Authenticity in RPGing

[pemerton]

If the thread had been "I think railroading leads to a lack of meaningful choice, and these games in particular are good at evading railroads" no one would have batted an eye

I don’t know about that. I think that the chances may have been better, I’d grant that. But I think plenty would still argue the point because of the perceived slight toward D&D and traditional play. Even though none of the methods cited as problematic are essential to that kind of play.

My experience has been that, in any thread in which it is asserted that a system like AW or BW are particularly good at evading railroads, many posters not only bat their eyes but vociferously deny the contention.

 

[Bedrockgames]

My experience has been that, in any thread in which it is asserted that a system like AW or BW are particularly good at evading railroads, many posters not only bat their eyes but vociferously deny the contention.

I don't doubt those systems are good at evading railroads. That seems to be part of the intention behind many of those systems.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think the three clue thing is deeper than that. If you HAVE to salt clues all over the place like that, then I think there's a kind of play going on that is pretty limited in what it can do in terms of character exploration.

Again see my responses to Hawkeye on this particular point, but I would just repeat all the three clue rule is doing is dealing with the details at the heart of the mystery. It isn't about getting the players to the spot the GM wants. It is about about to manage clues emanating from the heart of a mystery: for every 'conclusion' that can be drawn about the killer (i.e. he is a werewolf, he is a deeply religious, he is good friends with the victim, etc), you should make sure there are three clues related to that. Further the guidelines in the three clue article also talk about this simply being a safety net, not a straight jacket, that you should engage his corollary of Permissive Clue Finding: "if the players come up with a clever approach to their investigation, you should be open to the idea of giving them useful information as a result".

All the three clue rule is is a handy rule of thumb, along with some basic advice on how mysteries function, in order to prevent a problem people often had with mystery adventures. And it is not about structuring the mystery adventure in a linear way or leading the players from point A to point B. The only thing that is fixed at all is there is a mystery with objective facts at the hearts of it (so the players have something to solve), but they can go about discovering those details however they want, and they can take that information and use it however they want (i.e. there isn't a set piece climax waiting for them with the killer). It is a pretty non-railroad approach to adventure design in my opinion:

But, in point of fact, this type of simplistic “A leads to B leads to C leads to D” plotting is not typical of the mystery genre. For a relatively simplistic counter-example, let’s return to Sherlock Holmes in A Study in Scarlet:

WATSON: “That seems simple enough,” said I; but how about the other man’s height?”

HOLMES: “Why, the height of a man, in nine cases out of ten, can be told from the length of his stride. It is a simple calculation enough, though there is no use my boring you with figures. I had this fellow’s stride both on the clay outside and on the dust within. Then I had a way of checking my calculation. When a man writes on a wall, his instinct leads him to write above the level of his own eyes. Now that writing was just over six feet from the ground. It was child’s play.”

This is just one small deduction in a much larger mystery, but you’ll note that Holmes has in fact gathered several clues, studied them, and then distilled a conclusion out of them. And this is, in fact, the typical structure of the mystery genre: The detective slowly gathers a body of evidence until, finally, a conclusion emerges. In the famous words of Holmes himself, “When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

What is true, however, is that in many cases it is necessary for many smaller deductions to be made in order for all of the evidence required to solve the mystery to be gathered. However, as the example from A Study in Scarlet demonstrates, even these smaller deductions can be based on a body of evidence and not just one clue in isolation.

Now this may not be everyone's cup of tea. And I think the three clue rule, like anything else, can be overused, over relied upon (you need other tools and techniques if you want to run mystery adventures). But I ran mysteries and investigations almost exclusively for many, many years (still run them from time to time) and I've done so with a strong desire to avoid railroading the PCs. The three clue rule for me, and the advice in the article, has always been one of the more helpful ones on investigations. And I never found it steered anything towards railroads or towards limiting character exploration in some way. Now as I said before it isn't trying to solve the problem of "players don't have meaningful choices", nor is it trying to solve the problem of railroading, but it is clearly written towards people who were interested in avoiding railroads (that is why he talks about the problem of the breadcrumb trail).

