Chess is not an RPG: The Illusion of Game Balance

[Celebrim]

I think you are all being quite insightful, and at the same time talking right past each other. One thing though I'm very satisfied by is how this discussion is confirming for me something I've long suspected and believed, namely, that during any session of a traditional RPG (like D&D) that there is more than one game being played simultaneously. And it is with this fact that the GNS theory tends to break down, because GNS insists that the game is only functional if only one game is being played whereas I've always insisted that no RPG which provides only one game can be broadly successful.

I get what howandwhy99 is saying. He's saying that if the game doesn't provide what he calls 'the game board', and if there aren't associated mechanics for manipulating the game board in predictable ways that require updating of the game state, then it isn't a Game - and I'm capitalizing game because what he's defining (correctly) as a game is only a portion of what we normally understand a game to be. To a large extent, howandwhy99 is right but what he's failing to understand is that though that is that though the Game is the only part of the game he's interested in playing (because its the only part that is Playable), it's never the only game that is being played. Another player at the table observes the game and says, the Game is a machine for generating Story, and that player is also correct, even if howandwhy99 is not at all interested in this because its not part of the Game but an artifact of the Game. howandwhy99 may well say, "Who cares. We are playing a game. We are not Playing the Story.", and he's right to say that. Nonetheless, it remains the case that another player, lets call him Hussar, not only perceives the Story but while he is playing the Game begins playing it not just for the satisfaction of winning, but also because he sets for himself a goal of not only winning but also producing a Story of a certain form as one of the rewards of play.

Where I think GNS breaks down is that it suggests that howandwhy99 and Hussar are in inherent conflict now. This is because GNS assumes that there is a 'onetruewayism' under the 'System Matters' mandate. Each system must strive to produce one pure form of play - either only Game or only Story. But this is because humans are really bad at thinking about abstract things in terms of quantities instead of qualities. The assumption humans have is if we can't find an easy way to measure the quantity, then it must be a quality and if a quality then the thing is either X or it is Y. But in truth, that's rarely the case. A good example would be the quality of 'color' which is perceived as being a distinct thing. The thing is either 'red' or it is 'blue'. But now that we've found a measurement, we know that color is actually a quantity and it is not the case that a thing is either 'red' or it is 'blue'. Some things can be more 'more red than blue' and even white is not (only) a quality but also a quantity that is 'a bit of red and a bit of blue'.

At each table I think we are sharing the game, usually quite functionally, in a way that lets us each have a bit of Game and a bit of Story and a bit of a lot of other things. It's not like the only other goal of play is Exploration (whatever that means, which turns out to mean multiple things that GNS lumps together in order to keep its theory simple).

howandwhy99: What you are calling The Game Board can just as easily be thought of and is absolutely equivalent to The Fiction. And as long as The Fiction can be manipulated by performing associated mechanics and has concrete game states, then you have a Game. Equally, as long as The Game Board has a concrete description and a logic to it - the very factors that make it playable despite being hidden from you - it is a Fiction and produces a Story.

Or in other words, every story produced by an RPG is isomorphic to a series of moves on a game board. If you go back to my very first post on EnWorld, I think I observed that every sort of game - including those that are event or narrative driven - can be thought of as a sort of map. That is to say, the choice as to whether or not speak to an NPC about his son is basically the same choice as whether or not go left or right at a fork in the passage, and alters the game state. In the Savage Tide adventure path, there is a section where the players accumulate abstract victory points toward preserving a village and causing it to thrive. It's an example of a game structure that produces story and yet meets every definition you have of a Game.

You could do the exact same thing with My Life With Master, the only difference is that the players of My Life With Master aren't encouraged to think of the game board or focus on it, but instead focus on the Story outcome. But even if they don't focus on it, it's there, they just may not see it clearly, which may or may not have consequences in the play in the same way you not focusing on the story even though it is there may or may not have consequences is play. Yes, I understand you'd prefer they focus on the game board, and honestly, I think many of the theoretical story telling games might can be improved in some cases by having more attention to the game board and that many fail to make good stories precisely because they don't think the game board matters (I've seen this criticism of mechanics also made by adherents to Nar games, but in a different way).

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think you are all being quite insightful, and at the same time talking right past each other. One thing though I'm very satisfied by is how this discussion is confirming for me something I've long suspected and believed, namely, that during any session of a traditional RPG (like D&D) that there is more than one game being played simultaneously. And it is with this fact that the GNS theory tends to break down, because GNS insists that the game is only functional if only one game is being played whereas I've always insisted that no RPG which provides only one game can be broadly successful.

