Game Mechanics And Player Agency

The concept of player agency is a central pillar of all role-playing games. It is a balancing factor against the omnipotent, omniscient Game Master. For the purposes of this article, we will be focusing on the smaller-scale application of player agency and the role of game mechanics that negate or modify such agency.

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From the very first iteration of Dungeons & Dragons in 1974, there have been mechanics in place in RPGs to force certain decisions upon players. A classic D&D example is the charm person spell, which allows the spell caster to bring someone under their control and command. (The 1983 D&D Basic Set even includes such a possible outcome in its very first tutorial adventure, in which your hapless Fighter may fall under the sway of Bargle and "decide" to let the outlaw magic-user go free even after murdering your friend Aleena!)

It didn't take long for other RPGs to start experimenting with even greater mechanical methods of limiting player agency. Call of Cthulhu (1981) introduced the Sanity mechanic as a way of tracking the player-characters' mental stress and degeneration in the face of mind-blasting horrors. But the Temporary Insanity rules also dictated that PCs exposed to particularly nasty shocks were no longer necessarily in control of their own actions. The current edition of the game even gives the Call of Cthulhu GM carte blanche to dictate the hapless investigator's fate, having the PC come to their senses hours later having been robbed, beaten, or even institutionalized!

King Arthur Pendragon debuted in 1985 featuring even more radical behavioral mechanics. The game's system of Traits and Passions perfectly mirrors the Arthurian tales, in which normally sensible and virtuous knights and ladies with everything to lose risk it all in the name of love, hatred, vengeance, or petty jealousy. So too are the player-knights of the game driven to foolhardy heroism or destructive madness, quite often against the players' wishes. Indeed, suffering a bout of madness in Pendragon is enough to put a player-knight out of the game sometimes for (quite literally) many game-years on end…and if the player-knight does return, they are apt to have undergone significant trauma reflected in altered statistics.

The legacies of Call of Cthulhu and King Arthur Pendragon have influenced numerous other game designs down to this day, and although the charm person spell is not nearly as all-powerful as it was when first introduced in 1974 ("If the spell is successful it will cause the charmed entity to come completely under the influence of the Magic-User until such time as the 'charm' is dispelled[.]"), it and many other mind-affecting spells and items continue to bedevil D&D adventurers of all types.

Infringing on player agency calls for great care in any circumstance. As alluded to at the top of this article, GMs already have so much power in the game, that to appear to take any away from the players is bound to rankle. This is likely why games developed mechanical means to allow GMs to do so in order to make for a more interesting story without appearing biased or arbitrary. Most players, after all, would refuse to voluntarily submit to the will of an evil wizard, to faint or flee screaming in the presence of cosmic horror, or to attack an ally or lover in a blind rage. Yet these moments are often the most memorable of a campaign, and they are facilitated by behavioral mechanics.

What do you think? What's your personal "red line" for behavioral mechanics? Do behavioral mechanics have any place in RPGs, and if so, to what extent? Most crucially: do they enhance narrative or detract from it?

contributed by David Larkins

 

[pemerton]

If the game is done well, the in-fiction capabilities shouldn't be compromised by player system mastery/player-skill or lack thereof. The PC may succeed or fail (to the victory conditions of the game) based on game-play decisions made by the player, but he'll succeed or fail in character, and modeled true to concept.

I'm not talking about system mastery - I'm just talking about play (which in some systems includes mastery; but not all).

Even in a simple game, a player might forget an element of his/her PC. (Eg in the published example of play for MHRP, Shadowcat's player forgets to use an ability that could have helped Cyclops avoid havig his visor ripped off. It's the only example of play I know of which actually has a player noting that s/he misplayed!)

In D&D, which isn't simple, I think the chance of the sort of gap I describe opens up quite a bit. In my experience, it's quite common to come across 18 INT magic-users whose choices around spell selection and spell casting are fairly weak, because casual players don't have a good sense of how to choose spells and when to cast them.

There is a secret roll (or DC), if the player beats a lower, arbitrary DC, he's told something up and asked to make a decision, the decision has no impact on the result, which is determined by the secret roll (or, I added, just as easily by the DM, arbitrarily, it makes no difference to the player's experience, either way).

The illusionism here is fairly light - the real action was the roll, and the choice about where to move is really just adding a bit of colour. It seems to me that the GM could certainly tell the player of the trick as soon as it is pulled without puncturing the mood.

It adds a sense of fair play, tension, fate, etc. In Elfscrusher's example, it actually determines the result, but that fact is hidden from the player, who is instead allowed to believe that had he made a correct choice he could have avoided the trap.

Well, what the player believes will depend upon what s/he takes the meaning of the check to be! As I said, I don't think it spoils the GM's trick to reveal that the movement choice was just colour.

