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What is player agency to you?
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<blockquote data-quote="clearstream" data-source="post: 9119779" data-attributes="member: 71699"><p>With the caveat that I haven't read every post on score or so pages since I too a break - but only glanced over them - in what I'm sure will come as a surprise to no one, I have some further thoughts. I feel that I have observed differing intuitions about “player agency” in this thread, that I believe come out of a semantic distinction that I will attempt to explain here.</p><p></p><p>First to sketch out agency</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 40px">“…a being has the capacity to exercise agency just in case it has the capacity to act intentionally, and the exercise of agency consists in the performance of intentional actions and, in many cases, in the performance of unintentional actions (that derive from the performance of intentional actions”</p> <p style="margin-left: 40px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 40px">“…to act for a reason is to act in a way that can be rationalized by the premises of a sound practical syllogism, which consists, typically, of a major premise that corresponds to the agent’s goal and a minor premise that corresponds to the agent’s take on how to attain the goal”</p><p></p><p>There are two parts to agency, related to the major premise and the minor premise. Put succinctly, I feel intuitions may well be divided along the lines of the part they focus upon.</p><p></p><p>When focused on the major premise, I can say that one kind of player agency is influence over an <strong>outcome</strong>. I have bolded the word “outcome” to emphasise that agency to achieve <em>a given outcome</em> cannot be increased or decreased through change to agency to achieve a <em>different</em> outcome. The outcomes I’ve had in mind are natural ones, such as – to play Roulette, to spectate a CS: GO match, to cross a playground. In earlier posts, folk have sometimes substituted in <em>alternative </em>outcomes and argued from there that agency can be increased to achieve those (alternative) outcomes. That may be true, but it fails to respect the major premise. To revive another poster’s example, their agency to <em>spectate</em> can’t be increased by forcing them to take the field in play. If the game is American Football, I personally have much greater agency to spectate than I do to take the field at a professional level, i.e. in games that I might well otherwise spectate.</p><p></p><p>So player agency on the major premise is agency to achieve my goal such as to experience play of RuneQuest. Given that I have limited resources when I play (only so much cognitive capacity and time) experiencing non-goals feasibly comes at a cost to my goals. Interfering with or lessening my agency to achieve them. Mixed experiences are often distinct from unmixed; coffee with milk isn’t neatly coffee plus a retrievable extra component – I can't get the milk back out! – and to my palette the experience is distinctly different from my preferred americano sans latte. Mixed play experiences are not reliably identical to unmixed.</p><p></p><p>Player agency on the minor premise might well be described using the same words – <strong>influence</strong> over an outcome – but turns out to be player agency <em>given</em> the higher-order goal is satisfied. Focus for this second kind of agency is put more upon that bolded word – “influence”. It’s the moment-to-moment expression of agency within the chosen activity and is seen <em>wherever <strong>player</strong> is turned to for the direction or outcome of play</em>. It runs through play in the form of process techniques exercised at the given moment.</p><p></p><p>Given the same finite resources and mixing observations I made above, minor premise agency is reduced wherever dice, rules, or other participants are turned to rather than the player... <em>except to the extent that doing so optimises player agency overall</em>. When I am about to roll for Addy's Tune In in MotW to learn something about our sylvan horror, I could well obtain greater agency if I took up loaded dice that would amount to simply choosing my outcome. Player agency at the point of influencing is found in <em>techniques </em>that RPGs make greater or lesser use of, and indeed can be measured across games in the natural sense some posters have emphasised; even where the putative “increasing” runs contrary to an agent's major premise and thus cannot reasonably be included in their take on how to attain their goal.</p><p></p><p>I’ve mentioned optimising "player agency overall". What must also be considered is that play (outside of solo play) is a matter of <strong>shared agency</strong>. Giving total agency to one player feasibly comes at a cost to other players. Rules and referees can provide regulation that produces optimum player agency overall, in view of each player’s major and minor agentic premises; but that does not guarantee that they will. There are other considerations, too, such as making us say things we don't want to say, and building tension. Contemporary takes on all modes of play that bring GM into the rules framework can I believe be more successful at achieving optimum player minor premise agency <em>overall</em>. Just as structuring rules using contemporary design patterns can do. That's true of every mode of play (an argument I've made for example, about simulationism in another thread.) It mightn't of course satisfy someones goal of achieving a 100% authentic retro-gaming experience, but it could well be described as turning to player more often or impactfully for the moment-to-moment direction or outcomes of play.