RPG Theory- The Limits of My Language are the Limits of My World

[Ovinomancer]

I'm not necessarily expecting people to abandon those urges, or to get around it, but instead to address the actual point. If I level a criticism of some sort at a game or movie or whatever, and someone disagrees, I'd prefer they explain why they think I'm wrong, or why their contra opinion is valid.

Look at the Martin Scorsese/Marvel comments. I love Marvel. Doesn't mean Scorsese didn't have some valid points. It's an interesting topic to me with valid criticism on each side.

If you look around, you can see a lot of meaningful discussion about the topic. Many of the actors from the Marvel films shared their thoughts about the matter. They addressed the criticism with counter points and new thoughts. That's useful discussion.

What's not useful, in my opinion, is the Marvel fans who instead said things like "Oh yea what does he know" or "Avengers made more then The Irishman" or "Marvel is the bestest!!!!"

I'd rather see people engage with a criticism rather than dismiss it. Dismissing it is easy if you really want....you can simply ignore the post. But if you're going to take time to disagree, I think it makes sense to give some thought as to why. That defensive impulse to simply disagree but not to elaborate on why is what I'd like to see people move past.

I think we can look at how differently criticism is engaged depending on what's being criticized. If it's 5e, there's a huge amount of the kind of pushback you're describing here -- defensive and dismissive and that doesn't engage the criticism. On the other hand, if it's other games, like say Blades, then criticism is deployed and any response to that criticism that shows disagreement is what's treated in a defensive and dismissive manner. Like how social mechanics in a game like Blades are consistently misrepresented in criticism but any attempt to show why it is incorrect is met with dismissal and claims of "that just how I look at it." This exposes that the criticism isn't because it's not at all interested in getting into how play works but rather labelling it for easy dismissal.

I'm fairly guilty of the things being argued here. I deploy terms like "Force" to describe play that often occurs in 5e. I use words like Participationism or passive play to describe certain approaches to play, often associated with 5e. I also define these, and explain what I mean and why I use those terms. I almost never get any response to the explanations or the critique behind those, but I definitely get raked for suggesting "passive" as a term. Even by people that then go one to describe their play exactly as I presented it in my explanation. But they deny it because of the term. I offer to use a different term, but the term is still the point of discussion. The actual critique never seems to get to the forefront. And, I've done it the other way -- avoided the term or used a value neutral term for the same thing, but the arguments are still almost always about the form of the argument, not the substance. There isn't a magic bullet of using acceptable to all terms because whatever term is settled on as a euphemism will just be attacked the same way. It's actually bunk to claim that arguments would go better if you used different words.

 

[Malmuria]

rather than the clear point that 5e cannot be criticized without an appropriately statement that it is a great game and so forth.

This has not been the context of any recent posts in response to @Umbran. The most proximate context is the example of "sandbox" vs "railroad," which could describes styles of play within a 5e game. Using that example, if someone comes and says they run a "sandbox" game, I would try to respect their own description and experience (it is, after all, their game), even if parts of their description struck me as not a sandbox by my definition.

Sorry, but this is sophistic. You've clearly built a strawman of how I was using deferential to make it seem like it's being polite or engaging with arguments rather than the clear point that 5e cannot be criticized without an appropriately statement that it is a great game and so forth.

The opening statement is mush. It's a bunch of big words strung together to say that there being other people put limits on how you can engage in order to have a conversation. This is attempts to create a space were agreement that there are "some" limits to discussion like not screaming in faces or using vile insults or punching people is the same as the limit you're trying to enforce - that terminology be acceptable to everyone prior to the commencement of criticism. It's a bunk concept, regardless of the morass of large words used to disguise it.

Did you interpret my response to you above as very negative? That was not the intent. But even so, this seems to me to be an escalation of hostility. What do you hope to get out of a conversation when you describe the other person's statements as "mush," "bunk" or as merely a "morass of large words used to disguise [something]"? This small exchange demonstrates the thing this thread is trying to talk about, the way here that casual conversation turns into scathing commentary on my intellectual capability and writing style. smh.

 

[Ovinomancer]

This has not been the context of any recent posts in response to @Umbran. The most proximate context is the example of "sandbox" vs "railroad," which could describes styles of play within a 5e game. Using that example, if someone comes and says they run a "sandbox" game, I would try to respect their own description and experience (it is, after all, their game), even if parts of their description struck me as not a sandbox by my definition.

This feels a complete non-sequitur. I wasn't engaging with things @Umbran said. I was making my own point. If your statements are solely limited to things Umbran said, then okay, I withdraw them because Umbran didn't really say anything on the nature of allowable criticism, just some platitudes about self-reflection that amount to preaching rather than assisting the conversation. However, if your statements are only limited to this, I don't really care about the craft of deploying platitudes to seem wise.

I was speaking to how criticism works on these boards. If I want to criticize 5e, I have to constantly make deferential statements to the 5e fanbase about how much I like 5e and that it is a good game. This I have to do just to get the criticism in the door without the "5e hater" tag being applied to anything I say and the criticism dismissed. Doing thing, though, only gets me past that first hurdle, and then only slightly better than half the time as it's still deployed with depressing regularity. That's just dealing with the easiest form of dismissal. And this is obvious because the easiest way to criticize 5e is ask how 5e can be modified to fix whatever it is I'm talking about. This is the acceptable way to criticism 5e, because it's properly deferential to 5e as just being the bestest.

Did you interpret my response to you above as very negative? That was not the intent. But even so, this seems to me to be an escalation of hostility. What do you hope to get out of a conversation when you describe the other person's statements as "mush," "bunk" or as merely a "morass of large words used to disguise [something]"? This small exchange demonstrates the thing this thread is trying to talk about, the way here that casual conversation turns into scathing commentary on my intellectual capability and writing style. smh.