If the die roll doesn't actually matter, and the choice about movement doesn't matter, then it is illusionism (or participationism if the player knows the GM is a master manipulator).

And, no, it's not bad RPGing, it's just a different, really rather common/classic style. I guess I'll advocate for it, as I have for 'illusionism' in the past. It's a legitimate way to run a game, to get behind the screen and use misdirection to provide a great, even 'immersive,' play experience, like a stage magician entertaining his audience with 'illusions.'

If the players know what's going on and are playing along - most of my CoC experience has been like this - then it is like stage magic. (And The Forge calls it "participationism", not "illusionism", and doesn't regard it as dysfunctional contrary to what you've posted - see eg Ron Edwards here.)

If the players in fact believe that their checks and action declarations matter and so the GM is not just "weaving his/her magic" but actually lying, then I think it is dysfunctionality waiting to happen. Stage magicians don't have to lie (contrast Uri Geller); movie makers don't have to lie (contrast people who fake films and photos of UFOs and fairies); GMs who want to run games like this shouldn't need to lie either, should they?

 

[Tony Vargas]

( in the published example of play for MHRP, Shadowcat's player forgets to use an ability that could have helped Cyclops avoid havig his visor ripped off. It's the only example of play I know of which actually has a player noting that s/he misplayed!)

That sounds fine, the character didn't lose the ability or have it fail to function as intended, and the other character's ability (and limitation), was also correctly displayed. In that particular genre, it's not even odd.

The illusionism here is fairly light - the real action was the roll, and the choice about where to move is really just adding a bit of colour.

The idea was a pretty interesting one, because of the two DCs. The lower DC gave the player information, a hint - that the enemy was up to something - as far as the player could tell, that was it, he then decided what to do, and would naturally attribute the consequences to that choice, but it's actually based on the higher DC.

GMs who want to run games like this shouldn't need to lie either, should they?

DMs in this style routinely withhold information - it's the main point of the classic DM Screen - not just about what's around the next dark corner, but about what the rolls they call for or make behind the screen are about, even what the rules may actually say. It's just the conventions of the style, like the magician having control of the stage and not explaining how he does the tricks.

 

[Hussar]

I guess I don’t really see the distinction between the player setting the DC and the game doing the same. After all, isn’t that what opposed checks do? Set the DC?

So if it’s okay for the player to set a dc, why can’t the rules do the same?

And your third point about there being a disparity between the player and the character, to me that’s the point of role play. I’m not my character. I’m trying to experience the fiction through the lens of that character. So if the character believes X then I should do my best to portray that belief.

 

[Lanefan]

I understand (and agree with) the narrative goal, but not how that bears on this discussion or how it would unfold mechanically. Do you mean the character sneaking and an NPC failing to detect him, or an NPC sneaking around and a character failing to detect him? Is this pure narrative frosting, or an actual mechanic? (The difference between, "Nope, you don't hear anything but the wind" and "The guard stops and listens, but then you hear him mutter something about raccoons.")

Seems to me like an attempt to make these things (in this case Perception) work more like a sliding scale rather than a binary pass-fail, with rolls in the range of [just above/right on/just below] the DC giving uncertain results, which - if true - is a great way of doing it.

So if the DC is 12 a roll of maybe 9 or less would give a clear fail, a roll of maybe 15 or better would give a clear success, but anything in that 10-14 range would be narrated as an uncertain or not-sure result. And in the example it would work the same whether it's the PC sneaking or an NPC sneaking - a roll right around the DC is going to give an uncertain result.

Lanefan

 

[Guest 6801328]

I guess I don’t really see the distinction between the player setting the DC and the game doing the same. After all, isn’t that what opposed checks do? Set the DC?

So if it’s okay for the player to set a dc, why can’t the rules do the same?

And your third point about there being a disparity between the player and the character, to me that’s the point of role play. I’m not my character. I’m trying to experience the fiction through the lens of that character. So if the character believes X then I should do my best to portray that belief.

Upthread there was some mention of how high of a Diplomacy check would be required to move somebody from Hostile to Minion, or something like that. (If that was D&D, I skipped that edition...). So the implication is that based on starting attitude, a higher or lower roll would be needed to move somebody to a new attitude.

If the DM, or the game, sets the DC for the Duke persuading me to take his offer, it is effectively telling me how initially opposed I am to the offer. If I choose my own DC, I am choosing how initially opposed I am. It seems to me the player should be in control of that initial state.

And, again, there is the maturity requirement: a player who always chose DC 50 is not being cooperative.

 

[Guest 6801328]

Seems to me like an attempt to make these things (in this case Perception) work more like a sliding scale rather than a binary pass-fail, with rolls in the range of [just above/right on/just below] the DC giving uncertain results, which - if true - is a great way of doing it.

