D&D General What is player agency to you?

[AbdulAlhazred]

The point is to construct a fantasy world that operates as if or like it was the real world - so if our actual lives are 'low agency' then so would the game world. I'll give you an example and you can tell me if you chafe against it:


Suppose there is a goddess in this game world who has a particular portfolio, rituals, rites, etc. One of those rights is to swim to the bottom of a pool and bring back a treasure. Let's say that the PC's character isn't very strong and can't actually even reach the bottom, but player says that their character is training as hard as they can, and doing better and better, and is eventually able to reach the bottom but doesn't actually bring anything back. I would allow that player to say "The treasure I brought back is self confidence/growth/progress/etc". No, it's not a literal treasure, but I can see the goddess being like "Ya, that tracks".

Now suppose a different scenario happens, suppose instead that the player says "to receive the goddesses blessing I'm going to do something completely different that has nothing to do with her in anyway - does that work? I want to use my player agency to find a way to completely circumvent this but I still want the reward."

This is either bad-faith play or a mismatched understanding of the fiction. It has almost nothing to do with the specifics of the situation or even what game is being played, so how is it relevant?

 

[soviet]

I do notice how the side that is pro-increased agency has a bunch of actual play examples showing it to work, but the side that's against only has weird hypotheticals about eggs in lifeless vacuums and dimension hopping to modern day America

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Here is our fundamental disagreement. I do not subscribe to the view that the players can constrain the DM in anyway. I view the DM opperating the way that the SCOTUS operates: it is literally impossible for them to be wrong. You cannot tell the SCOTUS that they interpreted the constitution incorrectly because they have the sole authority to interpret it.

It's perfectly ok for some people to sit down and play with that process, but the way you put it is like you can't or won't understand that it is not only not the only way to do it, it's arguably not even the best way or even the most preferred when other options exist.

 

[mamba]

The principle I quoted was "If the story doesn't interest you, it's your job to create interesting situations and involve yourself".

It is about creating interesting situations. It's not about setting goals. Nor looking for new ways to accomplish goals.

so where do goals and the actions to accomplish them come from? Don’t tell me there aren’t any goals, and you better not tell me the DM declares them either

For instance: when I was playing Thurgon and Aramina, I wanted an interesting situation, namely, one involving Evard's Tower. So I declared that Aramina wanted to recollect the location of Evard's Tower - wasn't it around here somewhere? A Great Masters-wise check was made, and succeeded. Later on, I wanted an interesting situation, namely, one involving Thurgon's family, so I declared that Thurgon keeps his eye out for his family members, and made a Circles check. It succeeded, and Thurgon encounter Rufus.

yeah, that sounds either far too random and aimless to me, or you had your goal and achieved it, you will have to tell me…

so far I assumed the latter, but now I am not sure any more

If I were playing in a 5e game, and my PC was a Noble, and I declared that I (as my PC) was seeking an audience with a local noble, it's almost certain that I would regard the audience as an interesting situation. (I don't normally try and initiate boring situations when I'm playing a RPG.)

So is the result that you just to have interesting scenes, like Simpson’s episodes, where nothing is connected to anything else and you can watch them in any order, or do they make up a natural progression towards something and have to be seen in a specific order?

Given that you are working towards a climax I must assume it is the latter. How is ‘working towards a climax’ different from ‘working to accomplish a goal’? To me the climax is just the moment / scene where it is decided whether you succeed or not (let’s ignore that you can also fail in any prior ‘scene’ here…)

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

So now you're saying that games where players don't author all the fiction are barely games at all, let alone have agency.

This is textbook one true way.

No, when you exclude the middle ground and grossly simplify and distort the other side's argument you have committed a fallacy (2 actually, but who's counting).

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

I do notice how the side that is pro-increased agency has a bunch of actual play examples showing it to work, but the side that's against only has weird hypotheticals about eggs in lifeless vacuums and dimension hopping to modern day America

First, if you're trying to have an actual conversation with people (as opposed to score random points on the internet that cannot be turned into prizes), it's usually best to avoid labeling your side with terms like, "pro-increased agency."

