D&D General What is player agency to you?

[mamba]

Sure, but this is pretty much what I meant about options. In an adventure path type module, there are more likely to be fewer options. Fewer ways for the players to progress through play.

I don't think we were in disagreement on this...

 

[mamba]

So I think this is the basis for your post on page 110.

I was referring to this post

In a lot of D&D play, action declarations like At the T-intersection, I turn left rather than right or I open the north door, not the south door work like that: the action declaration means that the character is going left, not right; or is mucking about with the north door, not the south door. I have never heard it suggested that these are "meaningless" action declarations, or that they are negations of player agency, prior to this thread.

In fact, the whole OSR approach to designing dungeon maps (Jacquay and all that) rests on the premise that those sorts of action declarations are highly meaningful and are high agency.

The reason I didn't feel the need to quarrel is that, in a certain sort of RPGing - classic dungeoncrawling, where the goal of play is to beat the dungeon, by first exploring it and then systematically looting it - the exploration phase of play is part of the process of identifying the parameters of the puzzle that needs to be solved.

If there's no puzzle to be solved - for instance, because the GM is not holding the details of the situation constant - then the exploration phase of play is not part of an overall agency-laden process. It's just a prompt to the GM to narrate something.

Do you feel a need to quarrel now? If so, what are you objecting to? As far as I can tell the players said 'we go here' for the exact same reason they said 'we go left' in the above. In both cases they explore the map, except that one is a dungeon, while the other is overland, so easier to leave the road. Am I missing something?

 

[pemerton]

As far as I can tell the players said 'we go here' for the exact same reason they said 'we go left' in the above. In both cases they explore the map, except that one is a dungeon, while the other is overland, so easier to leave the road. Am I missing something?

It depends on what "the map" is.

The more that "the map" is what the GM thinks it should be, based on their own sense of the "living, breathing world" then the farther player is getting away from the model of the static dungeon which is a solvable puzzle.

That last bit is important: in Gygaxian dungeon crawling, exploring the map isn't just finding out what's there - it's also beating a maze, and - when you get out the loot - beating its occupants. As Lewis Pulsipher wrote over 40 years ago, this sort of play is not compatible with a high degree of GM improvisation or extrapolation.

 

[Raiztt]

I would pay any amount of money to play in one of Permerton's games.

 

[Oofta]

I don't know what you mean by "upsetting the whole apple care". Or why you would have expectations.

I once set up a young woman to be the big bad in the long term. The PCs were growing up in the same neighborhood (they started as kids) and she was a rude, entitled b**ch. Her father was a person of importance and aligned with evil entities (fiends in D&D standard cosmology) who's goal was to shape his daughter into a vessel for an evil entity. As part of the daughter's grooming she was being abused by her father; the PCs found out and over the course of multiple interactions (and years in-game) they made her into an ally.

I don't plan plot lines. I have goals and motivations for NPCs and groups. In this example I had expected the young woman to eventually become the living personification of an evil entity and instead she fought back and helped take down her father. They interfered with the goals of the NPCs and changed the course of what would have happened had they not befriended her.

What makes someone a "big bad" in the absence of a plot? I feel like there's something I'm missing.

Let's say I let the PCs know that there's a rumor that innocents children are going missing. It's one of the threads the PCs can look into. According to my notes they're being abducted by a wizard who wants to become a lich. If they ignore the thread and decide to pursue other things then the wizard is not thwarted. Since the wizard was not stopped, there's a new lich in town. They may be an adversary for a later day, another campaign or perhaps they just fade into the background.

 

[mamba]

It depends on what "the map" is.

well, in a published adventure that part should be pretty obvious. It can vary from adventure to adventure however.