I agree and think it goes beyond GNS. You see it in discussions about immersion for example, you see it in discussions all over the net about gaming in general (in fact you sometimes see it as a response to GNS where another one true way is simply proposed in its place). Most tables straddle a range of styles, approaches, goals, etc. Most players seem to fluctuate between various goals and motivations as well. We have to understand these ways of talking about games are merely models and lenses and they don't necessarily align 100% with every person's experience. They are useful so long as they help you game, but when they start constraining us as players, GMs or designers, we need to take a step back and re-evaluate. For me, while I've never been into GNS, I have been into other ideas surrounding immersion and I've found them very useful but I also found aspects of them too rigid and I noticed a gap between the idea and the table. I think this is going to be a problem anytime you have a unified theory of games, especially if that idea becomes exclusionary (i.e. games with narrative mechanics or dissociative mechanics are not RPGs, realism can't be a goal of RPGs, people who want 90s style storytelling are wrong, people who want tactics to matter are wrong, games that cater to multiple agendas are flawed, people who don't talk in character are wrong, etc, etc). We end up with a giant victorian list of "do nots", yet many of the things on the list people love and see as features not bugs.

Again this is what I see going on in the Wick article. He has a big idea about gaming and it is an eloquent and attractive sounding idea, but we know from our experience even if we can't put it into words, that his conclusion that D&D isn't an RPG is just flat wrong. There are some great and useful seeds in that article. He makes several good points, but the model overtakes everything to the point that he is forced to see D&D, the definitive RPG, as not an RPG. Either his model is flawed or he is applying it recklessly.

 

[Janx]

From the Wick article, this is essentially the fault I saw as well. D&D has aspects that appeal to many different players simultaneously.

It may not be perfect/best at any one of them, but the fact that it tends to accommodate feeding different play styles/goals/interests at the same time is a large part of its success.

Ironically, unbalanced focus on any one aspect is what turns players away from D&D (hence some of the 4e backlash)

I'm not sure if a given session has to hit all those different aspects, or if a GM should cater to the narrow interests of his players (usually the case), but D&D itself has to be balanced and neutral on those aspects, so that it remains capable of providing for them on demand by the players/GM.

 

[Umbran]

Where I think GNS breaks down is that it suggests that howandwhy99 and Hussar are in inherent conflict now. This is because GNS assumes that there is a 'onetruewayism' under the 'System Matters' mandate.

Agreed. I've long had that thought about GNS - it is one of the reasons why I feel it is an interesting and occasionally useful framework for theoretical consideration, but it should not be applied to *real world* use very strictly.

The assumption humans have is if we can't find an easy way to measure the quantity, then it must be a quality and if a quality then the thing is either X or it is Y. But in truth, that's rarely the case. A good example would be the quality of 'color' which is perceived as being a distinct thing. The thing is either 'red' or it is 'blue'. But now that we've found a measurement, we know that color is actually a quantity and it is not the case that a thing is either 'red' or it is 'blue'. Some things can be more 'more red than blue' and even white is not (only) a quality but also a quantity that is 'a bit of red and a bit of blue'.

Purple. There is already a quality for that, and it is called "purple". Or, perhaps "checkerboard" or "patchwork" or "striped" or "herringbone" - there are several qualities we can name for "both red and blue"

One of the problems of strictly defined things like "Gamism, Narrativism, and Simulationism" are that once you've set that these are the only qualities you can talk about, you cannot admit to various forms of mixtures easily. The language is guiding, but also limiting.

At each table I think we are sharing the game, usually quite functionally, in a way that lets us each have a bit of Game and a bit of Story and a bit of a lot of other things. It's not like the only other goal of play is Exploration (whatever that means, which turns out to mean multiple things that GNS lumps together in order to keep its theory simple).

Agreed.

Or in other words, every story produced by an RPG is isomorphic to a series of moves on a game board.

Be careful. Discussions of isomorphisms are often about one-to-one relationships. But, unless our maps and game rules are infinitely complex, it is possible to have two different stories that have the same moves on the game board - their structures can be the same, but the audience experience is not. As a base analogy - if you were to map "Romeo and Juliet" in game terms, you'd say it was the same as "West Side Story" - but if you watch the two, the singing and dancing give away that they aren't quite the same

It probably works the other way, as well - one story could me mapped through two different sets of rules to two different maps. I can play the same basic story out in FATE and Savage Worlds, but the rules-based moves are different.

 

[Hussar]

I'd largely agree with that Celebrim. Particularly the part about the views being in conflict. I agree, they aren't, or at least, shouldn't be. I'm not particularly interested in playing any RPG that leans too far one way or the other. At least, not for anything longer than a couple of sessions. Balance and moderation does tend to make a more fun game for me.

