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Message: <blockquote data-quote="howandwhy99" data-source="post: 4751066" data-attributes="member: 3192">I take it by "fictional positioning" you are referring to more <a href="http://rpgtheoryreview.blogspot.com/2008/03/weekly-review-february-2nd-to-march-8th.html" target="_blank">Forge theory jargon</a>?It's certainly dependent upon whether describing an action counts as acting out an action.  For a lot of people the second doesn't cut it.  The action must actually be performed.   In fact, the only times description only of actions does qualify as roleplaying is when such description relates the speaker's knowledge of the action.    Saying something like, "I swing my sword" isn't roleplaying as it doesn't relate the speaker's knowledge of how a sword is swung at all.  When that is the case, then the action isn't roleplayed.  The person acting out the role, either physically or through verbal desciption, is only acting out the portions they can prove they can knowledgeably perform.  (I'll explain more at the end of this post...)Those games are RPGs, but you are right that those specific elements of those games are not roleplayed.  Why? Because the designers decided they were not definitive of the roles being performed.  1. Roleplaying was defined by Jacob Moreno in 1921.  2. It's definition was changed in the 40's to another that has only recently begun to be called "roleplaying simulation".  This second definition is the basis upon which RPGs have long been designed.  3. The design of RPGs was very intelligent and this lasted throughout the 70s, 80s, and 90s so long as the designers understood why the hobby was termed, quite accurately, as it was because roleplaying games came from wargames.  In military simulations, the sister half to wargames (both manual and computer simulations) is roleplaying.  And that roleplaying and understanding of that specific definition of roleplaying, roleplaying simulation, has been around since the 40s.But I do agree, language changes.  Clearly the Big Model attempts to co-opt the definition of roleplaying that has informed the design o RPG for 30+ years by using a different definition of roleplaying and denigrating any definition or design goals previously used.  Essentially, non-Indie games.This isn't edition wars.  I'm saying Indie games are games designed to fulfill one definition of roleplaying.  Mainstream games, like D&D, are designed to fulfill another definition.  Are both fun?  I think so.  But apparently not by many Forge followers by the definition of the "fun" meme going around.  But that whole thing was also started via "One True Wayism" as you accurately point out.  The "Big Model" seems best to be equated to "the one true belief about roleplaying games".---Getting back to what I stated above, here are some examples of roleplaying.  I agree with all, but the last: D, as I state below.  For clarity in our ongoing conversations, which ones would you agree qualify as roleplaying?A. In the real world a man goes to a home where a woman opens the door.  He explains he is a telephone repairperson.  The two talk about the problem she is having and the man attempts to fix her phone.   - The man is roleplaying a telephone repairperson.B. Exactly as before the same man and woman act out their actions, but this time the woman is an actress (auxiliary/NPC) who is assisting in the teaching of the man to be a better telephone repairperson.  This is theatre as both persons are pretending to be in a situation neither is actually in.- The man is roleplaying a telephone repairperson.C. A second woman sits at a table with the man and asks him to describe to her how he would interact on the job as a telephone repairperson.  The man describes what he would do step by step and the woman relates back the results of his actions.  - The man is roleplaying a telephone repairperson.D. The same set up as C. except the man says only, "I convince the woman I am a good telephone repairperson."  - This is not roleplaying.  No performance of a role has been acted out or conveyed.Option C. is what a lot of tabletop roleplaying is like.  Except in my example the woman, the instructor, has complete fiat over what qualifies as a "good" performance to qualify as a telephone repairperson.  In an RPG, there is a unique role in all of roleplaying theory (academic theory, not the internet stuff), that of the Referee. A referee refers to the definition of the role as given in the rules rather than determining themselves the successful performance of that by another.  This is how roleplaying can qualify as a "game".  This is how it allows for objective measures for success or failure.  Judges, another kind of Director-based role in roleplaying was also defined in the 70's.  It used the "Imperfect Model" hypothesis Alex319 describes above.  Rather than a game though, this makes roleplaying more of a contest.  The performers attempt the role behavior as best they can, like a dancer dancing the rumba, and then the Judge adjudicates the performance accordingly.  This judgment is hopefully made objectively upon strict guidelines.</blockquote>

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