The more that "the map" is what the GM thinks it should be, based on their own sense of the "living, breathing world" then the farther player is getting away from the model of the static dungeon which is a solvable puzzle.

agreed, most modules are not dungeons, and sandboxes are not either

That last bit is important: in Gygaxian dungeon crawling, exploring the map isn't just finding out what's there - it's also beating a maze, and - when you get out the loot - beating its occupants. As Lewis Pulsipher wrote over 40 years ago, this sort of play is not compatible with a high degree of GM improvisation or extrapolation.

then it is literally a dungeon crawl, most published adventures are not (just) that. 'Beating the occupants' becomes 'solving the main quest', which usually involves visiting several separate locations.

'Going over here' means going somewhere on the overland map, whether a known location or 'North' does not matter. In the example it is the latter, since there is no known location outside the map.

 

[pemerton]

@mamba

In my view, agency in a RPG is about capacity to influence the outcomes of play. In my preferred RPGing, the main outcome is establishing a shared fiction. In Gygaxian dungeon crawling, the main outcome is beating the dungeon, which combines puzzle-solving and wargaming.

In either case, the capacity of a player to influence those outcomes depends on the GM being constrained: in the first case, constrained as to how framing and consequences are narrated (these are the core of the fiction that is being created); in the second case, constrained by their prep so that the puzzle and wargame scenario remain constant, thus knowable and thus beatable.

There is a lot more that can be said about how to operationalise these constraints, in each case. But I hope I've set out the essence of them clearly enough.

Simply talking about a player having their PC go "somewhere on the overland map", without getting into the processes of play on both player and GM side which enable the player to influence the outcome of play, leaves me in a position where I can't say anything meaningful about agency.

What I will say, as I have said many times previously, that I think part of the genius of the dungeon conceit is that it is an artificially austere environment, with very clear conventions around how its architecture and interior design are relevant to play. Wilderness and urban exploration, with frequently non-austere environments that are not governed by clear conventions, is in my view far harder for a GM to hold constant so as to be gameable in the way that a dungeon is.

 

[clearstream]

High utility to trad? I'm not sure what you mean by that. There are a number of more traditional or mainstream games that I enjoy and that spark joy in me.

Which ones? It's just, I can't see the reason for using 5e as our example of trad, if folk are lukewarm about it. We should be putting the most loved examples of modes of play forward.

 

[mamba]

In my preferred RPGing, the main outcome is establishing a shared fiction. In Gygaxian dungeon crawling, the main outcome is beating the dungeon, which combines puzzle-solving and wargaming.

yes, I am more on the Gygax side, the shared fiction is a means to an end, not the end.

In either case, the capacity of a player to influence those outcomes depends on the GM being constrained: in the first case, constrained as to how framing and consequences are narrated (these are the core of the fiction that is being created); in the second case, constrained by their prep so that the puzzle and wargame scenario remain constant, thus knowable and thus beatable.

it's not a wargame and you are not beating the DM. It's a world with which the players interact and that world can change through both their actions and due to their inaction.

Simply talking about a player having their PC go "somewhere on the overland map", without getting into the processes of play on both player and GM side which enable the player to influence the outcome of play, leaves me in a position where I can't say anything meaningful about agency.

you were the one starting it by saying 'the player says I go here' Not sure what you want me to say here, since the location is outside the map / adventure, you will have to tell my why you wanted to go there and what you wanted to accomplish. As far as the adventure is concerned, nothing there helps getting closer to 'beating the game'. At that point it is up to the DM to either invent something or drag them back onto the map.

What I will say, as I have said many times previously, that I think part of the genius of the dungeon conceit is that it is an artificially austere environment, with very clear conventions around how its architecture and interior design are relevant to play. Wilderness and urban exploration, with frequently non-austere environments that are not governed by clear conventions, is in my view far harder for a GM to hold constant so as to be gameable in the way that a dungeon is.

I do not disagree, it's a world / country / ..., not an abandoned tomb, the scale is different. I do not really consider it relevant however. You can decide what you do in either environment and there are methods to resolve that. I'd even say there is no need to hold either constant in either case.

 

[clearstream]

I do love traditional play including AD&D, MERP, and WFRP 1e. I also love more narr games. Different flavours for different moods.

Fixed!