Water-Uphill-World: Virtuality Examined

[John Kim]

OK, at Vincent (aka lumpley's) request, I am splitting off from http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=11822">"Sacrificing Character Integrity" - a Rant.  In it, Vincent (aka lumpley) and Matt had some questions about my Water-Uphill-World campaign and how it worked.  First of all, some references:
http://www.darkshire.net/~jhkim/rpg/wateruphill/">Campaign Web Page
http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=5113">Confused over Simulationism + example campaign
http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=11662">Virtuality and Ouija Boards

The second thread has a fairly extended description of the game.  But what came up was more on the question of moral issues.  

That there are "many moral questions" similarly says nothing much at all. There may be many moral questions raised in, say, Gamist play, but the players don't particularly care, and they certainly aren't focusing on those. What was going on there? Were people addressing those questions? If so, Narrativism. If not, Something Else. Was it just the GM (presumably you) "addressing" those questions? If the players did address them, and addressed many of them (if, in fact, these were distinct and separate Premises), then maybe you had, um, messy Narrativism going on, but it's still Narrativism. Narrativism play doesn't mean "good" or "focused" or "better" play necessarily, of course.

Well, that's a good question.  Was Noriko's taking on responsibility addressing a capital-P Premise, or was it just play with a moral issue?  So, all of the players were interested and focused on the moral issues here, in my opinion.  The players did not consciously consider these as moral issues to address as players, but I think an important part of its appeal were the open-ended dilemma that the PCs faced.  

I would be fine with calling it "messy Narrativism".  

As far as story structure goes, I have a hard time seeing where fit characters escalating a moral conflict into crisis and resolution would fail to produce a reasonably good story structure.  I think you're asking this: "but what if they just meander around and bobble and hit-or-miss the Premise, but still address it?"  The answer is, choose one or the other.

John: Well, there it is.  Did you meander around and bobble and hit-or-miss the Premise, or did you address it?

What would you say were the main take-home messages of your Water Uphill game?

With Matt, who would you say contributed those take-home messages to the game?

Answer in Actual Play, I'll be there.  

You ask whether the hit-or-missed "the Premise" -- but of course there wasn't any such thing.  There was no single central issue which all of play addressed.  There was just instead a bunch of different issues.  We would consistently hit issues with every session, but it wouldn't be the same from time to time -- and thus wouldn't form a clear take-home message.  Rather, I would say there were a jumble of mixed messages.  For example, Martin lied a lot, often for no clear reason, which Noriko was disturbed by.  They argued about it a number of times, but never came to a resolution.  In retrospect, I find this interesting given that Noriko gave up talking to her friends in order to protect them -- whereas Martin was just doing things for the heck of it.  

To the extent that there were clear messages, though, they were certainly generated by the players.  The removal of normal responsibility (i.e. being in an alien world with no parents, school, etc.) freed some of the PCs, while others (mainly Noriko) compensated by taking responsibility for the group.

I guess the question from the prior thread is over what this was in GNS terms ("messy Narrativism?").  A related question was whether this was promoted by the cause-and-effect approach.  I was using pretty loose homebrew mechanics.

[lumpley]

John, I'm with you so far.  Here's my next question:

Addressing a Premise means that you have characters locked into a conflict across the Premise's moral line, and you play that conflict through to its conclusion: it escalates to crisis and resolution.

So those moral issues present in your game: did you play any of those conflicts through to their conclusions?  Martin's lying and Noriko's disturbedness at it, for instance: what came of that?

-Vincent

[Ben Lehman]

It seems to me that this is front-loaded Narrativism with a concentration on a "Virtual World" technical agenda (note -- Vincent, I'm adopting your term of "technical agenda"  Cool?)  I.E.  -- the basic situation is set up such that the game itself must be interesting, in a narrativist sense.  Essentially, if you throw a bunch of people into a new world, rife with conflict, you will get a positive narrativist style experience out of it.

I play this way *all the time*, and I would go as far as to say that it is the most common form of narrativism.  Further, I think it trips up a lot of self-defined "simulationist" players.  To get past this, I think it is best not to think of GNS as "tribes" where you belong to one, but rather as "different ways to have fun" which everyone likes doing.

There are a metric ton of old threads on this, but I am in no state to look them up right now.

yrs--
--Ben

[John Kim]

John, I'm with you so far.  Here's my next question:

Addressing a Premise means that you have characters locked into a conflict across the Premise's moral line, and you play that conflict through to its conclusion: it escalates to crisis and resolution.

So those moral issues present in your game: did you play any of those conflicts through to their conclusions?  Martin's lying and Noriko's disturbedness at it, for instance: what came of that?

