A Question Of Agency?

[Crimson Longinus]

That does not seem like a very high-player-agency campaign. Nothing is happening.

It sounds like extremely low-stakes round-robin storytelling.

I'm sure it's possible to have quality RPGing that emulates fiction other than melodrama and adventure stories; or even that emulates Andy Warhol's Sleep. But the RPGing I've participated in or observed that involves nothing but PCs talking to NPCs about shopping hasn't been it.

'Like that' obviously referred to the manner of conducting the game (i.e. without rules) and not the content (talking and shopping.) It works best for genres that are mostly about talking, investigating, drama and atmosphere, and less about action and combat. It is my preferred method for cthulhuesque games.

 

[Lanefan]

side note:

During all this I think @zarionofarabel must have shattered the ENWorld record for most 'likes' given out in a single thread.

/side note

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Doesn't doing so kinda chew on their agency? Aren't they allowed to get hung up on something trivial if that's what they want to do?

In one of the most hilarious sessions I've ever seen, most of the session consisted of trying to persuade a particularly stubborn Dwarf PC to ride in a cart or ride a horse or use any method of transportation faster than his own stubby little legs, as we had a long way to go and limited time. You-as-DM would have been tearing your hair out (ours was!), but as players we just couldn't stop laughing. And the increasingly-ridiculous arguments put forth by both the Dwarf's player (to walk) and those of the other PCs (to get in the damn cart) - priceless!

We got nothing done that night, yet 35 years later I still remember that session fondly.

And that's one important form of agency. If the players wanted to engage with that sort of activity, then who is the GM to say that it doesn't matter? Obviously it mattered to the players.

 

[zarionofarabel]

side note:

During all this I think @zarionofarabel must have shattered the ENWorld record for most 'likes' given out in a single thread.

/side note

You peeps have blown my mind with all this if it makes you feel better. The likes are well earned in my very humbled opinion.

 

[Manbearcat]

It's not really that. It is merely that for choices to matter there must be some constraints and limiting the players ability to affect the setting to that of their character is one possible constraint. People seem to recognise this in a sense that they accept that the game needs to have rules; that a situation where the players can just freely declare anything and have it be so is not optimal. I really want people to answer this: do rules that place limits on how the player can affect the fiction or 'gamestates' reduce the players agency? And if they do, why we have such rules?

I'm going to try to answer your question here but go a bit further. Rules do a lot of things:

CONVEY PLAY PREMISE/PRIORITIES

Are we testing players' skill in extracting treasure from ruins while that crucible reveals/evolves the nature of their PCs or are we finding out how what gun-toting Paladins will do to uphold the Faith and mete out justice in a fantasy Wild West that never was?

CONVEY GENRE

Laser sword wielding ascetics with supernatural powers and swashbuckling space opera or dark fantasy apocalypse Peaky Blinders.

STRUCTURE PLAY

TTRPGs aren't free-form so we need to know how conversation is supposed to unfold, what props (if any) and when/how to deploy them, when to consult the dice (or whatever) to find out how the gamestate changes, when to write something down/tick a box etc, how do reward cycles and attrition work and advancement/PC change resolve?

DELINEATE PARTICIPANT ROLES, GIVE AUTHORITY, AND TAKE IT AWAY

Why we need different people doing different stuff (playing obstacles/adversity and playing protagonism), how much latitude does each participant have to make a thing happen, when and how does that change during the course of play, what is "the system's say" when the agenda of two (or more) participants collide?

---

I'm going to start with your first statement but revise it a hair:

For choices to matter there must be some constraints/limitations on all participants.

If the apex play priority of a game is about testing player's skill at x, then a referee who has no constraints on their authority will create 1 of 4 possible persistent states at the table (or any 2, 3, or 4 simultaneously with enough players):

* Player's choices ACTUALLY don't matter because the GM will use/has used their unbridled authority to manipulate outcomes at their discretion.

* Players exist in a persistent state of insecurity because their choices may (or may not) matter in any given moment, but they can't be sure because the GM has mandate to leverage the offscreen/backstory (that only they are privy to) or ignore/change action resolution results to manipulate outcomes at their discretion.

* Player choices matter because the the players have extended trust to the GM to respect outcomes despite their mandate (whether the GM has authentically earned it by actually respecting outcomes or contrived it by being highly proficient at Illusionism and/or their players aren't perceptive/invested enough to detect it).