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="clearstream, post: 9119779, member: 71699"] With the caveat that I haven't read every post on score or so pages since I too a break - but only glanced over them - in what I'm sure will come as a surprise to no one, I have some further thoughts. I feel that I have observed differing intuitions about “player agency” in this thread, that I believe come out of a semantic distinction that I will attempt to explain here. First to sketch out agency [INDENT=2]“…a being has the capacity to exercise agency just in case it has the capacity to act intentionally, and the exercise of agency consists in the performance of intentional actions and, in many cases, in the performance of unintentional actions (that derive from the performance of intentional actions”[/INDENT] [INDENT=2][/INDENT] [INDENT=2]“…to act for a reason is to act in a way that can be rationalized by the premises of a sound practical syllogism, which consists, typically, of a major premise that corresponds to the agent’s goal and a minor premise that corresponds to the agent’s take on how to attain the goal”[/INDENT] There are two parts to agency, related to the major premise and the minor premise. Put succinctly, I feel intuitions may well be divided along the lines of the part they focus upon. When focused on the major premise, I can say that one kind of player agency is influence over an [B]outcome[/B]. I have bolded the word “outcome” to emphasise that agency to achieve [I]a given outcome[/I] cannot be increased or decreased through change to agency to achieve a [I]different[/I] outcome. The outcomes I’ve had in mind are natural ones, such as – to play Roulette, to spectate a CS: GO match, to cross a playground. In earlier posts, folk have sometimes substituted in [I]alternative [/I]outcomes and argued from there that agency can be increased to achieve those (alternative) outcomes. That may be true, but it fails to respect the major premise. To revive another poster’s example, their agency to [I]spectate[/I] can’t be increased by forcing them to take the field in play. If the game is American Football, I personally have much greater agency to spectate than I do to take the field at a professional level, i.e. in games that I might well otherwise spectate. So player agency on the major premise is agency to achieve my goal such as to experience play of RuneQuest. Given that I have limited resources when I play (only so much cognitive capacity and time) experiencing non-goals feasibly comes at a cost to my goals. Interfering with or lessening my agency to achieve them. Mixed experiences are often distinct from unmixed; coffee with milk isn’t neatly coffee plus a retrievable extra component – I can't get the milk back out! – and to my palette the experience is distinctly different from my preferred americano sans latte. Mixed play experiences are not reliably identical to unmixed. Player agency on the minor premise might well be described using the same words – [B]influence[/B] over an outcome – but turns out to be player agency [I]given[/I] the higher-order goal is satisfied. Focus for this second kind of agency is put more upon that bolded word – “influence”. It’s the moment-to-moment expression of agency within the chosen activity and is seen [I]wherever [B]player[/B] is turned to for the direction or outcome of play[/I]. It runs through play in the form of process techniques exercised at the given moment. Given the same finite resources and mixing observations I made above, minor premise agency is reduced wherever dice, rules, or other participants are turned to rather than the player... [I]except to the extent that doing so optimises player agency overall[/I]. When I am about to roll for Addy's Tune In in MotW to learn something about our sylvan horror, I could well obtain greater agency if I took up loaded dice that would amount to simply choosing my outcome. Player agency at the point of influencing is found in [I]techniques [/I]that RPGs make greater or lesser use of, and indeed can be measured across games in the natural sense some posters have emphasised; even where the putative “increasing” runs contrary to an agent's major premise and thus cannot reasonably be included in their take on how to attain their goal. I’ve mentioned optimising "player agency overall". What must also be considered is that play (outside of solo play) is a matter of [B]shared agency[/B]. Giving total agency to one player feasibly comes at a cost to other players. Rules and referees can provide regulation that produces optimum player agency overall, in view of each player’s major and minor agentic premises; but that does not guarantee that they will. There are other considerations, too, such as making us say things we don't want to say, and building tension. Contemporary takes on all modes of play that bring GM into the rules framework can I believe be more successful at achieving optimum player minor premise agency [I]overall[/I]. Just as structuring rules using contemporary design patterns can do. That's true of every mode of play (an argument I've made for example, about simulationism in another thread.) It mightn't of course satisfy someones goal of achieving a 100% authentic retro-gaming experience, but it could well be described as turning to player more often or impactfully for the moment-to-moment direction or outcomes of play. [/QUOTE]
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