What is a "Narrative Mechanic"?

[AbdulAlhazred]

See my post 481 upthread. I think more progress might be made by discussing what seems to me to be the actual issue, which is who exercises "ownership" over which bits of the fiction.

I continue to take the view that "diegetic" is not a useful adjective applied to mechanics, because none of them are experienced by the characters in the fiction.

Yeah, at this point I'm sorry I even ever suggested it might possibly have some utility as a term. CLEARLY there are, in this thread, at least a dozen different ideas about what such a term should mean, and people aren't even consistent in employing it. As far as I'm concerned, its dead. If you want to use the dictionary definition of diegetic here in some way, be my guest. I will just assume other uses are replaced with the word "rumplefutz" or something and go on. It makes no sense at all.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

But it can be truly represented by a WIS saving throw, and hence those are "diegetic"? That makes no sense to me. What makes a player rolling a die a part of the fiction, in a way that a player spending a token is not?

There is no "fictional proposition" does he affect you?. In the fiction either the spell does or doesn't affect the character. The question "Does he affect you?" is one asked by the participants, in their capacities as audience and authors.

I can't follow your analysis here. I don't see what bit of CaGI makes it adiegetic, whereas rolling a saving throw is diegetic. I don't see how the player exercising their will to spend a token is adiegetic vis-a-vis the character's will, but putting the outcome of the character's will to the test via a saving throw is diegetic.

What if the fiction is one in which the gods have determined all outcomes in advance? Or even one in which, on this occasion, the gods have decided that the hero will resist? Does that mean that we can't roll the dice? Does that mean that a game in which dice are rolled is never one in which divine favour is exercised?

I find the whole analysis just muddled.

At this point it is just a rhetorical device. In the case of Inspiration he's objecting to the FREQUENCY OF USE. Now, it can be argued how realistic that is, but there are a few problems with his argument, like frequency of use is not related to AN INSTANCE OF USE. When I use inspiration am I reflecting something in the fictional world, is the bonus I get explicable in terms of ostensible causes and effects within the game world? It would seem so! I got inspired and I jumped further. Yeah, then the player spent a 'token'. But mostly its just a rhetorical device where anything that is disliked is called 'adiegetic'. I suggest we utilize the word 'cooties' instead (for you Aussie guy, cooties is a mythical disease which is asserted by young boys to be spread by young girls, so its a 'bad thing').

 

[clearstream]

Well, I sort of proposed a way of thinking about @clearstream's earlier Supervenient definition, but then I thought about it too much and read more of the thread, and basically there are so many different subjective factors involved that I have pretty much come to the conclusion that the term is, as you wisely said, meaningless. Instead we should probably just talk about what people find immersive or not-immersive in a subjective sense, and perhaps note some trends there, and leave it at that.

While I believe the notion of supervenience between game elements and world has some useful ramifications; like you I don't think it leads to any decisive test for what counts as diegetic. (It really just kicks the can down the road.) As I concluded in that very post

more accurately, I'm agreeing with your [@pemerton's] earlier intuition that it isn't a useful term

One way to retrieve usefulness for the term would be just to describe the local norm. If the local norm is that inspiration is something characters are aware of, then in that location inspiration is diegetic. One might not agree with its assignment, but at least the word has a clear meaning. It describes a kind of norm.

As you pointed out, a designer can set out to prescribe the norms for their game. They can rule inspiration in as diegetic in their game, and ceteris paribus that would prevail. It fits views offered in other threads about the purposes of rules. And fits with notions like secondary design. (As a side effect, broadening @pemerton's observation on setting establishment to at least include designers.)

NOTE EDITS

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Or to say it another way - such a mechanic gives the player the authority to narrate that their PC is trying harder now (hence the name 'narrative mechanic') - but there's no fictional reason a character cannot try harder even if the player is out of tokens - which is why such a mechanic is 'narrative' or 'adiegetic' or whatever you want to call that.

Not so sure. I think willpower depletion is a thing. Sometimes you just are out of spoons. Sure, we can quibble how well the mechanic represents the concept, but that's another matter.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

There really should be. I dislike the idea that saves work as written regardless of circumstance.

Well in 5e they explicitly don't. Several conditions give disadvantage to certain saves or make you fail them outright. And of course nothing is stopping GM assigning situational advantages or disadvantages like on any roll. Now I'm sure one can easily find interactions that cause WTF moments, but that is an issue with how well and consistenly the principle is applied, rather than whether it exists at all.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I think that this attempt to describe particular mechanics, or other processes of play, in rather abstract structural terms, with an expectation that doing so will then carve some significant boundaries of preferences for play, is hopeless.

I'm going to use a post of yours not too far upthread to elaborate my point:

There is no structural difference between a die roll that establishes in the past, an event occurred whereby I learned that Orcs of the Broken Bone worship Baghtru and a dice roll that establishes in the past, an event occurred whereby I learned that Evard's tower was in such-and-such a place.

Nor is there any structural difference between those sorts of rolls, and one that establishes that in the past, an event occurred whereby Evard's tower came to be in such-and-such a place.

Some posters might think there is a structural difference, because the knowledge involves the PC and the tower involves a NPC, but I think that thought won't be defensible under scrutiny. The PC having learned something implicates NPCs - there was an NPC teacher present, for instance, telling the PC <whatever it is that the PC learned>. And the tower one implicates the PC, as the presence of the tower is a causal factor in the PC's knowledge of it.

I don't think that trying to draw the distinction in terms of topic or substance will work either. It's true that the knowledge rolls focus on the topic of the PC having learned something in the past, while the tower roll focuses on the topic of a tower having been built in the past. But given that the proposition A knows that X entails X, the contrast breaks down under even modest analysis: if my PC accurately recalls some fact about Orcish cult practices, that entails a whole lot of setting stuff about Orcs and their cults.