* Player choices are irrelevant because the players just want to feel like their choices matter and their skill is tested...so long as the GM is capable of manufacturing that state of being then the player is happy enough to go along with whatever is happening.

Now I'm going to go back to the Moldvay example that I wrote out above.

Moldvay's (pretty much) exclusive play priority is testing tactical (Turn decision-point management in exploration, Round decision-point management in combat, creating and managing class synergies, etc) and strategic (loadout management, long term resource - rest/recharge etc - management, when to parley and when to fight, when to egress from the delve and when to push on, etc) skill.

If that is the apex play priority, then authority by any participant (GM or player), within any of the outlined components of rules that I've outlined above, that disrupts the competitive integrity of play with respect to that priority DOES NOT increase agency. It reduces it.

Put another way, if some facet of system/rules isn't distilling skill from ineptness, but rather distorting it and/or making it impossible for the cream to authentically rise to the top, then that facet of system/rules is rendering play fundamentally incoherent. Agency is decreased because agency is "play-priority context-dependent."

 

[pemerton]

They get to a door. They don't know what's beyond it, and all attempts to find any traps etc. have come up dry in such a way to leave the PCs still unsure if any are present or not.

The GM knows the door is safe and that there's no real threats right behind it...but the players don't and nor do the PCs. Which means, the principles of GM neutralilty tell me I should just sit back, shut up, let them decide what to do, and then react to that decision.

Doesn't doing so kinda chew on their agency? Aren't they allowed to get hung up on something trivial if that's what they want to do?

If the game is about puzzle-solving then the GM should be letting the players solve the puzzles. Though frankly I think if the game is going to have very much of what you describe here - ie puzzles where the answer is nothing to see here - then it may turn out to be a fairly tedious puzzle-solving game. (This manifests in classic dungeoncrawling in the form of too many empty rooms.)

But if the players are in fact looking for interesting things, than narrating straight past things with nothing of interest isn't stepping on anyone's agency. If we are playing to find out what happens, then nothing is happening here isn't a state of affairs that demands much dwelling on.

In one of the most hilarious sessions I've ever seen, most of the session consisted of trying to persuade a particularly stubborn Dwarf PC to ride in a cart or ride a horse or use any method of transportation faster than his own stubby little legs, as we had a long way to go and limited time. You-as-DM would have been tearing your hair out (ours was!), but as players we just couldn't stop laughing. And the increasingly-ridiculous arguments put forth by both the Dwarf's player (to walk) and those of the other PCs (to get in the damn cart) - priceless!

We got nothing done that night, yet 35 years later I still remember that session fondly.

And that's one important form of agency. If the players wanted to engage with that sort of activity, then who is the GM to say that it doesn't matter? Obviously it mattered to the players.

This is an example of what @Manbearcat, upthread, described as characterisation and pantomiming.

I don't think that is the sort of activity that @zarionofarabel had in mind when asking about player agency in the OP - because the ability to engage in characterisation and pantomiming is completely independent of whether or not the PCs come to a fork in the road, and if they do whether they will meet an ogre down one, the other or either fork.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Thing is, as the PCs have no way of knowing whether what they're deciding on is major or trivial it's only fair the players don't either.

Depends on the specific players too. If you get two or three over-planners in the same game be prepared to spend a lot of time waiting for stuff to happen - or be willing to bring the heat: wandering monsters can be your friend.

Well if it’s trivial, then I’m not spending time on it. Not significant time anyway.

If you mean something like the PCs are at a door that they think may be trapped and are deciding how to proceed...and you know it’s not trapped (or even if it is, honestly) a simple “okay, let’s go, you opening the door or moving along” should do the trick.

But yeah, if the matter is actually trivial? Why spend any real time on it?

To some extent, I agree. But when half a session or more goes into one PC's family drama it gets a bit much. (example: as a player right now one of my PCs is just coming in from the field and has some family stuff to see to before he heads out again - my hope is to resolve it with a few die rolls and the DM telling me how much I have to spend; so as not to bore everyone else with it).

So the impression I get from your posts is that your players are bored by anything that has to do with their characters, and have no patience for any events that are personal to another member of the group.

It kind of amazes me.

Perhaps - but about their characters as a party or their characters as individuals, is the question.

