D&D General What is player agency to you?

[EzekielRaiden]

In a game assembled for you, personally, that can be done. But, there's no guarantee of being able to produce that for other people at the table with you - in rather the same way that your personal favorite pizza may not be good for everyone else at the table.

I haven't said a single thing to contradict that. Instead, I have said that there are tools that can be used to bring that about--tools used in games that offer player agency.

I expect this is part of why Snarf keeps noting that talking about agency broadly, in general is not useful. Speaking about specific techniques, forms, and modes that can produce or enhance agency becomes more constructive, because producing agency becomes an act of assembling compromise solutions.

But I did that! I cited example tools in a recent post, in fact. The X-card and O-card, for example. I've also cited various moves from Dungeon World.

I am talking about techniques here. And then I'm told that's too specific. And then when I talk in generalities, I'm told that's too general.

It's honestly pretty tedious.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Again, that "wish things into existence" ability really isn't that common, I don't even know games that really let you do that. Maybe Fate? Certainly not any of the PbtA games I've played. Blades in the Dark's Flashbacks can seem like that, but I've already broken down how I disagree with that analysis for that example.

I actually put a mechanic like this in Heroes of Myth and Legend where you "alter your fate" using a resource. You can alter a fictional constraint in your favor, but not change the results of a check. Thus it can be used like a flashback or you can describe a reasonable explanation for how you can accomplish, or attempt, something that normally wouldn't happen or that helps you. Like a watchman happens by just as you are about to be robbed, plausible but lucky.

You can also regain this ability by accepting a 'misfortune' of a similar sort. Otherwise it resets at the start of each session, heroes have fate on their side.

 

[chaochou]

Agency isn’t subjective.

However, the willingness to accept the illusion of agency is.

Its the very core of the illusionist play style.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I mean I've personally tried to brainstorm houserules to hide hp values from players and just give them broad narrations for the characters fighting state.

This was a common sort of discussion back in the '70s. It's pretty impractical but at least a few GMs hid all the numbers from the players. Note that Gygax recognized the concept but came down more on the side of practicality and gamism.

 

[Golroc]

Agency isn’t subjective.

However, the willingness to accept the illusion of agency is.

Its the very core of the illusionist play style.

There are of course different ways to define agency. The subjective one is very common and used for example in management theory. What matters to the individual and the workplace is the feeling of agency. It doesn't matter how closely tied it is to the reality of choice or how comparatively reasonable it is or isn't.

To me that's also the useful perspective for an RPG. If a player is feeling bereft of agency - that is what matters. If a player has this issue, it is important to figure out why and how the player wants it to be improved. The answer is not to improve some abstract notion of agency.

One player might want an X card. Another may have no use for it. One player might want to have influence on what kind of narrative unfolds. Another might want highly realistic combat. Someone might just want others to dominate less in a purely social manner and have more "room" and attention.

Finally, sense of meaning affects agency. A player may feel that too little challenge or too much freedom removes meaning from the experience. Something that objectively adds freedom and authority might thus reduce agency for a particular player.

The original post in this thread describes a specific situation. That is always how one should approach agency in my opinion. You can't make the experience better for a player while denying subjectivity.

 

[hawkeyefan]

More options to express agency doesn't necessarily mean more agency. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. But every game has limitations on the agency of the people playing the game.

Yes, every game has limitations.

More options don't necessarily feel like more agency, which is the only comparison you can really make. Even if it does, there's no way to put it on a scale and measure it because it's going to vary from one individual to the next.

That's all.

I don’t think that’s true. I’m absolutely able to tell you which of the 5e games I’ve played in allowed more player agency and why.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

There are of course different ways to define agency. The subjective one is very common and used for example in management theory. What matters to the individual and the workplace is the feeling of agency. It doesn't matter how closely tied it is to the reality of choice or how comparatively reasonable it is or isn't.

To me that's also the useful perspective for an RPG. If a player is feeling bereft of agency - that is what matters. If a player has this issue, it is important to figure out why and how the player wants it to be improved. The answer is not to improve some abstract notion of agency.

One player might want an X card. Another may have no use for it. One player might want to have influence on what kind of narrative unfolds. Another might want highly realistic combat. Someone might just want others to dominate less in a purely social manner and have more "room" and attention.

Finally, sense of meaning affects agency. A player may feel that too little challenge or too much freedom removes meaning from the experience. Something that objectively adds freedom and authority might thus reduce agency for a particular player.

The original post in this thread describes a specific situation. That is always how one should approach agency in my opinion. You can't make the experience better for a player while denying subjectivity.

How do we square this, then, with the fact that, when players find out that their feeling of agency was hollow--that the things they thought they had agency over, they didn't--results in pretty clear anger, even feeling betrayed? Why do so many places that give advice about running the illusionism style make such a point of reiterating that players must not find out that their choices are illusory? If the actual facts of the matter are irrelevant, and the feeling alone is all that matters, why do players care when they find out?

 

[pointofyou]

How do we square this, then, with the fact that, when players find out that their feeling of agency was hollow--that the things they thought they had agency over, they didn't--results in pretty clear anger, even feeling betrayed? Why do so many places that give advice about running the illusionism style make such a point of reiterating that players must not find out that their choices are illusory? If the actual facts of the matter are irrelevant, and the feeling alone is all that matters, why do players care when they find out?

It seems as though the players' reactions might be similar to readers' or viewers' reactions to "it was just a dream" both in terms of how they react and why.

 

[Umbran]

How can one person be more kind than another person, if there is no unit of measurement for kindness?

How can one person be more intelligent than another, if there is no unit of measurement for intelligence?

How can one event be more influential on history than another, if there is no unit of measurement for influence?

These things can still be objectively true, without being about measured quantities.

With respect, no, they cannot. Kindness, intelligence, and influence are not even well-defined concepts, much less things whose relative values can be assessed objectively.

Each of these are things that one can have a personal opinion about. And maybe multiple people share those opinions. But objective values do not care about our opinions, individually or as a collective.

 

[Golroc]

How do we square this, then, with the fact that, when players find out that their feeling of agency was hollow--that the things they thought they had agency over, they didn't--results in pretty clear anger, even feeling betrayed? Why do so many places that give advice about running the illusionism style make such a point of reiterating that players must not find out that their choices are illusory? If the actual facts of the matter are irrelevant, and the feeling alone is all that matters, why do players care when they find out?

I have never experienced such issues myself. Everyone I have ever played with has been aware of, and ok with, the GM "making stuff up" at their discretion. I don't consider these hundreds of people low on agency.

If I happened to play with someone who wanted to have an experience where there is no "illusion", I would probably object to that term (I think all RPGs are inherently experential) but respect their preferences and try to find a good way to communicate that we probably don't have compatible RPG playstyles, but that I love playing boardgames, miniature games and video games and perhaps we could find common ground there.