Well, I object to the phrasing here because you imply that it is right and natural for things to come to dramatic conclusion, and that I am holding back if things don't neatly resolve.  

But the simple answer is no.  This was exactly my point in the http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=11662">Virtuality and Ouija Boards thread.  Virtuality, in my opinion, results in a lack of dramatic structure.  So the conflicts changed, but they rarely came to neatly-structured climax, resolution, and catharsis.  For example, with Noriko and Martin, that eventually resulted in Noriko accepting a magical voice of influence power in order to protect her friends -- because she felt they were in danger.  But the result of that was that she stopped talking to them.  The magic power was always on, so if she talked to her friends she would be mind controlling them.  The result was that she stopped talking to them -- and only talked to other people on their behalf.  But this meant that distance actually grew between Noriko and Martin and they never resolved (or could resolve) their differences.  Meanwhile, Martin fell in love with a girl he didn't know and was drifting away from the others.

[lumpley]

John, forget about "neat" and "structured."  That's not what I'm asking.  Also "resolving the conflict" doesn't mean "...and everyone's happy."

What was the relationship between this:

The result was that she stopped talking to them...

and this?

Martin fell in love with a girl he didn't know and was drifting away from the others...

Was this:

But this meant that distance actually grew between Noriko and Martin and they never resolved (or could resolve) their differences.

the end of the conflict?  Or was it just sort of some random thing?  Did it make the players sad or what?

-Vincent

[John Kim]

John, forget about "neat" and "structured."  That's not what I'm asking.  Also "resolving the conflict" doesn't mean "...and everyone's happy."

I'm not talking about "and everyone's happy" either.  I'm talking about structure.  In real life and in Virtuality, conflicts do not generally resolve and disappear.  They do not have distinct start and stop.  Instead, they  change, they simmer, they shift, they ebb and flow.  

What was the relationship between this:

The result was that she stopped talking to them...

and this?

Martin fell in love with a girl he didn't know and was drifting away from the others...

I could analyze for a bit, but I don't see a direct connection.  I think that Noriko absenting herself from discussion distanced everyone a bit from each other.  So that might have contributed to Martin's behavior, but only pretty indirectly.  

Was this:

But this meant that distance actually grew between Noriko and Martin and they never resolved (or could resolve) their differences.

the end of the conflict?  Or was it just sort of some random thing?  Did it make the players sad or what?

No, it wasn't the end of the conflict.  Noriko was still staying with the rest of them all the time, but she wasn't speaking to them because she couldn't without magically influencing them.  But although she wasn't saying anything, she still had feelings and disagreed with various things which were going on.  I'm certain that Noriko's player (Josh) frequently felt conflicted and sad that she had sacrificed her friendship with the others for their safety, and perhaps resentful on some level that they weren't more grateful.

[lumpley]

Forget.  About.  Structure.  Structure is not the key.

I think that Noriko absenting herself from discussion distanced everyone a bit from each other. So that might have contributed to Martin's behavior, but only pretty indirectly.

You're the one whose standards this game has to meet, so you tell me: is "pretty indirectly" good enough?  Would you say that Noriko distancing herself stepped up or applied pressure to the conflict about Martin's lying?  Did it show what was at stake in the conflict?  Did it put pressure on other people to align themselves with one side or the other, even subtly?

What about the opposite: did Martin's lying put pressure on Noriko's decision to distance herself?  Did it make it (for instance) harder for Noriko to stay with them, though they needed her?

I'm certain that Noriko's player (Josh) frequently felt conflicted and sad that she had sacrificed her friendship with the others for their safety, and perhaps resentful on some level that they weren't more grateful.

Awesome.

Josh had his character prioritize her friends' safety over their friendship.  This decision and its fallout engaged Josh emotionally.

If the game had continued, would it have been harder and harder for Noriko to stay with her friends?  Would Josh have had to make that decision anew and anew, each time a little bit harder?  Would Josh eventually have had to decide between "fuck it, they're on they're own" and "fuck it, I'll be here for them even now"?

-Vincent

[John Kim]

Forget.  About.  Structure.  Structure is not the key.

You know, Vincent, this is really annoyingly patronizing.  Putting periods between your words doesn't suddenly make me more convinced of your opinion.  Just to be sure, let me try...     Structure.  Is.  Important.  Structure is the key.  Are you convinced now?  No.  Alright, let's both drop the mind-control attempts and instead discuss.  

I do think structure is important, because structure is vital to how stories are constructed in static media (i.e. books, movies, etc.).  If you do not pay attention to dramatic structure, then the result will not be like most stories.  The conflicts will not resolve and disappear, nor will they steadily and linearly escalate.  

