D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[clearstream]

Which is exactly what pemerton has said. The imaginary world simply--flatly--does not exist. Our beliefs and attitudes exist, and those beliefs and attitudes can interact, evolve, and be coherent or incoherent with one or more other beliefs/attitudes. These beliefs/attitudes are causative agents, even though they fail to refer in any way because there simply isn't anything for them to refer to.

Yes, although I am adding that which is imagined among them. So that the world as it is imagined, and the events that are imagined to be going on within it, can be causal (given the cognitive facts that amount to their imagining.) Else it becomes rather elliptical to explain normal human cognitive activities such as planning (a plan is imagined, and then acted on: the formed plan is a step in a causal chain even if it exists only in imagination.)

The current King of France doesn't exist, because there is no King of France, it hasn't been a monarchy for 150 years (not since the Second French Empire was abolished and replaced by the Third French Republic.) But it is possible for us to have beliefs or attitudes about "the current King of France", and for those beliefs or attitudes to agree or conflict with one another, and for those beliefs or attitudes to be causative agents for future actions on someone's part.

I would count among those beliefs things we choose to imagine, seeing as they have no real counterpart. Supposing we agree that our fiction is that which we pretend to be true while knowing it is false, and are content to use descriptions such as "M imagines A to exist in a world and be capable of casting spells". Then it's unclear why pretences adopted about said world and A within it (as cognitive facts) cannot be counted among the causes of later behaviours.

Other beliefs may well be necessary, but it seems hard to say that are sufficient without including the specifics of what was imagined. I'd likely subscribe to some sort of multiple-drafts explanation of the development of fiction in TTRPG, implying consensus is another necessity (i.e. I'm not discounting social factors among causes.)

 

[SableWyvern]

He and you are wrong, because if the players just yank that lever down, they exercised full agency to do so. Why? Because they chose not to investigate the room, so they didn't find the little holes in the ceiling that the acid will drop down on them through. If they had, they could have blocked the holes and affected the outcome of yanking that lever.

In my experience, the vast majority of the times players hit lotteries in RPGs are because the players didn't try to figure things out, or gave it a half effort.

I would guess the original comment being quoted had more to do with games where the need to interact with random stuff was standard and expected or necessary, not just an occasional option. In that context, it would make sense to me.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Robertsconley has spent, quite clearly, a lot of effort on trying to work out such techniques, but unfortunately it really does seem like a lot of the end result is "I have to pass my intuitions on to you through direct teaching; they cannot be discussed in any meaningful way" which is...well, it just loops back around to the difficulties with vague handwavy terms and the idea that the only useful techniques are ones which can never be spoken about separately, nor examined afterward, only demonstrated in the moment, fleeting and ineffable, until the acolyte acquires the same intuition seemingly by revelation.

I frankly find learning from someone like Rob much easier. I think you are underestimating how different people are in this respect.

 

[pemerton]

This is the problem with all this conversation. The massively shifting goalposts any time anyone brings up anything. Sandboxing is apparently the quantum game, capable of being anything at any time to anyone.

I see what you're saying.

What I would prefer, in a conversation, would be for people to talk about the approaches they use, rather than trying to establish somewhat unhelpful abstract taxonomies of RPGing that their play falls under.

For instance, it's obvious in this thread that the posters who all describe themselves as doing "living world" sandboxing actually are quite diverse in the techniques they use. Some would do your "include Orcs" thing and others wouldn't. Some us GM hooks/prompts to make things "go", and some don't. Some think it's OK to use "that would be fun/interesting" as part of a decision-making heuristic, and some don't.

Etc.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Back a bunch of pages, I got told in no uncertain terms that one of the strengths of sandbox games is how it can so easily adopt player input. Players want X in the game, it's easy peasy to add it in and not a problem. That was touted as one of the biggest strengths of sandbox play - how adaptable it is.

Yet, here we have a perfect test case - the player chooses "orc" as a favored enemy. Adding orcs into the setting isn't exactly a huge thing. If you goblinoids, orcs aren't really all that different. Yet, what happens in play? The player's choice is completely ignored. Straight up told, "nope".

