Authenticity in RPGing

[Lanefan]

I don’t know about that. There’s nothing true about the decision, right? No elements relevant to a character, no clues about what’s down each path, no hint at consequences, no actual consequences… hard to see what’s authentic about it. Seems mostly like bad design.

Might be bad design, sure, but even though the decision both appears at the time to be and later turns out to be meaningless and-or irrelevant, it's still IMO authentic in its making. Not that in the long run it matters.

Sure, it’s not a certainty. But it’s certainly steering things. It may not be a hard right turn, but it’s at least a little nudge to the wheel.

It reminds me of something I was thinking about in regard to a campaign of Spire that I just wrapped up with my group. I made sure that any and all prep I did was about the situation now and the players involved, and never ever planned anything sequentially. I never committed to what was next for the PCs. Never anything like “once the PCs realize that the corpse fruit is being alchemically turned into the drug ambrosia, then they will confront the retroengineers responsible” or “once they speak to Trill the addict in Threadneedle Square, then they’ll go to The Sisters’ compound”.

Investigative adventures can be difficult to not sequence like that. I think if the GM has steps in mind…this will happen and then this which leads to that… that’s problematic (if we’re valuing player freedom and that sort of thing). The GM shouldn’t be deciding what’s next.

Partial dis/agreement here. The GM should have some ideas as to what comes next and maybe even have those ideas written down such that if things do progress as intended she's ready to seamlessly flow into the next phase. BUT - and here's the key bit - the GM's ideas on what might come next have to be considered as expendable in the face of whatever off-path things the players/PCs cause to happen next.

The problems IMO arise when the GM won't allow their ideas to be expendable.

I'm running a mystery right now, as it happens. The PCs have been asked to find out what became of another adventuring group who went into an empty Roman-villa-like manor house and simply never came out.

Spoiler

There's a nasty chute trap in there behind a few secret doors that teleports anyone falling in into a prison cell a hundred miles away or so; someone in the previous party fell in and the rest more cautiously followed, and of five adventurers three got killed at the other end, one escaped into some caverns, and one switched sides and joined the enemy out of self-preservation. The PC group are more powerful than the first lot and thus have a better - though not certain - chance of a better outcome.

Adventure design critics would probably flay this thing sideways were I ever to write it out in publishable form: most of the villa's rooms are empty and trashed (the previous group took out the foes and treasure), the clues that point to there being more to this place than first appears are quite subtle and easily missed, there's a few cases where missing one clue or element means they simply can't access part of the place, and it's very possible they'll fail outright in that they might never find the key thing noted in the spoilered bit.

And I'm fine with all of that. If they succeed then I know what comes next, and if they don't I'm ready and able to wing it from there as they figure out what to do next, whether there or elsewhere.

 

[Lanefan]

Uninformed means that the meaning of the subsequent events does not arise from the act of choosing.

Correct, yet again here the information level at time of choosing and the ultimate meaningfulness of the choice are not related.

If the GM has a selection of rooms, and, as characters walk through the dungeon, the GM rolls a die to choose what room is next, clearly, the players are not actually making a choice. If no choice is made, that choice cannot be meaningful.

As the players aren't in fact making the choice here (other than to cede the choice-making power to the GM) this example isn't germaine.

Same situation, but the GM hands the die to the players - again, they are not making a choice, so there is no meaningful choice.

The players are in fact making two choices here: 1 - to continue exploring rather than turn back or stop or abandon the dungeon, and then 2 - to cede the where-to-explore-next choice-making power to the die. This does allow them to blame the die if things go wrong later, I suppose, but the meaningfulness of the choice - made for them by the die at their request - still won't and can't be known until (maybe much) later.

Same situation, but the GM hands a piece of paper to the players, with 5 random letters on it, and tells them to choose. The letters are free of semantic content, so there is no relevant thought process to choose one over another. If there is no relevant thought process, the determination is arbitrary - no different than a random choice, which we have already determined is not actually a choice, and so has no meaning.

Ah, but have we determined that a random choice has no meaning, though? I certainly haven't. A completely random choice can in hindsight turn out to be highly meaningful; and this meaningfulness is not changed by the fact the choice was randomly made at the time. You might, for example, randomly decide to take a different bus one day throgh flipping a coin, and on that bus meet the love of your life; and thus in hindsight a random choice becomes the most meaningful decision you ever made.

 

[Umbran]

Such investigative type adventures are very susceptible to railroading. They tend to be linear and many elements are predetermined. It takes some real effort to work against these elements pushing things a specific way.

