D&D General What is player agency to you?

[AbdulAlhazred]

No one is suggesting there are any games like that. We are talking about agency here and digging into the notion of whether saying yes all the time can invalidate agency instead of empower it.

Not everything is an attack or suggestion that narrative games play a certain way.

I'm not really feeling super argumentative and don't have the motivation to haul in a bunch of quotes. There were statements made that were of the form "X is true of some games, thus Y." However X was never the argument of people like @pemerton (I don't even need to read back in the thread to know this, as I am pretty sure he wouldn't even suggest such things). X was being argued against, but X was never a point of contention, and is in fact a non-existent phantom thing that was invented strictly for the purposes of concluding Y. This is ESSENTIALLY a straw man, as there were propositions (lets call them P) which WERE made, and are NOT X, so a real argument would engage those.

I'll leave it to pedants to decide if this merits the label 'straw man', but it is certainly either a display of ignorance of the subject matter, or a deliberate attempt to prove a point using invalid premises passed off as valid ones.

Honestly, it would be little remarked on, except this is probably the 1000th time this exact thing has come up in a thread and its been pointed out to posters that they're misrepresenting things.

 

[FrogReaver]

And this is why we don't have conflict resolution mechanics invoked when nothing is at stake! If every choice leads to the same place, then the rules of pretty much all narrativist games I know of, and many others too, simply say "don't bother with rules here, just move forward." I mean, even the 5e DMG states this as, at least optionally, a criteria for checks to happen or not. If all approaches to opening your door lead to the same outcome, NONE of these systems recommends what you are talking about doing here.

I don't think I disagree here.

I do think that your belief that this even needs brought up indicates a severe misunderstanding for why I'm posting such examples in the first place.

As for the "consequences" part. I would expect that the fictional situation would be structured so as to make it explicit which 'criminal organization' you are establishing a relationship with BEFORE the situation is established.

Well I was actually imagining you went to one and asked for help as your next step after encountering the locked door. So kinda sorta.

Like in BitD you would acquire this as a resource (maybe in a flashback, but still established before any conflict). I can see a D&D game where you have a class feature to 'call in a favor' and it also operates in a similar fashion within the structure of play (IE only invoked at the time of use, with fictional consequences being somewhat retroactive). Its a technique that can work in any game, but certainly having it be 'after the fact' of carrying out the task is unusual at least. I wouldn't consider these things 'stakes', normally. They're costs, but more resource expenditure. Now, BitD DOES allow for calling it stakes, by using Devil's Bargain mechanics (gain an extra die in your pool in return for a complication) but again you choose the bargain BEFORE any resolution happens!

I like BitD. I don't see any issues with your explanation here.

 

[FrogReaver]

I'm not really feeling super argumentative and don't have the motivation to haul in a bunch of quotes. There were statements made that were of the form "X is true of some games, thus Y." However X was never the argument of people like @pemerton (I don't even need to read back in the thread to know this, as I am pretty sure he wouldn't even suggest such things). X was being argued against, but X was never a point of contention, and is in fact a non-existent phantom thing that was invented strictly for the purposes of concluding Y. This is ESSENTIALLY a straw man, as there were propositions (lets call them P) which WERE made, and are NOT X, so a real argument would engage those.

I'll leave it to pedants to decide if this merits the label 'straw man', but it is certainly either a display of ignorance of the subject matter, or a deliberate attempt to prove a point using invalid premises passed off as valid ones.

Honestly, it would be little remarked on, except this is probably the 1000th time this exact thing has come up in a thread and its been pointed out to posters that they're misrepresenting things.

I'm not saying nothing hasn't ever been misrepresented. I'm sure it has - often due to misunderstanding, but perhaps not always. On the flip side, i've seen many of my positions being misrepresented in just as bad if not worse ways. I don't think it's useful to rehash all that though.

But more importantly what I actually said and am saying here and now is that what you quoted and acted like was against narrative games - that wasn't a misreprestantation of anyone and it wasn't even about narrative games.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Sure, and my point didn't really disagree with it. My point was that always saying yes or rolling for success minimized agency, not got rid of it. Sure the choice has some inherent meaning, but the amount of agency involved is less than if the various choices had a range of meanings from failure to roll to auto success.

Well, lets look at PbtA games here, like DW or AW. When a situation comes up, the GM has made a move and the players are responding (even coming to a locked door is such a move, though it may be 'draw from your prep') the players describe their action. If its simply fictionally possible for them to go on past this point, then no obstacle exists and that's what happens (granting that some cases may open up a hard move if the players simply 'move on' and don't address whatever it is, the 'golden platter' rule.).

