D&D General What is player agency to you?

[Maxperson]

Nope! What did I say that gave you that impression?

You may not have, but @pemerton has claimed that he has more agency with his style than my players have in my game. @soviet may have, I can't remember for sure. There have been at least a few who have made that claim.

That's my biggest objection and what I have been arguing against. The idea that narrative games grant greater agency than traditional games is wrong. Agency is agency.

 

[pemerton]

Let's take the example, P1 wants to say

my PC is in Townshire because my mentor told me that's where I can find the herbs that will let us brew the potion that will revive my cousin from the magical sleep the local warlock tyrant has placed him into?

But P2 has a different idea, they want to say that nothing can revise the cousin except for a sacrifice on their part of whatever they hold dearest. Is it down to who spoke first? GM helps players navigate such conflicts, applying the rules judiciously.

I don't see the problem.

Player 1: My cousin has been placed into a magical sleep by the local warlord tyrant. My mentor told me that he can be revived by a potion. Brewing it requires special herbs, and according to my mentor these can be found here in Townshire. That's why I'm here!

Player 2: Nothing will revive your cousin except a sacrifice <in such-and-such circumstances> by me of <X, where X is the thing that the PC holds dearest>.​

We resolve the disagreement via play. Luke Crane talks about this sort of thing in the Burning Wheel Adventure Burner (reproduced in the Codex).

 

[Maxperson]

You made the comparison.

There was no comparison. Agency = agency. Someone else compared imaginary game agency to real world agency and said it didn't work because the two agencies were so different. I said that it's no different except that one is imaginary.

No it doesn’t.

So what's different. I have agency in the real world to affect my environment through my choices. My imaginary character has agency to affect his imaginary environment through his choices. Other than one being imaginary, what's different?

I’m not free to simply change the rules of the real world to give me more control over how much I can influence it.

People choose to break the rules all the time in order to gain greater influence and/or control.

But I can do that with an RPG.

In the same way as the real world, sure. The major difference is that unless you're a player and you're cheating, you aren't going to get in trouble for doing it like you probably would in the real world.

 

[soviet]

You may not have, but @pemerton has claimed that he has more agency with his style than my players have in my game. @soviet may have, I can't remember for sure. There have been at least a few who have made that claim.

That's my biggest objection and what I have been arguing against. The idea that narrative games grant greater agency than traditional games is wrong. Agency is agency.

I do think players have more agency in (most) narrative games than (most) traditional games, yes. I use the qualifiers because these are broad and mostly undefined categories.

I think you may have misunderstood which part of the earlier post hawkeyefan's 'Nope!' applied to, but I will let them correct you because I'm not 100% sure either.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Agency in a game is agency, period. The fact that different games have different ways of expressing that agency is irrelevant. There's no difference between the person playing having agency in the game and "player" agency. In either case it's the person at the table that has agency as far as I'm concerned. Not sure what is unclear.

Yes, that’s what I’ve said and you keep disagreeing with it. I think it’s because you seem to use player and character interchangeably at times. Characters have no agency. Players do. Their agency is as a player playing a game. So it consists of the ways they can influence the state of the game.

In the case of an RPG, that means it’s what they’re allowed to make up, when, and why.

The most basic problem here is does the player expect the whole world to revolve around their special character? And, sure, most players will say an automatic "No", but then in that same breath say "oh, so this game has no player agency".

This really comes down to time. Does the player demand that THEIR story be front and center in the very first session of the very first game? Must their story come up in the first thirty minutes? Must everything be about their story?

What about the other players? Do some have to take a back seat so one player can be in the spot light? Or do all two to six player stories have to happen at the same time?

Yeah, who ever heard of a D&D game where the focus moved from one character to the next… as if there were turns or something!

More nuance is required.

For exploration it's not sufficient that a player authors fiction - he must author the fiction in specific ways and about specific things. Authoring fiction outside of those specific ways and specific things can/will conflict with the intended purpose of exploration.

For example (starting with baby steps): if a player pre-authors all the details about a town and it's inhabitants, then he literally can't explore it because he already knows what's in that town. He could say his character has never been there and then have his character explore it, but that's not the player exploring the town.


Yes. But not any fictional action can be declared and still be exploration. Some actions preclude exploration. An example: declaring your PC remembers he's been to this location before and knows who and where everything is.

That some details may be decided by the players doesn’t mean that they cannot explore. I played a game last night where this came up.

The characters were approaching a town that hasn’t been seen in play yet. One of the characters has been to this town before. So I asked him a question about the NPC that has become the marshal of the town, and his men. “What past do you have with Brennan and his Claws?”

The player decided that he has a grudge against Brennan’s lieutenant, Pryder, because in the past he absconded with Pryder’s bride to be. So there’s bad blood between them.

Still plenty to explore!

I see no difference other than a different implementation of how to do that no matter how often you try to create this subcategory of agency you label "player agency".

Oofta… the thread is about player agency. It’s in the title. No one’s talking about some subset of it or anything like that. We’re talking about the agency of a player playing the game.

Given the assumption that agency is not-binary (which was noted as being in dispute)

It’s not in dispute for me!

When I say it's an assumption that agency is not binary and you essentially say 'agency is not binary' - that's not conducive to discussion.

When I say it isn’t binary and you say it is, that’s not conducive either, by your logic.

I think it’s obvious that it’s not binary, that there are degrees of agency available to players, depending on the rules and practices.

