D&D General What is player agency to you?

[Maxperson]

With respect, adding "in my experience" would be key here.

Because you haven't demonstrated credentials beyond anyone else who gamed during the period (and there's lots of us around here), nor have you cited any decent sources.

So, you know, watch out how deep you want to plant that flag of claiming there was One True Way.

There's no one true wayism there. I didn't say it was the only way to play, but the way the books tell people to play and teach them to play is not the Hickman Revolution. If you learn from books or from someone who learned from the books, it's unlikely that you would default to the Hickman Revolution. I mean, if you did it wouldn't have been a revolution when Hickman did it.

 

[pemerton]

Because people want different things. The family that would rather participate has less agency when watching. But not the ones who chose to watch.

Yes, people want different things. But getting what you want isn't a synonym for exercising agency.

I work as an academic. I read a lot. I write a lot. When I read, I am not exercising agency over the content of what I read. I am learning what someone else wrote. When I write, I am exercising agency (typically, at least - perhaps not much agency if it's something like a reply to a student about a cookie-cutter extension request). Those who read what I write are not exercising agency over the content of what they read.

The fact that I sometimes enjoy what I'm reading doesn't change any of the above. The fact that I often find writing a challenge doesn't change any of the above either.

In the sports case, a spectator exercises almost no agency over what happens in play - perhaps their cheers and groans have some modest effect on the morale and effort of the players, but that's it. I've watched other groups play RPG sessions. I wasn't exercising any agency over the content of their shared fiction. I've watched the odd snippet of RPG play on youtube now and then. I wasn't exercising any agency over the content of those shared fictions - that content was fully established in the course of recording it, all of which happened prior to my learning of it and watching it.

Agency is a fundamentally causal notion - "action or intervention producing a particular effect" is what Google gives me this morning, which seems good enough to go on with - and the fact that A and B are both interested in a thing, or pleased by a thing, doesn't mean that they are in the same sort of causal relation to it, let alone that they exert the same degree of causal influence over it.

 

[Mort]

Unless the table has agreed as you mention in the last sentence, there should be no "push them back on the path." Those paths can be exited. They are very linear adventures, but they are not railroads because the path can be exited. If you agree not to exit the path, then the adventures cease to be linear and become accepted railroads. The party is on the rails until the end.

I agree with the linear vs. railroad distinction, linear =/= railroad unless the PCs are forced down it(though I suspect enough people don't to trigger another 3000 posts).

BUT, in an adventure path, the PCs are not creating the story - they are playing through an already created story. As such, I can certainly see @pemerton's point re: forced story.

 

[niklinna]

I acknowledge different styles and systems have different levels and kinds of agency. However, the term "low player agency" is derogatory and should be used with care. Voluntary lack of agency is associated with passivity, submissiveness and low intelligence in many cultures.

I don't find it a bit derogatory. I use it for games I play in, and for games I GM. I can see how voluntary lack of agency can be associated with passivity, and submissivness, but low intellgence seems like a stretch to me.

A player who is not interested in narrative agency, but cares about rollplay, character creation or even just interaction at the table is not "low agency" by definition. It is perfectly possible to combine low narrative agency with a highly interactive and expressive experience. I have seen it.

I can't say I've seen people calling players "low agency". Apart from that, it seems the issue is the use of the phrase "low agency" without context (and as it turns out you get to that later on). Agency exists within some domain of activity (and goals). A player who isn't interested in narrative agency...doesn't care if there's narrative agency (or might want it to be low/absent). A player who's interested in roleplay, character creation, or even just interaction at the table clearly wants agency in those activities. Maybe those two players should play games, and do with groups, that match their preferences (which of course may vary from game to game and group to group).

We can discuss agency and even how certain systems are high on (potential) agency compared to others, but let's please stay away from categorizing players in the same manner.

If by this you mean "low agency" without further qualification, then sure. But I'm totally cool with saying I enjoy some games featuring low player agency in terms of establishing goals and framing scenes (as one example), or that I don't enjoy games in which the GM gets to override my dice rolls (as another example). I would not categorize myself as a "low agency" player. In which posts have people claimed players themselves, and in general, are low agency?

People who watch sports instead of participating do not have lower agency. They do not prefer "low agency activity". (And the distinctions for rogs are even less extreme than this)

They absolutely do have lower agency in terms of participating in sports. And they have high agency in terms of watching sports. (And yelling at the TV, of course.)

