Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="clearstream" data-source="post: 8733085" data-attributes="member: 71699">One way in which I feel the golfing analogy may be not quite right, is that it's possible to see TTRPG play more in terms of performance than competition. What I mean is that it is the journey, not the destination, that counts.We can be interested in the imagination, choices, and portrayals that participants commit. I think in many of the greatest sessions it's those, and not how we reach a conclusion, that matter. I'm probably forced to have that view because I hold freeform play equal (if different) to mechanistic play.In my experience, at time 0 the game designer to some extent describes a situation, and one of the participants has curated that game design for the group and in many cases further developed the situation. Generally speaking, the imaginative qualities of that situation are impactful: if it's well considered, our play will more likely go on to be interesting. In the case of a Torchbearer game for example, through curation the starting point might be somewhere in Middarmark.At time 1 and onwards, I don't really see your first option (GM preconceives) happening: we're all looking to continue our stream of play. In golf, perhaps each hole can be seen as a discrete sub-game? The players committed at the outset to some number of holes and they will play them in the sequence presented. Where TTRPG can be episodic, I think we can have<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">a participant continues to curate and may further develop the situation</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">at the same time, players alone decide what they will do next</li> </ul>The group upholds player-fiat so that as you say, "The play itself can naturally evolve from one end point to generate a new, emergent starting point during play." The traces of previous play are normally influential on what happens next, so I think it lacks the discrete nature of the next golf hole. (I'm not holding up your analogy just to nitpick: I'm hoping to use it to show why I think looking at play in that light might not be quite right. Or perhaps it's better to say, accepts a limit that needn't be imposed.)If I understand your first option here correctly, then I think that yes, we do see a lot of that in traditional play. It's more or less the norm for published adventures, which is a great shame in my opinion because it by no means has to be.I think the second and third options both have their merits. There are GMs I would trust over the results of some game systems, but that's more of an aside. Our experience of play is the journey, not the destination. The requirements of the outcome are simply this: picturing it, we felt inspired and our journey was enthralling.That's on the one hand. On the other hand, I think we can also have<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The conflict reaches its endpoint through a form of negotiation, where we work to shape the fictional position so that it must follow.</li> </ul>I agree that the last term can help the play: it's good when a system guides a group in their improvisation. I don't especially see the need for "bind", but I suppose that's because I am assuming principles are in play that bind everyone at the table. I wouldn't pick out whichever participant accepts the burdens normally associated with GM for binding, especially.In some cases, I would favour the first option. Where groups lean into heavily tactical play with a game system designed to support that, there can be substantial gains in satisfaction in well-crafted obstacles. I am not speaking here of any sort of encounter that will be relocated to inevitably be in front of the group. And many games now take a lighter-weight approach that can make it easier to develop satisfying obstacles on the fly (although less satisfying, for those who want heavily tactical play!)Again, freeform play would generally not have a budget/procedural constraint, and pretty much what the group values is the focus on feel. To the extent that TTRPG play is an artform, I'm less dismissive of working by feel over working systematically. On the other hand, it's not ideal if the "feel" favoured by one participant in a privileged position of authorship overwhelms the feel that would be favoured by another participant. One possible resolution to this conundrum is different but equal privileges... but that doesn't work out in every case. [USER=16586]@Campbell[/USER] here and elsewhere lays out pretty well some of the reasons why.Tying it back, I don't think what you have said in your latest justifies a fundamental position of antagonism and distrust toward a participant who takes on burdens to arbitrate and guide, and perhaps to work on world rather than character. I feel it is always hard to really be justified in a position that starts out with such negative characterisations, and the validity of your actual thoughts doesn't seem to require them!And then of course, I definitely sustain the virtue of freeform play, which commits me to disliking any thesis that systematically determined conclusions to chains-of-resolution are inevitably better.</blockquote>

Verification