D&D 5E To boxed text or not to boxed text

[pemerton]

having played with more than a few DM's who have decent experience in story telling, as in the vocal art, I can honestly say that evoking emotions is part and parcel of a performance.

Absolutely! But in my view the main job of a GM is not performing. It's establishing compelling situations, and helping resolve them (together with the other participants).

Relying on the players to evoke emotional responses, is, IMO, an exercise in frustration. They're far, far more likely to go with a dick joke than dive deep into trying to evoke feelings.

I was thinking more about exhibiting emotional responses themselves, than evoking them in other participants. But that can happen too, eg when the whole table is on edge wondering whether a player will make a certain call, or how some declared action will turn out; or when the players are debating something among themselves, trying to decide what it is that they want to do.

So here, too, I'm not seeing the players' role as one of performance: it's about inhabiting their characters in the fiction.

When I play a RPG I am not going to experience fear because of the referee's narration. That's a response appropriate to a book or film, perhaps, but not a RPG.

In a RPG, my emotional responses are generated by the context for, and consequences of, the actions I declare for my character.

WAT, this comment makes zero sense. In fact it makes negative sense.

I don't know how you managed to figure out how to emote backwards, but somehow you did. I'm not interested in arguing with you, you emote however you want man. I will say that this sounds like the kind of thing someone would write on the internet to argue a point while not actually acting that way in reality.

Again, you're sort of promoting this weird "I don't emote in response to situations, I emote after situations" or something, honestly it's terribly confusing and I have no idea how you're doing that.

When I'm watching a film or reading a book (or being read a book) I'm experiencing a performance or someone else's composition. That work evokes a response in me (assuming it's any good).

When I'm playing a RPG, I'm being my character. I'm making choices in the context of a situation that the referee has established. As in real life, the emotion comes not from appreciating a performance or a composition, but from having to choose and facing the (imagined) consequences of that choice. That's what makes it imaginative play.

To put it another way: in a film, the lighting of the set, the framing of the shot of the farmstead, the soundtrack (or it's absence0 are all crucial. But in a RPG, the narration is secondary - it's role is to estabnlish an imagined choice sitution. It's the choosing, for my character, and having to (in the ficiton) wear the consequences of that, which produce the emotional weight of the epxerience.

 

[pemerton]

I mean, okay? Definitely not a game I'd like to play. I mean, why even bother with entire genres of TTRPGs (you know, CoC, VtM, WoD, Dread, or even bother with any Ravenloft in D&D?).

We played a Cthulhu Dark session not too long ago. No text, boxed or otherwise. It was pretty fun.

I mean, it fits in a weird way with the rest of his argument if he's got one of those really weird ultra-analytical minds that just doesn't emote much. If I assume that about him it fits with the preference for bullet-point information and the demand for situations he can analyze and respond to rationally, vs situations he reacts to emotionally.

This is a complete misdescription and misreading of what I said.

One way to have your emotions aroused is to be an audience member to a performance.

Another, different way - much more like real life! - is to have to make a hard choice. Rationality has nothing to do with that. Both rational and irrational people experience emotions when they have to make decisions.

The last session in which I was a player (as opposed to GM) I explored the tower of the Great Master and demon summoner Evard. There, I discovered old letters writen by my mother to Evard, suggesting that the latter was my grandfather. I burned them.

The emotions I expereinced weren't resulting from the GM's performance. They were resulting from my inhabitation of my character and the situation. That's what makes it RPGing, rather than storytelling and acting.

 

[Immortal Sun]

We played a Cthulhu Dark session not too long ago. No text, boxed or otherwise. It was pretty fun.

This is a complete misdescription and misreading of what I said.

One way to have your emotions aroused is to be an audience member to a performance.

Another, different way - much more like real life! - is to have to make a hard choice. Rationality has nothing to do with that. Both rational and irrational people experience emotions when they have to make decisions.

