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Message: <blockquote data-quote="The-Magic-Sword" data-source="post: 8263673" data-attributes="member: 6801252">Not every form of authorship is the same, the difference between player and GM authorship, particularly the way Story-Now games (my reference being Masks: A New Generation) lies with the way their role is constructed and how that frames the purpose of the things that they can create and how they can be engaged with.Intentionality is one of the big elements here, where the boundaries of authorship can create creative cohesion by privileging one participant (the GM) with the lion's share of the authorship (it does this by designating 'spaces' of authorship as relatively strict constructs, the GM authors the world, the players author their characters actions), meaning that participant can utilize those elements within a single vision. This element of vision and intentionality is an important one to exploration as a play aesthetic, because you're looking to put the puzzle pieces together, so you want the pieces to fit together according to some design. Masks actually utilizes the GM for this role, framing them as a keeper of continuity and tone, and giving them an editorial role over the elements of the fiction that the other players establish.An interrelated concept is the way the activity you're participating in is framed: are you telling a story about people exploring a dungeon, or are you exploring a dungeon. To boil it back down to a mystery structure as discussed in Manbearcat's recent post: a bunch of players getting together to find clues and solve a mystery is a very different activity than inventing the clues sporadically and deciding who the culprit ought to be-- both might be fun, but they aren't the same activity. Its comparable to the difference between building an escape room, and solving an escape room. Reading and Writing are not synonyms even if reading contains interpretation, and writing contains deduction. It doesn't matter that the activity produces an illusion, because the illusion is instrumental to the experience you're having, its about what role you play in that illusion-- the generation of the illusion, and the experience of the illusion are different.By the same token, the ability to generate elements of the fiction outside of the character changes the way we think about the problems we're solving, an intentional move on the part of Story Now games. We aren't interested in whether the players-as-characters can find a way to solve the problem given a set of constraints, we're interested in what the solution the players as author-as-actors come up with means for the fiction, if my players establish a way out of the situation in Masks, that's fine, but I'm supposed to complicate that solution to give it dramatic consequences. You can certainly establish that Superman is wandering on by and can help out, but I'm responsible for giving him opinions of your characters, to make that an opportunity for narrative. Its the core of "Yes, and" we're building a narrative out of the elements of the fiction we're establishing, the point isn't the problem-solving as a player activity, its the construction of a story in which problems are solved, and we make that more interesting by building on one another. Contrast with Pathfinder, because the players ability to establish elements of the fiction outside their character actions are more limited, they can engage in problem solving from the perspective of their characters. Problems are interesting mental exercises in their own right, rather than just as an impetus for drama or a creative writing prompt for the table. You aren't just telling the story of a dragon-slaying, you're slaying the dragon, an activity being simulated through the use of rules which emulate the presence of a dragon, the difficulty of slaying it, and the tools one might have in a story about slaying dragons. The GM 'runs' the Dragon, as a means of rendering a distinct entity you are constrained from controlling.The purpose of the illusion in Pathfinder is emergent storytelling through simulation (which demands constraints imposed on the players authorship of the game world, to maintain their Ludonarrative role), the purpose of the illusion in Masks is emergent storytelling through collaborative authorship (which relaxes those constraints to refocus on storytelling, over simulation.) They can both be fun, but they produce different experiences.In short, this actually betrays the crux of the problem:The purpose of the constraints placed upon player establishment of the fiction, and the privileging of the GM is to emulate a tangible reality to undergird its processes and volition, so that emulation of a tangible reality can provide a constrained play space for the simulation that produces an emergent narrative (that tangible reality being curated by 'Story Before' elements). This is true regardless of whether the GM employs systems with rules that output consistent results to provide a framework, or uses their best aesthetic judgement to do so, to reference back to the GM Notes thread. Story Now games, with their heavy emphasis on player establishment of fiction, trade away the idea of these constraints emulating a world to function as playspace, in favor of a more direct 'collaborative storytelling' model where the rules function as a structure to resolve uncertainty and prompt the creation of additional fiction, rather than constrain it. This is a tradeoff, because you lose some of the benefits of the other style, but you gain things from it as well.  You can also admixture a little of that style while still maintaining the simulation oriented game play, usually by having the GM approve all the additions to the fiction-- which gives the players the sense that they're weaving it into their simulation.</blockquote>

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