GM fiat - an illustration

[AbdulAlhazred]

I don't think in the context of an RPG this is true. If the GM hands the player the dungeon map, do they suddenly have more agency? I don't think they do (in the sense of what agency generally means in an RPG). Again there seems to be a divide here, I would point people to the Monte Cook article I posted, because it is a closer use of the term to how I and I think how people like @FrogReaver are using it. For me, if the players make choices in the campaign, that lead their character to obtain that map in setting, so they can then exploit it, that is agency. On the other hand, if the GM just hands the map to the players soley to give them more information (not because of something that happened in game), that info doesn't make their choices meaningful. It doesn't enhance agency. It simply shifts their POV from first person to something else. A shift in POV is not an expansion of agency

Now we get back to the goals of play. Having information needed to decide what resources are required to get to the treasure room is different than some other goal. Without knowing that you can't analyze the question.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

You are using agency in a way that is unnatural when it comes to the way most of us are using it. I have 100% agency in the real world by the definition I use. I do not know everything or every scenario. Knowing more doesn't increase my agency at all.

So, you have now reduced the term to meaninglessness. I doubt that will be edifying...

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Can you rephrase this. I am not 100% sure I understand the question

I mean, in the absence of information used to make informed decisions about play, pick moves, play becomes a trivial set of blind choices, right? Even if a game is about a mystery, like Clue, the total lack of relevant information means the moves are a series of blind guesses. In dungeon play isn't the best option to just basically follow a rule like "always go left?" Those are not really choices in a nontrivial sense and thus it is hard to see them bearing on agency.

 

[Bedrockgames]

So, you have now reduced the term to meaninglessness. I doubt that will be edifying...

It isn’t meaningless and this is, from what I see, how most gamers seem to mean it (or at least they mean it inna way that is closer to this). Agency is about being able to have your character do things without the Gm placing constraints to railroad. If the GM isn’t placing limits on what your characters can try to pursue, most folks see that as a campaign respecting player agency

 

[Bedrockgames]

I mean, in the absence of information used to make informed decisions about play, pick moves, play becomes a trivial set of blind choices, right? Even if a game is about a mystery, like Clue, the total lack of relevant information means the moves are a series of blind guesses. In dungeon play isn't the best option to just basically follow a rule like "always go left?" Those are not really choices in a nontrivial sense and thus it is hard to see them bearing on agency.

Dungeons and mysteries arent just a series of blind choices. Some blind choices might exist but usually there is opportunity to get information. Having a limited POV isn’t a restriction on agency here. Giving someone omniscient view of the dungeon map, reducers the meaning of their choices. Choices that are informed but with degrees of uncertainty are more standard than blind choices

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I'm pretty sure that compared to mystery solving and exploration in trad(ish) games whole narrativism is an incredibly tiny niche.

Well, I live 3 miles from WotC, and it's hard to throw a stone without running into someone happy to play some Narrativist game or other. I don't know what is more common, probably D&D, but here in the capital of RPG land I don't think your assertion holds up well.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Well, I live 3 miles from WotC, and it's hard to throw a stone without running into someone happy to play some Narrativist game or other. I don't know what is more common, probably D&D, but here in the capital of RPG land I don't think your assertion holds up well.

That doesn’t mean it is the norm outside that region though

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Dungeons and mysteries arent just a series of blind choices. Some blind choices might exist but usually there is opportunity to get information. Having a limited POV isn’t a restriction on agency here. Giving someone omniscient view of the dungeon map, reducers the meaning of their choices. Choices that are informed but with degrees of uncertainty are more standard than blind choices

Reduces the meaning in respect of what? You're carrying a whole lot of assumptions about what games are about into this. But beyond that it feels like you're equating agency with other qualities of game play.

 

[thefutilist]

I agree that hidden information can be used in a very specific type of play, a couple of them actually, but it is not great at producing good Narrativist play. It's good for what I would consider pretty niche styles. One would be full up mystery story play, which IMHO is a very specific thing that is best addressed by dedicated rules sets. Another might be classic DC play where much of the interest focuses on risky exploration and management of risk/resources. Both are, in my long experience, quite vulnerable to failure modes of various sorts.

My default preference is for 'off screen' stuff to be known about by everyone at the table, simply so we're on the same page. Yet there are some back story parts that are commonly hidden that necessitate other back story parts to be hidden.

The most common hidden backstory part is the status of a person or thing.

Michelle has been murdered

The money isn't in the safe.


The following often needs to be hidden if the above is hidden.

NPC backstory: Michelle's backstory can't include the fact she's dead if her murder has to be hidden. Likewise with Michelle's murderer.

NPC effectiveness gets hidden a lot for the same reason.


Why hide it?

We want to see the interaction between the player and the GM's suddenly revealed backstory in real time. Otherwise we have a lot of pre-play for a lot of things.

'what happens when my character discovers Michelle has been murdered?' and so on and so on.

 

[pemerton]

When Hawkeyefan says:

Set aside the idea of narrative control... because it is itself a muddy term. I mean, telling the duke to go screw and heading off to the west... that's an exercise of narrative control. It's the players saying that they're not interested in this duke situation, and they want the characters to go west. Surely this will change the narrative.

It's alien to me. The players telling the Duke to screw and going west has nothing to do with what the players are interested in and is instead a result of constrained positioning (or whatever you want to call it)

It does seem to have at least this much to do with what the player is interested in: namely, they do not seem to be interested in having their PC accede to the Duke's request; and they do seem to be interested in whatever events might happen if they have their PC go west.