D&D General What is player agency to you?

[pemerton]

Clearly I'm talking about something that doesn't make a lot of sense for a given situation, not something that does.

What actual RPG, or actual (as opposed to imagined) gameplay process, are you talking about?

Also, when you talk about thing "making a lot of sense", are you meaning makes sense relative to the fiction that has been established in play, or makes sense to the GM given all the other stuff they are imagining that is private/secret to them?

 

[pemerton]

I'm just popping in here to mention that, at least in Burning Wheel, the GM is not limited to yes or success with a cost. As written, the game says failure should lead to complications and be responsive to intent.

If you're looking for the Falcon's Claw, and don't find it, and instead find black arrows - that's not success with a cost!

 

[hawkeyefan]

Compelling = reasonable in my opinion.

Sure. I said compelling because I imagine my bar is higher than many in this thread in that regard.

As for imaginary, it's an imaginary game! The concern that it should always work absent compelling reasons for it not to is imaginary as well!

It's not an imaginary game. It's a real game, but many of the events of the game are imaginary. Criticisms of a game can be real... they can be valid. Or they can be imaginary... in this case, supposed by someone who hasn't played that way, and not accurate according to those who have.

Um, no. "Say yes or roll the dice" being a railroad for me is not even remotely the same as the ability being called in "I win button." So no, there has been no claim, implication, inference or anything else by me(or anyone else that I've seen in this thread) that it's some sort of unfair "I win button," but nice try. No, not really. It was rather an absurd statement to make about me.

I'm not going to comb back through all the quotes, and I don't know if the term "I win button" was used all the time... but there was plenty of insistence that letting an ability always work would be problematic... it would lead to absurdities and inconsistencies and player abuse and so on.

If you don't think that's true, I don't know what to say. It's been very clear to me.

 

[hawkeyefan]

For me it's "try to say yes..." not "always say yes..." (I wonder if anyone actually does do that).

I mean, in the case of 5e's background features, I actually do let them work every time they've come up in play. They don't tend to come up incredibly often (some do more than others, but even those it's not that frequent), so I don't see any need to not let them work as intended. Sometimes the way they work is obvious in the context of the game world, other times it isn't. When it isn't, I don't shoot the idea down... we discuss it and we think of a way to make it work.

It's more about not always (or way too often) saying no - and unnecessarily limiting things.

But aside from the 5e background features, this is my general view. I try to work with the players and get their ideas to work. On the rare occasion that's not possible, then I say it and explain why, and we talk about alternatives.

 

[Oofta]

What actual RPG, or actual (as opposed to imagined) gameplay process, are you talking about?

Also, when you talk about thing "making a lot of sense", are you meaning makes sense relative to the fiction that has been established in play, or makes sense to the GM given all the other stuff they are imagining that is private/secret to them?

As a DM I have information that the players don't have all the time. I assume it's the same when I'm playing. For that matter when I'm playing I wouldn't want to know as much as the DM. It would destroy my sense of immersion, suspense, discovery and surprise.

If I say no there will be a reason. Much of the time the reason will be obvious, or at least should be. But even if it's something I just made up that makes sense based on the situation we find ourselves, it will be logical to the basic premises of the campaign world.

 

[Vaalingrade]

does not change anything, call it buying the ticket then as the action. No matter how you frame it, some action lead to you having the winning ticket, do you consider that action meaningfull?

Not if I buy on every week. Habits aren't meaningful actions.

and this utterly tortured analogy means nothing when it comes to this topic if the Lottery board is going to decide if I win or lose instead of there actually being any real chance. It's an agency-free situation.

 

[mamba]

I want to give some details, and see where people would point to Lack of Player Agency or Railroading. I just want to see what other people will say.

the first occurrence seems to be here

In any case I come down hard on any player that tries to do anything non adventure related.

but it appears to be contradicted by

For the first couple sessions I did just let the groups do whatever they wanted.

other than that, I do not see much, but I am sure some will say that the whole world should be built around the chars more

 

[mamba]

Not if I buy on every week. Habits aren't meaningful actions.

All the losing ones were meaningless, because the outcome was meaningless. Buying the winning one was meaningful because the outcome was. Since you do not know whether you will win or lose when you buy it, that action is meaningful.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

The weird thing about this is that it kinda does in simulationist play as well. Some GMs who are heavy in this style of play have even talked in these forums about how as the players wander the setting, they (the GM) are simulating/generating the setting as the players interact with it.

The whole argument is preposterous. What else does a fantasy setting exist for except as a stage upon which the PCs are placed an in which they act? It has no other point or purpose, unless you are simply doing world-building as a hobby with absolutely no intention to use it in play. The world doesn't just revolve around the PCs, it is built explicitly for PCs to adventure in! The whole category of arguments about settings that don't take account of the characters or operate around them is bogus, completely bogus. EVERY setting does that already.

 

[Micah Sweet]

The whole argument is preposterous. What else does a fantasy setting exist for except as a stage upon which the PCs are placed an in which they act? It has no other point or purpose, unless you are simply doing world-building as a hobby with absolutely no intention to use it in play. The world doesn't just revolve around the PCs, it is built explicitly for PCs to adventure in! The whole category of arguments about settings that don't take account of the characters or operate around them is bogus, completely bogus. EVERY setting does that already.

The world may have lots of things for PCs to do, but it isn't necessarily built for a particular group of PCs in mind. It just has cool stuff in it, and the players decide what they want their PCs to interact.

Your insistence on RPGs always being the way you say is not helping the conversation, or likely to change hearts and minds IMO.