Storytelling vs Roleplaying

[I'm A Banana]

In the context of this thread, "storytelling" has meant "player power extending beyond the PC".

That's part of your problem. That's not what storytelling means! At all! It's not related! It's just going to confuse things and start threads like this!

Is the game about the players assuming roles and exploring fictional worlds from within those roles or is the main objective for the playing group to collaborate on weaving a story through play.

There's another part of your problem. These things are not mutually incompatible for a game's goals. Both happen all the time in most games of D&D. This isn't a zero-sum binary solution, a "choose A or B" kind of situation: both of these things happen in EVERY RPG.

It's even possible to emphasize both at once.

This whole conversation seems to be "I'm going to make up definitions and everyone is going to abide by them."

 

[Hussar]

Nope. You're off about labeling games as this or that. That's why my "But then ..." led into your invocation of GNS; whatever the theory, the practice seems often to come down to such labeling, with the non-N considered "not really RPGs".

"That's not precisely a claim I've seen him make so far" was in response to:

In the context of this thread, "storytelling" has meant "player power extending beyond the PC". Shifting the meaning still does not change the distinction between -- on one hand -- describing component activities within the game and -- on the other -- slapping a label on the game as a whole.

Ok, IIRC, and I did post rather a lot in this thread, so I may have mis-spoken, but, exactly where did I "invoke" GNS? If I did, I did so entirely mistakenly, because I don't really grok GNS.

IIRC, and I'm not going to swim upthread yet again to clarify a point I have just clarified, I made the point that editorial power being given to players is not an exclusive feature of narrative games.

But, since I have now TWICE clarified my point, please stick to my clarifications and stop belaboring your understanding of what I said before.

And, I would just like to say that KM is getting it perfectly well.

Something that confuses me EW. You state that in CoC it is okay for the player to use rules which change the setting, so long as those rules involve a measure of random chance. That random chance element apparently is enough to maintain a game's "role playing game" nature.

But, even though the EXACT same scenario happens in my Diamond dog example, other than random die roll - the player invokes a game resource to change the setting, and exercise editorial control, in this case Fate Points - that suddenly changes it to a story telling game.

So, are you now claiming that it is possible to have player vested editorial control in a role playing game, so long as the mechanic is not guaranteed?

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I agree here. I've always felt the narrativist justification was just that, a justification. I believe the main purpose of these mechanics is balance though, not interesting resource management.

The power system structure is for balance, but the presence of power is for resource management, tactical play or simply decision making (however you prefer to call it.). Achieving balance is hard (to impossible if you allow too much freedom) if you use different resource subsystems for the same area (typically combat. But from a "gamist" point of view, without limited resources, there is little tactics involved - you need something to make meaningful decisions about.

 

[Hussar]

That's part of your problem. That's not what storytelling means! At all! It's not related! It's just going to confuse things and start threads like this!

Well, to be fair, I think Ariosto actually has pegged that rather well. EW's primary criteria for separating Story Telling Games from Role Playing Games has boiled down to editorial control over the setting. Thus Story Telling Games has become, in this thread at least, synonymous with player editorial control.

My problem is that almost every single RPG out there has some mechanics which give editorial control to some degree to the players, thus, splitting the hair here seems to be counterproductive.

 

[tyrlaan]

I'm not all that concerned with terminology for it's own sake. What I would like is for a game to state the prime play objectives openly. Is the game about the players assuming roles and exploring fictional worlds from within those roles or is the main objective for the playing group to collaborate on weaving a story through play. As long as one can tell the difference from reading a blurb about the game it's all good.

Not to sound snarky, but isn't that what reviews are for?

Judging a book by it's cover and getting the short end of the stick when you buy it is by no means an rpg industry only experience. Hell, I've seen movie trailers that bill the movie as genre X and when you see it the thing turns out to be genre Y.

Furthermore, unless these definitions you are crusading get accepted by the industry as a whole, they're meaningless. As this lengthy thread demonstrates, this is a very subjective point of discussion. That means someone could bill their new RPG as a story-telling style game but be "wrong" in their categorization by your eyes.

Actually, even if the industry accepts it, unless retailers do too, it could still lead to confusion because a brick and mortar shop might mix their story-telling games in with their "adventure games"*

Coming full circle, I think perhaps reading a review is the right answer here. I say that because I'm starting to get the sense that this hair being split wouldn't be a concern if you just research a product a bit before you buy it.

*I'm dubbing RPGs that you think are not story-telling games as adventure games. I by no means suggest this is a good term (of course I think we shouldn't even be doing this segregation in the firstplace, but hey) but I needed something to put my sentence together without implying the insult that somehow story-telling games are not what you define as RPGs.

 

[ExploderWizard]

There's another part of your problem. These things are not mutually incompatible for a game's goals. Both happen all the time in most games of D&D. This isn't a zero-sum binary solution, a "choose A or B" kind of situation: both of these things happen in EVERY RPG.

It's even possible to emphasize both at once.

This whole conversation seems to be "I'm going to make up definitions and everyone is going to abide by them."

It really is as simple as that. Players are either playing the game from within their defined roles or not. If players are operating in the game outside of the role of adventurer and yet are still roleplaying, what role is that exactly?

 

[Doug McCrae]

I have to admit, claiming 4e isn't a roleplaying game because it has too many storytelling elements gets 10/10 for originality. Normally the 'not a roleplaying game' charge comes from the other direction - just a videogame, feels like M:tG, nothing but combat, etc. So EW is to be congratulated for that. The claim needs a lot more substantiation than we've seen so far, though. You can't just throw something like that out there and not back it up. We need specifics. Is it the action points, player's ability to choose treasure, possible interpretations of the power Come And Get It or what?

 

[ExploderWizard]

Coming full circle, I think perhaps reading a review is the right answer here. I say that because I'm starting to get the sense that this hair being split wouldn't be a concern if you just research a product a bit before you buy it.

I actually try and play a game before I buy if possible. Some reviews are more useful than others.

 

[Doug McCrae]

GURPS is quite easy to adapt and play as a story game. A lot of the cinematic options pave the way and the point based system is great for designing custom advantages that allow the player to control plot elements.

Could you expand on this please? Give specifics. What could the players do that made it no longer a roleplaying game? Were they no longer controlling individual PCs?

 

[Hussar]

It really is as simple as that. Players are either playing the game from within their defined roles or not. If players are operating in the game outside of the role of adventurer and yet are still roleplaying, what role is that exactly?

But that's the problem. Why can't a game be a role playing game and have players doing both activities. Granted, not at the same time, but, certainly performing both activities.

It would be a very strange game indeed where you don't actually play any role at all, but rather always simply add on the next line in the plot. Totally agree that that's not a role playing game at all.

But, other than you, no one is actually talking about that, I think. Every single game that's been brought up in this thread has instances where you are not specifically playing a role, including D&D. Yet, you call some of them role playing games and not others.

Another question then. To qualify as a role playing game, do you have to role play in character 100% of the time?

And can you give me an example of a game where that happens?