This is the problem with all this conversation. The massively shifting goalposts any time anyone brings up anything. Sandboxing is apparently the quantum game, capable of being anything at any time to anyone.

I think @AlViking's idea of things here is probably more the norm for sandboxes. Setting fidelity is usually pretty important. I am not saying if you add orcs because players want them, it suddenly isn't a sandbox. I just think his thinking probably reflects a majority

 

[AlViking]

Have you followed the discussion? I posted this:
I took it to be obvious. Self-evident, even. Because of this, which I also posted:

And @robertsconley, @Lanefan and @Faolyn have all subsequently made posts disagreeing with me.

Some of the disagreements are illusory: @Faolyn and @Lanefan asserted that beliefs about authored works can have causal effects. Which is true - obviously true - and not something I ever denied.

Bur @Lanefan also seems to be arguing that the GM should be pretending the fictional world is real - just like children who believe in Santa Claus - when making decisions about it.

I'm less clear what @robertsconley is arguing, because he has posted things that are similar to what I have posted - for instance, talking about heuristics a GM might adopt in order to help make decisions - but to present them as if they somehow contradict what I have posted.

EDIT:
I have tracked things back to these two posts:

So I think my claim is very clear:

*Imaginary things - fantasy worlds among them - do not have real causal power. This means that any talk by a RPGer about what the world did (eg "the world responds to what the players had their PCs do") is really talk about what an author authored the world as doing.​

​

*In a "living world" sandbox, typically that author will be the GM.​

​

*That GM may use various heuristics (eg plausibility, bringing existing trends to fruition, etc) and also techniques (eg rolling on table) in order to decide what to author.​

Not only is this clear, but to me it seems accurate. It describes what I have done for years as a GM. It conforms to what other RPG books that I've read suggest.

I find @robertsconley's claim less clear. He appears to disagree with my assertion that "there is no world that exercises causal potency". The most natural interpretation of that assertion is that the imaginary world does exercise causal potency; but that seems an unlikely belief for someone to hold, and so I presume that something else is intended.

He then refers to the central difference between "living world" and "Burning Wheel" - but in a way that I find obscure. Because both approaches treat the world as a consistent space. In both, outcomes are shaped by how players have their PCs interact with the world (I've given ample BW examples upthread). And in both, what happens next in the world is downstream of the GM and the procedures etc that they use.

It's just that the procedures etc are different. The BW procedures, for instance, include having extensive and nuanced regard to the priorities that a player has established for their PC.

They're talking about using logic and procedures to help them simulate a realistic world including how it responds to character actions and the ripple effects. Much like I do. We're all just explaining what we do the best we can. I find talking about different techniques interesting and don't see any value in belittling other people's processes even if they wouldn't work for me.

 

[pemerton]

This suggests an interesting construction, where there are actual mental states matching or upholding what is imagined (which I assume must be counted into the causation of A's speech act along with inter alia beliefs, social arrangements and thespian propensities.)

And then there is separately "imaginary stuff" which is the pretend world apart from the players. A simpler construction might deny the existence of that world altogether.

So that when @Maxperson speaks of an in-fiction suggestion spell causing a player to say some specific words, they must be referring to a fiction represented upon mental states (along with physical ephemera, such as character sheets, sketches and miniatures.)

Which is to say that the disagreement here appears to be formed around the descriptions rather than the discounting of what is imagined as a cause of what a person goes on to say. Seeing as I don't take @Maxperson to be excluding beliefs etc as joint causes.

They could be saying that those other causes are not sufficient, even if they are necessary... which could also be where misunderstanding or disagreement lies (for instance both sides pointing out that the elements they're interested in are necessary, and the other insufficient.)

Yes, although I am adding that which is imagined among them. So that the world as it is imagined, and the events that are imagined to be going on within it, can be causal (given the cognitive facts that amount to their imagining.) Else it becomes rather elliptical to explain normal human cognitive activities such as planning (a plan is imagined, and then acted on: the formed plan is a step in a causal chain even if it exists only in imagination.)


