Chess is not an RPG: The Illusion of Game Balance

[howandwhy99]

Having sat through classes in cryptology and played many games, I have no idea what you mean by that. You could say they're both generalized computing problems, which I might contend in the case of games, but they aren't simply isomorphic.

I contend they aren't isomorphic, game play is code breaking. It's why we have a division between players and referees.

I think this is a silly argument; the disagreement between you is not about whether group collaborative storytelling can occur in a game, but about what the definition of a game is.

His definition of game doesn't include games. It only includes group storytelling.

That seems to beg the question. All the people arguing in this thread that it was not okay understood that RPGs and D&D are cooperative games.

No, they are arguing from a decade old usurpation of cooperation in games by attempting to make collaboration interchangeable. They are two different things. The previous posters' arguments all make sense for collaborative storytelling games. Not having read the entire thread I still suspect they don't touch on cooperative games or cooperative game designs.

That's an incredible claim. Never do cooperative games say you must cooperate to play this game? Never ever?

Never as a rule of the game. Cooperation is a strategy taken by players or the game wouldn't be about cooperation.

D&D 5E Adventure League Player's Guide says:
SNIP

4th and 5th edition are exclusively storygames in design and advice and not really imitating D&D at all as a cooperative roleplaying game.

It was universally understood that only really bad games told players the choices there were to take in games rather than solely defining the rules resulting in the game's design. The other is strategy advice, like examples for divvying up treasure or how to beat a troll.

There are semi-cooperative board games where competition is expected, but Sentinels of the Multiverse, Pandemic, Hanabi and Forbidden Island certainly don't expect competition, and being competitive would be a good way to lose those games. The biggest complaint about Pandemic is the lack of individual play, that it often turns out that one player functionally runs the other characters.

Competition or simply ignoring the other players are always options in cooperative games or the games wouldn't be about cooperating. They would be unreflective rule-following collaboration.

That's a good way to get me to tune out, when you suggest that everyone who disagrees with you in a subject is ignorant walking in blind conformity.

They aren't disagreeing with me. And attempting to convince people they should tune out any voice that rejects the certitudes of a community isn't a sign of an open or diverse community. What are you engaging in with that last line?

 

[prosfilaes]

A game without classes, roles like doctor, lawyer, or wizard, warrior, isn't a role playing game.

Nope. The terminology is established here, since it's been 30 years since the first roleplaying games without classes, and there's no disagreement that GURPS is a roleplaying game. That statement is simply false unless we use your idiosyncratic definition, in which case it's trivial; you can define roleplaying game however you want for your purposes, but stating that definition conveys no information.

 

[howandwhy99]

SNIP
...there's no disagreement that GURPS is a roleplaying game.

The fan war between D&D and GURPS raged the entire 1980s on exactly that point until White Wolf thumbed their nose at everyone by calling their game a "storytelling game". Which pretty much united everyone against them in the 90s, for awhile at least.

Stating the original definition of roleplaying and RPGs enables us to reject contemporary groupthink created by an agenda-driven community trying to "win" everyone into their myopic view of games. (Namely a bunch of WoD fans who didn't think WoD led to "good" stories.)

We should not have a single definition of RPG because we have so many different understandings. Attempting a single one can only reject others. Mostly the attempt to remove D&D from the hobby.

EDIT: And games don't result in good stories. They exist as one of the many alternatives to stories in life.

 

[prosfilaes]

I contend they aren't isomorphic, game play is code breaking.

Isomorphic means they are fundamentally the same thing.

Never as a rule of the game.

I just gave you several examples from the rulebooks where they stated as expectations, not strategy.

It was universally understood that only really bad games told players the choices there were to take in games rather than solely defining the rules resulting in the game's design.

How come now being universally agreed upon is a good thing?

And attempting to convince people they should tune out any voice that rejects the certitudes of a community isn't a sign of an open or diverse community.

I didn't say they should tune out any voice that rejects the certitudes of a community. I said they should reject any voice that comes in and acts like certitudes are obvious evidence of close-mindness instead of carefully building an argument against the consensus. A consensus in a diverse enough community often means that a subject has actually been analyzed long enough that people do understand that point. Given that I don't see much of a consensus in the RPG community, it's also a black strike that you argued for one to try and set yourself up as an iconoclast.

 

[howandwhy99]

Isomorphic means they are fundamentally the same thing.