So if the DC is 12 a roll of maybe 9 or less would give a clear fail, a roll of maybe 15 or better would give a clear success, but anything in that 10-14 range would be narrated as an uncertain or not-sure result. And in the example it would work the same whether it's the PC sneaking or an NPC sneaking - a roll right around the DC is going to give an uncertain result.

Lanefan

Yes, I agree with this in theory, but to also maintain immersion it gets very complicated, perhaps impractically so. Elsewhere (very briefly in this thread, more extensively a year ago or so) I've written about the need for the mechanics to support positives, negatives, false positives, and false negatives in order for "detection" (stealth, traps, lies, etc.) to function in a meaningfully immersive way, by which I mean the player genuinely feels some mix of certainty/uncertainty; never (or very rarely) an absolute.

Of course, if you don't care about this type of immersion, which [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] nicely summarized above, then it's all a lot simpler.

 

[Hussar]

Upthread there was some mention of how high of a Diplomacy check would be required to move somebody from Hostile to Minion, or something like that. (If that was D&D, I skipped that edition...). So the implication is that based on starting attitude, a higher or lower roll would be needed to move somebody to a new attitude.

If the DM, or the game, sets the DC for the Duke persuading me to take his offer, it is effectively telling me how initially opposed I am to the offer. If I choose my own DC, I am choosing how initially opposed I am. It seems to me the player should be in control of that initial state.

And, again, there is the maturity requirement: a player who always chose DC 50 is not being cooperative.

Fair enough but, by far the same token, that’s precisely how deception works in the game. Your “disbelief” dc is set by your Insight skill. Whatever you the player might think, your character believes the lie if you fail to beat the opposed check.

And for persuasion it could easily be an opposed check. Your wisdom vs persuasion or something like that. The mechanics are there already.

I can kinda see the issue of the dm setting the dc. But opposed checks certainly fill that need.

 

[Guest 6801328]

Fair enough but, by far the same token, that’s precisely how deception works in the game. Your “disbelief” dc is set by your Insight skill. Whatever you the player might think, your character believes the lie if you fail to beat the opposed check.

And for persuasion it could easily be an opposed check. Your wisdom vs persuasion or something like that. The mechanics are there already.

I can kinda see the issue of the dm setting the dc. But opposed checks certainly fill that need.

Opposed checks don't take into account the initial belief state, though. To use the character's Wisdom vs. the NPC's persuasion assumes that the character always starts with the same degree of opposition.

Imagine that an NPC is trying to persuade a PC of 5 different things, ranging from the trivial ("No, please, you go first...") to the outrageous ("Become my vassal...."). If it's Persuasion vs. Wisdom then it's the exact same probability for each. Which seems...undesirable.

The DM could assign varying modifiers to each. But if that's the solution, why not let the player decide where his/her character stands on each question?

 

[pemerton]

If the DM, or the game, sets the DC for the Duke persuading me to take his offer, it is effectively telling me how initially opposed I am to the offer. If I choose my own DC, I am choosing how initially opposed I am. It seems to me the player should be in control of that initial state.

And, again, there is the maturity requirement: a player who always chose DC 50 is not being cooperative.

My starting point for thinking about this is what resources does the player have to spend, to reflect his/her PC's resolve? This is somewhat analogous to setting a DC, but you can't always set it at 50 if your player-side resources are finite.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Upthread there was some mention of how high of a Diplomacy check would be required to move somebody from Hostile to Minion, or something like that. (If that was D&D, I skipped that edition...).

D&D 3.x, it was the basis of the notorious Diplomancer build.

If the DM, or the game, sets the DC for the Duke persuading me to take his offer, it is effectively telling me how initially opposed I am to the offer. If I choose my own DC, I am choosing how initially opposed I am. It seems to me the player should be in control of that initial state.

Sure, in 3.5e you could simply be a real surly guy and always choose hostile. The game would set the DC based on that. And the Diplomancer would hit it.

But it still just changed attitudes, it wasn't actually 'persuasion.'

I guess I don’t really see the distinction between the player setting the DC and the game doing the same. After all, isn’t that what opposed checks do? Set the DC?

Opposed checks set s DC randomly, giving overly swing results*. Fixed DCs make useful targets for system masters to optimize to.

So if it’s okay for the player to set a dc, why can’t the rules do the same?

Obviously, in this context, someone might feel setting the DC is giving the player agency?

And your third point about there being a disparity between the player and the character, to me that’s the point of role play. I’m not my character. I’m trying to experience the fiction through the lens of that character. So if the character believes X then I should do my best to portray that belief.

Sounds reasonable.





* aside: in the context of d20, and especially 5e BA, I think opposed checks are a bad mechanic and simply shouldn't ever be used...