Really I don't know what else one would want the three clue rule to do in order to make it less railroady or place less limits on character exploration. Obviously it is different from a game like Hillfolk, which I have also run a mystery with (and equally obviously the three clue rule is advice, not a game system, but I think it assumes you are using something more like Call of Cthulhu or D&D). With Hillfolk, the way a mystery would be handled is totally different because the players can assert details about NPCs and events that happened int he past and make them so through dialogue (there are methods to countermand this, but basically I as a player can say "But I heard John was seen at the docks drenched in blood last friday" and that pretty much means it happened. This approach also avoids railroads, but it also means you can't have an objective mystery at the heart of the adventure (which is fun, but also a totally different mystery solving experience). You can have an objective thing like at the start of the adventure a body of the sect leader is found in his room. But as you play the background information can be informed by ideas the players present trough their dialogue. That increases player freedom to explore but it also puts limits on things because everyone knows the mystery at the heart isn't nailed down but is in flux, so it means how you portray your character and how the GM portrays NPCs has to account for that unknown (which is limiting because it get into portraying motives). Neither approach is a railroad though. Fundamentally which approach is better is more about what you want in a mystery adventure than about whether or not you are interested in evading railroads or enhancing meaningful choice

 

[clearstream]

There are methods that promote authentic play. Authentic meaning that these choices and actions taken matter.

There are methods that don’t promote that kind of authentic play. Railroading, the three clue rule, and the like. These lead to choices and actions that don’t have all that much impact on play.

I don’t really get who would disagree with this. I feel like disagreeing with it means that folks can share examples of railroading that somehow allows for the kind of authenticity that’s being talked about.

A thought on that is to ask whether a focus on exploring/expressing personal authenticity in itself does anything to guarantee personal authenticity? A person may dissemble on any topic, including sincerity.

An explanatory model I find appealing is that suggested by Miguel Sicart (in the context of ethics in games.) He suggests that to be a player is to adopt a mental duality, i.e. we become our characters without ceasing to be conscious of ourselves as players. For example, we take actions "in character" without being unaware of how we would act in the real world. In RPG we are committed to a sort of simulation (simulated personhood), a sustained pretence in imitation of a person who is not ourselves and may not exist. I think that is as true of BitD as it is of D&D, and that word - simulation - is an important one. Each player can simulate their character with or without any special adherence to personal authenticity.

That may seem regressive, but I believe it reveals two concerns. Firstly, a person who simulates may persuade those around them of their personal authenticity, without that guaranteeing they possess or even have any interest in such qualities. Consequently, a game that does not overtly create space for or lead players to focus on exploring/expressing personal authenticity may be no less likely a circle within which to find them doing so. Simulated behaviour is not identical to genuine behaviour.

I think it is right to say that story games set out to lessen the character-player duality that I described above. So must a player of BitD be guaranteed to evince greater personal authenticity than a player in D&D? I don't call actors liars, even given their specific skill is to portray a falsehood with every appearance of personal authenticy. That is, I draw clear lines between simulation and personal authenticity, and I seem to think that the former can be done with/without the latter. Seeing as I do not equate simulation with personal inauthencity, can I really turn around and equate simulation in circumstances of lessened duality with any greater personal authenticity? It would come down to what I think the results of lessened duality are.

I can say that in story games, character is brought nearer to player and through mechanisms promoting autonomous conscious choice space is defined, expanded, or perhaps outright created in which player is more able to simulate themself-as-character. (This is the antithesis of immersionist play, which is driven by creativity, curiousity, delight in discovery, and empathy.) Given their methods and focus it seems right to say that story games bring players to notice and question how they might simulate in ways that do not transgress and ideally expound however they construct themselves.

For those with concerns about the shade that might cast, I think one can safely say that it does nothing at all to promise that any player is/is-not more personally authentic... not even in their play. It may attempt to put a player's personal authenticity more on display, but again "a person may dissemble on any topic". Games like BitD can do nothing to avoid false simulation - although I think in their context they demand and reveal personal authenticity - they may even inadvertently encourage insincerities. Games like D&D take simulation on face value (appropriately enough.)

I think that for some gamers, "story" games can lean into behaviours that feel (to them) inappropriate in the context of "play". I find myself sometimes wincing at clumsy or painful simulation. These are the risks, I suppose, that @Campbell might have been writing of. In any case, this would in the end accept the OP's argument, at least to the extent of conceding that they call for that behaviour. I could therefore conclude with the following

• Personal authenticity is perforce a property of a player, not a character
• Where player is united with character, then we should see their personal authenticity more visibily inside the magic circle
• Where player is separate from character, their personal authenticity remains implicated in their choices of what their character says and does
• To the extent that player is simulating character, they perforce translate what is personally authentic to them into what their character says and does, so if their character is imagined to be psychologically and culturally different from them, they can only guess at what would count as personally authentic for that character: such guessing doesn't rest on whether player personal authenticity is/is-not on display inside the magic circle

Crucially, not setting out to explore/express personal authenticity is not the same as not choosing actions in any context with more rather than less, better rather than worse, personal authenticity. (As an aside, this thread really helped highlight for me some of the virtues of immersionism.)

