Let's talk about "plot", "story", and "play to find out."

[payn]

This started in another thread but I thought I would spin it off into its own thread before it goes wild.

What do you think of TTRPGs (broadly) in relation to "story." Are RPGs "stories." Are they "story generators"? Something else? How do the particular mechanics of a game interact with what you think the relationship is? How about adventure structure, particularly for campaign length adventures, from At The Mountains of Madness to The Enemy Within to Curse of Strahd?

For you, personally, are you telling a story when you play a TTRPG?

I see it more as seeding a story. You are choosing a setting and characters and then making something of that. I dont mind a little prep work on the GMs part of the ingredients if it leads to an excellent story making experience. So, id re-frame it as making a co-operative story rather than telling one.

For my part, I think you are creating a story through play, but that story is not what happens at the table per se. Rather, the story is how we talk about it after the game is done. Stories have a structure that does not really work in play. RPGs are messy, ephemeral things in play, with terrible pacing and contradictory plot elements. But once play is done, the thing that remains with us is the story that RPG play generated. Perhaps most interestingly, that story is different for every participant.

I think this is a simple re-framing of the idea that a story exists before play. I'd agree, the real/complete story is what is left after the game is over.

Now, you can force games to be more like stories by demanding certain beats be present and forcing pacing, etc... But every single element that makes play more like a story makes it less like an RPG -- because RPGs are defined by their embrace of player agency. In trad games this is mostly the GM, but more modern games give players tools to put their fingers on the scale as well.

This is the bit I dont really agree with. Role playing is role playing. If you choose a pregen and had no decisions in its making, you are still role playing that character. If you choose an adventure path that doesnt allow you to leave an area of interest in the setting, you are still role playing that character.

I do think agency is an important aspect of the game portion of role playing, but I do not tie agency strictly to role playing itself.

As is probably obvious, I am an advocate of playing to find out and presenting situations rather than plots or adventures.

I'd love to be an advocate of this style of play, but, oh boy, have my most worst experiences been in this style of play. I've encountered some lazy GMs looking to off load work on the players, and more than a few players that simply cant be proactive. I think its an evocative style and if its a good mix of active players and a flexible GM it can be pretty great. It just requires folks flex muscles that are uncommon or take intention to bring out.

Where do you stand? What is your preference when it comes to TTRPG play and story?

I think "story" has become rather loaded as an RPG term. I see quite a bit of light between a railroad and a linear adventure which a lot of folks will not. Largely its a matter of perspective that folks cant help but frame in black and white terms of right and wrongness instead.

I really like @sevenbastard 's sports take. For example, you could be playing a baseball game. You know its gonna take place on a field, and its going to use a rule set, but after that anything can happen. Its just as fun for me to see the outcome of a good baseball game as it is a drama that I have no idea what the rules or potential are. Though, I watch both sports games ive seen a thousand times, and movies which ive seen a thousand of. Each is exciting for their own aspects. Thats essentially how I see linear and non-linear play. Finally, story isnt set, its made during play.

 

[AnotherGuy]

Two scenarios.

1. Character died.
2. Character saved via Clone spell which had been prepared Halaster who kept the character as prisoner and as a form of entertainment.
[Adventure - Death - Clone - Adventure - Death - Clone...etc]

3(a) GM came up with a challenge for the character to escape Halaster's prison which tied up thematically with the character (deity/ideology etc). Character succeeded on the challenge and escaped.
3(b) GM consulted with player, informing him of pertinent details, in the hopes that player had an idea of how they would escape. Player changed it from not how he escaped but why he was released.
Player devised the entire story, which internal logic made sense to me and for the story which evolved.

Both those scenarios occurred last year in my game.
And both those scenarios required a story to be crafted in order for the game to proceed.

In 3(a) Kelemvor interfered to stop the mockery of his domain, particularly on one of his chosen (the PC). And through this I was able to create a challenge (the game) which could allow the PC to either escape, escape with complications, or utterly fail.

In 3(b) Halaster became jealous when the PC and Halaster's muse (ex-PC) became close and so instead of making the PC a martyr in her eyes, he gave the PC the choice to "escape" which would look like he had abandoned her.
We roleplayed this scene with a serious threat from Halaster should the PC attempt to return.

TLDR: I think the story is necessary for the game, and the game necessary for the story. At times one may take centre stage or be dominant but saying there is no story until the end of the game, is short-sighted IMO.

I saw in the other thread that someone said a story has a beginning, middle and end.
So if you only watch the middle of Lord of the Rings, was is it not a story?

 

[bedir than]

For my part, I think you are creating a story through play, but that story is not what happens at the table per se. Rather, the story is how we talk about it after the game is done. Stories have a structure that does not really work in play. RPGs are messy, ephemeral things in play, with terrible pacing and contradictory plot elements. But once play is done, the thing that remains with us is the story that RPG play generated. Perhaps most interestingly, that story is different for every participant.

