What are we talking about when we say 'Creative Agenda'?

[Gordon C. Landis]

Here's what's I've been thinking lately:

1)  Current status: "Creative Agenda" and "GNS Priority" are synonomous, just about.
2)  Where we're moving to:  Creative Agenda is a bigger thing, that includes a Priority called G, N or S.

The Social vs. Personal issue - among others - needs some work (and I'm going to be having spotty net access for the next month), but  . . . I see real value (and accuracy, IMO) in being able to talk about some things (Virtuality, Dramatism) that were previously "just" Techniques as being part of a larger "layer" in the model - and it looks to me like we've found a way to do so without losing the power (and accuracy, IMO) of the GNS Priority-split.

Gordon

[Caldis]

Marco,

Sorry for the delay in my reply, unfortunately life stepped in and had me running the past week never got a chance to sit down and write out what I was thinking.

I noticed something in your last post to me that goes back to my central point of this thread.  

Under the 3D model, I have a big-honkin' head start. In fact, if I tell the GM I want him or her to run the game in Theme/Dist mode while I willl play in Immersed/Dist mode (can I even do that?) then I get pretty close to what my wirte up concering roles and responsibilities was (I think).

What you find useful about the 3d model is something that I hadn't even considered to be part of it.  My thoughts were that it was about categorizing types of games to get everyone working with the same goal not about what ones role in the game is.  As long as were trying to use the term to mean different things we wont be able to have any meaningful discussion.   For Creative Agenda to be a useful tool in discussion we have to decide whether it's a hammer or a saw.

Gordon's last post went in the same direction I've been thinking.

1) Current status: "Creative Agenda" and "GNS Priority" are synonomous, just about.
2) Where we're moving to: Creative Agenda is a bigger thing, that includes a Priority called G, N or S.

If we see Creative Agenda as "the big thing" then we can subdivide it (possibly infinitely) if we want to learn everything that could be important to a gamer.  The ones that I'm seeing as important are as follows.

Spark – The hook that gets you interested in the game.  It can be any of the elements listed in Hunter Logan's big list or a passion for the source material or a desire to learn how the game rules work, maybe even just to hang out with your friends.  This aspect of creative agenda is vast and I don't think there's much worth in trying to define all the sparks, it just may be important to realize that they exist and that they can influence how someone plays.

Creative Form – This is where I would put GNS into the game as I've described it in this thread, which I think is pretty close to canon however I could be wrong.  It's what form you want the game to take, what I am creating in this game.  Is it one in which players proving their worth in tests of skill is the emphasis of the game?  If you answer yes then its gamist.  Is it one where players try to address premise?  Narrativist.  Rather than simulationist I would prefer to use immersion as the 3d model does, it better suits what I feel is going on.  Finding out what it would be like if you were x character in y situation.  

Guiding Principles - Where GDS fits and other matters of the players personal ethics.  How the game should be run, is fudging allowed or is the game played straight by the rules.  These principles can conflict with the Creative Form such as in Marco's example in the Techniques, Expectations, and Interactions thread.

That was a breach of Virtuality in that, I had not decided the reporter was snooping around and while I did specify that she had some "evidence of weird stuff happening out by where the character was" I did not specify recent photographic evidence (and even if she was out in the desert taking pictures the experiment site was very large--they wouldn't likely have met each other).

I would suggest that in such a case Marco's reaction was typical.  The creative form took precedence but an effort was made to avoid the breach of the guiding principles in the future.

[Marco]

That was a breach of Virtuality in that, I had not decided the reporter was snooping around and while I did specify that she had some "evidence of weird stuff happening out by where the character was" I did not specify recent photographic evidence (and even if she was out in the desert taking pictures the experiment site was very large--they wouldn't likely have met each other).

I would suggest that in such a case Marco's reaction was typical.  The creative form took precedence but an effort was made to avoid the breach of the guiding principles in the future.

I don't know what you mean by "typical." This was done, IMO, to build energy for play--the effort that was done to avoid the breach of guiding principles was (IMO) considerably more pravelent during the game.