I think that Noriko absenting herself from discussion distanced everyone a bit from each other. So that might have contributed to Martin's behavior, but only pretty indirectly.

You're the one whose standards this game has to meet, so you tell me: is "pretty indirectly" good enough?  Would you say that Noriko distancing herself stepped up or applied pressure to the conflict about Martin's lying?  Did it show what was at stake in the conflict?  Did it put pressure on other people to align themselves with one side or the other, even subtly?

What about the opposite: did Martin's lying put pressure on Noriko's decision to distance herself?  Did it make it (for instance) harder for Noriko to stay with them, though they needed her?

Good enough for what?  That question makes no sense to me.  I wasn't judging the game based on how strong the connection was between these two elements.  That wasn't part of my standards.  Now, it did certainly change things.  Once Noriko had taken on the power, she took over most of the talking for the group -- rather naturally since her voice now had magical influence.  So that specific conflict didn't come up again.  But there were certainly related issues of maturity and responsibility which did.  

I'm certain that Noriko's player (Josh) frequently felt conflicted and sad that she had sacrificed her friendship with the others for their safety, and perhaps resentful on some level that they weren't more grateful.

Awesome.

Josh had his character prioritize her friends' safety over their friendship.  This decision and its fallout engaged Josh emotionally.

If the game had continued, would it have been harder and harder for Noriko to stay with her friends?  Would Josh have had to make that decision anew and anew, each time a little bit harder?  Would Josh eventually have had to decide between "fuck it, they're on they're own" and "fuck it, I'll be here for them even now"?

Not at all.  I mean, she's trapped in an alien world.  Where would she go?  It was painful for her to be with her friends but not talk to them, but there was no doubt that she would stay (at least over the course of the campaign).  On the other hand, I suspect she did have at least a slight tempation to talk to them -- which would inherently mean that she was magically influencing them.  She never gave into it, but I could feel it there.  (And as GM I was a little worried about what that might do to inter-player dynamics.)

[lumpley]

Hey John.

I recognize that structure is vital to story in static media.  I'm saying that it's not vital to Narrativist play.  You don't play Narrativist by attending to dramatic structure while you're playing.  Rather, dramatic structure arises from playing Narrativist, insofar as it does so, because of what you do attend to: fit character, moral conflict, escalate.

I'm sorry for patronizing you.  I'll try to knock it off.

On the other hand, I suspect she did have at least a slight tempation to talk to them -- which would inherently mean that she was magically influencing them. She never gave into it, but I could feel it there. (And as GM I was a little worried about what that might do to inter-player dynamics.)

Ah!  I see.  

1) What was the relationship between that temptation and her feelings of responsibility for the group?  (Her feelings of responsibility predated her power, yes?)  For instance, did her temptation to magically influence them, like, follow from or spring from the same source as her feelings of responsibility?  Did getting the power make her more responsible for them?  

2) Did the temptation to use the power on them grow over the course of the game?  Like I asked about the wrong conflict, would Josh eventually have had to decide between "fuck it, I'm able to make the decision for them, I'm going to" and "fuck it, it's their decision even now"? Was the intensity of the temptation constant, inconstant, or growing?

3) If Josh had given into her temptation and it had caused inter-player problems, did you have any sort of plan or response or S.O.P. for dealing with it?  And, did you communicate your worry to Josh in any way - I'm thinking of a warning look or an "are you ... sure?"  I ask this last because knowing that you were worried about it might have constrained his decisions.

I'll spill: when I talk about conflict escalating to crisis and resolution, you seem to me to think that I'm talking about a formal structure.  You seem to hear a metronome marking the beats: "...and ESCALATE and ESCALATE and READY? and CRISIS."  Which you, naturally, reject; so do I.  What I'm trying to say with my questions is: quite the contrary, it's possible and common for conflict to escalate to crisis very subtly, very naturalistically - as you say, changing, shifting, ebbing and flowing - but with a direction and a turning point overall.

When you say things like this:

Once Noriko had taken on the power, she took over most of the talking for the group -- rather naturally since her voice now had magical influence. So that specific conflict didn't come up again. But there were certainly related issues of maturity and responsibility which did.

my emphasis
It makes me suspect that there was a subtle, natural direction - an escalation toward crisis (but with no metronome) - in your game.  That's what I'm pursuing and trying to get at.

