Caring How it Resolves?

[lumpley]

Nathan, I don't think that's why Instances of Play are so long.  They're long because it takes time to fulfill (or conclusively fail to fulfill) a Creative Agenda.  It takes many, many character actions to address a Premise.

Here's from the glossary:

Instance of Play
Sufficient time spent on role-playing necessary to identify all features of System in operation. According to the Big Model, once these features are identified and evaluated in terms of a given group's Social Contract, then Creative Agenda (or its absence) may also be identified. In practice, an Instance of play is rarely shorter than a full session, and may be much longer.

Does "identify all features of System in operation" imply "identify places where in-game causality and thematic meaning are incompatible"?  I don't think so, but then I guess I wouldn't.

Here's from GNS and Other Matters:

In the course of Narrativist or Gamist play, moments of attention to plausibility that contribute to the main goal are not Simulationism. The primary and not to be compromised goal is what it is for a given instance of play. The actual time or activity of an "instance" is necessarily left ambiguous.

Taken together, I think Ron's saying what I'm saying: it's not that most of the time you can't tell the difference between a "Narrativist decision" and a "Simulationist decision"; instead, there's no such thing as a "Narrativist decision" or a "Simulationist decision."  Narrativist and Simulationist apply to many, many decisions taken as a whole - an Instance of Play - not taken as a pie chart.

Your individual decisions have to be fully causal, because otherwise your fellow players tell you to stop screwing around and play your character, play the world.  Your CA depends on what those decisions amount to.

-Vincent

[Paganini]

Does "identify all features of System in operation" imply "identify places where in-game causality and thematic meaning are incompatible"?  I don't think so, but then I guess I wouldn't.

I think it does mean identifying places where in-game causality and thematic meaning are incompatible. But, I also think it means more than that, because an Instance of Play isn't just for identifying the Nar / Sim split, but also for identifying all the other relationships between Creative Agendas.

Taken together, I think Ron's saying what I'm saying: it's not that most of the time you can't tell the difference between a "Narrativist decision" and a "Simulationist decision"; instead, there's no such thing as a "Narrativist decision" or a "Simulationist decision."  Narrativist and Simulationist apply to many, many decisions taken as a whole - an Instance of Play - not taken as a pie chart.

I agree with this; this is just another way of saying that all three modes are always on - you can't see which one the player prioritizes unless they conflict.

I don't see that this is a problem with my description of Nar and Sim in play. My points aren't really concerned with all the times that the CAs exist in harmony; they're concerned with the times when there's conflict. It seems to me that you're saying that Nar and Sim will never conflict in the context of Character. I'm saying that, yeah, maybe they get along fine most of the time, but there will be times when they don't.

When they don't, an external observer can't tell which mode the player is prioritizing, because the player's actions support both CA's equally well. It doesn't *appear* that the player is really prioritizing anything.

I believe there was a thread a while ago where the idea was put forth that most people aren't actually concsiously aware of what they're prioritizing during most of play. You could even say that the player can't prioritize a CA *until* there's some kind of CA conflict. He just does what seems cool.

But I believe that those conflicts *will* happen eventually, contrary to your original post. There will at some point be a situation where you might want to address premise in a certain way, when doing so would contradict previously established parameters about "what your character would do."

[lumpley]

Nathan,

There will at some point be a situation where you might want to address premise in a certain way, when doing so would contradict previously established parameters about "what your character would do."

How can that be, if addressing Premise means playing a moral conflict out to its conclusion?  Egri's very clear about this: if you have your character do something implausible, you've ruined your conflict and thus your Premise.  This matches my experience.

When they [a player's CAs] don't [conflict], an external observer can't tell which mode the player is prioritizing, because the player's actions support both CA's equally well. It doesn't *appear* that the player is really prioritizing anything.

But that's definitely not true, because we can look back over the Instance of Play from the end of it and say, "dang, girl.  You kicked that Premise's ass."