NOTE EDITS of bullet points. It's a complex topic! There are only interim conclusions in the interests of advancing our conversation. Not final destinations.

 

[Umbran]

Fair enough. What you think of as counselling, I think of as friendship, collaboration and genuine conversation.

If you are trying to avoid having folks thin Snarf is right in his assessment, this maybe isn't a good way to do it. Putting this together with the prior writing yields, "My game is about friendship, collaboration, and genuine conversation, other games squelch those things!" This is a weird thing to say to people on a messageboard traditionally centered on D&D news, among people who have developed lifelong, authentic friendships playing D&D. You get pushback largely because the truth of their lived experiences belie your assertions.

Game rules do not force "genuine" or "authentic" emotional and psychological engagement. One can be a fakey poseur just as easily playing Blades in the Dark or D&D.

And the psychological safety required for genuine and authentic interactions is not generated by the rulesets, either. They are a function of the people at the table demonstrating that they give a crap about each other, and demonstrating that they will respect personal boundaries and needs, which, again, the rules do nothing to enforce either way.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

What if a character has a Belief that "I will always choose the right-hand path!" And a player, by choosing to go right, manifests that Belief in play. Depending on other features of the game being played, the procedures adopted, etc, this might be meaningful. And might connect in some fashion to authenticity.

Or flip it around: if that character's player chooses to go left despite the Belief, maybe they are setting things up for some kind of character epiphany, or are inviting the GM to "bring it on".

This is why I think that these sorts of examples of decision-making need a lot of context to be provided before we are able to talk about their relationship to meaning, authenticity etc.

Well, I agree, and we did explore that a bit in some later posts than the one you quoted, though not in the terms you put it here. I think, as per my later statements, that the problem I have is really with the word 'choice'. What choice is there when you have no information? Sure, you can PICK 'left' or 'right', and you can instill it with some sort of meaning or plot significance or something. I don't think its necessary in most play to even discuss the 'decision' though (again, I touched on 4e's skip to the good stuff) BUT you have posited a situation where the PCs have BROUGHT meaning to it, and created a choice where none was inherent. Presumably in a game of the type you are pointing to this T intersection would be deliberately placed by the GM in the course of play, framed in as we say, specifically for the purpose of challenging the PC's belief. In fact, its impact will be enhanced, I would think, by making it apparent that their 'always go right' choice is WRONG, or at least appears so at first glance. This could also be an outcome of mechanics, a Dungeon World Discern Realities check might throw a 6- and the character is consequently wrong, and may change their belief (although DW doesn't actually have 'beliefs' as a specific mechanism in this sense).

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I don't think understanding the nature of the choice makes it authentic (again that makes it informed). But in terms of whether it has meaning? That is more about whether the choice was a genuine one where my deciding to do A or deciding to do B had impact and significance. So I think that could apply to a very large range of choices

I think what makes a choice authentic is that it IS informed. I mean, you would, outside the context of an RPG discussion, probably consider the phrase 'authentic choice' to indicate something where the chooser is using their volition to determine a course of action, taking various things into consideration, and that the choice is consequential, right? I think in that context 'genuine' would generally come across as fairly synonymous with authentic too.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

No, just an intentional tautology saying that if you're informed then you're informed and that's it; in an attempt to make the point that the presence or non-presence of information at the time a choice is made has no relevance to the level of meaningfulness that choice in hindsight turned out to carry.

And to throw in another pebble: all of this assumes one can trust the information one has available; and-or that the information is correct. A choice can seem meaningful at the time it is made and lose all meaningfulness later once it becomes apparent the information used to make that choice was faulty, or even intentionally outright false.

Extreme example: all the signs, omens, divinations, foreshadowing, etc. point to the left door being disaster and the right door being highly rewarding; yet when each is opened there is nothing of consequence or relevance behind either one. This is the flipside of my earlier point that a choice's meaningfulness cannot be known until later: the same holds true for a choice's ultimate meaninglessness.