Negative to me? No. I viewed it as mostly empty, though. You didn't say anything to the points I was making and instead tried to establish a false equivalency with other things, such as comparing my claim that deference to the in-group is required prior to criticism to both general limits on behavior for conversation or that deference is also the same thing as just engaging with others' statements. This is badly flawed.

As for your style and word choice, I have zero problems with big words or an intellectual style. I very much enjoy @pemerton's writing and @Manbearcat, both of whom are regularly attacked for being too intellectual in posting habits. No, rather my point was that you turned up the style and went to larger words to hide that that what you were saying was establishing some false equivalences to what I said in order to try and knock their stuffing out. You amped up the intellectual style at the same time you engaged in rhetorical tricks.

 

[pemerton]

this fued has been going on so long that no one knows who or what event actually started it.

What feud?

I've certainly read plenty of posts about dissociated mechanics, Schroedinger's <whatever>, shouting arms back on, etc. I ignore some I think are wrong, I reply to some I think are wrong. Occasionally the result is a productive exchange. Sometimes it's not. I don't see that there is any feud!

On the bigger issue of critique, negative connotations, etc - no one has told me what the negative connotations of "backstory first" or "situation first" are. They describe approaches to play. I certainly read plenty of posts where RPGs say that what they enjoy, as players is discovering the GM's world - which is to say, enjoy learning fiction that the GM has created. I don't see that there are any negative connotations in noting that this is a different play preference from my own general inclinations. Likewise, if someone tells me that RPGing can be located on a railroad-sandbox "spectrum" than I can infer that they are probably not familiar with the approaches to RPGing that are not on that "spectrum" because situation-first rather than backstory-first.

Some posters give me the impression - I'm sure it's not deliberate, and is perhaps a misperception on my part - that they both have very strong playstyle preferences and want to insist that no who has different preferences is having a different experience from them. Why I assume such an impression is not being deliberately conveyed is that it seems almost incoherent, that two things could at the same time both be importantly different yet not different at all.

 

[FrogReaver]

What feud?

really?

 

[Aldarc]

FUN IS MANDATORY EVERYONE WILL HAVE FUN

WANG CHUNG-ING WILL HOWEVER BE OPTIONAL

Everybody will like what they like tonight!

 

[pemerton]

really?

Really.

 

[Campbell]

Personally I don't really think people on this board are hostile to criticism of 5e on these boards. Loads of people criticize the game without getting raked over the coals. Many fans of the game still get caught in the crossfire for liking it for the wrong reasons.

What I have personally experienced is that these boards are firmly entrenched in the playstyle advocated by the folks at White Wolf magazine and people like John Wick. Even if you are fan of 5e if you are not a fan of GM as Storyteller no matter how respectful you are you are in the outgroup. You can enjoy pretty much every other way under the sun to enjoy playing roleplaying games (as I pretty much do). You can like 5e or not like 5e. If you acknowledge other ways of playing the game, view the game as a game, or suggest that there are other ways to enjoy the unfolding narrative of the game (even if you ground it as personal to you) you are in the out group.

Look at what happened in the recent Apocalypse World thread on these boards. The game was basically raked over the coals for not being congruent with traditional GM as Storyteller presenting a mystery players are expected to work together to solve play. Attempts to clarify that the game handles mysteries just fine, but not GM defined ones players are duty bound to solve only resulted in more consternation.

In this and other threads there has even been hostility towards what I call Critical Role kids - people my age and younger who are fans of Critical Role and expect a deeply collaborative play experience. The GM Authority thread in particular seemed to want to not acknowledge that play culture.

 

[Fenris-77]

Well, I think people should be able to play whatever way they want, just so long as it's the same as my way.

 

[Aldarc]

Personally I don't really think people on this board are hostile to criticism of 5e on these boards. Loads of people criticize the game without getting raked over the coals. Many fans of the game still get caught in the crossfire for liking it for the wrong reasons.

What I have personally experienced is that these boards are firmly entrenched in the playstyle advocated by the folks at White Wolf magazine and people like John Wick. Even if you are fan of 5e if you are not a fan of GM as Storyteller no matter how respectful you are you are in the outgroup. You can enjoy pretty much every other way under the sun to enjoy playing roleplaying games (as I pretty much do). You can like 5e or not like 5e. If you acknowledge other ways of playing the game, view the game as a game, or suggest that there are other ways to enjoy the unfolding narrative of the game (even if you ground it as personal to you) you are in the out group.

Look at what happened in the recent Apocalypse World thread on these boards. The game was basically raked over the coals for not being congruent with traditional GM as Storyteller presenting a mystery players are expected to work together to solve play. Attempts to clarify that the game handles mysteries just fine, but not GM defined ones players are duty bound to solve only resulted in more consternation.

In this and other threads there has even been hostility towards what I call Critical Role kids - people my age and younger who are fans of Critical Role and expect a deeply collaborative play experience. The GM Authority thread in particular seemed to want to not acknowledge that play culture.

I love getting accused of trying to push bespoke indie games or non-traditional games. Have you seen my posting history? Here is my list of fairly traditional games that I have lavished over (e.g., True 20) and here are the ones that I still play and recommend (e.g., Fantasy/Modern AGE, Cypher, 5e D&D, ICRPG, SotDL, Beyond the Wall and Other Adventures, Black Hack, etc.) as well as others that I want to play (e.g., Ryuutama, Pathfinder 2, The One Ring 2e, etc.). How are people getting the impression that I only play more narrative-focused indie games? And I'm still not loving 5e in the correct way?