And I don't think your counters to them hold up very well. Do you want to discuss this or just have each of us declare we are right?

It’s a discussion forum. I’m discussing. I’m no more obligated to accept your argument than you are mine. If we disagree, so be it.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I do think players have more agency in (most) narrative games than (most) traditional games, yes. I use the qualifiers because these are broad and mostly undefined categories.

I think you may have misunderstood which part of the earlier post hawkeyefan's 'Nope!' applied to, but I will let them correct you because I'm not 100% sure either.

Yes, I was asked if the “narrative side” (not that I speak for a “side”) was now saying that D&D players had no agency instead of less.

So I was saying “nope” to that. I don’t think D&D players have no agency.

Generally speaking… as you point out, this is a pretty broad take.

 

[Maxperson]

Yes, I was asked if the “narrative side” (not that I speak for a “side”) was now saying that D&D players had no agency instead of less.

So I was saying “nope” to that. I don’t think D&D players have no agency.

Generally speaking… as you point out, this is a pretty broad take.

Fair enough. I misunderstood and thought you were finally acknowledging that agency is equal in both traditional and narrative games. Oh, well.

 

[hawkeyefan]

There was no comparison. Agency = agency. Someone else compared imaginary game agency to real world agency and said it didn't work because the two agencies were so different. I said that it's no different except that one is imaginary.

You compared the agency of your character to the agency you have as a person in the real world. I’ll quote the initial comment from @EzekielRaiden and your response where you make the comparison.

The things a player, within a game, can do are often radically different from the things a human, within the real world, can do

This is the bit you bolded and then responded with the below. I think it’s very relevant to the current angle of the discussion.

The bolded isn't relevant at all. It's not WHAT you can do, it's that you have plenty TO do. It doesn't matter that I can get into my car and drive to a 7-11 for a Slurpee and my D&D cleric can't. It also doesn't matter that my cleric can cast cure wounds and magically heal a cut and I can't. We both still have options that affect our environment. We both still have full agency. The agency is the same, even if the available options aren't.

So here you talk about the agency of a character in the game and your agency as a person in the real world. I don’t think it’s a useful comparison in and of itself (the two things are radically different), nor do I think either really helps us understand the agency of a player playing a game.

@EzekielRaiden ‘s comment is far more relevant.

So what's different. I have agency in the real world to affect my environment through my choices. My imaginary character has agency to affect his imaginary environment through his choices. Other than one being imaginary, what's different?

Your character has no agency. It is an imaginary construct with no will of its own.

You as the player have agency. That agency is defined by the rules, processes, and participants of the game.

The reason your agency as a player is different to that of you as a human in the real world is that the participants of play can change any rule or process they like. The participants collectively define and agree to the rules and processes. That’s not how the real world works.

This is why I’ve made repeated suggestions to look at other games and think of what agency means in those games. Look at chess, look at soccer, look at Monopoly. How do the players of these games exercise their agency? How does it work?

Then, after you do that, think of a person playing D&D. Not their character… not the fictional stuff that’s happening, but the way the fiction is crafted. The game. How does a player have agency in a game?

 

[Maxperson]

You compared the agency of your character to the agency you have as a person in the real world. I’ll quote the initial comment from @EzekielRaiden and your response where you make the comparison.



This is the bit you bolded and then responded with the below. I think it’s very relevant to the current angle of the discussion.



So here you talk about the agency of a character in the game and your agency as a person in the real world. I don’t think it’s a useful comparison in and of itself (the two things are radically different), nor do I think either really helps us understand the agency of a player playing a game.

@EzekielRaiden ‘s comment is far more relevant.

Saying agency = agency no matter where it's at is not a comparison of different kinds of agency. I simply asked what other than one being imaginary is different, and I've asked it multiple times now. Nobody has bothered to answer other than your very vague, "That's far from the only difference...," which isn't a real answer.

You as the player have agency. That agency is defined by the rules, processes, and participants of the game.

Okay, if you want to make that distinction than there is only one agency = agency, which makes a comparison impossible to have happened.

My agency to act within the real world and my agency to have my PC act within the game world are identical. I can make decisions that have impact on the environment, real or imaginary.

The reason your agency as a player is different to that of you as a human in the real world is that the participants of play can change any rule or process they like. The participants collectively define and agree to the rules and processes. That’s not how the real world works.

Sure it is. Government can change every rule in existence. In my household I can change any rule in existence. Agency = agency. Scope only matter as subjective preference. The government doesn't have greater agency than I do. Both the government and I can make decisions that impact our environment.

This is why I’ve made repeated suggestions to look at other games and think of what agency means in those games. Look at chess, look at soccer, look at Monopoly. How do the players of these games exercise their agency? How does it work?

The meaning in other games doesn't matter to agency other than to focus more or less on specific aspects of agency. If you enjoy those aspects, it will feel to you as if you had greater agency, even though you do not. If you don't enjoy them, it will feel as if you have less agency, even though you do not.

 

[pemerton]

Yes, I was asked if the “narrative side” (not that I speak for a “side”) was now saying that D&D players had no agency instead of less.

So I was saying “nope” to that. I don’t think D&D players have no agency.

Generally speaking… as you point out, this is a pretty broad take.

I have not said that D&D players have no agency.

I've pointed to instances of play in AD&D and 4e D&D that were high player agency.

I've pointed to approaches to play - GM-driven setting-oriented play, or AP play - that I think are quite common in D&D play, and that are lower and even in some cases low agency play.