 

[Celebrim]

Agreed. I've long had that thought about GNS - it is one of the reasons why I feel it is an interesting and occasionally useful framework for theoretical consideration, but it should not be applied to *real world* use very strictly.

I think it's a good first step, but its too simplistic. It wants to tie up things in a neat little bow, and it ignores some things that I think are fundamental truths to do that. One example of how it misleads designers is it over prioritizes putting rules into a neat little bow because it doesn't notice that several games can be going on at once and to the extent it does it is appalled by the lack of elegance of that.

So Forge influenced designers tend to want to make "the one true mechanic" to fit to GNS's idea that each game has one true way to be played based on its written rules. But even if you think about the game board howandwhy99 is talking about, you'll see that one true mechanic isn't necessarily helpful. Even within the game howandwhy99 is playing, there are bunches of little minigames present. To suggest that you need to have exactly the same mechanics for handling the minigame of turning left and right on the gameboard that represents the physical space of the dungeon, as you have for the minigame that is about defeating some obstacle that blocks further progress down one of those paths, as you have for the minigame that involves navigating the often poorly documented mental space that represents changing an NPCs mental space (from hostile to helpful, or helpful to hostile, or whatever), is I think to miss the point and potentially do harm to the game as a whole.

Each minigame only needs to be functional for the part of the game board it references. It's ok to be playing one game and then 15 minutes later switch to a completely different one. If you've been playing RPGs for any length of time, you're doing it all the time even if you aren't conscious of it.

Purple. There is already a quality for that, and it is called "purple". Or, perhaps "checkerboard" or "patchwork" or "striped" or "herringbone" - there are several qualities we can name for "both red and blue"

Yes. But the important point is that we realize those qualities actually are "both red and blue". That purple is red and blue together is something you are taught at an early age. But it's not actually a trivial point.

One of the problems of strictly defined things like "Gamism, Narrativism, and Simulationism" are that once you've set that these are the only qualities you can talk about, you cannot admit to various forms of mixtures easily. The language is guiding, but also limiting.

That would be a problem with imposing a system for discussing things generally, but specifically GNS as developed by Ron Edwards also argues that mixtures are wrong. Edwards argues that any game that has rules that allow for a good game from one perspective inherent conflicts with any other agenda. Each game must be approached from a 'one true way' perspective, and a good designer is one that knows his perspective and rigidly adheres to it. They even have a word for a game that tries to fulfill multiple agendas: actually, they've gone through a series of words in a fit of private political correctness, so I don't remember what it is but its like 'kludged', 'conflicted', 'incoherent' or some such thing that suggests 'bad'.

Be careful. Discussions of isomorphisms are often about one-to-one relationships. But, unless our maps and game rules are infinitely complex, it is possible to have two different stories that have the same moves on the game board - their structures can be the same, but the audience experience is not.

There is actually a lot to be unpacked in my suggestion, but I didn't want to start unpacking any of it until I gave everyone a chance to respond and digest my first set of conjectures and assertions.

As a base analogy - if you were to map "Romeo and Juliet" in game terms, you'd say it was the same as "West Side Story" - but if you watch the two, the singing and dancing give away that they aren't quite the same

The players of the characters in "West Side Story" were given an additional mini-game to play that isn't found in the original source material. As a result, the story produced by the game has features not found in the original.

Stretching the analogy even more thinly, Shakespeare didn't specify the combat system to be used to resolve contests between the characters, leaving GM's open to very creative interpretations of the mini-game suggested by "They fight."

Which proves simultaneously that "System matters", and "System doesn't matter.", for different values of "matters".

It probably works the other way, as well - one story could me mapped through two different sets of rules to two different maps. I can play the same basic story out in FATE and Savage Worlds, but the rules-based moves are different.

Exactly.

 

[Umbran]

Yes. But the important point is that we realize those qualities actually are "both red and blue". That purple is red and blue together is something you are taught at an early age. But it's not actually a trivial point.

It is more complicated than that.

The thing that we name is a human experience, "Purple". It comes about from a mix of signals from different kinds of light receptors in our eyes. Any combination of light that sets off the right signals is "purple". What you have to mix up to get that final experience depends upon your medium - if you are mixing paint, then equal amounts of red and blue get you purple (this is the the RBG Color Model). But, if you are working with inkjet printers, you're probably going to use a lot of Magenta with a bit of Cyan (The CMYK color model). But, if you can work directly with light, you can just find one wavelength, and it alone will generate "purple" for your audience.

GNS gave us names for things, and those who have been exposed to it strongly tend to think only in terms of those things - as if there were no other way to approach the issue.