I agree with all of this, except the idea that "stories have a structure...RPGs are messy"

Stories are quite messy. Two people can read the same story, watch the same film, listen to the same podcast and come away with different meanings, see different main plots even.

To me RPGs are stories in the way that campfire tales are. They involve a lot of wandering, forgotten threads, lack firm outlines and are at their best when the tale is woven through multiple voices providing input.

Can they be a traditional novel after the campaign? Absolutely! But during the telling of the tale they are similar to writers who don't edit as they go or a director who over films alternative concepts that aren't on the script.

One of the more thrilling things about RPGs is that it is an ensemble cast of both PCs and recurring NPCs. Together they're important, but the tale and spotlight as to who is most important can easily shift. Use any of them as the point of view to change the story as you understand it. Each can be vital.

The messiness is the fun part of RPGs as story.

The messiness is what helps me discover tales I cannot tell on my own. That's part of the power of the table and broad casts in ensemble stories.

You think you've seen stories like this before, so you can guess what's going to happen. Who's important and who isn't, but that's because you're trapped in your POV.
- later -
When you file people away as sidekicks you don't realize their importance to the story, and this story belongs to a lot more people than you think. Where to shelve a book, it's not a little thing. You're telling the world what to value. Who to value.

From The Magicians, Side Effect (S4, E&).

RPGs are very much like THAT. They remove your assumptions. You don't know what's going to happen. The POV constantly shifts and the importance of the broader cast shifts constantly. From RPGs as Story we learn what and who to value.

 

[thefutilist]

Yeah it’s a story to me. I’m making character choices based on what they would do but it’s through the prism of value rather than rationality. Same with how I perceive the other participants contributions to the fiction, they’re good if they’re expressive in the same vein that stories are expressive (values and moral lines and stuff).

If we play out a situation whilst making choices through that prism, then we get the plot of the story in retrospect. So we’re playing to find out how the situation resolves.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Given the terms you used, I'd call RPGs "story generators."

IMO there should be no inherent plot or story, but the GM should provide situations and characters who have motives and action. How the PCs interact with the world and its denizens generates stories; long term interaction with NPC motivations can result in a meta-plot. The world changes the PCs and the PCs change the world through play.

I would say that how the PCs interact with the world and it's denizens generates events, not story. Story comes from the telling of those events afterwards, a deliberate process. Before that, it's all just stuff that happened.

 

[Reynard]

I saw in the other thread that someone said a story has a beginning, middle and end.
So if you only watch the middle of Lord of the Rings, was is it not a story?

It is definitionally not a complete story.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Two scenarios.

1. Character died.
2. Character saved via Clone spell which had been prepared Halaster who kept the character as prisoner and as a form of entertainment.
[Adventure - Death - Clone - Adventure - Death - Clone...etc]

3(a) GM came up with a challenge for the character to escape Halaster's prison which tied up thematically with the character (deity/ideology etc). Character succeeded on the challenge and escaped.
3(b) GM consulted with player, informing him of pertinent details, in the hopes that player had an idea of how they would escape. Player changed it from not how he escaped but why he was released.
Player devised the entire story, which internal logic made sense to me and for the story which evolved.

Both those scenarios occurred last year in my game.
And both those scenarios required a story to be crafted in order for the game to proceed.

In 3(a) Kelemvor interfered to stop the mockery of his domain, particularly on one of his chosen (the PC). And through this I was able to create a challenge (the game) which could allow the PC to either escape, escape with complications, or utterly fail.

In 3(b) Halaster became jealous when the PC and Halaster's muse (ex-PC) became close and so instead of making the PC a martyr in her eyes, he gave the PC the choice to "escape" which would look like he had abandoned her.
We roleplayed this scene with a serious threat from Halaster should the PC attempt to return.

TLDR: I think the story is necessary for the game, and the game necessary for the story. At times one may take centre stage or be dominant but saying there is no story until the end of the game, is short-sighted IMO.

I saw in the other thread that someone said a story has a beginning, middle and end.
So if you only watch the middle of Lord of the Rings, was is it not a story?

The story of Lord of the Rings existed long before you decided to just watch the middle portion, so yes, it was a story by then, or rather part of one.

 

[Reynard]

Something I want to add: long stories are both granular and fractal. Just like a chapter in a novel might be a story in and of itself within a larger context, so might a particular adventure or session generate its own story within the larger context of the as-yet untold campaign story.

 

[Deset Gled]

It is definitionally not a complete story.

Alternatively, it's just a different story. The Exploration of Moria or The Fall of Baromir are two stories that take place in the middle of The Lord of the Rings.

 

[Reynard]

Mind explaining what your definition of player agency is?

Essentially, at any given moment, the player may choose to do anything (within the context of the fiction and rules). So if you decide ahead of time that Thing A Must Happen, you will almost surely run into situations where in order to make that to continue to be true, you are barred from certain choices. Note that this is different than making choices in character hoping for some outcome.