-Vincent

[John Kim]

I'll spill: when I talk about conflict escalating to crisis and resolution, you seem to me to think that I'm talking about a formal structure.  You seem to hear a metronome marking the beats: "...and ESCALATE and ESCALATE and READY? and CRISIS."  Which you, naturally, reject; so do I.  What I'm trying to say with my questions is: quite the contrary, it's possible and common for conflict to escalate to crisis very subtly, very naturalistically - as you say, changing, shifting, ebbing and flowing - but with a direction and a turning point overall.

While I'm happy to talk about the game more at length, I want to address the overall concern first.  Water-Uphill-World was, as I said, very meandering and unstructured.  It never had particularly rising conflict and in general was low on tension.  Plots and conflicts would be dropped to be replaced by new ones.  In short, it lacked escalation and was not very story-like.  

However, this does not mean that moral issues were absent or irrelevant.  Indeed, I think that the moral issues were very important to the game, certainly for me.  (Now, I should really talk about magic in the game at some point -- but I don't want to sidetrack the talk about Virtuality and Narrativism.)  

I am not unfamiliar with or opposed to structure, however.  In my Vinland game, there was some of that meandering in the larger picture -- but there were definite beats and crises to it.  Many plotlines would branch out and be going simultaneously, and then all come together in a sudden shock -- like when Thorfinn was revealed to be a woman (Thorfinn's sister) in disguise.  As another example, I eventually tied up the campaign in the death of the patriarch of the house where all the trouble started.  Overall, I enjoyed Vinland much more -- it has been my favorite campaign.  But Water-Uphill-World was different and valuable to me for that difference.  I see it as experimental in many ways, but a valuable experiment.  

I recognize that structure is vital to story in static media.  I'm saying that it's not vital to Narrativist play.  You don't play Narrativist by attending to dramatic structure while you're playing.  Rather, dramatic structure arises from playing Narrativist, insofar as it does so, because of what you do attend to: fit character, moral conflict, escalate.  

Well, I would say you're just replacing "attend dramatic structure" with "make a character fit for structure" and "escalate".  To me, those are the same thing.  The key point here is that Narrativism is not just attending to moral conflict.  

By story standards, the Water-Uphill-World characters were not very fit.  The players designed them knowing that they'd end up in a fantasy world, but with no idea what things would be like on the other side.  Two of them (Kate and Steve) were largely autobiographical -- i.e. they were versions of the player as a child that age.  In turn, I came up with the Water Uphill World situation and setting earlier with no idea of who the PCs would be.  The point was throw them together and see what happens.  

On the one hand, you could say that attending moral issues makes the game Narrativism.  By this criteria, Water-Uphill-World would be "messy Narrativism".  However, it wasn't very story-like.  So alternatively, you could say that it wasn't Narrativism -- as is shown by the lack of escalation.  In that case, though, you need to incorporate escalation (i.e. structure) into the definition of Narrativism.  

On the other hand, I suspect she did have at least a slight tempation to talk to them -- which would inherently mean that she was magically influencing them. She never gave into it, but I could feel it there. (And as GM I was a little worried about what that might do to inter-player dynamics.)

Ah!  I see.  

1) What was the relationship between that temptation and her feelings of responsibility for the group?  (Her feelings of responsibility predated her power, yes?)  For instance, did her temptation to magically influence them, like, follow from or spring from the same source as her feelings of responsibility?  Did getting the power make her more responsible for them?  

2) Did the temptation to use the power on them grow over the course of the game?  Like I asked about the wrong conflict, would Josh eventually have had to decide between "fuck it, I'm able to make the decision for them, I'm going to" and "fuck it, it's their decision even now"? Was the intensity of the temptation constant, inconstant, or growing?

3) If Josh had given into her temptation and it had caused inter-player problems, did you have any sort of plan or response or S.O.P. for dealing with it?  And, did you communicate your worry to Josh in any way - I'm thinking of a warning look or an "are you ... sure?"  I ask this last because knowing that you were worried about it might have constrained his decisions.

1) In my opinion, if she were to use it, it would most likely be to chastise them and keep them together for their own protection.  As one might expect from kids, trying to get them to spontaneously agree to something and go with it was like herding cats.  

2) In short, no.  There was no particular escalation.  Now, obviously, situations which would tempt her to use it would come and go.  So I suppose you could say that there was escalation and de-escalation -- but there wasn't a larger pattern to it.  

3) No, I had no plan.  I privately wondered to myself what I would do if it happened, but I didn't come up with any answers and so put it off.  I think I was pretty good about being completely open to any player actions in that game -- there was no such warning or whatever.  If anything, I was mildly curious what would happen.  On the other hand, it is perfectly obvious that mind-controlling other PCs has some issues which I'm sure that Josh was aware of.

[Marco]

John,

Would you say that there was a depth of emotional involvement in the players? Or would you say the interest was primarily intellectual?

