In Defense of the Theory of Dissociated Mechanics

[Yesway Jose]

None of the things you put in quotes were actually written by me. They are all inaccurate recharacterizations of what I wrote, and I specifically told you they were inaccurate the first time you made the mischaracterization. So please don't play the "putting words into my mouth" card, okay?

I used single quotes --- which is paraphrasing, but not quoting -- or so I thought, but apologize if you misunderstood the spirit of it.

Let's take a break/breather?

 

[wrecan]

They perceive the results of the die rolls, but within the context of understanding the nature of the resolution mechanic, and how that mechanic exists within an agreed upon, pre-existing model of rationality.

But that model can be that the DM (or the DM and players jointly) will interpret the result within the context of the shared narrative.

Dissociative mechanics are problematic not because they can't ultimately be "explained" in context, but because every single explanation is necessarily "reconstructing" the reality of the game when it happens.

It's not "reconstructing", which implies that the reality of the moment had already been constructed.

Every die roll in a game contributes to the ongoing construction of the reality. When you roll your d20 to hit something in a D&D game of any edition, and then you get a "hit" that doesn't necessarily mean anything concrete in game. You still roll your damage, apply any other effects, and the DM then compares that to the stats of the NPC your character hit. In that moment between the roll of damage and the DM deciding what that means, has any reality been "constructed"? No. The DM could narrate that the blow staggered the creature filling his eyes with fear, or that it was a grazing blow that did little damage, or a solid shot to the jaw that causes the creature to smile and say "Is that all you've got?"

The dice dictate a mechanical effect. Its' the DM and players who determine what their characters perceive, based on that mechanic. Sometimes the mechanic leaves little room for interpretation. Sometimes it leaves a lot of room for interpretations. But invariably, between the dice and the DM's narrations, there is going to be an interpretation of some sort.

The reason for creating a consistent "reconstruction" at all is so players can later act and react to the inferences and assumptions such a reconstructions presents.

I don't think theAlexandrian is giving an accurate presentation of how the process of interpreting dice works. Any inferences and assumptions of what a given die roll means has to be on an ad hoc basis, until the DM and players obtain a shared set of assumptions.

Let's take hit points. I've seen games in which it is assumed that every "hit" on an attack roll is an actually hit, that 10th level fighters may emerge from a battle against archers looking like porcupines. I've seen games in which a "hit" means nothing concrete unless it knocks you into the negative numbers. And in other tables, the players and DM decide when a "hit" means physical contact and it doesn't, usually based on how entertaining it would be one way or the other. I don't think anybody is playing incorrectly at any of these tables. It's just a matter of preference.

Narrative doesn't exist in a vacuum. Dissociative mechanics are dissociative because they inherently disrupt the concept of, "I accept this world's internal 'rules'."

I think that assumes that the combat mechanics represent some sort of "internal rules", as opposed to game rules designed to evoke a feeling of heroic fantasy combat.

For me, the rules help the DM and players construct a narrative. The dice ensure that some of that narrative is beyond the control of the DM and the players, and that adds an element of gambling-style fun. The rules and dice don't act as physical laws, but rather of narrative ones.

 

[wrecan]

I used single quotes --- which is paraphrasing, but not quoting -- or so I thought, but apologize if you misunderstood the spirit of it.

Let's take a break/breather?

No problem.

 

[innerdude]

Roleplaying is a shared world. The players and DMs must necessarily interpret what the dice mean and make it a believable narrative. In D&D particularly, the combat rules cannot be a precise retelling. They require the players and DM to interpret them and contextualize them into a shared narrative.

Okay, now we're getting somewhere.

The entire gist of this thread is that we're debating whether interpretation and contextualization comes first, and the narrative follows; or the narrative comes first, then the contextualization and interpretation that support the narrative.

So, the question is, what forces interact with the GM and players' collective interpretation and context?

It would be my contention that it is an amalgamation of:

• The known physical laws of the world/reality we inhabit.
• Accepted/observed notions of sociality, law, economics, etc.
• The stated conditions of the rules.
• The GM's personal interpretation of the fictional world construct.
• The player's vision of their avatar construct.
• Our own perceived real-world experiences.

To me, the problem with dissociated mechanics is that it imposes "the stated conditions of the rules" as the primary contextualization factor above the others. This is germane to 4e, because most of the mechanics are directly tied to the player's avatar.

If I'm reading you correctly, wrecan, you're in essence stating that the narrative itself can supersede contextualization, if that's what the players and GM agree on.