The last session in which I was a player (as opposed to GM) I explored the tower of the Great Master and demon summoner Evard. There, I discovered old letters writen by my mother to Evard, suggesting that the latter was my grandfather. I burned them.

The emotions I expereinced weren't resulting from the GM's performance. They were resulting from my inhabitation of my character and the situation. That's what makes it RPGing, rather than storytelling and acting.

I get what you're saying a little better but...

I'm still not terribly sure why you're stacking these things as separate elements. This is, again like what I got at in my first post in this thread, it's weird to me to ask these to be separate. Not from a DM perspective mind you, since there are times when the flavor can make the crunch unclear or difficult to understand. But it's something of a package deal. And you can achieve the emotive experience responding to a situation laced with flavor just as well as you can achieve the emotive experience responding to a situation that is not.

You call it "RPGing" like, this is some thing that is separate from acting or storytelling. But it's not really its own thing not because it is stands out uniquely in its own right, but because it combines gaming, acting, storytelling into one complete whole. In some respects, you are an audience member, because you get to sit back and watch the performances of the other players, the DM being the NPCs, and the descriptive elements the DM adds to help set the stage. But you're also an active participant, you have a turn where then others get to watch your performance and respond to the elements you add to the scene.

Hence why the name "RPG" is an acronym. "Role" "Playing" "Game". There are multiple elements combining to form a unique experience that in some respects is like watching a movie or reading a book, at least when it's not your turn. But also isn't totally like a game either. And it isn't wholly acting either.

It's great that your character had an emotion....but like the people who started this discussion, I still feel like you're trying to draw a line between you and your character which is an inherently fuzzy boundary. But someone should be reacting to the flavor of the information put forward, be it you or your character. And if you want information completely devoid of flavor, then quite frankly I just don't understand the worlds that your characters live in.

If your issue here is that I was referring to "you", then keep in mind I refer to "you" in a general sense as the Player/PC unit. I don't consider these things to be separate. I talk to the player at my table, and the PC takes actions within the game. To me these are not separate and distinct units. A PC has no life of its own, no decision-making capacity, no ability to act without the player. The player similarly has no ability to actually act within the game world, other than through the window that is their character.

Your perspective still seems strange to me. What about the performance of the DM behind NPCs? Does your DM not run NPCs? Who does? Are they interesting? Who makes them interesting? Whose performance is responsible for that?

I still feel like, in asking for everything to be cut and dry, you're making an argument that you don't actually participate in at the table. There must be some performative elements on behalf of the DM, otherwise to me, it sounds like your game world is little more than Matrix-code running down a screen.

 

[Satyrn]

Did you whistle the tune?

I can't whistle, so I used audio from the movie!

The scenario I used had Orcs forcing a captured NPC adventuring party to build a bridge across a river of lava so they could reach the tomb on the other side. The NPCs were whistling to help guide would-be rescuers to their location.

The party leader, a tinker gnome, refused to be rescued and threatened to raise the alarm because he really wanted to finish his grand project. But it worked out well enough for the players, since they assured him he could continue his work . . . for them.

 

[Immortal Sun]

The party leader, a tinker gnome, refused to be rescued and threatened to raise the alarm because he really wanted to finish his grand project. But it worked out well enough for the players, since they assured him he could continue his work . . . for them.

Darn, and rivers of lava are such convenient body disposal sites.

 

[pemerton]

I'm still not terribly sure why you're stacking these things as separate elements. This is, again like what I got at in my first post in this thread, it's weird to me to ask these to be separate. Not from a DM perspective mind you, since there are times when the flavor can make the crunch unclear or difficult to understand. But it's something of a package deal. And you can achieve the emotive experience responding to a situation laced with flavor just as well as you can achieve the emotive experience responding to a situation that is not.

<snip>

if you want information completely devoid of flavor, then quite frankly I just don't understand the worlds that your characters live in.