Our play tends to be about the group, but plenty of personal stuff comes up for each of the PCs. This doesn't bore the other players anymore than if I as GM presented them with a prompt of some kind.

It's to also set up the idea that history is happening around the PCs above and beyond their own purviews.

Okay, cool. I think that kind of stuff can really help make the world seem like a place that exists independent of the PCs.

I just don’t think that kind of stuff needs to be determined months in advance.

The agency this player has right now is immense, though she might not realize it: her PC has what everyone wants, and no matter what she does with it that action is going to change the fiction's course, probably in a big way.

That’s cool. I meant more at the beginning. Like, were they aware of all these factions and the likelihood that they’d be stirring up a bee’s nest with this? If not, when you decided it happened, it sounds like you went pretty far with it before they even learned about it.

It's kind of a game-world response. I didn't pre-plan the idea of this Necromancer war in the slightest, but when the party ended up taking over half a year on what I-as-DM initially thought would be maybe a 2-month venture I started thinking about what the ramifications of that delay might be, then rolled some dice and came up with this.

Right, this is why I ask. These may be logical reactions to what the PCs have done. But how aware of this logic would the PCs be?

If one person designs the setting ahead of time there's way more opportunity to find and iron out any inconsistencies.

How can there even be inconsistencies if something is made up in the moment?

Taken independently there's nothing wrong with any of these. But put 'em together and now you've got a river trying to flow uphill. And while you could easily say "Oh, just turn it around and make it flow north-to-south", that would retroactively invalidate the run of play that took place in the city which for me would be a game-wrecker.

I live near the Hudson River. It flows both ways. Perfectly mundane explanation.

I’ll admit though that our games tend to not be worried about this kind of stuff. It generally doesn't come up.

And can that question ever truly be answered, other than in hindsight? Ahead of time, all one can do is guess.

Well, no....you can observe. You can ask. You can listen.

 

[hawkeyefan]

You might not be, a lot of people certainly strongly implied.

I feel that seemed mostly a misunderstanding rather than anyone implying anything.

And this is why I really don't agree with the idea, that agency is so easily quantifiable that any increase of the player decision making power will automatically increase the net agency. I think I explained it well enough with my example about 'get out of jail free card' meta currency. And the truth is everyone actually agrees with this in theory. Everyone agrees that the game has to have some limits and making decisions within these limits is what makes those decisions meaningful, thus producing agency. People just do not agree what those limits should be.

The limits should serve whatever the purpose of the game is.

If I’m going to play a cinematic game of the Alien RPG, then I’m not going to give players the agency to wander about the galaxy. I’m going to initiate play with a pretty tightly woven scenario, very likely in a specific location, and they’ll encounter it, and we’ll see what happens. I’ve designed the scenario to be fun and engaging for a session or two.

If I’m going to play something more long form, then I’m going to lean on the players a lot more. I’m going to ask them what they’d like the play to be about. We’ll do this through character creation with each player providing goals for their PC, and possibly shared goals for the group.

I’ll come up with a scene to kick things off, and then where it goes from there is up to them.

Not too long ago, I GMed for my buddy’s nephew and a couple of his friends. It was a one shot, and the friends were new to RPGs. We played 5E D&D. I made it a very short and succinct dungeon crawl. I intentionally kept things focused and moving. There were a few decision points for them, and we really gave those thought, but these were far fewer than what I’d want to do for an experienced group.

When my brother comes in to town, he sometimes wants to play just for old time’s sake, to get together with some old friends and roll some dice. I don’t really worry about agency in those games. They’re brief and the purpose is not to let the players drive the fiction.

It all depends on what the goal of play is. Sometimes, agency isn’t as strong a concern. But in my weekly ongoing game, it very much is.

This is not exactly what I meant, though I am not sure what us knowing that the player's agency was limited gets us. Like so what? What are we using this information for?

You said it was pointless to state that something reduced agency. I gave you an example that would matter to me as a player.

Talking.

Anything more specific in mind?

RPGs are barely games anyway. Imagine a part of a D&D session where the characters are just talking with each other and some NPCs, exploring a city, perhaps shopping. No dice have been rolled. Did it stop being a game? You can just run entire sessions or campaigns like that. Perhaps ask GM asks some rolls and just sets up the odds based how likely in they think the character is to succeed. In practice it doesn't run significantly differently than a game with somewhat more complex rules. Its really good for horror and drama where the focus is more on atmosphere rather than 'winning'. Keeps the focus on the fiction rather than on the rules.