Just as After The War opened with a combat scene that I felt got the blood moving (although I wouldn't characterize my priorities as Gamist) I would say that there will be places in games (times of low energy, the start, the end of the current plot thread) where a player in charge of pacing (the GM, traditionally) may wish to inject more excitement--however, IME, this is not necessiarily related to preferred Creative Agenda.

Combats are often exciting, even for non-gamists ... even for Narrativists (the stereotype of the Narrativist who'll turn his nose up at a cool fight or deplore combat not directly related to a current story-line is, I think, fast vanishing--and not quickly enough for my tastes).

Intellectual stimulation or simply a mild rasing-of-the-stakes may not the defining preference of play--but if energy is low and entertainment is the aim of play (which is often the case in the begining of a game) then what we have here is a priority that is sort of pan-CA (or non-CA).

At the start of a game, I don't really care what happens so long as it's punchy and I get traction on it. An interesting, engaging imaginary world to work with (Sim?), is just as good as a moral issue at a sudden crisis (Nar?), or an interesting fight (Gam?).

I'll take any of the above as a kick-off--and I'll go so far as to say that my preference is whichever the GM feels she or he has the best handle on at the time.

If a string of fights--even interesting ones--becomes a steady diet, then I might not be optimally engaged (although, hey, if they're truly interesting and exciting, I'll take it in a heart-beat)--but I wouldn't characterize what I did as anything but GDS Dramatism.

Which, if you relate it to GNS Creative Agenda ... will get you in all sorts of trouble.

-Marco

[contracycle]

Combats are often exciting, even for non-gamists ... even for Narrativists (the stereotype of the Narrativist who'll turn his nose up at a cool fight or deplore combat not directly related to a current story-line is, I think, fast vanishing--and not quickly enough for my tastes).

Was there such a stereotype?  Its news to me, especially as Ron has maintained that the drivers in N and G are similar enough that one may morph into the other.

As I understand your argument here, the fact that some challenge was interspersed in an allegedly N game demsontrates Dramatism.  Maybe.  However, in orthodox GNS, there is no problem with a generally N game having bits of S or G, so this does not indicate any problem with GNS at all.

[Marco]

As I understand your argument here, the fact that some challenge was interspersed in an allegedly N game demsontrates Dramatism.  Maybe.  However, in orthodox GNS, there is no problem with a generally N game having bits of S or G, so this does not indicate any problem with GNS at all.

I wasn't saying that challenge indicated Dramatism. I was questioning the statement that some kind of "creative form" took precidence over "guiding principles" which was what I thought Caldis' post seemed to imply.

To me that would indicate that there was some sort of "creative form" (agenda) that was congruent, over-all, with dramatic (but not necessiairly challenge-oriented--that was just an example) play.

Considering that, several times, I discounted what I felt was the more dramatic or thematic option in favor of what I felt was the most probable aspect, I would hesistate to call, say, Dramatic play a "creative form" and virtuality a "guiding principle" instead of, say, vice versa.

-Marco

[contracycle]

I wasn't saying that challenge indicated Dramatism. I was questioning the statement that some kind of "creative form" took precidence over "guiding principles" which was what I thought Caldis' post seemed to imply.

Marco, I must once again ask you to please read what I write and address it.

I did NOT suggest that you said challenge indicated Dramatism at all.

What I suggested was that you interpreted a game that does not exhibit a pure CA as being dramatically sculpted.

All I pointed out is that the stock theory already allows for this, as it has never claimed that actual table play will purely stay in one mode.

[Caldis]

Considering that, several times, I discounted what I felt was the more dramatic or thematic option in favor of what I felt was the most probable aspect, I would hesistate to call, say, Dramatic play a "creative form" and virtuality a "guiding principle" instead of, say, vice versa.

-Marco

Good points.  I think you are right it's not one over the other, each can override the other at certain points.  However the danger of the principles overriding the form are as Lee Short pointed out in his essay on virtuality  that the game is going to bog down into something no one finds interesting, or if the GM is making all his decisions for dramatic or gamist purposes it may disempower the players to either address premise or face challenges.

[M. J. Young]

Rather than simulationist I would prefer to use immersion as the 3d model does, it better suits what I feel is going on.  Finding out what it would be like if you were x character in y situation.