Second, it's best to avoid turning everything into two sides, if you actually want to have a conversation.

Third, the purpose of "weird hypotheticals" comes from a Socratic method; here, to show that an absolute statement (this power must always work, even if it is just a ... background feature, which is not supposed to be a major ability) is not correct. That's it.

That said, there are, quite literally, an infinite number of scenarios where the fiction (in most assumed D&D games) would not allow the "Position of Privilege" feature to work. Here's an easy one-

The party is engaged in combat with a group of Orcs. On the third round of combat, the character with the Noble background (we will call him Chad) says, "I use my Position of Privilege to tell the orcs we are fighting with that they must cease fighting and give me an audience with their chief."

No?

The party is engaged in combat with Mind Flayers. In the middle of combat, Chad says, "I use my Position of Privilege to tell the Illithid to recognize my nobility and take us to the elder brain."

No?

The party is about to fight the BBEG, a local warlord. But the local warlord laughs and sends a group of his henchmen to kill the PCs, with the explicit instruction that they KILL THEM. But late in the combat, with the tide turned against them, Chad says ... "Hey, I tell these henchman that I'm a noble and stuff. Time to get an audience with the BBEG!"

Yeah. These seem silly ... because in most games we assume players to operate in good faith, and we wouldn't expect them to use this background feature in that way. Just the same as we wouldn't expect the DM to "just say no" to a reasonable use of the feature! But this is the entire point of this conversation. People are just talking past each other.

These are different playing styles, with different built-in assumptions. These things don't normally arise at the vast majority of tables, because the vast majority of tables consist of people who talk to each other and are trying to have fun, not people arguing with each other in order to assert that their playing style is superior with the use of hypotheticals.

 

[Oofta]

It's perfectly ok for some people to sit down and play with that process, but the way you put it is like you can't or won't understand that it is not only not the only way to do it, it's arguably not even the best way or even the most preferred when other options exist.

It is however a core assumption of D&D. Other games work differently with different controls, costs, ways of balancing the different roles. It's comparing apples and oranges to compare D&D to PbtA games for example.

Those options may be preferred by you, they are not preferred by a lot of people. You don't get to decide for everyone else the best way, especially when it's worked for the most popular RPG for nearly half a century.

 

[mamba]

I do notice how the side that is pro-increased agency has a bunch of actual play examples showing it to work, but the side that's against only has weird hypotheticals about eggs in lifeless vacuums and dimension hopping to modern day America

you need examples to show that a less player driven game can work?

I am not sure why… the hypotheticals are there to test for the boundary, to see whether you ever concede that yes, something is flat out impossible and the DM has every right to say so. We do not need that if we assert that he can essentially say so at any point (caveat: provided the DM thinks they have a good enough reason…)

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

In D&D, the only thing a player has fictional control over is their PC's words and deeds. Whatever action they declare the DM determines what happens. It seems you've redefined agency that virtually no actions in D&D show player agency, which I think is bunk. By that definition, no one in the real world has any agency because we don't control the outcome of our actions. We can reasonably predict them, as I type this my expectation is that letters will show up on my screen, but I don't have any control over it. Guess I have no agency.

Your definition of agency is so narrow it's pointless.

Well... I say the same of yours! You claim that the situation where players are limited to declaring their PCs actions, strictly limited by GM rulings, some of you even stating without knowing enough to evaluate the costs and benefits, is the apex of player agency. When I point out that this is plainly not the case, by presenting genuine examples of play where the players have greater agency by any reasonable definition, then I'm met with a whole host of objections, none of which are convincing, many of which feel contrived.

Everyone can play as they like but lets all stick to calling it preference instead of all the mental gymnastics.

 

[mamba]

You claim that the situation where players are limited to declaring their PCs actions, strictly limited by GM rulings, some of you even stating without knowing enough to evaluate the costs and benefits, is the apex of player agency.

I don’t think anyone claimed that

Everyone can play as they like but lets all stick to calling it preference

I agree