It pays to read a bit in systems specifically designed to do investigative scenarios - like Ashen Stars, or most other Gumshoe variants. While there are elements that are pre-determined (who or what location has a given piece of information) they only become railroads when they are set up as "Clue 1 -> Clue 2 -> Clue 3...," which is, well, a newbie mystery-adventure-writing mistake. Set them up as a web, rather than a chain, and there's no railroad.

 

[Lanefan]

I am going to say that I find your use of the term 'meaningful' to be inaccurate. I think you mean 'consequential'.

I've already stated upthread that I consider those two terms to be synonymous.

In your last example here you have an inconsequential choice, which I would call a FALSE CHOICE, and indeed it isn't meaningful. I'd note that the information being provided, being wrong, isn't really information at all though, its deception or simply incompetence perhaps. There never was a genuine choice, both doors lead nowhere. I don't think this really says anything except what we have been saying all along, genuine/authentic choice requires consequence. Again, in the ordinary use of English this is widely understood, as the phrase "You leave me with no real choice" is perfectly understood by all.

"You leave me with no real choice" simply shows the chooser has enough information* to foresee some potential outcomes of whatever options are available, and of those options only one has potential outcomes beneficial (or at least clearly less worse) to the chooser.

Whether any of those potential outcomes - good or bad - would in fact come out real won't and can't be known until after the choice is made.

* - which may or may not be accurate or true.

 

[Bill Zebub]

With the caveat that I haven’t read the entire thread, what exactly is “authenticity” in this context? Authentic what?

I would know how to parse the phrase authentic gospel music. Or authentic mont d’or cheese. Or an authentic Renoir. Or authentic tears.

But WTF is authentic roleplaying?

 

[hawkeyefan]

I don't really think they're any more prone to railroading that other adventures. The PCs are still in control of how the proceed and conclude the investigation. I'm working on a scenario for Blade Runner, a murder mystery, and the meaningful decisions won't have anything to do with finding clues. The meaningful decisions come from deciding what to do with those clues. In my scenario, the PCs get to decide the fate of a replicant named Casey. Knowing he did nothing wrong, do they capture/kill him as their boss demands which is bad for their humanity but good for their career? Or do they allow him to escape in the San Diego reclaimation zone and sleep easy at night?

It sounds like a cool scenario and very suitable for the setting. But it sounds like you already have the defining decision set. It’s all building toward that… do they let Casey go or take him in? This decision also seems to rely on them learning the fact that Casey is innocent.

I would not say this is a railroad. I would say that if I played Blade Runner, this would be the kind of scenario I’d expect and I’d be onboard. But it does make certain assumptions about the way the game will go.

Might be bad design, sure, but even though the decision both appears at the time to be and later turns out to be meaningless and-or irrelevant, it's still IMO authentic in its making. Not that in the long run it matters.

Partial dis/agreement here. The GM should have some ideas as to what comes next and maybe even have those ideas written down such that if things do progress as intended she's ready to seamlessly flow into the next phase. BUT - and here's the key bit - the GM's ideas on what might come next have to be considered as expendable in the face of whatever off-path things the players/PCs cause to happen next.

The problems IMO arise when the GM won't allow their ideas to be expendable.

I'm running a mystery right now, as it happens. The PCs have been asked to find out what became of another adventuring group who went into an empty Roman-villa-like manor house and simply never came out.

Spoiler

There's a nasty chute trap in there behind a few secret doors that teleports anyone falling in into a prison cell a hundred miles away or so; someone in the previous party fell in and the rest more cautiously followed, and of five adventurers three got killed at the other end, one escaped into some caverns, and one switched sides and joined the enemy out of self-preservation. The PC group are more powerful than the first lot and thus have a better - though not certain - chance of a better outcome.

Adventure design critics would probably flay this thing sideways were I ever to write it out in publishable form: most of the villa's rooms are empty and trashed (the previous group took out the foes and treasure), the clues that point to there being more to this place than first appears are quite subtle and easily missed, there's a few cases where missing one clue or element means they simply can't access part of the place, and it's very possible they'll fail outright in that they might never find the key thing noted in the spoilered bit.

And I'm fine with all of that. If they succeed then I know what comes next, and if they don't I'm ready and able to wing it from there as they figure out what to do next, whether there or elsewhere.

Well I think it’s all about knowing the myriad elements involved so when the players do X, you know what factions Y and Z are going to do. You’re responding to them.

There’s a half baked thought that’s been in my mind during this discussion about discovery versus revelation, and how each feels to the players and how each impacts play. I haven’t quite worked it out, though.

