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Message: <blockquote data-quote="clearstream" data-source="post: 9079015" data-attributes="member: 71699">My view on simulationist GM as putatively neutral arbiter is an evolving one, that I hope to give some signposts toward here. I will lay some groundwork and then suggest a conclusion. Long story short, I'll argue that simulationist GMing, done powerfully, is non-neutral.First I want to highlight a few jobs often done by GM.<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Author: They create material in advance of and in response to play.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Referee: I put the obligation like this: if you want to play the game as intended, then you ought to follow the rules. A referee can secure that through knowing the rules, giving thought to their interpretation, saying what obtains in case of doubts, and holding participants to follow the rules.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Advocate: For adversaries and adversities; in cognizance of the Czege principle.</li> </ul>All of these jobs can be done by players. Recollecting Suits' construct that players form pre-lusory goals, adopt a lusory attitude in light of those goals, and submit to the lusory means. In what ways might GM be exceptional? There are a few permutations, already discussed in earlier posts. Under Suits' construct, these are their components<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Pre-lusory goals: GM isn't excepted from a stake in the pre-lusory goals. That is self-evident. To draw an analogy, a soccer referee does not come onto the field wielding and enforcing the rules of badminton: players and referee are all there to see played a game of soccer.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Lusory attitude: This appears to be optional for a GM and the lines are blurred... possibly crossed and recrossed over during play. Either they agree to work within the rules, which constrain them in concrete ways, or they exempt themselves from the rules, or those rules aren't written so as to constrain them. In case of the former (constraining), the lusory attitude isn't to accept the same inefficiencies as players, but it is to accept inefficiencies.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Lusory means: From the players' perspective, GM is normally counted among the lusory means. That's described above. GM of course, might have lusory means of their own that constrain them: moves they can make, prices they must pay.</li> </ul>I'm going to stick with the label GM, but what I mean by it sheds assumptions about what assignments of the above jobs and components are in play.I pondered this for a long while, and in the end concluded that GM is not "impartial." Drawing again on the analogy of soccer, the referee is opinionated: they aim to see soccer played, and to a noble standard (or perhaps, to a debauched standard!) This is evident on reading in full football club guidance for referees.I don't think simulationist-GM is impartial. The group has chosen a subject, and simulationist-GM has as much desire to achieve an elevated appreciation and understanding as the players. More, possibly. I recall a Land of the Rising Sun game GM'd by an aficionado of the period. Their facilitation of play was highly intentional: to help us get ourselves into situations where truths of the subject became palpable. To the extent that rules and subject were conjoined, simulationist-GM was their advocate and obedient servant. They held strong opinions on their meaning and implementation, and had a stake in seeing them upheld.GM as advocate of adversaries and adversities can't be impartial. Conflict is an over-burdened term, but in whatever form it takes in your play, GM can't be impartial in dishing it out. However, their dissimilar lusory-goals can (and must) be satisfied without harm to player lusory-goals, which might at times look like neutrality or impartiality.According to Tuovinen, the concepts a GM needs in a game like RuneQuest would be various forms of what would drive this player's elevated appreciation and understanding of Glorantha?Internal cause is a central technique in simulationism, not its ends. Just as addressing an "engaging issue or problematic feature of human existence" via "player makes choices" is a central technique in narrativism. Maybe those techniques can't be done without? Whether that's right, it's not required to be neutral arbiter to apply the techniques. Working with the group, simulationist-GMing can emphasise some internal causes, cast others into doubt, develop an opinion that this is not the cause we are looking for. (After all, what are the definitive factual causes of an imagined reality? That's no more than normatively established.)The next section I am quoting not in disagreement, but to highlight some consequences of resisting sterile-neutrality in simulationist-GMing.There are process differences, but it can't be denied that bringing Duskvol and the game's engine to life are very much on the agenda for simulationist-GMing. Simulationist-GM willingly follows players' leads and deploys their own capacities. A divider might be found in player authorship, but sim-players can author (as discussed in several posts up-thread). Am I blurring boundaries? Yes: I'm philosophically skeptical about stable identities and boundaries in the domain of TTRPGs.Simulationist-GM don't get to introduce whatever crap they want to. They must be responsive to subject and players engagement with it.I can only recoil in horror. Sterility, neutrality, goal-less wandering... if these are used to characterize simulationism (and I'm pulling them out of context to make my point, not saying this is [USER=6696971]@Manbearcat[/USER]'s point!) then we have a full-house of misapprehensions that arise from the struggle to put in words what made us care about simulationism in the first place. Returning to LRS, players (samurai) say they're obedient to the daimyo. Right then, let's get a visceral appreciation of that by putting it under stress.This represents ideal simulationist practice. (Of course the agenda and principles may differ.)By my lights nar rejects story imperatives while sim can go either way. (I have some quibbles with "story imperatives" that I'll come to further on.) "GM story hour" is one approach to achieving elevated appreciation and understanding of a subject. I personally feel it doesn't take best advantage of game as game, but that doesn't stop it working for others.... and being a launchpad into other sim modes. Eero describes multiple approaches to achieving sim, he reports that in one campaignIt's moot to sim play. Let's say our subject is Cold War intelligence operations in Europe and the Middle East. If we see a way in which hiding information will let us more vigorously investigate subject, so be it. Subject isn't hidden. Contingent details might be.From my perspective, it's the first one... I haven't run BitD but I believe I could run a sandbox using it. As Eero saysWhen I'm doing what subject demands - analytical or empathic: resolutely authentic - my choices are hard and accurate. My curiousity is limitless, whether in designing, prepping, playing, authoring, or responding. Players say what about this, and we really get into it. Something I'm not doing is making dramatically potent choices that create a story. (This is a quibble, but I think that although nar doesn't want to be told a story, it does demand potential to create one. I'm assuming "story imperatives" are about the former, not the latter.)When will it conflict?Consistent with my skepticism about the stability of TTRPG identities and boundaries, different groups might be successfully eliciting different play from the same textual artifacts (published game texts). That could be down to different readings, different emphasises, unanticipated elements in their social contract.... As I've noted in earlier posts, if nar-choices often enough turn out non-disruptive, it seems hard to rule out (and on grounds of observation and experience I'd rule in) hybrid or toggled play.Still, one can say how things normally work out. An incomplete list of the utility of good sim-texts would include supplying an abundance of subject (RuneQuest), an abundance of procedures for developing subject (Ironsworn), a thought-provoking view on subject (Far From Home), mechanics as subject (GURPS). The second to last implies that some texts overtly designed for story play could turn out to have utility for sim play (Stonetop?)  Sim-participants want to get into subject far beyond what nar-participants are looking for. Instantiate it, explore it, stress it, immerse in it, understand it mechanically (something that may drive the sim predilection for bespoke mechanics, described by [USER=85555]@Bedrockgames[/USER] or [USER=13383]@robertsconley[/USER] above.)In conclusion, my view on neutral-GM is that if it exists, it's not ideal for powerful sim. Either it's a semantic mistake (accepting a label that turns out to be inappropriate) or the sim purpose isn't being vigorously pursued. GM can't be neutral while joining the effort to elevate appreciation and understanding. In closing, this has been a long and complex train of thought. I think the sense of it is right. Errors will be interesting to understand and rethink.</blockquote>

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