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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7641141" data-attributes="member: 42582">I think your metaphor is not that helpful.Taken on its own terms, it presupposes that we are in the boat trying to get somewhere. But what if we're not? What if we just want to enjoy sitting in a boat? Then there's no need to steer.But more importantly, I think it's inapt for RPGing. There are options in RPGing other than setting out to author a story or passively doing nothing. [MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION] said "follow the fiction like a dog after a bone". I don't know much about dogs, but that doesn't sound passive to me. It seems active. And single-minded. And focused on a here-and-now rather than a long-term project or an ultimate destination.I think if a RPG is designed for it, then playing with integrity in Campbell's sense will produce a story wihtout anyone needing to aim for that outcome.This requires a particular approach to setting design and (what I would call) framing on the GM's part. And a particular approach to action resolution - ie that action resolution outcomes maintain the dynamism and the pressure to make choices that will result in more things happening.To elaborate a bit: if the GM has designed the setting so as to support some particular dramatic arc then what Campbell is describing won't happen. Because either the player playing with integrity will result in a departure from that arc and hence the pressure to choose will be lost, and thus there will be no salient fiction to follow; or the GM will push towards the arc in resolving action declaration, which will undermine the player's attempt to play his/her PC with integrity.Equally, if the GM has designed the setting without regard to the sorts of characters the players are creating for their PCs, then there will be no fiction to follow because the right sort of pressures won't be created. To give a simple example: if the PC is built with such-and-such a relationship, and then the GM presents the setting in way that doesn't impicate or bear upon that relationship at all, the player has no chance to play with integrity in respect of that part of the emotional life of the PC. If this generalises across the rest of the PC's emotional life, then the sort of play Campbell is describing won't be possible.As best I can tell, this is why [MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION] has identified some systems as better suited than others for the play experience he is looking for.</blockquote>

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