The real issue of preference, as best I can tell, is about which participant - player or GM - gets to establish or "own" which bits of the fiction. So rather than worrying about "narrative" mechanics or "diegetic" mechanics, or even "metagame" mechanics, to me it would make more sense to directly talk about that real issue.

One obstacle to doing so is that it collides fairly immediately with the assertion that "The player decides what their PC thinks and feels". That statement, while it may be true as a generality, is literally false of a game in which (i) the PC is not particularly stupid and hence tends to believe true things, and (ii) the PC, given their background and training, probably believes some true things about Orcish cult practices, and (iii) the GM is the participant who is entitled to establish Orcs and their cults as elements of the fiction.

The reason for including (i) is to rule out the (surprisingly common) retort that the player is freed to have their PC believe false or outlandish things, but the GM will decide whether or not they are true. Once (i) is included, the interplay of (ii) and (iii) fairly clearly entail that it is the GM who will decide what the character whose player succeeds on a History/Religion/whatever check wil believe about Orcs and their cults.

Because of the weirdly shibbolethic status of "The player decides what their PC thinks and feels" I don't expect this post to generate wide uptake in this thread. Nevertheless, I think it explains why the attempt to analyse RPGing preferences in terms of abstract structural labels is not a very profitable one.

I don't know what you mean by "structural difference."

But yes, it is about whose responsibility it is to decide things about what subject matter. Traditional arrangement of roles is that the player's subject matter is the thoughts and actions of the character and the GM's the world. And no, you generally* do not smuggle in authority to address subject matter reserved to another person by a PC thinking things about the world into being via "thoughts and feelings" or the GM controlling the PCs because the PC is part of the world.

(* I am sure one can find some miniscule and rare example of boundary crossing and fuzziness, but the general principle is clear.)

I generally understand it to mean mechanics that let the player to affect the fictional reality beyond the causal effects of their character's actions.
And I think that's roughly what most people mean when they use the term. I'm not sure that it is a good term for that, but it is what it is.

This was my first post in this thread. This obviously refers back to the areas of responsibility outlined earlier. I think the definition is coherent enough to be understood by most people in the context of roleplaying games. Again, that you could find some edge case fuzziness doesn't mean that it is not a sensible definition.

 

[clearstream]

But it can be truly represented by a WIS saving throw, and hence those are "diegetic"? That makes no sense to me. What makes a player rolling a die a part of the fiction, in a way that a player spending a token is not?

There is no "fictional proposition" does he affect you?. In the fiction either the spell does or doesn't affect the character. The question "Does he affect you?" is one asked by the participants, in their capacities as audience and authors.

I can't follow your analysis here. I don't see what bit of CaGI makes it adiegetic, whereas rolling a saving throw is diegetic. I don't see how the player exercising their will to spend a token is adiegetic vis-a-vis the character's will, but putting the outcome of the character's will to the test via a saving throw is diegetic.

What if the fiction is one in which the gods have determined all outcomes in advance? Or even one in which, on this occasion, the gods have decided that the hero will resist? Does that mean that we can't roll the dice? Does that mean that a game in which dice are rolled is never one in which divine favour is exercised?

I find the whole analysis just muddled.

Pursuing your line of thinking

A fact F is diegetic if players are normally permitted to act as if their characters know that F.

Game norms being established according to views that we've developed in numerous other threads.

 

[pemerton]

Pursuing your line of thinking

A fact F is diegetic if players are normally permitted to act as if their characters know that F.

This rules out all dice rolls as diegetic. Only in a 4th-wall breaking RPG is a character permitted to act as if "I just rolled a 20 on my saving throw!"

 

[clearstream]

This rules out all dice rolls as diegetic. Only in a 4th-wall breaking RPG is a character permitted to act as if "I just rolled a 20 on my saving throw!"

So there is also the (non-diegetic) case where a player is permitted to act as if their character knows F and that F is external to their world.

And there would be the (diegetic) case where a player is permitted to act as if their character has knowledge and beliefs that make dice rolls internal to their world. Peculiar, but not ruled out. I've assayed designs where dice are fateful spirits that gather to characters, who know they're used for certain acts. Dice-spirits. The idea is that some have unique sides and characters can choose which to call on.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

So there is also the (non-diegetic) case where a player is permitted to act as if their character knows F and that F is external to their world.

And there would be the (diegetic) case where a player is permitted to act as if their character has knowledge and beliefs that make dice rolls internal to their world. Peculiar, but not ruled out. I've assayed designs where dice are fateful spirits that gather to characters, who know they're used for certain acts. Dice-spirits. The idea is that some have unique sides and characters can choose which to call on.

Look, by any defensible definition of 'diegetic' there can be NO game mechanics who's operation by a player fits that bill. That's my conclusion. Rolling dice is not diegetic (aside from your peculiar case, perhaps), marking off hit points of damage is not diegetic, no forms of manipulation of a currency are diegetic, etc.

In fact, all of this was known and acknowledged in the early days of D&D! I can definitively state that this is the case, as it was widely discussed at the time (there has been considerable terminological shift since then). It was widely understood that a fully diegetic game practice would involve the GM rolling all dice, the non-conveyance of any facts about the existence of or state of things like hit points, etc. A GM would keep ALL of this hidden from the players, simply narrating the fictional state (IE the orc slices you with his sword, but you manage to dodge the worst of it, you now have a large cut across your chest!). There were people who actually experimented with this style of play, though it was never very popular as it clashed pretty heavily with classic play.

I don't know if Dave or Gary ever experimented with this kind of play themselves, but they were at least aware of the ramifications, as there are various advice given about keeping certain things behind the screen, etc. My suspicion is that Gary didn't practice this kind of thing and would have considered it rather impractical and less fun, but I'm just guessing.