It means they share the same mathematical morphism. Using it out of context wasn't helping. But it doesn't change the answer.

I just gave you several examples from the rulebooks where they stated as expectations, not strategy.

And everyone of them is a worse game for attempting to include that as if rule. Those aren't cooperative games as I just explained.

How come now being universally agreed upon is a good thing?

Because games designers understand this rule is against the entire spirit of game design. Instead of allowing players to play however they wish within the structure of the game the rules define, the rules tell the players how to behave instead. Rules have nothing to do with telling players how to behave.

I didn't say they should tune out any voice that rejects the certitudes of a community. I said they should reject any voice that comes in and acts like certitudes are obvious evidence of close-mindness instead of carefully building an argument against the consensus. A consensus in a diverse enough community often means that a subject has actually been analyzed long enough that people do understand that point. Given that I don't see much of a consensus in the RPG community, it's also a black strike that you argued for one to try and set yourself up as an iconoclast.

You don't see a consensus in the RPG community that role playing is story telling and RPGs are collaborative storytelling?

Maybe you don't know the history of the prejudice that led to such singular definitions. Or are like many others who simply have no idea there were, even completely different understandings. But I put it to you I understand there is at work an attempt for mass acceptance of (belief in) those two ideas above and are taken by most without question.

 

[Bedrockgames]

The fan war between D&D and GURPS raged the entire 1980s on exactly that point until White Wolf thumbed their nose at everyone by calling their game a "storytelling game". Which pretty much united everyone against them in the 90s, for awhile at least.

Stating the original definition of roleplaying and RPGs enables us to reject contemporary groupthink created by an agenda-driven community trying to "win" everyone into their myopic view of games. (Namely a bunch of WoD fans who didn't think WoD led to "good" stories.)

We should not have a single definition of RPG because we have so many different understandings. Attempting a single one can only reject others. Mostly the attempt to remove D&D from the hobby.

EDIT: And games don't result in good stories. They exist as one of the many alternatives to stories in life.

I gamed during the 80s and the 90s. I never met anyone who felt GURPS wasn't a roleplaying game. I certainly met lots of people who didn't like it much, and I was never a big fan, but clearly what was taking place at a typical GURPS session was indeed roleplaying. If your definition of RPG excludes GURPS, there is a serious issue with your definition. That would be like having a definition of game that includes chess but excludes checkers.

 

[howandwhy99]

I gamed during the 80s and the 90s. I never met anyone who felt GURPS wasn't a roleplaying game. I certainly met lots of people who didn't like it much, and I was never a big fan, but clearly what was taking place at a typical GURPS session was indeed roleplaying. If your definition of RPG excludes GURPS, there is a serious issue with your definition. That would be like having a definition of game that includes chess but excludes checkers.

I think what happened is game theory informed the design of D&D in ways no one had much experience in before. There were very few cooperative games anywhere, in boardgames, cardgames, or wargames. Almost none of them allowed players to have variable power levels and still be balanced (see the original Dungeon! boardgame for where that game design from). And none but perhaps Mastermind included a referee who relayed hidden information behind a screen to those who were to "play" the game. By which I mean to decipher the current game situation to obtain objectives within the game.

I believe the term "role playing" came from the wargaming community in the military where roleplaying was used in military exercises. This was to differentiate it from theater and get at what the core of games where. That massive requirement of intellect and memory inherent to game design and play. Gary was very insightful to include many other aspects of great game design into D&D too, but I believe he borrowed a lot design from the golden age of wargaming too, so not everything is to his credit. Even advancement happens in many games.

What didn't happen was Gary explaining the design of the game. Or why he called it an RPG later. Or what made it an RPG. And when a slew of imitators came later they didn't know what they were doing. Neither did most players. But many did and many understood good game design and recognized it in D&D.

That there was a disagreement at the top levels of the community between D&D and GURPS that trickled down to the fans is part of history. And afterwards no attempt was made for some clear distinction at what an RPG needed to be and RPG, or what went on in an RPG, or what was role playing even. (For D&D players performing a personality was understood by many as not necessary all the way into the mid-90s IME).

Now we get to contemporary RPGs. There is still confusion. In fact, there is a history of confusion. But now the storygame community wants to make storytelling role playing and RPGs storygames. Something 1000s of prior games never were in the RPG hobby.