I don’t agree with most of this. You can have scenes where no rules are engaged, but entire sessions is pushing it, and entire campaigns means you’re not even really playing a game anymore. You’re still role-playing, but without rules, it’s not a game.

My games tend not to linger on this kind of stuff for too long. Interaction with NPCs is expected and encouraged, but shopping and that kind of stuff is maintenance that we sum up quickly and then move on. So the NPCs that we try to focus on for interaction tend to be ones where something meaningful may take place.

The hope is that these interactions lead to interesting things, or give context to elements of the fiction.

Nah. I just want to pretend to be an elf or somesuch. I want to do things that would be sensible from the POV of my character and I want things that make sense in the fictional context result from those actions. The rules can help to facilitate that but they're just an imperfect simulation engine.

That’s fine. I don’t think of the rules as an imperfect simulation engine. My preference is that the rules help me do what I want to in the game, and that they’re fitting to it, and that they be engaging mechanically. I’m not exactly sure what it means to pretend to be an elf (meaning I’m dure different people will have ideas about that) but if that’s my goal, then I hope the rules help me do that.

Ideally rules should be as unobtrusive as possible - like the stereotypical butler, they should always be present but out of the way, and never noticed until needed.

Ideally rules should be fun. They should be engaging and should promote play, and add to it. I don’t think that would make then obtrusive.

 

[pemerton]

I don’t think of the rules as an imperfect simulation engine. My preference is that the rules help me do what I want to in the game, and that they’re fitting to it, and that they be engaging mechanically.

<snip>

Ideally rules should be fun. They should be engaging and should promote play, and add to it. I don’t think that would make then obtrusive.

I don't know what the measure of obtrusive is supposed to be.

It's hard to think of a mechanical resolution process in which the rules are more prominent - in the sense of providing the content and the topic and the focus of the conversation - than D&D combat rules: there is generation and discussion of initiative results, to hit rolls, damage rolls, comparison of rolled numbers to other numbers (eg to hit vs AC), adjustments of running tallies (eg hit points lost or regained), etc.

But given that @Lanefan and @Crimson Longinus both appear to enjoy playing D&D, I take it that this is not an example of obtrusive rules.

(D&D combat rules are also not very much of a simulation engine. But that's a different point.)

Anyway, the rules of a RPG do the same work as the rules of any other game: they tell the participants what to do and when to do it. This includes telling us when and how to roll dice, and what the consequence is for the game of the result of the roll.

If you game rules tell you to roll dice when you don't want to, then you need better rules! The same if your rules don't tell you what follows from rolling this rather than that on the dice.

EDIT: Here's Vincent Baker again:

Roleplaying's Fundamental Act​

Roleplaying is negotiated imagination. In order for any thing to be true in game, all the participants in the game (players and GMs, if you've even got such things) have to understand and assent to it. . . .

So look, you! Mechanics might model the stuff of the game world, that's another topic, but they don't exist to do so. They exist to ease and constrain real-world social negotiation between the players at the table. That's their sole and crucial function.​

 

[Manbearcat]

Well if it’s trivial, then I’m not spending time on it. Not significant time anyway.

If you mean something like the PCs are at a door that they think may be trapped and are deciding how to proceed...and you know it’s not trapped (or even if it is, honestly) a simple “okay, let’s go, you opening the door or moving along” should do the trick.

But yeah, if the matter is actually trivial? Why spend any real time on it?

Or (a) establish a party Caller and (b) set an eggshell timer for decision-points that become session-stalling bottlenecks. 1 minute timer after you've canvassed the situation as the group and the time spent has yielded no forward movement. If you haven't made a decision by then, the party Caller decides for the group.

I mean, people used to bitch about 4e Turns (and therefore Combat) taking long. I never experienced the horror stories that people presented (our average 3 PCs Combats averaged about 24-36 minutes with the most intensive ones being around the 50-55 minutes mark) but it can't be worse than the agonized over strategic bottlenecks where 5 minutes turns to 10, which turns to 20 (and so on...all being spent haggling and arguing over a single decision-point)! How is one THE WORST EVER and the other is A-OK?