I can see that as a valid position to take. I don't think it produces the types of gameplay and rules I would enjoy, but the position itself is reasonable.

 

[Yesway Jose]

Quick re-post, related to above:

We have the fiction. This is an almagam informed by:
- real life (human behavior, politics, etc. which we can't agree upon and constantly have debates and even wars over)
- history (knights, castles, etc. and all the arguments about anachronisms, longswords vs katanas, etc.)
- fantasy literature (dragons, magic, none of the which are exactly the same according to any one author)
- D&D fiction (rust monsters and other D&D originals)
- other genre laws (Hollywood action movie tropes and cliches, not exactly consistent)

The sum of all that incoherence is what the in-game characters experience to be true.

But then we have extraneous interests that want to clarify the truth of the fiction:
- adventure format (cliches such as tons of dungeon delves because we don't have time, money and/or inclination to think of more interesting stories)
- game mechanics (surviving 200" jumps, oozes being knocked prone, powers that are effective 1/day, etc.)
- what the DM says
- what the players say

Now on top of that, we also have:
- adventure pacing (narrative that is structured to optimize player experience of the game mechanics, which has arguably changed over editions)

So where do you draw the line? Where's the baseline? Where do you separate what you want to be fictionally true vs what isn't or shouldn't necessarily be true?

Because if you accept that ALL of the above is part of the reality that IS true in D&D fiction, then there cannot be any disassociation.

If you say 1/day mechanism is not disassociated from the fiction, because in the fiction that power is only used 1/day, then it's a closed circle.
There's nothing to argue about.

Conversely, I think I draw my baseline somewhere between points 4 and 5. Which is not to say that anything is set in stone, I often rethink a fictional construct, but that's the general vicinity. So the adventure format, game mechanics, adventure pacing, even DM/player input, may or may not support my vision of what the fiction could/should be. You know how some people say, if you don't like the rules, change them? That's where my head is at. That's how I can see disassociation between mechanics and my baseline for the fiction.

 

[innerdude]

It's not "reconstructing", which implies that the reality of the moment had already been constructed.

The dice dictate a mechanical effect. It's the DM and players who determine what their characters perceive, based on that mechanic. Sometimes the mechanic leaves little room for interpretation. Sometimes it leaves a lot of room for interpretations. But invariably, between the dice and the DM's narrations, there is going to be an interpretation of some sort.

Okay, here's where we disagree then--the "reality of the moment," as you say, has not been constructed, absolutely true. But how that "reality of the moment" becomes constructed is either based on something that the avatar characters, if they actually existed, could rationally observe and understand based on their knowledge of the game world construct, or it is based on something else.

You can have two mechanics, one dissociated, one not, that produce the exact same narrative effect.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

• The GM's personal interpretation of the fictional world construct.
• The player's vision of their avatar construct.

I think those two are too limited, as written. Each person at the table has their interpretation of the fictional world construct. The GM's simply carries more weight, usually. Then each character portrayed by one of those people has a portrayed interpretation, of their part of that world.

That is, when a GM plays a goblin with a personality, he may have in his mind the broader picture and something more or less akin to what a player with a character similar to that goblin might have.

I'm not sure that's all I see missing from the list, either, but those two jumped out.

 

[wrecan]

If I'm reading you correctly, wrecan, you're in essence stating that the narrative itself can supersede contextualization, if that's what the players and GM agree on.

I'm not sure I understand how narrative can supersede contextualization since the narrative is a result of the contextualization of what happens at the game table.

To me, the problem with dissociated mechanics is that it imposes "the stated conditions of the rules" as the primary contextualization factor above the others.

I don't think that's specific to disassociated mechanics. All mechanics place themselves above the other factors because only mechanics are rules that dictate specific results.

Let's take the good old "Stinking Cloud" spell. The spell dictates that the victim (assuming he fails his save) begins to retch and vomit for a specific period of time. That's a specific mechanical effect, and I would not classify it as a disassociated effect. Barring the DM and players agreeing to ignore it, this effect applies even if the victim had been established as having an empty belly, even if the heroic sweep of the story is ruined by making the hero retch in a given circumstance. The Stinking Cloud mechanic has elevated itself above what some might consider to be the physical laws of the world, above the player's vision of his avatar's construct, our own perceived real-world experiences, perhaps the GM's own personal interpretation of the fictional world construct.

