D&D General What is player agency to you?

[hawkeyefan]

Agency is the ability to do things, simpliciter.

Attempting to secure a meeting with someone is an act of agency, whether you actually get it or not. The outcome is irrelevant vis a vis a.) did you do something and b.) could you have done otherwise?

Again, I think you should look at other games and what it means to have agency as a player in those. You seem to be mixing up character and player here, which causes confusion.

From a purely player standpoint, I say "I do X" and the DM responds with "You cannot do X". Absent any conditions that need to be met for me to say "I do X", the DM is denying my agency.

Look at other games and see if you can find similar examples to the above. One participant says "I do X" and another participant says "You cannot do X".

You misunderstood. I'm saying that if the DM is telling me what my character does, that is an example of something that is not agency.

What if they tell you what your character does not do?

To me agency boils down to the ability to make reasonably informed choices having a decent understanding of alternatives an probable results. So it doesn't matter what n number of choices a player has in front of them, any two games have basically the same agency as long as they both have n number of choices. The outcome doesn't need to be guaranteed, nor does the person need total control over the outcome (even if successful).

So let's imagine two groups of players in different games, but facing the same obstacle. Group A can approach that obstacle in a few ways: combat, stealth, magic, or diplomacy.

Group B can approach the obstacle through only combat or magic.

You're saying these two groups have the same amount of agency? I don't know if I agree... but I suppose it depends very much on what narrowed down the n for Group B, or what allowed Group A to have a higher n.

That's before we get into the nature of the obstacle and what the players are trying to accomplish and all that kind of stuff, which is also very relevant.

 

[Mort]

so how does this work? The players say 'we want to do X' and despite this 'Y' happens and they do not notice it? Or do we run down a long sequence of 'you cannot do that' until they finally come up with one of the two choices the DM could have proposed at the beginning?

Sounds like a pretty stupid approach to things...

Take a look at the post above yours (by the OP of the thread, in fact).

Illusionism is a very common technique and is actually championed in some circles. The OP is quite the fan, as they have expounded on previous threads.

 

[mamba]

Take a look at the post above yours (by the OP of the thread, in fact).

this?

A player describes something in some vague terms that they wish to encounter. Then I as the DM make that encounter. But everything I think is 100% different then what the player thinks. So no matter what a player says and "thinks" they are saying, it's not what I think or create.

sounds like a misunderstanding, nothing more

 

[hawkeyefan]

this?

sounds like a misunderstanding, nothing more

I’m sure they chatted and sorted it all out!

And I bet the player got what they want! And then everyone had snacks whenever they felt like it!

 

[pemerton]

I have never done any of this and see no value in it

Fair enough. I assume, though, that you're familiar with this sort of thing.

so how does this work? The players say 'we want to do X' and despite this 'Y' happens and they do not notice it?

Normally, the GM manipulates the fiction to produce the desired outcome. Eg the players say "We burn the bodies." The GM's notes recorded that some or other clue was on one of the bodies. Now it is destroyed. So the GM introduces the clue in another context that the PCs encounter.

Or, eg, the PCs kill a NPC who is high status in the gameworld. The GM then decides that a second-in-command steps up and keeps the dead NPC's plans going, and so nothing about the overall trajectory of the fiction changes.

I have seen WotC modules that set out both the above techniques.

And as I posted, on these threads I see posters who talk about rolling meaningless dice, or about pretending their improvisation is actually taken from their notes.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I mean, every published adventure is an example of lower agency play.

 

[mamba]

I’m sure they chatted and sorted it all out!

And I bet the player got what they want! And then everyone had snacks whenever they felt like it!

maybe not in this particular case, but I don't see this as an overall bad approach It's not like misunderstandings are restricted to trad games

 

[Oofta]

"I seem to recall that . . ."

In this thread, I think the phrase "player narrative control" has been used only by people saying that they don't want it. I haven't seen anyone use it to describe Dungeon World. I've denied its applicability to Burning Wheel or 4e D&D. This is from post 211, and I've reposed it several times, including (I'm pretty sure) in reply to you:

First, that's not at all what I meant. What terminology would you use for a player is adding to the fiction of the world? You're also ignoring the fact that I asked for a phrase that you would be okay with. So you would rather just throwing barbs when I don't use the "correct" terminology? Guess that's par for the course, if a bit disappointing.

Also, plenty of people term it narrativist play. A couple of recent examples:

You can do all of these things in a narrativist game too.

Expecting your Noble background feature to (almost) always work does not mean you are authoring the details of that meet or deciding the intentions of the person you meet. That can still all be within the purview of the GM. You don't have to abandon exploration in order to increase agency.

I think you can do it, but you have to be more flexible about how things center more on the PCs than is typical in those games. There's such a thing as vanillaof course a lot of DM's just aren't very good at improvisational game developments

 

[Mort]

this?

sounds like a misunderstanding, nothing more

Combine it with their next sentence.

There is no misunderstanding. This DM does what HE wants to do regardless of what the players want.

 

[mamba]

Fair enough. I assume, though, that you're familiar with this sort of thing.

in concept, I( just see zero value in it.

Normally, the GM manipulates the fiction to produce the desired outcome. Eg the players say "We burn the bodies." The GM's notes recorded that some or other clue was on one of the bodies. Now it is destroyed. So the GM introduces the clue in another context that the PCs encounter.

yeah, given that you kinda have a story, things must remain 'solveable', I assume that is not really all that different with narrative games, unless they have no real goal in mind - which I would not consider an improvement

I am sure you have to 'roll with the punches' too, unless you do not really care what happens, as long as the players can keep making things up

Or, eg, the PCs kill a NPC who is high status in the gameworld. The GM then decides that a second-in-command steps up and keeps the dead NPC's plans going, and so nothing about the overall trajectory of the fiction changes.

well, if you kill a mafia boss, the organization will just keep going, don't think that is so unbelievable. Specific plans on the other hand, that depends on what they were