I can understand recognizing "finding out what it would be like" et cetera as being simulationist. The problem I have with "immersion" as a replacement name is that I think it leads to something that can only be seen as "pawn stance immersion", which if not inherently contradictory is at least counterintuitive. People do play "to see what it's like" without any character identification at all, strictly as observers.

Marco, have you considered the possibility that you have trouble identifying your agendum because you, personally, are quite willing to drift to whatever is being emphasized by the others at the table? I drift quite a bit in response to many factors, including the responses of the other players, the nature of the setting and situation, and my personal feelings at the moment. In the early days of the GNS debate it was suggested that I was quite likely playing to every "goal", but at any given moment I was focused on a particular one. I think that does happen in some games, that people play one way for a while and then change to another as new stimuli enter the picture, and if you're having trouble figuring out what it is you're after, it may be that initially you're after trying to figure out what the game offers so you can target that.

--M. J. Young

[Caldis]

I can understand recognizing "finding out what it would be like" et cetera as being simulationist. The problem I have with "immersion" as a replacement name is that I think it leads to something that can only be seen as "pawn stance immersion", which if not inherently contradictory is at least counterintuitive. People do play "to see what it's like" without any character identification at all, strictly as observers.

Yeah that's the problem with all language used so far to identify sim, it doesnt really fit without implying or overlaping into something else.  I see problems with learning or discovery, you see problems with immersion, everyone sees problems with sim.  Maybe we should just call it the nameless problem child of creative agenda.

[Ron Edwards]

Dammit,

Have I been stuttering lately? From Narratism: not a Creative Agenda ...:

Simulationist play is defined by confirming one's input, via the output.

You're a Star Trek fan? OK, then, let's play Star Trek. Whatever the agreed-upon important input is, its effect during play is supposed to get us Star Trek.

That input might be the funny-physics of the show. Fine - we work out what those are (or read them in the sourcebook, whatever) and put them into action via System.

Or that input might be the distinctive character interactions or political tropes of the show. Fine - we dedicate ourselves to depicting and reinforcing those issues through what our characters do, which is also System.

Or ... and so on. Whatever angle you choose as the motor for input, i.e. processing through System, the output should confirm that this is, indeed, Star Trek. To play in this fashion is a celebration of Star Trek.

It is absolutely irrelevant to the general concept of Simulationism whether a story is produced or not. It is, however, very important in terms of an applied instance of Simulationism whether a story is taken as one of our going-in constraints.

For instance, one group might be more interested in "being kitty-people fighting with ray-guns" than in "doing Star Trek." Their play-experience and attention to "doing the story right" will be very different from that of the Star Trek fans. However, the guiding aesthetic is the same: agreed-upon input, processing, confirmatory output.

Narrativist play, like Gamist play, is not confirmatory of anything that "goes in." In Gamist play, play itself determines who wins or does best in terms of personal strategy and guts. Similarly, Narrativist play is that in which only play itself determines how Premise is transformed into Theme.

To clarify about Narrativist play, think in terms of any story created by any person or group in some familiar medium like movies or novels. It is absolutely irrefutable that at some point in time, there was no story of this particular sort (medium, presentation, details, etc). But at some point in the creative process, a story did indeed appear.

Whatever happens at that transition is what happens during Narrativist play. It cannot be agreed-upon beforehand, nor can it be imposed by a single person in an "ah-ha" sense upon the others during the process.

That's it, people. That's what Simulationist play is.

You want a distinctive statement of Agenda? There you go. Can it be compatible with a Gamist or Narrativist one, as a first priority? No it can't. Can it be realized through vast array of what gets Explored first or later, what gets Explored mildly or intensely? Yes it can. Is it compatible with my first attempts to articulate it in the Simulationist essay? Yes it is.

I am so sick of all this babble about "discovery" or "what if." All of that has brought us precisely nowhere. This post marks my explicit statement that people should simply drop those terms, even if they are personal favorites, as useful for purposes of discourse. They are perfectly fine as "say it yourselves," apparently, but in a group-discussion context, they're poison.

Best,
Ron