Are CRPGs really role-playing games?

[Raven Crowking]

I see no rational basis for your conclusion.

Please demonstrate how this is so.

I see no rational basis for it not to be so.

Burden of Proof is a fallacy in which the burden of proof is placed on the wrong side. Another version occurs when a lack of evidence for side A is taken to be evidence for side B in cases in which the burden of proof actually rests on side B. A common name for this is an Appeal to Ignorance. This sort of reasoning typically has the following form:

Claim X is presented by side A and the burden of proof actually rests on side B.

Side B claims that X is false because there is no proof for X.

In many situations, one side has the burden of proof resting on it. This side is obligated to provide evidence for its position. The claim of the other side, the one that does not bear the burden of proof, is assumed to be true unless proven otherwise. The difficulty in such cases is determining which side, if any, the burden of proof rests on. In many cases, settling this issue can be a matter of significant debate. In some cases the burden of proof is set by the situation. For example, in American law a person is assumed to be innocent until proven guilty (hence the burden of proof is on the prosecution). As another example, in debate the burden of proof is placed on the affirmative team. As a final example, in most cases the burden of proof rests on those who claim something exists (such as Bigfoot, psychic powers, universals, and sense data).

Example of Burden of Proof

Bill: "I think that some people have psychic powers."
Jill: "What is your proof?"
Bill: "No one has been able to prove that people do not have psychic powers."

Logical Fallacy, Appeal To Authority. Whoever coined the term Role-Playing Game has no say in what the word means.

From http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/appeal-to-authority.html (excerpted)

This fallacy is committed when the person in question is not a legitimate authority on the subject. More formally, if person A is not qualified to make reliable claims in subject S, then the argument will be fallacious.

Since this sort of reasoning is fallacious only when the person is not a legitimate authority in a particular context, it is necessary to provide some acceptable standards of assessment. The following standards are widely accepted:

1. The person has sufficient expertise in the subject matter in question.

2. The claim being made by the person is within her area(s) of expertise.

3. There is an adequate degree of agreement among the other experts in the subject in question.

It is important to keep in mind that no field has complete agreement, so some degree of dispute is acceptable. How much is acceptable is, of course, a matter of serious debate. It is also important to keep in mind that even a field with a great deal of internal dispute might contain areas of significant agreement. In such cases, an Appeal to Authority could be legitimate.

4. The person in question is not significantly biased.

It is important to remember that no person is completely objective. At the very least, a person will be favorable towards her own views (otherwise she would probably not hold them). Because of this, some degree of bias must be accepted, provided that the bias is not significant. What counts as a significant degree of bias is open to dispute and can vary a great deal from case to case. For example, many people would probably suspect that doctors who were paid by tobacco companies to research the effects of smoking would be biased while other people might believe (or claim) that they would be able to remain objective.

5. The area of expertise is a legitimate area or discipline.

The general idea is that to be a legitimate expert a person must have mastery over a real field or area of knowledge.

A modern example involves psychic phenomenon. Some people claim that they are certified "master psychics" and that they are actually experts in the field. Other people contend that their claims of being certified "master psychics" are simply absurd since there is no real content to such an area of expertise. If these people are right, then anyone who accepts the claims of these "master psychics" as true are victims of a fallacious appeal to authority.

6. The authority in question must be identified.

As suggested above, not all Appeals to Authority are fallacious. This is fortunate since people have to rely on experts. This is because no one person can be an expert on everything and people do not have the time or ability to investigate every single claim themselves.

In many cases, Arguments from Authority will be good arguments. For example, when a person goes to a skilled doctor and the doctor tells him that he has a cold, then the the patient has good reason to accept the doctor's conclusion. As another example, if a person's computer is acting odd and his friend, who is a computer expert, tells him it is probably his hard drive then he has good reason to believe her.

What distinguishes a fallacious Appeal to Authority from a good Appeal to Authority is that the argument meets the six conditions discussed above.

EDIT: Frankly, I'd be very skeptical of the claims of anyone re: rpgs that didn't accept Gary Gygax as an expert on the topic. This might be a failing of mine, however.

 

[Doug McCrae]

by definition, games have rules

Not according to Wittgenstein.

In his Philosophical Investigations,[1] Wittgenstein demonstrated that the elements of games, such as play, rules, and competition, all fail to adequately define what games are. He subsequently argued that the concept "game" could not be contained by any single definition, but that games must be looked at as a series of definitions that share a "family resemblance" to one another.

I suspect that 'roleplaying game' is also a family resemblance term.

 

[Raven Crowking]

It would be perfectly possible to write a crpg that allowed players to alter its rules during play. For instance in a D&D crpg there could be a button to alter whether characters die at 0 or -10 hit points.