But that's because that's what mechanics do. They demand to be applied, well, mechanically. In this respect, disassociated mechanics like hit points, attack rolls and daily powers are no different than associated mechanics like stinking cloud spells.

In the end, with respect to contextualization and narrative, I think the narrative follows (and is in fact created by) the contextualization of the mechanics. The basic flow is:

Player/DM declares what action is attempted
Player/DM rolls dice to determine if action is successful
Player/DM consults the mechanical effect of the results
Player/DM describes (i.e., contextualizes) those results into the narrative
Other Players/DM almost always accept that description. If not, then the group will replace it with one the group can accept.
Most of this time this occurs so quickly, that you don't even note the discrete steps.

This can also occur without dice or mechanics. Does the following sound familiar:

DM: After you knock, a loud chime resounds through the hall and the doors open. You enter the duchess' chambers. She is in an exquisite gown, and she is flanked by her exchequer, her master-of-arms and some guards wielding halberds. She acknowledges you and says "I have heard much of you, Heroes of Westerly. I wodner how much of the legends are true."

Tom: I say "Nice knockers!"

DM: No, you don't.

Tom: What? I meant in the hall.

DM: Don't say that.

Harry: Tom, don't be a jerk.

Tom: Fine.

What happened? The player (Tom) declared his attempted action (a blue joke) and the DM and other players rejected that addition to the narrative and replaced it with their own (no blue joke). It happens all the time in games and we rarely consider them. It's only when the mechanics are of a style who contextualization we haven't yet internalized, does it become jarring to us.

 

[wrecan]

how that "reality of the moment" becomes constructed is either based on something that the avatar characters, if they actually existed, could rationally observe and understand based on their knowledge of the game world construct, or it is based on something else.

I don't understand how disassociated mechanics do not result in something the characters could rationally observe and understand based on their knowledge of the game world construct.

 

[Yesway Jose]

I have, without rancor, explained why they are absurd and rather than respond to that, you continue to toss out absurd hypotheticals.

I apologize once again for the "absurd hypotheticals" (quoting now, not paraphrasing).

I will try again....

You didn't like the example of a complete jerk winning the encounter on his own via mind control. That was not my intention, so let's tone it down to say that the DM agrees that, out of combat, Hypnotism can also be used to mechanically add some bonus to diplomacy rolls or make the target fall prone.

This player is very much in Actor stance. Now the PC engages in meaningful combat. The player remains faithful to his vision of the character operating as if he's a wizard who is using Hypnotism in that slightly more versatile way. I don't know how you can fault this hypothetical player for this, because you've indicated that the in-game the character cannot observe a difference between magic in and out of meaningful combat, and the player is thinking accordingly in Actor stance.

So the player has one narrative vision (=Hypnotism that can be used to move a target, attack another, influence people, and make them fall prone) whereas the meaningful combat mechanisms only allows for a more limited narrative (=move a target, or attack another).

To remain true to his narrative, the player can pretend that his character does try to use Hypnotism (behind the scenes, beyond the abstraction of combat as suggested by the mechanics) to make a target fall prone or be nicer to him, but that will never have any mechanical affect on the shared narrative with the other players and DM.

(Again, I don't know how you can fault this hypothetical player for this, because you've indicated that the in-game the character cannot observe a difference between magic in and out of meaningful combat)

Since his fictional POV (which is oblivious to the shift from default to combat reality) has no mechanical effect, the player cannot narratively share this conceit with the other players who are operating by what the mechanics dictate to be true to the narrative.

To remain true to the shared narrative as defined by the mechanics, the player must stop pretending that his hypnotism can do what it does out of combat. In doing so, it breaks immersion for him, because he is no longer faithful to his narrative.

(If you don't like the Hypnotism example for any reason, sub with any other fictional construct that works differently in and out of meaningful combat).

James is absolutely right, I think, that it all boils down to immersion in the end.

Some (many?) players want to tell a story of fictional constructs being more or less consistent regardless of combat vs non-combat, and the mechanics of 4E combat are hindering those players from telling that story. Therefore, the mechanics are disassociated from the story that those players want to happen.

This is NOT about anybody acting like a jerk, or ruining fun for everyone else. Going back to the Paladin with the toads, you've insisted that the character in-game cannot observe and explore the difference between Baleful Polymorph in and out of combat, and that's why it's not disassociated (if I extrapolate correctly). This is a premise I cannot agree with. Not because combat is not an abstraction (I agree it is), but because IMO your implications are completely disassociating the mechanics from the story I want to tell.

Does that help to explain my position?