scott Christian]

Heck, the absolute head 'sploding that goes on when we suggest that maybe we don't need to tie races to specific classes to give advantages and disadvantages in play based on the race you take shows just how ingrained Gamist priorities are. Being able to create a character that fits a player's particular narrative needs takes a FAR backseat to forcing everyone to prioritize in-game advantages.

Forgive me for being naive, but wouldn't tying specific races to classes imply a narrative game?