Otherwise there is a judgment, is the action fictionally capable of resolving the situation? If not then the obstacle remains and maybe the GM makes another move, or maybe they just ask the players what they do next. Things like 'stick a rat head in the lock' would fall under this definition most likely. "OK, the rat's guts are all over your hands now, what do you do next?"

Finally an actual check can happen. A move is triggered, the player rolls 2d6, the fiction moves on, either in the direction the player wishes, or in some other direction depending on the dice. Often the player gets what they want, but the GM also gets to describe how things get more complicated (the lockpicks break, the door triggers an alarm, etc.).

This is exactly how things work in real world play in games that offer full agency to players. In fact the locus of the difference between this and 5e D&D is not even necessarily at this point, as @clearstream has well-articulated how the 5e DMG offers advice which can produce largely similar kinds of play (though I contend it has other related issues, but that's a whole other discussion).

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I don't think I disagree here.

I do think that your belief that this even needs brought up indicates a severe misunderstanding for why I'm posting such examples in the first place.

I think it often gets lost in the course of this discussion!

Well I was actually imagining you went to one and asked for help as your next step after encountering the locked door. So kinda sorta.

Yeah, that's a perfectly reasonable possibility as well.

I like BitD. I don't see any issues with your explanation here.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

But more importantly what I actually said and am saying here and now is that what you quoted wasn't a misreprestantation of anyone.

You're saying that characterizing some sort of game as some weird 'just say yes to everything' process isn't a mischaracterization? Sure it is! I agree, I didn't point to a specific quoted statement and say "It mischaracterizes THIS", but its a lot more general than that, it's mischaracterizing an entire style of play! One that has been a significant subject of this and many other threads!

 

[mamba]

Sure, and my point didn't really disagree with it. My point was that always saying yes or rolling for success minimized agency, not got rid of it.

but it doesn't, your agency is increased, you essentially decide what happens and it does.

As you said, the player can decide to perform a dance in front of the door in hopes of unlocking it and the DM says 'it worked'. That is not decreasing agency. Believability, realism and consistency sure, but agency, not so much... A genie granting your wishes is not decreasing your agency.

Sure the choice has some inherent meaning, but the amount of agency involved is less than if the various choices had a range of meanings from failure to roll to auto success.

what has been removed is the possibility for you to make suboptimal choices, let alone fail. I do not see this having a negative impact on your agency.

 

[FrogReaver]

You're saying that characterizing some sort of game as some weird 'just say yes to everything' process isn't a mischaracterization? Sure it is!

I'm saying the closest thing to an actual game that was categorized that way was 5e D&D with always saying yes to background abilities. What actually happened was the discussion went into hypothetical territory after that.

Like I get how someone could jump in the middle and miss that context and then fill in the gaps with a narrative that otherwise makes sense to them, but what you suggest is simply not what happened. I've explained what the comment was 3+ times now.

I agree, I didn't point to a specific quoted statement and say "It mischaracterizes THIS", but its a lot more general than that, it's mischaracterizing an entire style of play! One that has been a significant subject of this and many other threads!

Believe what you will. I'm done trying.

 

[Maxperson]

but it doesn't, your agency is increased, you essentially decide what happens and it does.

Not so. There's the agency inherent in the achieving the goal + the agency in the meaning of which choice was made to achieve the goal. Say yes or roll the dice, especially if fail forward is present, deprives me of the latter. I end up with the agency inherent in the achieving the goal - the agency in the meaning of which choice was made to achieve the goal, because the meaning in which choice was made is gone. There's no real agency in the choice itself, but only in achieving the goal.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I'm saying the closest thing to an actual game that was categorized that way was 5e D&D with always saying yes to background abilities. What actually happened was the discussion went into hypothetical territory after that.

Like I get how someone could jump in the middle and miss that context and then fill in the gaps with a narrative that otherwise makes sense to them, but what you suggest is simply not what happened. I've explained what the comment was 3+ times now.


Believe what you will. I'm done trying.

I responded to THIS POST and nothing else except what followed. It was IMHO a gross misrepresentation of ANY sort of play, certainly of 'say yes...' based principles. It is an argument where the argumentor should certainly know better than to try to claim that 'say yes' means you can simply pick any random action declaration and expect it to magically do what you want. That's an argument used to mischaracterize various forms of narrativist and even some more trad forms of play. I get that, shorn of all the vast context of all the debates that have gone on in the history of this and a 100 other similar EW threads you might find it's target pretty vague, but we have all been down this garden path all these 100's of times.