The 1999 WotC survey gave us another framework we could use - a story/combat and strategy/tactics approach we could use. And the fact that we can do this supports your point that these aren't incompatible.

F'rex: Maybe that "Gamist" player is really a *tactical* player, but all he's been exposed to are games with strong tactical combat minigames, and he hasn't been presented with a coherent and interesting way to approach story from a *tactical* perspective. Or maybe that "Narrative" player is really strategic - he has a natural ability to make good long-term choices fitting with fictional genre, but D&D's strategic combat tools are weak, so he's never really approached that area.

That would be a problem with imposing a system for discussing things generally, but specifically GNS as developed by Ron Edwards also argues that mixtures are wrong.

Yep. And I think the WotC results above pretty much put a hole in that boat. If he had the mathematical education, Edwards never thought in terms of coordinate systems. GNS is one set of coordinates. WotC had another show up in their data. Just like you can map a globe in polar coordinates or rectangular ones. Both are merely frames of reference for talking about a physical planet.

 

[Sunseeker]

The first time the record came to a halt for me was with

-help you tell stories?

RPGs are a lot of things and that is what I find so great about them. You want to tell a story? Write a book. Starting off with characters like Riddick and "Lieutenant Colonel Alan Caldwell" is a really really bad idea in order to make a point. Why? Because they're characters in a story, not players at an RPG table. They don't have stats. They don't roll poorly. They do exactly what they are written to do because they are written to do so. They will never do anything more and they will never do anything less. They live when they are written to live, they die when they are written to die, they kill with a teacup or their thumb because they are written to do so. They are utterly unlike the players and their characters at the table and comparing them ignores their substantial differences.

Because the focus of an RPG is to tell stories.

Oh he just had to go and repeat it didn't he? I'm only a little while in and already I'm getting a sinking feeling that this is a great big article on how everyone who doesn't play the way he does is having badwrongfun.

Video games like World of Warcraft call themselves roleplaying games, but are they?

Ruh-roh, he just dove head first into a debate that is more heated than "What came first, the chicken or the egg?" Worse, he defends his position with some of the oddest examples. Yes, you can play video games without actually role-playing. Especially MMOs. But the fact that you can do something is not really evidence for anything substantive of any sort. The implication here is that you can't really be playing an RPG unless you're actually RPing. Meaning that if you're RPing in a game where you mustn't, then you are doing it wrong and conversely if you are not RPing in a game where you may, you're also doing it wrong. And even with those who agree with Mr Wick here, I suspect will not take kindly to being told that they're having fun the wrong way.

You know why they get the same experience? Because World of Warcraft and Dungeons & Dragons have the same design goals.

Well John, let me play Clint Eastwood and pretend you're in the chair beside me and ask you a few questions:
What came first, D&D or WoW?
What preceeded both 4th Edition and WoW?
Would you like to retract your point now?

When 4th Edition came out, there was an almost universal negative reaction.

And here we get down to it. John Wick is essentially reliving the glory days of the edition wars. John, there are many names I'd like to call you right now. But quite plainly I think I'll just go out on a limb and suggest that just because you design games does not give you the right to define what is or is not the purpose of an RPG (save those you design I suppose) and what is or is not fun to do with them.

Mr Wick: Your points are bullocks. You're welcome to your opinion and quite frankly I'm highly inclined to let you keep it and never touch one of your 'RPGs'. I can't read a single word beyond this point in your 'article' because I'm so unwordingly infuriated with your 'opinion' on RPGs that I might just vomit the next time you try to explain why games that aren't designed by you aren't RPGs.

 

[Celebrim]

It is more complicated than that.

I would say this is a statement you'll never find me disagreeing with, except that it is probably more complicated than that.

However, since that tends to lead me to extreme verbosity, I have to cut off my discussion somewhere. In fact, I was aware of the situation with purple.

More when I have time.

 

[prosfilaes]

You could do the exact same thing with My Life With Master, the only difference is that the players of My Life With Master aren't encouraged to think of the game board or focus on it, but instead focus on the Story outcome.

Actually I chose My Life With Master to talk about because My Life With Master has a game board in this sense, has stats that are very important and are raised and lowered through skill checks and those stats ultimately produce the outcome at the end of the game. Something like Primetime Adventures, in isolation I'd happily say isn't an RPG, but My Life With Master provides part of the chain that connects it to D&D, that makes story games not trivially separable.

Certainly part of the reason I'd consider storygames RPGs is sociological; storygamers consider themselves playing RPGs, and the two groups are entangled; also, storygamers aren't a big enough group to need separating out. Same way Magic: the Gathering is Magic, whereas Spellfire or Dragon Dice would probably end up tossed in with the boardgames.