I would count among those beliefs things we choose to imagine, seeing as they have no real counterpart. Supposing we agree that our fiction is that which we pretend to be true while knowing it is false, and are content to use descriptions such as "M imagines A to exist in a world and be capable of casting spells". Then it's unclear why pretences adopted about said world and A within it (as cognitive facts) cannot be counted among the causes of later behaviours.

Other beliefs may well be necessary, but it seems hard to say that are sufficient without including the specifics of what was imagined. I'd likely subscribe to some sort of multiple-drafts explanation of the development of fiction in TTRPG, implying consensus is another necessity (i.e. I'm not discounting social factors among causes.)

Imagined things don't exist. Full stop. There are no unicorns, no dragons, no hyperstellar space freighters, etc.

We can imagine such things. But imagining them doesn't make them real. Just as with @EzekielRaiden's example of "the present king of France", I can say "I see a unicorn" - and I can form a mental imagine of a uni-horned, goat-hooved but otherwise rather equine white ungulate. But that doesn't mean that any unicorn's exist, or that the word "unicorn" has any such thing as a referent.

An imagined suggestion spell doesn't make me do anything. But imagining a suggestion spell might prompt me to say something - eg "I'm imagining a suggestion spell.

 

[pemerton]

They're talking about using logic and procedures to help them simulate a realistic world including how it responds to character actions and the ripple effects. Much like I do. We're all just explaining what we do the best we can. I find talking about different techniques interesting and don't see any value in belittling other people's processes even if they wouldn't work for me.

I'm not belittling anyone's processes. I'd just like people to describe them, instead of using ellipsis and metaphor like "the world responds to what the players have their PCs do".

I mean, "simulating a realistic world" seems to just be another way of saying "making things up about a world and trying to ensure those things are realistic". Like, no one is running models of the sort that engineers, economists and other natural and social scientists use when they run actual simulations - are they?

 

[Bedrockgames]

They're talking about using logic and procedures to help them simulate a realistic world including how it responds to character actions and the ripple effects. Much like I do. We're all just explaining what we do the best we can. I find talking about different techniques interesting and don't see any value in belittling other people's processes even if they wouldn't work for me.

Yeah and I doubt we are going to break it down to constituent parts that will be satisfying if people are looking for process (it isn’t reinventing the wheel, the GM runs the game as normal, just being as open as possible to where and what the players want to do, and if it is a living world, they do their best to have everything function as it seems it ought to). But people are bringing levels of realism as a straw man none of us are advocating for. Importantly, just having been involved in conversations around this stuff for years, it really isn’t that hard to understand. It doesn’t require a whole new vocabulary or in depth study of the processes. You need ideas as guiding lights (like a living world), some examples from what other people are doing (which is no different in terms of quantity than the kinds of examples people have provided here for things like burning wheel), some guidance on prep and an understanding of the kinds of principles and tools people use. Again I don’t think there is one answer here but things like striving for impartiality, pinning down details before choices are made, letting players ‘trash the scenery’ as Rob says, playing NPCs as live players on the board with their own goals and agency, utilizing tables to help offload some of the setting management, etc. it is just like any other style of play. You have to look into it, experiment, see what other people are doing and decide if it is for you or not. If you are looking for a consistent, platonic sandbox, you probably won’t find that. I don’t think consistency from table to table is as highly valued. What you will find are what I called more procedure heavy-consistent with some proponents (Crawford or Alexander for example). that will get you more consistency table to table if that is what you are after (but I think it is very important to emphasize that many of us are not seeking this)

 

[TwoSix]

No. Not blinders. Just an understanding that there are two major types of agency. Player agency(outside of the PC) and character agency(Player agency through the PC).

A traditional sandbox game is at or near 100% character agency. Since you can't have more than 100% agency, and player facing games include player agency, player facing games have less character agency. Every period of time a player uses some mechanic to author something into the game outside of his character, is a period of time where the PC could have been exercising agency, but isn't.