Why Jargon is Bad, and Some Modern Resources for RPG Theory

[The-Magic-Sword]

One frustration I have with the way we use jargon is that the words and definition you use function as a kind of framework for what ideas you can even express-- language can in essence control whats possible in your conceptual space. So I'm comfortable with Forge Jargon as a lens, but defaulting back to it in every conversation especially for non-forge games, makes it hard to discuss ideas that the framework (Edwards mainly) wouldn't endorse or didnt come to as part of their movement.

This is somewhat problematic especially in the context of words like "simulation" "narrative" and "game" which all have intuitive non forge meanings that predate their codification-- the conceptual drift between their forge meanings and their other meanings aren't imperfections of understanding, they're differences in framework.

 

[Aldarc]

One frustration I have with the way we use jargon is that the words and definition you use function as a kind of framework for what ideas you can even express-- language can in essence control whats possible in your conceptual space. So I'm comfortable with Forge Jargon as a lens, but defaulting back to it in every conversation especially for non-forge games, makes it hard to discuss ideas that the framework (Edwards mainly) wouldn't endorse or didnt come to as part of their movement.

This is somewhat problematic especially in the context of words like "simulation" "narrative" and "game" which all have intuitive non forge meanings that predate their codification-- the conceptual drift between their forge meanings and their other meanings aren't imperfections of understanding, they're differences in framework.

I agree, but I also think that this problem predates the Forge, as Edwards was modifying the preceding, prevailing model (i.e., GDS), which also had its own sense of "simulationism" and "gamism." It gets a bit confusing not only because of the factors you mention, but also because some people still operate from a GDS framework, particularly in their understanding of 'simulationism.'

 

[Garthanos]

It obviously can be beneficial in other genres, but some characters in other genres are, well, kind of disconnected.

That seems more like a failing than a genre feature nor do I feel it was a core part of the fiction which inspired D&D. In fact that lack of world connection is a part of D&D that I have blamed the murder hobo phenomena on.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I've got no particular view on Torner's work, which I haven't read. But I agree with your basic point.

I think that the sociology of gameplay isn't necessarily relevant to technical questions of game design: for instance, it seems to be within the scope of plausible results from sociological research into gameplay that playing games serves a similar function in American urban communities today as it did thirty years ago. (I'm not saying that's true, or even the most plausible conclusion on the question; just that it doesn't seem so implausible as to be fairly obviously false, or a result that would be greeted with incredulity.) But even if such a thing were true, that wouldn't tell us anything about game design and whether or not it's developed in some way.

Right, I think this is really where I'm coming from as well. Its quite possible that D&D has much the same social function and form that it did in 1981. Discussion of that, which seems to be pretty adjacent to the whole "taxonomies of players" thing that Torner seems to be hung up on, may well be of the form "gosh, this hasn't changed much." I just don't even see the sort of taxonomy-like stuff that is embodied in things like the WotC survey and discussions of 'Timmies' and 'Optimizers' and 'Actors', and 'Explorers' even relates much to what guys like Edwards are talking about. I mean, certainly player and game agendas connect with these classification schemes in some sense, but a set of analytical tools like GNS is aimed at understanding the actual form and process of play, whereas debates about whether people want to fight or explore (all inevitably had within the structural assumptions of Trad D&D generally) don't even relate to that much at all.

The point of a system like Apocalypse World or Blades in the Dark, relative to D&D, isn't to change the social system within which gameplay occurs. Nor to change the fundamental reasons why people play games.

The same thing could be said about recipes. Good chefs are inventing new recipes all the time, but not with the goal of changing the basic social logic of food, eating, dining out, etc. That doesn't mean that no chef has ever developed anything new. Likewise for cinema: Citizen Kane didn't revolutionise the social logic of cinema - other inventions from outside the domain of film-making, perhaps most obviously television, have done that - but that doesn't mean it didn't make significant technical innovations within the domain of film-making.

I made a post in a similar vein to yours nearly a decade ago:

It took time, experimentation, reflection and ultimately a particular group of designers to work out how to do this stuff. You mention Blades in the Dark, but I think the clearest technical realisation of it is Apocalypse World.

Right on. I agree that Apocalypse World probably represents the fulcrum or pivot point where modern RPGs emerged in their present form. Games like Sorcerer and Everway and whatnot definitely presaged that, but AW is really the game which presents all the parts in a fully realized cohesive form which can be replicated and elaborated on as a pattern. This is really almost the first time an enduring pattern of game design has arisen which contrasts with the paradigm of D&D at all levels. I mean, there are definitely many variations of mechanical structure (skill systems instead of leveling systems, dice pools, etc. etc. etc.) but with AW you finally get a fundamentally reimagined RPG paradigm in a mature form that isn't just a sort of weird one-off experiment. The coining of the term PbtA itself signifies the final coming out of a revolution in RPGs.

So sure, Edwards, Baker, et al. may be addressing the same old social and cultural questions and structure that the RPG world has always existed in (though I personally think the cultural milieu has changed a good bit in the last 40 years) but their approach to actual game design and play has a pretty significantly different character. I don't know if Peterson, Torner, White, etc. are actually out there playing these various games or not, but if they aren't acknowledging the significance of this evolution, then they're missing something that feels pretty significant to me!

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

GURPS and HERO actually do have that in spite of being really early offering saw them in early 80s. Where players may define their own mentors / contacts / adversaries / enemies and rivals and so on.... or other events and expect them to enter play or even control how often.