There's great value in the discussion about how different systems and styles enable, codify, support and promote various kinds of sgency, even to someone like me who is skeptical about games with a focus on joint creation of fiction. You have actually piqued my interest, for what that's worth. But when I read posts categorizing players in somewhat unflattering language, I am right back feeling skeptical. I know this isn't about my feelings. But let's please remember that agency in the context of a system/table and the same in context of individuals have very different connotations.

Systems/tables and individuals aren't two separate contexts; they are factors of the single context for any given session/campaign, or activity, to use a broader term. You've raised a fair point about context, however (even though you didn't apply it in the prior quotation), and I have seen it elided from such discussions often enough that I agree it's good to point out.

Because people want different things. The family that would rather participate has less agency when watching. But not the ones who chose to watch. That was my whole point - people are not "low agency" purely because they don't choose one over the other.

The people who choose to watch the game rather than participate still have no agency over/within the game. After all, they aren't engaged in the activity. The question of agency over/within the game doesn't even apply to them because the context for it doesn't exist—and agency is very much a contextual thing, as you pointed out in your earlier post. What spectators do have agency over is whether or not they will continue to watch the game, which is the activity/context they are engaged/involved in.

Anyhow I am done with this thread.

 

[niklinna]

Yes, people want different things. But getting what you want isn't a synonym for exercising agency.

I work as an academic. I read a lot. I write a lot. When I read, I am not exercising agency over the content of what I read. I am learning what someone else wrote. When I write, I am exercising agency (typically, at least - perhaps not much agency if it's something like a reply to a student about a cookie-cutter extension request). Those who read what I write are not exercising agency over the content of what they read.

The fact that I sometimes enjoy what I'm reading doesn't change any of the above. The fact that I often find writing a challenge doesn't change any of the above either.

In the sports case, a spectator exercises almost no agency over what happens in play - perhaps their cheers and groans have some modest effect on the morale and effort of the players, but that's it. I've watched other groups play RPG sessions. I wasn't exercising any agency over the content of their shared fiction. I've watched the odd snippet of RPG play on youtube now and then. I wasn't exercising any agency over the content of those shared fictions - that content was fully established in the course of recording it, all of which happened prior to my learning of it and watching it.

Agency is a fundamentally causal notion - "action or intervention producing a particular effect" is what Google gives me this morning, which seems good enough to go on with - and the fact that A and B are both interested in a thing, or pleased by a thing, doesn't mean that they are in the same sort of causal relation to it, let alone that they exert the same degree of causal influence over it.

Well put.

I remain done with this thread, though.

 

[pemerton]

I remain done with this thread, though.

As is your agential prerogative!

 

[Maxperson]

There’s a significant difference between the two as they're presented. I was young enough when 2e came along that my friends and I didn't always treat them very differently. But looking back with a more discerning eye after the fact, there are many significant differences.

For sure. I'm not saying that there are not differences or that many of those were not significant. I'm saying that those differences really didn't shift how people ran the game as you note for you and your group.

There really isn't much difference between DMing THAC0 as opposed to the 1e charts. Or DMing specialist wizards or specialty priests instead of clerics and magic users.

The Hickman Revolution is still the dominant form of play. To be fair, the elements of it already existed in the early days... you can just look at the G-D-Q series for a good example. But once Dragonlance came along, everything that TSR was making shifted toward that model. And then Vampire came along and solidified it even further.

Is there some reason you can't just exit the series in the middle somewhere and go seek out the Isle of Dread or something? Dragonlance was designed differently, but I didn't see any other modules really copy the method identically. You could find linear stuff, but it wasn't really a railroad in the way Dragonlance was.

Nothing since then has really removed that play paradigm from being predominant. 5e certainly doesn't do anything to change that. It's very focused on the DM as the primary storyteller and worldbuilder and so on. And 5e is the predominant game in the hobby by orders of magnitude.

If it's so predominant, why have I never seen it with the many DMs I've observed and played under? You'd think I'd seen it at least once or a dozen times by now.

Who cares what label they gave it? They provided a clear definition for what they mean, and it's a pretty commonly accepted and used term. Beyond arguing the label, what issue do you have with the description? That it's linear? Isn't that a strength of that style?