I don't understand the contrast you're drawing between flavour and crunch.

Is the fact that the orcs might get to my horse before I can flavour or cruch in your terminology?

Similarly I don't understand the contrast you're drawing between information and flavour.

You call it "RPGing" like, this is some thing that is separate from acting or storytelling. But it's not really its own thing not because it is stands out uniquely in its own right, but because it combines gaming, acting, storytelling into one complete whole. In some respects, you are an audience member, because you get to sit back and watch the performances of the other players, the DM being the NPCs, and the descriptive elements the DM adds to help set the stage. But you're also an active participant, you have a turn where then others get to watch your performance and respond to the elements you add to the scene.

I don't see the pleasure of RPGing being performance for an audience.

An analogy would be conversation. Generally I don't see conversation as a performance in the artistic/thespian sense; and the relation between interlocutors in conversation isn't one I see as performer and audience. Of course there are modes of "conversation" which do have the performer/audience structure, but I associate these with a certain sort of upper-middle class status game-playing rather than sincere conversation.

What about the performance of the DM behind NPCs? Does your DM not run NPCs? Who does? Are they interesting? Who makes them interesting? Whose performance is responsible for that?

<snip>

There must be some performative elements on behalf of the DM, otherwise to me, it sounds like your game world is little more than Matrix-code running down a screen.

NPCs are interesting because of the framing of the situation. Why do I care about my PC's mother's parentage? Because I wrote my mother in to my backstory; and now the GM is putting that element of the fiction under pressure.

There can be narration without performance in the artistic sense: again, think of telling your coworkers how you spent your long weekend.

It's great that your character had an emotion

I talked about me having an emotion. That I had in common with my character (in a certain fashion - there's an element of metaphor or isomorphism rather than literality here, although I think it's quite complicated to unpack).

I still feel like you're trying to draw a line between you and your character which is an inherently fuzzy boundary.

I don't undestand what you're pointing to here. As I just reiterated, I am talking about the player having an emotion, in virtue of the situation in which s/he has to choose for his/her PC.

 

[Immortal Sun]

<snip>

Yeah I'm just gonna go ahead an excuse myself from this conversation.

It's clear you know what I'm talking about and simply want to play mindless word games. I've got better things to do.

 

[pemerton]

It's clear you know what I'm talking about and simply want to play mindless word games. I've got better things to do.

Huh? I don't have a clue what you're talking about. I'm talking about whether the quality of narration is important in RPGing. I assert that it's not. That the emotion is generated by the choice situation that confronts the players, not the performance of the GM.

I take it you disagree, but I don't have the least idea what you think "flavour" vs "crunch" has to do with this. The contrast I'm drawing applies as much to Cthulhu Dark (which has virtually no "crunch") as to 4e D&D.

 

[Satyrn]

If I was [MENTION=6981174]Immortal Sun[/MENTION], this would be my reply:

 

[Hussar]

Huh? I don't have a clue what you're talking about. I'm talking about whether the quality of narration is important in RPGing. I assert that it's not. That the emotion is generated by the choice situation that confronts the players, not the performance of the GM.

I take it you disagree, but I don't have the least idea what you think "flavour" vs "crunch" has to do with this. The contrast I'm drawing applies as much to Cthulhu Dark (which has virtually no "crunch") as to 4e D&D.

Is it important? I would say maybe. Can it be important? I would say definitely. The difference between a DM who has no presence and no story telling chops and one who does is massive. You're basically arguing that if I presented all my game from the DM's side in a flat monotone, no excitement, no emotional reaction, that my game would be just as good as if I was animated, and used some good presentation habits.

To me, that's just wrong. Part of ANY presentation is the presenter. There's a reason that live play's are popular and part of that is the DM. Sure, adventure design is hugely important. It is and I won't argue otherwise. But, the notion that the "art" (for lack of better word) of presentation isn't also very important is something I do not agree with.

How you DM is just as important as what you DM.