D&D General What is player agency to you?

[pemerton]

To be fair, 4e as you prefer to play it (ie, with a larger than usual emphasis on player-authored quests) is a pretty small slice of the D&D pie.

And?

OSR - which you seem to prefer - is pretty small too. You don't see me going around telling you that you're not playing D&D, that your views about OSR are not relevant to the play of D&D, etc.

 

[mamba]

I dunno what burning wheel is, but my gut intuition is that it's gar-bage.

Doesn't really sound like you want to find out, but here it goes anyway

The Burning Wheel - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Torchbearer In-Depth

In RPG discussion circles in places like Reddit and Twitter, there has been a fair amount of hay made over the relative absence of ‘critique’ in the RPG realm. As someone who reviews RPGs fairly re…

cannibalhalflinggaming.com

The Burning Wheel Store

The Burning Wheel Store offers products related to The Burning Wheel, Mouse Guard, Torchbearer, and Dungeon World role playing games. Forged Lord Comics featuring Christopher Moeller's "Iron Empires" products are also available.

www.burningwheel.com

 

[hawkeyefan]

you asked a question about such a game. Given that no such game exists, it will have to go unanswered...

Well, it's been answered by one person, at least. And also, that kind of game absolutely exists. Look at many posts by the OP. He proudly runs railroads. Most of us here probably have at times, too.... especially earlier in our time as GMs before we've learned about different ways to handle different elements of the game and have developed our own style.

I know I've both run and played in those games.

 

[Micah Sweet]

And?

OSR - which you seem to prefer - is pretty small too. You don't see me going around telling you that you're not playing D&D, that your views about OSR are not relevant to the play of D&D, etc.

You also don't see me going around claiming that my tiny niche of no-longer-popular gaming preferences are broadly applicable to any discussion mostly revolving around much larger portions of the gaming community. I like what I like, and so do you. Neither of us are part of the so-called mainstream.

 

[Micah Sweet]

You also don't see me going around claiming that my tiny niche of no-longer-popular gaming preferences are broadly applicable to any discussion mostly revolving around much larger portions of the gaming community. I like what I like, and so do you. Neither of us are part of the so-called mainstream.

Well ok, maybe I do do that. But it makes me just as wrong-headed.

 

[mamba]

I don't know what is an 'outlier'.

What happened to your English SAT? It's an exception

I virtually guarantee you that @pemerton also qualified whatever he said as 'limited agency '.

you do not need to, I mentioned it in my post

 

[pemerton]

You also don't see me going around claiming that my tiny niche of no-longer-popular gaming preferences are broadly applicable to any discussion mostly revolving around much larger portions of the gaming community.

The thread asked "what is player agency to you". I answered. With reference, among other games, to 4e D&D and AD&D.

I've also explained how I would adjudicate the Noble background if I were GMing 5e D&D, and have explained that by reference to my general views about player agency and following rules.

Other seem committed to telling me that I'm wrong to see any connection between decision-making that actually contributes content to the shared fiction and agency. That's their prerogative. But I'm not obliged to agree with them!

EDIT: I just reviewed the first several pages of the thread. Another poster mentioned me in post 104. I am guessing that is what drew my attention to the thread. Then I replied to a post on p 7 (my fist post was 126). An example had been given (by @CreamCloud0) of something they don't like, and I asked if there is any RPG they know of that actually works that way.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

What happened to your English SAT? It's an exception

I know what an outlier is, I just wasn't sure what it was that you were referring to which was supposed to be one.

 

[mamba]

I told you what the fundamental difference is. The rules of Burning Wheel say that, if a player fails a Scavenging test, the GM's job is to narrate a consequence that incorporates their intention, and thwarts it.

So the 'you fail' part of a failed test

This is one point at which the GM introduces their ideas; the other is when the GM frames scenes/situations.

yes, precisely, you start framing now. You do not leave it at 'you fail', you add 'and this happens'. That is you 'directing' the game, just like we were 'directing' the game by saying 'you fail' in the first place.

But I guess I get your distinction now, in your case the failure is determined 'outside' the DM while in our case it is 'inside' the DM. In both cases the result of the failed check influences the narrative, influenced by the DM. In yours that is more directly, whereas I see myself more asking 'what now' than setting something up right away. That also sounds like agency, the players decide the 'what to do' part...

Do you prefer Burning Wheel or Torchbearer, which one is closer to D&D? From my 1000 mile view that is TB. Any opinion on TB1 vs TB2? I see mixed feelings on that.

 

[mamba]

I'm nothing if not consistent!

to a fault