Clearly I care. Words mean something. They don't exist to be redefined willy nilly.

The problem I have with it is that it's NOT linear. It's a railroad and railroad is not the predominant state of play. If it were merely linear play I'd still disagree that it was predominant, but I wouldn't really have an issue with it outside of that.

So do you have any examples of this from play? Have you run any of the 5e adventures and then gone significantly off-script due to player decisions? If so, what did you do? How did you handle it? Did things eventually make their way back to the adventure?

I don't need an example of an official 5e adventure, because I've done it with a long term adventure that I created. There's no difference between mine and theirs other than who made it.

Several years ago instead of the typical method we use to figure out the theme of the next campaign, the players came to me and asked me to just make it up. So I did. When it started they decided that they didn't particularly care for that theme and told me that their characters were going to head south and become pirates. So that's what they did. The entire thing I had planned out still happened over time, but they just heard about it through rumors and having it occasionally touch their play a bit since it was widespread and it couldn't be avoided entirely, but it wasn't the focus of their play and they were fine with it touching their play occasionally because of that.

 

[Maxperson]

What % of plays through any given module go 'off path' and don't play through most of the material? I mean, come on!

No idea, but I'm sure it happens. Also, the important aspect is not whether it DOES happen, but rather that it CAN happen. If it can happen then it's not a railroad and therefore not the Hickman Revolution as I've seen it described in this thread.

 

[Maxperson]

This statement is absolutely not true and doesn’t serve to help things. It should probably just be stricken from the record.

Every parent/guardian athlete ever would vehemently dispute this claim about sports above when watching their kid/ward. Their first commentary and lament is how agonizing the event typically is because they are helpless in watching their child/ward play precisely because the parent/guardian has little to no agency to impact events. They’re just stuck in an emotive, performative position of cheering and hoping rather than “doing the thing!”

EDIT: And this paradigm holds true for anyone invested to the outcome that is relegated to “spectator status” whether it be an American defensive Football player watching the offense take the field at the end of a game down a score or a starting pitcher who is up next game but has to watch his teammates on the brink of elimination try to extend a series to the next game (I’ve been in all of these situations! They suck!).

I don’t even understand how someone can say “spectators invested in an outcome have the same agency as an actual participant?” How can that even be a thing said?

Because...

I have full agency to buy a ticket and go to the game or sit back at home and watch it on TV. If I'm at the game I have agency to buy what I want, when I want it. Go to the bathroom when I have to go, or waggle my foot quickly for an hour waiting for the 7th inning stretch. I can have a deep conversation with the friend next to me and only half pay attention to the game, or I can not say much of anything and watch the game intently. And more.

All of those things have a significant impact on how the game turns out for me. I have a ton of agency, even if I'm not an active player. You see, my part in the game is different than the part of say the third baseman or pitcher, but it's still a part that I am playing and experiencing. And I have a lot of choices on how it turns out for me.

 

[Maxperson]

I agree with the linear vs. railroad distinction, linear =/= railroad unless the PCs are forced down it(though I suspect enough people don't to trigger another 3000 posts).

BUT, in an adventure path, the PCs are not creating the story - they are playing through an already created story. As such, I can certainly see @pemerton's point re: forced story.

Yeah, I don't agree. I don't know about your players, but mine will create new ways to get things done. If the adventure path takes them to a small town near Baldur's gate, they are as likely to go there and hire 200 mercenaries with their mass of gold as they are to just continue on the path to the next clue or part. They will sometimes go very far afield looking for information on something in the adventure, including places not in the adventure like Candle Keep.

Unless the DM is going to railroad the group down the path in the adventure book OR the group is very passive and doesn't bother to get creative, they will often do things outside the scope of what is written and that can drastically alter how the adventure continues. Going back to the mercenary hiring, those 200 mercenaries might enable a win where the path expects a loss or at least an inability to assault a place. They could theoretically complete the adventure and "win" halfway through.

Stories in D&D are collaborative in the way I mention above, even if the story is in large part pre-written. Pre-written =/= set in stone, so the story can and will develop differently for each of dozens of different groups.

It's only if the DM is forcing the path that HE wants done and the story that HE wants to happen, that will wander it what @pemerton is describing, and I really don't think that happens more often than very rarely.

Edit: Note: The above is with adventures created by me. I don't run official adventure paths, but it wouldn't be any different if I did.