(It seems to me you've said the former was certainly present--but I'm asking if you can try to compare the two--and if you can't, to compare the two in yourself).

I am thinking presently that as described the major operational difference between Nar and Sim deals with emotional vs intellectual investment.

As I said to Contra, since a story can have both (and the example would be the story that gets spycraft right or computer technology [/i]right[/i] and is still a great story on a human level) then this *does* make Sim merely an inferior form of Nar (less emotional investment or equal emotional investment but some form of restriction in place on acting on it--railroading).

You've been pretty clear that the Water-Up-Hill game wasn't "railroaded" from your POV.

But I have one more question along that line:

Did the players ever "try to do something they thought should've worked in the world" to discover that for reasons you'd built into situation/setting it didn't or turned out to be, in their view, a very bad idea (perhaps with unintended consequences)?

I believe that the definition of Force and Railroading is a gray area for some people when the GM is running a virtuality and doesn't change it to accomodate players or 'story' needs.

-Marco

[Caldis]

The question for me is were the theme's central to play?  Did most scenes keep coming back to what the game was about?  It's not important whether plots were resolved but were they directed towards a central theme?


From the sound of it a premise at least developed, something along the lines of children existing without parents can they accept the responsiblities of an adult world.  You've set that up and are allowing the players to react to it and answer the question however they want, the only question is whether it became the focus of play or whether wandering around exploring the strange world they live in took precedence with those concerns becoming secondary.  Some of the things you've mentioned seem like issues that fall under the banner of the larger premise, one character lieing and another taking issue with it.  Were all the issues that came up subservient to that bigger question of children and responsibility?

[John Kim]

Would you say that there was a depth of emotional involvement in the players? Or would you say the interest was primarily intellectual?

(It seems to me you've said the former was certainly present--but I'm asking if you can try to compare the two--and if you can't, to compare the two in yourself).

I am thinking presently that as described the major operational difference between Nar and Sim deals with emotional vs intellectual investment.

It's a good question, but I have to give the middling answer that it's fairly evenly mixed.  That's what Liz said.  Maybe Josh tended more towards emotional involvement, while Russell tended more towards intellectual -- but mostly it's somewhere in between.  On the other hand, in your distinction this would make the campaign a "hybrid" which also sounds like a perfectly valid classification.  

I'd be a little wary of thinking along the lines of what the GNS Nar/Sim divide "really" is.  Different people have different conception of what Nar/Sim means, and I think it is destructive to try to work out which one is the "right" difference is and dismiss the others.  For example, the emotional/intellectual split is a good one, and is important regardless of whether it is what GNS Nar/Sim "really" is.  

Did the players ever "try to do something they thought should've worked in the world" to discover that for reasons you'd built into situation/setting it didn't or turned out to be, in their view, a very bad idea (perhaps with unintended consequences)?

Well, yeah.  This was a weak point in the magic system.  So the players explored magic up to a point, but I had only worked out a limited portion of it.  So (for example) Kate was trying to do stuff with the Knowledge path, but it never really worked out.  On the other hand, I was pretty up-front that this was my fault (i.e. it really should have worked but I hadn't worked out what it should do).  I don't think that ever came up with other stuff, but that's in part because the players weren't very sure about what would work in the physical/social world.

[lumpley]

John:  I accept at long, long last that you weren't playing Narrativist.  What's the next step, establishing that the reason it was non-Narrativist play was its virtuality?

In order to do that, we'll have to establish that the reason wasn't a) the details of the setup, or b) incoherence.  Either of those could create non-Narrativist play independently, virtuality or no.  That's how I see it, anyhow.  What do you think?

-Vincent

[John Kim]

John:  I accept at long, long last that you weren't playing Narrativist.  What's the next step, establishing that the reason it was non-Narrativist play was its virtuality?

In order to do that, we'll have to establish that the reason wasn't a) the details of the setup, or b) incoherence.

Well, how did you come to that decision, and what made you change your mind?  You seem sure that it isn't Narrativist now -- presumably based on my answers to your questions.  The point of this thread is to investigate the process of GNS distinction.  My impression is that you learned that there wasn't well-formed escalation of moral conflict in the game, and on the basis of this you conclude that it wasn't Narrativist.  

However, I would point out that escalation isn't a part of the current Narrativist definition.   By the current definitions, I would tend to call it (as Matt Snyder put it) "messy Narrativism".  However, I do think that dramatic structure is an important part of stories in other media -- and thus probably should be in the definition of Narrativism.  To me, dramatic structure is the big distinction between my Vinland game (for example) and Water-Uphill-World.