S/Z: On the Difficulties of RPG Theory & Criticism

[Li Shenron]

So after seeing this happen yet again, I thought I'd create a thread based explaining why this happens, and why RPG Theory and Criticism can be so very hard and contentious.

Loved your article. But now I have a theory (and some criticism) about why you wrote your theory and criticism over general RPG theory and criticism...

 

[Aldarc]

But, I mean, what if dying isn't a loss condition? Either in that the character intended to die or in that you gained satisfaction/enjoyment even though the character died, there is the possibility that dying is not a loss condition. I don't see how this is absolute or objective.

Sure, but that isn't exactly unique to TTRPGs. Maybe a player of a board or card game is satisfied that although they lost, they still took down another player in the process, or that they helped the other players reach the end-goal of the game by their sacrifice.

 

[Sadras]

I would think it would be a given that the first goal of play is for one's PC to survive.

Maybe initially yes, but goals may change in value of importance during a course of a game as happened within an In Nomine game I played where my character's life (initial primary goal) became less important than saving the arch-angel Michael (later primary goal).

 

[Fenris-77]

But we can (and should be able to) ALSO talk about the theory and design of the things we buy off the shelves, that we also happen to call RPGs. If we call them both RPGs, we are going to be hopelessly confused.

I agree, we just need to be specific about what we're talking about. The game off the shelf, the text, if you will, is the rules and a bunch of expectations about and/or suggestions about how they could or should be used at the table. That's more than enough to start working out a vocabulary and some theory.

The three part definition I quoted much earlier in this thread has three main components:

1) Role-playing is an interactive process of defining and re-defining the state, properties and contents of an imaginary game world.
2) The power to define the game world is allocated to participants of the game. The participants recognize the existence of this power hierarchy.
3) Player-participants define the game world through personified character constructs, conforming to the state, properties and contents of the game world.

The text defines what mechanics and conventions govern 1, the nature of the allocation in 2, and the rules for creating 3. What the text doesn't cover is the people and the table. So if we confine ourselves to mechanics and expectations when it comes to the text we should be fine.

 

[Umbran]

In games where PC death is off the table then either other loss conditions will replace it (loss of wealth, or status, or health, or whatever) or the game will be in win-only mode - and given the definitions we've seen so far, would win-only mode even still count as a 'game'?

I already noted that if you look around you'll quickly find a great many definitions of "game". And, I'll bet that most of them were created before RPGs, or were created by people who were not considering RPGs. Or, they were actively trying to exclude certain kinds of activity from the "game" category.

And, I think moving forward with a concept of "game" that is not generally inclusive of a lot of RPG activity... is going to end up in tribal argument - like trying to tell people that any particular edition of the game was "not D&D."

Aside from all that being rude, annoying, and kind of jerkish... I think that in so doing you lose huge amounts of wisdom about play. As a result, in terms of having language to discuss what we do.. our language would be incredibly lacking.

And, maybe therein lies a major thought - if we are looking for a discussion of RPG theory, a discussion of "game" in the classic sense of the term... is perhaps missing the literal central bit: the Playing. I was askign bout the goal of play, not the goal of the (sub)game.

So, then, I think you are being remarkably limiting in thinking of play only in terms of win/loss. If we think of the game as structured play (which may or may not have other attributes, but I suspect we can agree on structured play), then winning and losing are really only one of a wide range of considerations.

Upthread, Belerophon listed some 8 different kinds of games from an essay. In only one of the 8 (the Challenge Game) is determining win/loss necessarily a primary goal of play. In many of the others, who wins or loses may be irrelevant to the players, or even contrary to the basic goal of play, insofar as determining win/loss ends the play, which may not be the desired outcome.

 

[Beleriphon]

The text defines what mechanics and conventions govern 1, the nature of the allocation in 2, and the rules for creating 3. What the text doesn't cover is the people and the table. So if we confine ourselves to mechanics and expectations when it comes to the text we should be fine.

I think its possible to discuss at table play in broad terms. There are academic studies of all kinds of games, no reason we can't apply the same principles here. There will always be outliers, but the nature of RPGs I think can be broken down into relatively broad categories. I think we've seen that here a few times relating to the nature of how skills are used in other discussions. There seems to be two broad categories of how folks use them for example.

Maybe, if we get super ambitious, we'll end up with the RPG equivalent of a DSM V.

This part of the reason why I think it is extremely important to work on the most basic level of what an RPG is and define the most basic terms to start with. I helps establish a base from which to work. Per my previous three point list we need rules, a group, and player avatars (characters).

If anybody is interested there's a paper about using RPGs (from context it is TTRPGs, not a CRPG) to simulate Multi-Agent Systems in a Senegal River Valley. It is actually fascinating read, but I'm not sure what the context of a multi agent system is here. I know what those words mean but in context I'm lost. That said, I think this paper has some interesting examples of the kind sof things we want to discuss.

 

[generic]

Those are moral victories, not actual ones.

I could play the best game of chess in my life and feel really great afterwards about how I played, but if I end up getting checkmated I still achieve a loss condition.

Same thing in an RPG: I could set up for the best death ever, and pull it off spectacularly. I could be completely giddy about it afterwards. Doesn't change the fact of my achieving a loss condition.

There's various loss conditions in most RPGs; and to be sure, some are more wishy-washy in their definitions than others. Character death, however, is perhaps the most clearly defined of all, other than TPK.

It's not a loss condition though, because you don't "lose the game". This is because RPGs don't have rules, they have guidelines. Generally, when you lose a game, you leave the table to eat some fish and chips with your mates while everyone else finishes up. In an RPG, you roll up a new character, and begin playing again. You haven't lost, per se, because the game delineates no loss condition.

If you can show me a clearly defined loss condition in a popular RPG like D&D, then I would be surprised.

 

[Fenris-77]

Woah there champ, slow your roll. RPGs do indeed have rules, that's part of what puts the G in RPG. They don't have game ending loss conditions though. Those two facts aren't related.

 

[generic]

Woah there champ, slow your roll. RPGs do indeed have rules, that's part of what puts the G in RPG. They don't have game ending loss conditions though. Those two facts aren't related.

Rules? Hmm... given the fact that I am a powergamer, I would like to agree. However, the DM/GM is free to alter any and all rules. Therefore, the rules in the book are only guidelines.

 

[Fenris-77]

Ahh, well yes and no. The GM can monkey around with things all he likes prior to a campaign, and has a limited amount of agency to change minor things at the table sometimes, and only then by table fiat. He does not have the authority to use or ignore rules as he sees fit during play. Once you start playing the rules harden from suggestions into, you know, rules.