Hero System (in its various incarnations) starting with Champions offered a LOT of this kind of stuff, yes. You could even define how your powers worked in terms of external things like constraints and what their source might be which could definitely drive play. The game didn't quite go the next step and really make that sort of thing the core driver of play in an explicit way though. Like there's still the conception of a GM who constructs scenarios and runs the players through them. Interestingly when we played Champions my recollection is that things WERE pretty centered on how we wrote our characters. It was a side game, so the person GMing it didn't spend much prep on it (because he was running our D&D campaign too). We did think that was kind of cool, but IIRC the attitude back then was something like "Oh, gosh, this game makes you invent a bunch of backstory. Maybe we shouldn't have given the GM so much ammo to use against us!" lol. Like, the possibility was there, latent in the game, but we didn't really have the conceptual framework constructed in our heads to use it like you might use similar things in BW or even FATE based games today.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I agree, but I also think that this problem predates the Forge, as Edwards was modifying the preceding, prevailing model (i.e., GDS), which also had its own sense of "simulationism" and "gamism." It gets a bit confusing not only because of the factors you mention, but also because some people still operate from a GDS framework, particularly in their understanding of 'simulationism.'

As an observation on this, GDS had to deal with the fact it was originally a conversation between dramatists and simulationists (in its usage); this had two consequences. First, it probably over-weighted the preference for simulationism, that, while likely more common in that period, was never as significant an interest as its position in GDS would have suggested. Secondly, since gamism came in late, and was never as well represented as dramatism and simulationism, it tended to get defined by people who weren't much interested in it. As such it was kind of the red-headed stepchild of the model.

I see some of the same things with GNS: N became defined by a very specific style preference, taking up a big piece of mindspace. G at least showed some sign of people involved understanding what it was about, but with assumptions that don't seem to entirely to match up with reality. And the rest of GDS dramatism gets swept into S, which puts it together with GDS sim, which essentially says the whole set of distinctions most of the people who put together GDS were making are, well, trivial.

This shows a fundamental problem with jargon outside of physical description (and perhaps even there); its going to be heavily colored by those who develop the terminology with their own biases and interests.

 

[Thomas Shey]

That seems more like a failing than a genre feature nor do I feel it was a core part of the fiction which inspired D&D. In fact that lack of world connection is a part of D&D that I have blamed the murder hobo phenomena on.

I think that privileges a certain sort of fiction, honestly. It says the only legitimate fiction is that which is situated so that character's position in their very specific part of society is always and primarily going to be relevant. That excludes a pretty large amount of adventure fiction that well predates D&D, simply because it excludes any character or characters who are chronically on the move.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Mayyy-be? I wasn't even thinking about resource systems/management when I wrote what you quoted.

Right, it just seemed apropos. I was thinking for example of the differences in resource models between 4e and 5e (easy to compare since they are 'sister' games). 5e generally plays differently for different PCs depending on the challenges faced (IE casters generally want short workdays, whereas a battlemaster is much less likely to care). 4e will play differently if there is one encounter or five before a long rest, but the difference will be basically identical for all characters. So there may be adventure designs or 'patterns of play' that work better in one than the other.

 

[overgeeked]

One frustration I have with the way we use jargon is that the words and definition you use function as a kind of framework for what ideas you can even express-- language can in essence control whats possible in your conceptual space. So I'm comfortable with Forge Jargon as a lens, but defaulting back to it in every conversation especially for non-forge games, makes it hard to discuss ideas that the framework (Edwards mainly) wouldn't endorse or didnt come to as part of their movement.

This is somewhat problematic especially in the context of words like "simulation" "narrative" and "game" which all have intuitive non forge meanings that predate their codification-- the conceptual drift between their forge meanings and their other meanings aren't imperfections of understanding, they're differences in framework.

This is one of the reason I dislike jargon. It’s infinitely better to discuss the actual ideas behind them and you can more easily see what people actually mean rather than assuming we all mean the same thing. As seen in these threads, even people steeped in the jargon often disagree about the meaning of those words. Though the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis still applies.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Hero System (in its various incarnations) starting with Champions offered a LOT of this kind of stuff, yes. You could even define how your powers worked in terms of external things like constraints and what their source might be which could definitely drive play. The game didn't quite go the next step and really make that sort of thing the core driver of play in an explicit way though. Like there's still the conception of a GM who constructs scenarios and runs the players through them.

Well, the issue is (as someone who had a fair bit indirectly to do with how Champions character construction works) is that its very clear when dealing with superhero characters that there is a great degree of engagement with the world around them and their own specific natures that they, effectively, walk in the door with (I'm excluding for the moment the "young heroes" subgenre here because it has a slightly different dynamic).

That, however, does not intrinsically say anything about how the players of same are going to interact with that world outside those specific traits. While I think its entirely defensible to suggest supers are one of those genre that if not demands, favors engagement on a more authorial level than others, the idea of the borders in play (as compared to during character creation) were still pretty strong then. Its notable that Hero is still one of the few superhero-supporting systems that has barely even a metacurrency (I think its still optional). The only other one I know of that vintage that does so is because its author is actively hostile to anything that expects a player to engage with the game on anything but a purely IC level.

Interestingly when we played Champions my recollection is that things WERE pretty centered on how we wrote our characters. It was a side game, so the person GMing it didn't spend much prep on it (because he was running our D&D campaign too). We did think that was kind of cool, but IIRC the attitude back then was something like "Oh, gosh, this game makes you invent a bunch of backstory. Maybe we shouldn't have given the GM so much ammo to use against us!" lol. Like, the possibility was there, latent in the game, but we didn't really have the conceptual framework constructed in our heads to use it like you might use similar things in BW or even FATE based games today.

I'll tell you a little secret; the whole point in having Champions Disadvantages and Limitations set up the way they were was as a method of bribing people to take genre-appropriate flaws that not all of them would likely do if they were just going to be a way of tossing the GM handles on them. Its essentially a solution to the fact that not everyone playing a superhero game--even people familiar with and fond of the genre--are always going to be willing to abandon the part of their focus is on game just to make the story-structure of the genre look right.