Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Campbell" data-source="post: 7083697" data-attributes="member: 16586">I think directly correlating just playing your character to actor stance involves a pretty narrow conception of what playing your character means and the various ways to approach roleplaying games.I can play my character by making decisions for my character based on pursuing the objectives of the game whether stated or not. This is the way D&D was mostly originally played. This is pawn stance play.I can play my character by making decisions for my character based on on my conception of my character's knowledge, motivation, drives, intuitions, and  goals. This is actor stance play.I can play my character by making decisions for my character based on my desires for where the narrative should go and what I believe would be best "for the story". This is author stance play.I can play my character while describing their inner thoughts, things that go unsaid, describing their actions in visual terms, describing dialog in broad strokes, and describing their intent. I can also talk about their connections to the fiction, say how they view the situation, and provide gaps for other players to play off of. This is director stance play.No matter the stance you are still playing your character and making decisions for them.I think talking in terms of stance can be a fruitful to tease out player motivations and play techniques. However, there are significant issues with the stance model that I believe can lead us to draw the wrong conclusions about Actual Play. Time to put my beefs out on open display.<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">It can often lead to conversations where we talk around issues of player motivations and play techniques instead of directly addressing them in a real way.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">It assumes that we are in a particular stance at any moment and that the stances are mutually exclusive. Actual motivations and human behavior are far more complex than all that. We actually make decisions based on a multitude of considerations that we actively prioritize. We also often justify our decisions after the fact.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">It can serve to limit our discussions of player motivations to the 3 primary stances: actor, author, pawn. It ignores social considerations, aesthetic considerations, and many other factors. Additionally distinctions are not normally made within the particular primary stance. Am I pursuing the objectives of the game because I am motivated by challenge, achievement, status, power to affect the game world, or completion? Is it a combination of these things?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Director stance depicts a set of techniques, not player motives. These techniques are overly broad. Some instances may be acceptable where others may not. It basically describes any instance where you are not using first person description. </li> </ul></blockquote>

Verification