I am going to say that I find your use of the term 'meaningful' to be inaccurate. I think you mean 'consequential'. In your last example here you have an inconsequential choice, which I would call a FALSE CHOICE, and indeed it isn't meaningful. I'd note that the information being provided, being wrong, isn't really information at all though, its deception or simply incompetence perhaps. There never was a genuine choice, both doors lead nowhere. I don't think this really says anything except what we have been saying all along, genuine/authentic choice requires consequence. Again, in the ordinary use of English this is widely understood, as the phrase "You leave me with no real choice" is perfectly understood by all.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I quite agree with this in the Quantum Monster sense; where the GM is meta-changing things behind the scenes in direct reaction to what the players/PCs do. In my view a GM doing this risks making the whole game inauthentic, not just the here-and-now choice.

I don't agree in cases where it's already set that each choice leads to, say, nothing (the two dead ends off the T, for example); here the choice is perfectly authentic, but ultimately turns out to be meaningless.

I'm not 100% on board here, in that IME many players/PCs are more than capable of arriving at a different and-or "erroneous" conclusion even after getting all three clues; and then chasing that red herring to the ends of the setting and back.

That said, I'm not that big a fan of leading them by the nose at the best of times; given the choice between that and them getting stuck on something because they missed or misinterpreted a clue or some info, I'd rather they get stuck and have to figure it out - or, even, abandon it; as that's another quite realistic option.

Right, I don't think 'three clue' (or just a game with clues in it in general) is a 'railroad'. I think its a puzzle! You may or may not solve the puzzle. I do think that a puzzle which has 'choke points' in it where you can't proceed past a certain point without some information or a mcguffin is a bit of bad design though. An ideal puzzle, like a good murder mystery, presents a bunch of clues, and you, the 'detective', have to decide when and if you have sufficient information to make an accusation which is correct. Maybe you do, maybe you don't, more clues will make this easier. A really skilled mystery creator will also draw the suspects with enough authenticity that the player can use his or her intuition (or I suppose this can be a mechanic) such that they 'get a feel for' who might be included or eliminated in the suspect list. This also might interact with clues, like the maid seems innocent, until you happen to spy her exposing her cruel and psychopathic personality!

BUT, the existence of a 'clue driven' process wherein the clues and their proper interpretation are the sole purview of a GM or writer is itself a type of play. It can be quite genuine/authentic when used well, within a certain limited scope. The more open process where the formation and solving of the mystery is the subject of in-the-moment framing will focus more reliably on the characterization side though, as such things as clues become of secondary importance (IE the 'detective' may be confronted with evidence that his sister is the killer, in game mechanical terms the fact 'is my sister' CAUSED 'evidence of guilt'). Now the focus is on something like "Do I stay true to my ethos as a crime solver, or do I save my sister whom I love."

I'm not going to engage in the exercise of trying to call one more or less genuine than the other.

 

[Willie the Duck]

Uninformed means that the meaning of the subsequent events does not arise from the act of choosing.

If the GM has a selection of rooms, and, as characters walk through the dungeon, the GM rolls a die to choose what room is next, clearly, the players are not actually making a choice. If no choice is made, that choice cannot be meaningful.

Same situation, but the GM hands the die to the players - again, they are not making a choice, so there is no meaningful choice.

Same situation, but the GM hands a piece of paper to the players, with 5 random letters on it, and tells them to choose. The letters are free of semantic content, so there is no relevant thought process to choose one over another. If there is no relevant thought process, the determination is arbitrary - no different than a random choice, which we have already determined is not actually a choice, and so has no meaning.

I think their point was that informed can be insufficient (to meaning). Sure, if your choice isn't informed it isn't (really) a choice, but a choice (informed or otherwise) isn't meaningful unless other criteria are met (in particular, that the net outcome meaningfully differs based on which choice is made). At least that was my takeaway.

hawkeyefan, thanks for the kind post!

Where I referred to genuine choices that say something, you've referred to choices and actions mattering. There's overlap in our two formulations, but maybe not strict synonymy. With my use of "saying something", and also my use of authenticity as a key notion, I think I might be putting more emphasis on a particular way that things can matter - their role in expression, revelation etc in a type of interpersonal, creative context.

Does that make sense?

Not to me, at least. Once again, we are back to these nebulous terms genuine, authentic(ity), and 'saying something,' without a clearer and more cohesive thesis on how you mean them, or how various playstyles engender them better than others. I've followed fairly well multiple peoples' takes on what they think you meant in the OP (and so if someone got it perfectly, that would be useful informatin), so I know I'm not just too dumb for these concepts (too daft to understand your clear communications still a distinct possibility), but I as of yet am in no way confident I know what you did actually mean.