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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Aldarc" data-source="post: 7410257" data-attributes="member: 5142">There are several problems with this summary, and they all have to do with the percentages you provide, namely that one can even speak of them with any certainty or accuracy to begin with. 1) Outside of the context of roleplaying games, the statement that "[our/your] agency is at 100%" is a veritable field of volatile landmines. To the best of my own limited knowledge, most contemporary thinking rarely regards human agency at being somehow "100%" but instead as being inherently limited. Nowadays the debate seems centered more on discussing the limiting factors and the extent which they limit agency. (And as characters themselves are run by human players with presumably limited agency, the characters themselves would likely exhibit far less agency in-game than their human ones in-real-life.) The degree that the philosophical notion of (human) agency exists cannot objectively be ascertained, especially in terms of simple percentages. And as such... 2) The idea that one could quantifiably measure the differences of agency as percentages or perform basic arithmatic would be equally fallacious. We are discussing qualitative assertions of comparative agency and not quantitative ones. So I don't think that you, me, or anyone else in this thread can reasonably reduce each others' arguments to "our form of agency produces a quantifiably equal amount of agency once we subtract their agency X and add their new agency Y, which as you can see is equal to our agency Z." It's a simply ridiculous assertion. 3) This is not to say that we cannot speak of "more" or "less" agency, but we must be clear that we are not talking actual numbers and percentages but qualitative values and philosophic notions of agency. It's a discussion on the shape, caveats, and contours that the various notions of agency possess in the context of player-experience. It is still ultimately a utilitarian argument of sorts, but the utility is "measured" in terms of player-empowerment. And here, I would suggest that one of the principle battle lines in the debate of agency surrounds which form of "agency" produces the more meaningful manifestation of player-empowered play. Again though, this is a qualitative assessment. Saying that your/our games have "100 percent agency," for example, gives me little to no idea how much of that agency is actually substantively meaningful from a player-side perspective or a GM-side perspective. I am more interested in knowing how those approaches impact my decision-making abilities and choices as a player, and subsequently, how the outcomes of those approaches align with my own player values and principles, general fun-having, desired outcomes, etc. See, but that sort of thought still often results in conversational religiosity, except not one of conversion, but as combating perceived heresies that threaten the prevailing hegemonic expression of the game's religious cultus.</blockquote>

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