Playing Narrativist isn't visible only when you break causality.  It's visible whenever you successfully address Premise.

edit:

Premise (adapted from Egri)
A generalizable, problematic aspect of human interactions. Early in the process of creating or experiencing a story, a Premise is best understood as a proposition or perhaps an ideological challenge to the world represented by the protagonist's passions. Later in the process, resolving the conflicts of the story transforms Premise into a theme - a judgmental statement about how to act, behave, or believe. In role-playing, "protagonist" typically indicates a character mainly controlled by one person. A defining feature of Story Now.

emphasis mine

Addressing the Premise means resolving the conflicts.  Narrativism is visible when the conflicts resolve - does the resolution of the conflicts make a judgemental statement about how to be? - not when it's incompatible with Sim.

-Vincent

[C. Edwards]

Hey Vincent,

You have to set the pins up in order to knock them down. Narrativist play requires you to be addressing a Premise from the get go or else there isn't going to be any Nar relevant conflict to resolve. I think Narrativism is visible in the set-up as well as the resolution.

Implausibility and the breaking of causality tend to be very subjective. Take your The Fugitive example for instance. It didn't break causality for me. Jones' character seemed to be dealing with a conflict between strict adherence to duty and his personal feelings. He had already told Ford's character that he would shoot him in a previous scene. I think your example scene was just indicitive of the ongoing internal struggle of Jones' character.

I'm not saying that Nar play is going to jump out and slap you in the face during those set-up stages, it might or it might not. I'm also not saying that The Big Model says that you can see Nar play in the set-up stages. But from my own experience, and that of others, I say it's there and it's visible.

Let's not forget the author/audience split either, and the difference in perceptions between those two during play.

-Chris

*edit: to fix a stupid tyope

[lumpley]

Chris: Absolutely.  Setup is the promise, resolution is its fulfillment.  At setup you might be able to say, "ooh, I can't wait to take this Premise on." Then in the middle of an Instance you might be able to say, "if this keeps up, we're gonna rule this Premise."

(Breaking character is one of the things that can make "if this keeps up" turn out false.)

-Vincent

[Doctor Xero]

My character is chock full of problematic human issues, but I don't care how *any* of them turn out... I know that no matter what happens, the result will be entertaining. When I play my character, I'm constantly asking myself "what would this character do?" I have not yet asked myself "what should I do in order to make sure that this conflict turns out the way I want it to?"

Interesting: It sound like your saying sim is where the SIS decides what happens and nar is where you as a player decide

You *may* in fact go ahead and have the guy shoot his nephew. In that case, an outside observer won't be able to distinguish whether the player was in Nar mode or in Sim mode. But, in fact, in this case, he did not shoot his nephew because "it's his deal." He shot his nephew because of your meta-game desires. You wanted it to turn out that way.

Now wait a minute!

It seems that, by your definitions and interpretations, the primary difference between simulationist play and narrativist play is whether one focuses on believable characterization with sustained "belief" in the secondary world of the campaign (sim play) or on player doing what he or she wants regardless of believable characterization (nar play) -- is that what you intend to put across?

If narrativism means I alone am in control of the scenario, rather than playing out what happens as a result of interaction between my interpretation of my character, the setting, the NPCs, the in-game metaphysics (e.g. theme),

so that nothing happens except what I want to happen when I want it to happen, needing no justification beyond embodying the moral of the story I've already determined in response to a quandary and setting which have no function except to give me an excuse to show off the moral I've decided upon, nothing new to explore/discover/learn,

why am I wasting my time roleplaying narrativism with other human beings when I could put the same creative energy to more permanent and less exhibitionist use at home, by myself, in front of my computer writing a short story in which I have just as much control and no greater need for other people than I do in this interpretation of narrativist play?

I'm not certain I agree with your interpretation of nar play.

I hope I've misinterpretted you (or at least your emphasis), so feel free to correction me with clarification.

If this makes sense to anyone (a big if), then I think I see more clearly how people could believe that Nar doesn't value character integrity:  Nar players put in the same amount of work, but they do it at different times.  A Sim player isn't going to even look at what happens after the event... if the decision isn't justified by what went before then it isn't justified for the Sim CA.

Interesting -- would you be willing to expand upon this apropos both this thread and the seemingly inevitable n-not-s tropes we keep falling into?