It pays to read a bit in systems specifically designed to do investigative scenarios - like Ashen Stars, or most other Gumshoe variants. While there are elements that are pre-determined (who or what location has a given piece of information) they only become railroads when they are set up as "Clue 1 -> Clue 2 -> Clue 3...," which is, well, a newbie mystery-adventure-writing mistake. Set them up as a web, rather than a chain, and there's no railroad.

Yeah, I’ve read and played Gumshoe games…Trail of Cthulhu, mostly, but I picked up Night’s Black Agents and the Dracula Dossier because the idea intrigued me and I wanted to see how it worked.

So let’s take the Dracula Dossier as a good example. It’s an investigation scenario. I think I’d say that it constitutes the kind of web you’re talking about. There’s an abundance of information to use. Maybe too much, honestly.

But there’s so much because a lot of it is alternate takes. There are multiple ways to portray the conspiracy and how the different characters fit into it. A lot has been done to try and prevent the game from becoming a railroad. It could still easily be done given the nature of it.

Investigations need not be railroads, but they do seem susceptible given how many elements are predetermined.

 

[Umbran]

It could still easily be done given the nature of it.

But, is that meaningful? Isn't it true that anything could easily be done as a railroad? Try to name a genre that couldn't be easily done as a railroad, and tell us why you think the genre is somehow railroad-resistant.

Investigations need not be railroads, but they do seem susceptible given how many elements are predetermined.

Again, if everything is susceptible, this is not special.

I ran Ashen Stars for my regular group for several years - I used many of the published adventures for it, and not a single one of them was a railroad in design. It took no effort on my part to make the scenarios non-linear in construction.

Now, Ashen Stars has an ethos from its inspirational material - every mystery has, at its end, an ethical conundrum or choice the PCs will have to make. While eventually you expect every group to solve the mystery, how they get there, and what they do when they get there, are not on rails.

 

[MGibster]

I would not say this is a railroad. I would say that if I played Blade Runner, this would be the kind of scenario I’d expect and I’d be onboard. But it does make certain assumptions about the way the game will go.

Sure, but I make certain assumptions about every game I run. Sometimes it bites me in the butt, but if the players are given the quest to go recover the Cheese Wheel of Destiny I can usually count on them to try to recover it. And, hell, you never know, maybe they'll suprise me in Blade Runner by trying to get the replicant off planet or contact the replicant underground.

 

[clearstream]

I don't think the criteria is what is authentic for the PLAYER, most of us would not do 99.9% of the things that are depicted in RPGs. A belief in taking the right-hand path is of course a bit simplistic, but in a magical world it could easily be a superstition or a way of signaling allegiance to some sort of divine power or something. Why would this belief/superstition be inauthentic just because the player doesn't ACTUALLY hold the same? When acting in character they certainly, authentically, act as if this is a part of their mental makeup. If it is supported by mechanics, then they participate in that level as well, and might, as @pemerton suggests, decide to contravene that belief for some reason. Now, the reasons for doing that might be an interesting point of discussion here, I'd go for an examination of what exactly to call that!

I feel that's a reasonable view, but it has the consequence of calling out that personal authenticity canot be the "authenticity" we're talking about. We might be discussing what I've labelled "simulation": the impression that an imagined persona is acting in a way we would count personally authentic... for a real person; notwithstanding that we're guaranteed the player is essentially - and successfully - dissembling.

You might want to say that being able to act as if you genuinely hold beliefs you do not hold is a sign of personal authenticity. I don't find that an especially attractive idea. It would seem to let in that the con artist is counted more genuine than the person who is always openly and stubbornly true to themselves. Maybe there is theory for theatre that can help disssolve this paradox?

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I feel that's a reasonable view, but it has the consequence of calling out that personal authenticity canot be the "authenticity" we're talking about. We might be discussing what I've labelled "simulation": the impression that an imagined persona is acting in a way we would count personally authentic... for a real person; notwithstanding that we're guaranteed the player is essentially - and successfully - dissembling.

You might want to say that being able to act as if you genuinely hold beliefs you do not hold is a sign of personal authenticity. I don't find that an especially attractive idea. It would seem to let in that the con artist is counted more genuine than the person who is always openly and stubbornly true to themselves. Maybe there is theory for theatre that can help disssolve this paradox?

Yeah, I'd have to leave that for others, I'm not particularly knowledgeable about acting and such. I think what we might be able to say is that the authenticity must be experienced by the participants in the game, but it is ABOUT the characters and how play explores them and reveals them? I guess here @pemerton expressed something about this. So, the question is then perhaps, can the player "grab the bull by the horns" and say something authentic about their character?