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Supposing D&D is gamist, what does that mean?
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<blockquote data-quote="clearstream" data-source="post: 8638045" data-attributes="member: 71699"><p>Here we might have to agree to disagree. There's a wealth of evidence that the game being played at each table differs. In this thread we have had multiple examples of different ways to play various games. My intuition is that we're approaching this at two different levels of zoom, and on the level we are thinking of, we are each right.</p><p></p><p></p><p>It's true that what counts as regulatory and what counts as constitutive can be ambiguous. My own view is that certain and a sufficiency of regulatory rules can have a constitutive effect. "If you do it, you do it" is in that set. There is an antecedent activity that can be done without the rule in place (a group deciding that a player's description of what they do is necessary and sufficient to invoke a mechanic is something I have seen from even the very earliest years of play) and the rule casts it as a regulation. On the other hand, that regulation goes on to have a constitutive effect.</p><p></p><p>EDIT The distinction continues to matter because there are differences in how players grasp regulatory versus constitutive rules based on specifics of their construction. An example that you might recall was over the implications of a PHB rule on Ability Checks in light of a DMG rule on Ability Checks. The risk with a regulatory rule is that because it doesn't constitute the activity (there is an antecedent activity that it regulates) it is hard to test for completeness. Further components of the regulatory rule in other places are hard to anticipate. (Whereas if it constitutes the activity, it is normally obvious if the activity has been constituted, i.e. by the doing of it.) In the case of "to do it, do it" there could be additional components of the rule in other places that adjust its consequences. Ideally there are not, making it a well-fomed regulatory rule.</p><p></p><p></p><p>It's true that we generally see evolution rather than entirely novel origination. I will reflect further on this point, because from a design perspective I am seeing included in game texts accurately articulated principles and agenda that formerly would have been in a preface or sidebar and typically rather muddled. Game designers I have spoken with say that they are more conscious of the value of spelling out the principles they want players to approach play with, They see those as a component of their game text - conceived to operate together with the mechanics - rather than as side advice. They may <em>also</em> provide side advice.</p><p></p><p>The subjects of an RPG game design now often consciously include the principles of its play. Better answering the question of how the game designer procures that their game text in the hands of players delivers their envisioned play. Thinking about the discussion above, that helps bring instances of play nearer together. In the past, principles were discussed to my reading more as observation and testimony, or wise words, not as intentional design. Or it might be better to caveat, not as widely approached by game designers as a proper subject of intentional design. YMMV.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Yes. It's valuable for the game designer to spell out what they intend to make their game distinct.</p><p></p><p></p><p>You joined an ongoing conversation. The possibility of massively inept play shows that rules have no inherent binding power, else how would it be possible to not follow them, or to follow them not as intended? We're able to see that there is a rule, and see that a player has not found that rule to be inherently binding (through their failure to follow it).</p><p></p><p>One option that has been discussed in game studies is to deny that a genuine instance of play has occurred <em>at all</em>. So that - tautologically - only when all the rules happen to be binding in the right way is a bona-fide instance of the game being played. That runs into some problems, such as failure to follow rules that don't arise in play (en-passant in chess is an example.) Another is how to define cheating, seeing as one may now be saying that disapplication of a rule means the game isn't played at all. To my reading, it can be shown that one eventually has so caveated what counts as play as to exclude instances of play that are normally counted as genuine (see abundant testimony on enworld as to differences as to what rules are applied or disapplied at different tables, without resulting in cross-accusations that the game in question has not been played.)</p><p></p><p></p><p>Yes! You outline here some reasons why rules can turn out not to be binding. It is with those sorts of reasons (and more) in mind that I say rules are <strong>not</strong> inherently binding. That agreement to a rule is <em>never</em> located in that rule. This is not to lessen the importance of rules, even while avoiding overstating any freedom entailed in rule zero, which perforce operates in the context of the attitudes and motives that lead people to put rules in force for themselves.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="clearstream, post: 8638045, member: 71699"] Here we might have to agree to disagree. There's a wealth of evidence that the game being played at each table differs. In this thread we have had multiple examples of different ways to play various games. My intuition is that we're approaching this at two different levels of zoom, and on the level we are thinking of, we are each right. It's true that what counts as regulatory and what counts as constitutive can be ambiguous. My own view is that certain and a sufficiency of regulatory rules can have a constitutive effect. "If you do it, you do it" is in that set. There is an antecedent activity that can be done without the rule in place (a group deciding that a player's description of what they do is necessary and sufficient to invoke a mechanic is something I have seen from even the very earliest years of play) and the rule casts it as a regulation. On the other hand, that regulation goes on to have a constitutive effect. EDIT The distinction continues to matter because there are differences in how players grasp regulatory versus constitutive rules based on specifics of their construction. An example that you might recall was over the implications of a PHB rule on Ability Checks in light of a DMG rule on Ability Checks. The risk with a regulatory rule is that because it doesn't constitute the activity (there is an antecedent activity that it regulates) it is hard to test for completeness. Further components of the regulatory rule in other places are hard to anticipate. (Whereas if it constitutes the activity, it is normally obvious if the activity has been constituted, i.e. by the doing of it.) In the case of "to do it, do it" there could be additional components of the rule in other places that adjust its consequences. Ideally there are not, making it a well-fomed regulatory rule. It's true that we generally see evolution rather than entirely novel origination. I will reflect further on this point, because from a design perspective I am seeing included in game texts accurately articulated principles and agenda that formerly would have been in a preface or sidebar and typically rather muddled. Game designers I have spoken with say that they are more conscious of the value of spelling out the principles they want players to approach play with, They see those as a component of their game text - conceived to operate together with the mechanics - rather than as side advice. They may [I]also[/I] provide side advice. The subjects of an RPG game design now often consciously include the principles of its play. Better answering the question of how the game designer procures that their game text in the hands of players delivers their envisioned play. Thinking about the discussion above, that helps bring instances of play nearer together. In the past, principles were discussed to my reading more as observation and testimony, or wise words, not as intentional design. Or it might be better to caveat, not as widely approached by game designers as a proper subject of intentional design. YMMV. Yes. It's valuable for the game designer to spell out what they intend to make their game distinct. You joined an ongoing conversation. The possibility of massively inept play shows that rules have no inherent binding power, else how would it be possible to not follow them, or to follow them not as intended? We're able to see that there is a rule, and see that a player has not found that rule to be inherently binding (through their failure to follow it). One option that has been discussed in game studies is to deny that a genuine instance of play has occurred [I]at all[/I]. So that - tautologically - only when all the rules happen to be binding in the right way is a bona-fide instance of the game being played. That runs into some problems, such as failure to follow rules that don't arise in play (en-passant in chess is an example.) Another is how to define cheating, seeing as one may now be saying that disapplication of a rule means the game isn't played at all. To my reading, it can be shown that one eventually has so caveated what counts as play as to exclude instances of play that are normally counted as genuine (see abundant testimony on enworld as to differences as to what rules are applied or disapplied at different tables, without resulting in cross-accusations that the game in question has not been played.) Yes! You outline here some reasons why rules can turn out not to be binding. It is with those sorts of reasons (and more) in mind that I say rules are [B]not[/B] inherently binding. That agreement to a rule is [I]never[/I] located in that rule. This is not to lessen the importance of rules, even while avoiding overstating any freedom entailed in rule zero, which perforce operates in the context of the attitudes and motives that lead people to put rules in force for themselves. [/QUOTE]
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