Is "GM Agency" A Thing?

[Bill Zebub]

I just wrote a couple paragraphs about pre-written adventures and GM agency, but realized this is one of those topics where hairs are being split in multiple ways.

I guess we're gamers. That's what we do.

 

[Reynard]

I just wrote a couple paragraphs about pre-written adventures and GM agency, but realized this is one of those topics where hairs are being split in multiple ways.

I guess we're gamers. That's what we do.

I still think it is a worthy discussion.

Asa reminder, this thread started off as a question: does "GM Agency" even exist, and if so, what does that mean? I feel like a consensus has built in this thread that it does exist, although there is less consensus about what that means and how it is expressed. As it relates to pre-written material, agency seems to be tied up with fidelity to that pre-written plot. And while I think GM Agency, if it exists, infuses everything the GM does, I think that the ability to veer from the pre-written word a form of "agency" in that regard. I don't think that means that running a pre-written adventure as-is means the GM doesn't have agency, because there is agency in controlling the NPCs and enemies and environment, as well as adjudicating the rules as the circumstances demand.

I like @Snarf Zagyg 's recent "fairness" post, although it isn't really about whether "GM Agency" exists so much as it is about how GMs should exercise that agency.

 

[Umbran]

And of course any creative act has influences, but if you choose to plagiarise another creative then you have also seriously limited your own creative agency.

Yeah, but if you weren't going to exercise that creative agency anyway, then... so what if you limit it?

If, in doing that limitation, you open up your ability to exercise other possibilities for agency that you really want, isn't that a gain, rather than a loss?

 

[Thomas Shey]

Oh, right, that. You already said it.

Glad you did it anyway; it was always possible I was misinterpreting where you were coming from in your post.

 

[Celebrim]

So what is a DM doing if they're running a module (without changing anything)?

I think it's fair to say that a DM running a tournament module at a convention has very little agency by design. A well-designed tournament module will probably tell the DM what to do in every situation and will probably have text to the effect of "all other approaches other than the ones above should fail". There may even be a head judge that is supposed to be called in whenever the DM is to make a ruling in an unclear situation.

So if we can imagine cases where the DM has no agency and is intended to just be a rules engine that could be replaced if we had the resources with a computer (see Baldur's Gate 3), then I think concept of GM's agency has meaning.

It's just that outside of some edge cases, a GM normally has so much agency that it's not even a major concern. The big concern is how the all-powerful GM limits his agency to the degree that the other participants can share and influence the story.

 

[Celebrim]

Yeah, PbtA is an interesting case. On the one hand it seems to cover everything because, by definition, anything that might possibly happen fits into one of the buckets. On the other hand, the rules don't really tell you what to do because, for an awful lot of those cases, they don't really tell you the outcome. Ok, so I either put the player "in a tight spot" or she "loses something of value". Now I have to invent what that means. So I'm really just improvising the outcome after all.

Some of the weird unintended(?) side effects of the mechanics adopted by 'Story Now' games is that they tend to not produce stories, validate DMs that want to railroad, and empower power gamers. (Yes, I brought up all of that in the "Unpopular Opinions" thread. Take it up with me there if you are outraged.)

Ironically, simulation-based mechanics are more likely to tell you hard and fast what the outcome actually is, which limits GM agency. If your goal is railroading the players into your story, the ability to make up game elements at will and determine outcomes regardless of the action ends up granting the GM more agency than he might otherwise have. In a game with simulation-based mechanics in order to railroad the GM usually has to fudge in some manner - arbitrarily set DCs based on the desired outcome rather than the guidelines of the setting, introduce new problems not previously present in the fiction, fudge the stats of a favored NPC, break the rules, etc. But in a game more Nar based mechanics the assumption that the GM is "making the story as interesting as possible" generally empowers the GM to do all of those things either de jure or de facto. I'm not saying that the story will necessarily be a railroad in either case, but if I wanted to railroad as my primary GMing aesthetic Nar games wouldn't be a hinderance.

Maybe I'd be playing against the advice and spirit of the system, but I would equally be playing against the advice and spirit of a simulation type game to railroad for desired results.

I also can't help but think of creators of RPGs who have complained about things like PC's becoming too empowered by gaining levels or players becoming too empowered by gaining system mastery and how that ruins the game, and their response seems to have been create more Nar style games that constrain PC's more and GM's less. Think for example of all the Story Now games that have as a selling point that they are rigged for failure. The odds are set such that the players expected result on any roll is failure rather than success, and just how empowering that is to a GM.