That to me is rewriting history to fit the absolutisms of today. And it is the deliberate extinction of a hobby by those who have a "better" understanding. Without the backlash who would be playing any of all those games? But the misunderstanding and ignorance persists. Even among those who are fans of older games.

So, I'm not here to exclude contemporary RPGs from being RPGs because they can't hang a label on their game. I'm trying to understand and put forth the definition of role playing and game D&D was designed within. These matter for anyone who wants to play D&D as it used to be before the 90s confusion and the contemporary attempt to make all RPGs, well, nothing whatsoever like D&D.

It's the removal of thought that other definitions seek by seeking widespread acceptance. It is the accuracy of understanding where we came from that I seek.

No one's going to or should determine "the way all RPGs must be understood."

 

[prosfilaes]

But it doesn't change the answer.

What does it mean for a game to be a code? Does it mean we can translate Nim into a code, apply code decryption techniques and translate that back into a solution to the game?

You don't see a consensus in the RPG community that role playing is story telling and RPGs are collaborative storytelling?

No. I think there is consensus that RPGs include storytelling. What of it? Instead of complaining about them, make a counter argument that accepts the prototype definition of RPGs (all editions D&D, GURPS, Trail of Cthulhu, Vampire, etc.) and then offers a better formal definition.

 

[howandwhy99]

What does it mean for a game to be a code? Does it mean we can translate Nim into a code, apply code decryption techniques and translate that back into a solution to the game?

Yes. That's basic game theory.

No. I think there is consensus that RPGs include storytelling. What of it?

Okay. But role playing isn't storytelling and RPGs have nothing to do with it.

Instead of complaining about them, make a counter argument that accepts the prototype definition of RPGs (all editions D&D, GURPS, Trail of Cthulhu, Vampire, etc.) and then offers a better formal definition.

Then no definition can occur. There is no overlap between storygames and roleplaying games except to say that both use the label game. They are utterly different activities.

i understand this makes me sound like Mr. Wick who is arguing for all storygames to be the only kind of roleplaying game. But for anyone who has experience with both can see they each deserve their own term to preserve their identity.

Anything less becomes exceedingly bland.

For example, neither can say they are necessarily human activities. Maybe they could say they are "stuff happening", but I hardly think the community will accept that definition of roleplaying game. (though it did for game).

Personally I understand that roleplaying meant something unequivocally different than improvisational acting from the 40s to the early 80s, almost the complete opposite in fact. But since then the term has been conflated with acting.

So maybe D&D should stop being called a "role playing game" too, as Mr. Wick says? It will probably kill the game and hobby off which I suspect is the goal here, but the ongoing confusion of terms isn't helping anyone.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I am not particularly worried about the conception of the hobby as much as what it developed into. By the 80s you clearly have something called RPGs that include GURPS, Dungeons and Dragons, Traveller, Call of Cthulu, Pendragon and many other types of games. Any definition of RPG that excludes D&D is absurd. Any definition that excludes GURPS or Call of Cthulu is also absorb on the face of it. We can construct all kinds of arguments going to the root of the hobby, going to the root meaning of the individual terms in RPG, etc. But that isn't how language works. You are not chained to the meaning from a word's inception. What matters is how the community of gamers uses the term RPG and how people outside the community use it. Giving it a definition in order to exclude elements we don't like from the hobby is a bad idea. Whether that is story gamers trying to make all RPGs narrative or immersionists trying to remove story gamers from the hobby. I think both are trying to set limits on how others can enjoy themselves at the gaming table. I am personally in the camp of immersion, but that doesn't mean I feel people who like bennies or are into shared narrative mechanics are doing it wrong. They are just doing it differently. I didn't always take this view. My vision of RPGs was much more narrow in the past. Now I give people the courtesy of not imposing my preferences upon the entire hobby and I expect the same courtesy from them in return.

Fundamentally that is the problem with Wick's article. He tries to set his preference as the default definition of RPG. That is the problem with some of the issues you site where people have used the word "story" to enforce a design philosophy on the whole hobby. But the worst thing to do is to simply inverse that. We can have a clear sense of what makes our style of play (immersion) work without tearing down other styles. I can play the way I want, without narrative mechanics, and not deny people who do play with them he right to call themselves role-players. This kind of back and forth doesn't get us anywhere. It is just tribalism.