I never said that it was impossible; I said that I haven't seen it yet. In fact, I speculated recently on the idea of setting up something like Second Life as a role-playing game. That would almost certainly meet my criteria.

 

[LostSoul]

In a role-playing game, it is integral to the game itself that the game participants can choose to ignore/alter rules during play. In a role-playing game, all rules are guidelines, and the choices of the participants are limited only by the participants themselves.

I guess a whole bunch of the games I play are not role-playing games.

 

[Kem]

Burden of Proof is a fallacy in which the burden of proof is placed on the wrong side. Another version occurs when a lack of evidence for side A is taken to be evidence for side B in cases in which the burden of proof actually rests on side B. A common name for this is an Appeal to Ignorance. This sort of reasoning typically has the following form:

Thank you for agreeing with me.

From http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/appeal-to-authority.html (excerpted)

This fallacy is committed when the person in question is not a legitimate authority on the subject. More formally, if person A is not qualified to make reliable claims in subject S, then the argument will be fallacious.

We are talking about the definition of the term "Role Playing Game".

Gary Gygax, no matter what he may have coined or made, is not an expert on what words mean.

 

[crazy_cat]

Just thought I'd drop by to say I'm really pleased to see this thread still going. Can somebody please drop me a PM or an e-mail when a definitive conclusion is reached. Thanks.

 

[Kem]

I never said that it was impossible; I said that I haven't seen it yet. In fact, I speculated recently on the idea of setting up something like Second Life as a role-playing game. That would almost certainly meet my criteria.

Any single player game is able to do this. Many multiplayer games can too. Most MMORPGs cannot without getting you kicked out of the game.

 

[takyris]

It would be perfectly possible to write a crpg that allowed players to alter its rules during play. For instance in a D&D crpg there could be a button to alter whether characters die at 0 or -10 hit points.

In NWN, a difficulty slider determines whether drinking a potion incurs an attack of opportunity or whether an ally's fireball can damage you by accident. (The Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale series had similar difficulty sliders, but I don't remember the specifics of what different difficulty levels meant.) If a fight is proving to be too hard or too easy, players can change that difficulty in the middle of the game.

While not as fully configurable as "Hey, DM, can we talk about how AoOs work?", that seems to meet the "capability of changing the rules to improve the player experience" portion of the definition.

 

[Raven Crowking]

It wasn't meant as an attack. I'm sorry you took it that way.

Think nothing of it, then.

Do you have any response to the substance of the rest of my post concerning DM control and Gary's position?

What, specifically, do you think hasn't already been answered already?

First, Because thing X and thing Y are not restricted to systems in your definition, the definition is much too broad.

Simulate (dictionary.com): "to create a simulation, likeness, or model of (a situation, system, or the like)"

Simulation (expanded alternate): noun

1. the act of imitating the behavior of some situation or some process by means of something suitably analogous (especially for the purpose of study or personnel training)

2. (computer science) the technique of representing the real world by a computer program; "a simulation should imitate the internal processes and not merely the results of the thing being simulated"

3. representation of something (sometimes on a smaller scale) [syn: model]

4. the act of giving a false appearance; "his conformity was only pretending" [syn: pretense]

or

1. Close resemblance or imitation, as of one symptom or disease by another.

2. Assumption of a false appearance.

3. Reproduction or representation, as of a potential situation or in experimental testing.

Second, because the definition does not address directionality. By your definition, if Y is a simulation of X, then X is automatically a simulation of Y as well (a relationship that is not upheld in most examples of simulations).

I said "A simulation is any thing X that simulates another thing Y, especially in the case where the medium used in X and Y differ."

EXPAND: "A simulation is any thing X that creates a simulation, likeness, or model of (a situation, system, or the like) another thing Y, especially in the case where the medium used in X and Y differ."

Because X is creating a model of Y, directionality is part of the definition....although it should be noted that two objects can, in various ways, become recursive simulations of each other. D&D 3.X simultes aspects of computer games IMHO, which themselves arose as simulations of earlier rpgs (including earlier versions of D&D).

the only way to play with no limitations on your character is to play without any rules, at which point the activity you are engaged in stops being a game (because, by definition, games have rules).

Doug beat me to this.

I would also add that there is a large difference between "only the limitations agreed upon by the participants" and "no limitations at all", your attempt to equate the two notwithstanding.

 

[Doug McCrae]

I notice that in the PHB quote, Gary makes no mention of the rules being altered during play, only that they can be altered, which would fit many crpgs currently available.

"This game is unlike chess in that the rules are not cut and dried. In many places they are guidelines and suggested methods only. This is part of the attraction of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, and it is integral to the game."

RC, why did you add the part about during play? Was that purely to exclude current crpgs? Otherwise what is your basis for doing so?