Being open ended about what you can create is not necessarily a limit on GM agency.

And if the player is the sort that wants to rules to define everything, so that the DM doesn't have too much power, there's a decent chance when I say, "Ok, you succeed, but you lose your grandmother's locket that you've had since you created the character" she is not going to like it.

Agreed.

 

[Aldarc]

Some of the weird unintended(?) side effects of the mechanics adopted by 'Story Now' games is that they tend to not produce stories, validate DMs that want to railroad, and empower power gamers. (Yes, I brought up all of that in the "Unpopular Opinions" thread. Take it up with me there if you are outraged.)

This feels so completely disconnected from the reality of all of my experiences running games that you would likely call "story now" games that it feels like you run Story Now games in the Upside Down.

 

[bloodtide]

All of the above proceeds from the point that every participant in a game surrenders agency for a reason: to foster their intended experience. That includes GM.

I don't really follow your example?

Your saying as a GM you "surrendered agency" to a rule? You "surrendered to some scribbles on a page?" I mean, ok, you choose to do that....you chose to surrender.

But, a lot of other GMs...like myself...would just laugh at the rulebook. And maybe flick it onto the floor. And then just do whatever I want in the game on a whim. And that rulebook could just sit on the floor forever.

Nope. He claimed that running a module is a high DM agency situation.

The logic flaw I see here is......."is the adventure on the DMs side"? See that's the odd part. I guess the players might see anything they don't have control or influence on to be hostile to them...

The DM controls everything in the game...including the module. But is it on the DM side? The DM can change and alter things at will.....the scribbles in the module do not matter at all.

Though, sure, a defensive DM could point to a page in the module and tell the players "Oh, I'm not doing this, Page 11 is forcing me to do this". This is common in Line Walking games where the DM and players feel they must follow the rules at all times. So if page 11 says to do X, everyone will do X.

Other then by choice, A DM can't be "made" to give up power in a game.....so there is nothing even close to agency in the first place.

 

[Umbran]

I don't really follow your example?

Your saying as a GM you "surrendered agency" to a rule? You "surrendered to some scribbles on a page?" I mean, ok, you choose to do that....you chose to surrender.

But, a lot of other GMs...like myself...would just laugh at the rulebook. And maybe flick it onto the floor. And then just do whatever I want in the game on a whim. And that rulebook could just sit on the floor forever.

And your players, then, who were depending on those rules to guide their experience?

RPGs are group collaborative activities. When one engages with a group, one gives up some absolute freedom for the sake of being able to work together.

 

[innerdude]

Some of the weird unintended(?) side effects of the mechanics adopted by 'Story Now' games is that they tend to not produce stories, validate DMs that want to railroad, and empower power gamers. (Yes, I brought up all of that in the "Unpopular Opinions" thread. Take it up with me there if you are outraged.)

I've generally found your takes in the past to be interesting and generally reasoned.

But I gotta say, this statement, especially in regards to Story Now games not actually generating a story and validating GM railroading, rings false at every experiential level I've had with these systems.

A Story Now game generates at the very least the same kinds of "stories" as every other RPG -- connected scenes with shared referential qualities that can be recounted by the participants. Does it produce deep, philosophical narrative with every turn of the dice? Of course not. But generally speaking, even if it only produces the same kinds of "standard" stories as every other RPG, I've found that there's often an extra layer of character intent or drive or actualization within the story frames that is missing with D&D and Savage Worlds.

Can these same kinds of character intent / actualization be present in non-Story Now games? Sure! Of course they can. But Story Now games seem to push this element of character intent (and the resulting fallout of that intent) much more strongly. Probably because Story Now play resolution tends to emphasize character intent and broader scene-based resolution. Action resolutions tend to be spaced farther apart and "meatier" in PbtA play than a series of "I roll to hit, I roll 13 damage" actions repeated ad nauseam.

Second, I can't speak for any given GM's intent to railroad / produce desired outcomes for any given frame of play. But I can say in my time playing Ironsworn as a GM, thoughts of railroading never crossed my mind. The entire loop of play points you away from it at every turn. If you're playing PbtA / Story Now as intended as a GM, your overall mindset/ethos/intent is literally 180 degrees and a continent away from railroading. Trying to railroad Story Now play would be roughly equivalent to trying to play basketball on a regulation 10 foot rim with croquet or bocci balls.

Can it be done? I mean . . . sure, I guess. But why would you bother? You clearly don't want to play basketball as it's intended to be played.

(As to the last point, whether Story Now works for power gaming or not, I simply don't care.)