To my mind, sim play can certainly have very strong feelings associated with it, but the driving force is curiosity, what happens next, how does that work, why is he doing that, with no drive to make it necessarily "issue relevant" as long as the SiS is made broader and fuller.

Yes!  Still . . . Simulationist curiosity seems to be "oooh, what is that?" whereas Narrativist curiosity seems to be "whoa, what would I do then?" (I hope it isn't "whoa, what moral can I preach through the mutable SIS?"!), and Gamist curiosity seems to be, "hmmm, how might I surmount this difficulty and be the best?"

You have to set the pins up in order to knock them down. Narrativist play requires you to be addressing a Premise from the get go or else there isn't going to be any Nar relevant conflict to resolve. I think Narrativism is visible in the set-up as well as the resolution.

True.  However, I've seen many a Sim game which also has built into it the challenge from the start.  While World of Darkness's Vampire became a Gamist war game, it started out with possibilities for Narrativist questioning of how to deal with a hunger which borders on rape/murder as well as Simulationist exploration of what it would be like to a member of a vampire species as envisioned in the Anne Rice novels.

Doctor Xero

[Paganini]

There will at some point be a situation where you might want to address premise in a certain way, when doing so would contradict previously established parameters about "what your character would do."

How can that be, if addressing Premise means playing a moral conflict out to its conclusion?  Egri's very clear about this: if you have your character do something implausible, you've ruined your conflict and thus your Premise.  This matches my experience.

Because, the resolution that the player wants may not always be the one that game causality demands. Maybe it's true that you, Vincent, never have a conflict between what you want to happen, and what makes sense. That's cool. But there have been times when I think "boy, it would be cool if *this* happens, but it doesn't make sense with what we already know." But then I go ahead and have whatever it was happen anyway.

The other night in Mike's HQ game I came to an internal decision point about whether my character (a shamanic priestess type) would abandon her clan and everything she's been working for to go off with this guy she has a crush on. It's been established through the system that her crush on this guy is stronger than her desire to save her clan, stronger than her desire for power, stronger than her hatred for another NPC who she might be able to whack if she stays around (seeing as how my character just summoned up some kind of super toad demon from the river). I played it causally. I had her ask the guy to take her with him.

I *could* have not done that though. I, the player, could have decided that it would be cooler if she stayed behind and stuck out the coming disaster with her clan. I could have decided that her desire for revenge won out. I could have decided that her crush on a *different* guy made her stay behind. If I had done that, then I would have been going against previously established parameters (her crush on Marek is more powerful than anything else) to get the result that I wanted as a player. HQ is especially designed to allow and encourage these sorts of decisions. But I didn't use my freedome to depart from causality, because through the whole game I've been playing like this, and it's very entertaining to see what sort of consequences come out of "what my totally screwed-up character would do."

When they [a player's CAs] don't [conflict], an external observer can't tell which mode the player is prioritizing, because the player's actions support both CA's equally well. It doesn't *appear* that the player is really prioritizing anything.

But that's definitely not true, because we can look back over the Instance of Play from the end of it and say, "dang, girl.  You kicked that Premise's ass."

Playing Narrativist isn't visible only when you break causality.  It's visible whenever you successfully address Premise.

I must respond with a "how can that be?" of my own. The whole point of the "story" section of the Nar essay was that you can't identify Nar play by looking at a transcript. Your game can address premise without you using the Narrativist CA at all. "Address premise" just means "to imagine in such a way that a problematic human issue is resolved." That can happen with *any* of the three Creative Agendas.

It might be true that the Premise was totally kicked... but your girl could have done so without ever once thinking "how do I want this to turn out?" She could have spent the whole time thinking "what would my character do next?" This is *exactly* describes the way I played in Mike's HQ game. It's not Narrativist.

After the end of a game session, if Premise was Addressed, well, Premise was Addressed. That doesn't mean you were playing Nar. The result is not the important thing; it's what the real people were doing to *get* the result.

[C. Edwards]

Hey Doc,

True. However, I've seen many a Sim game which also has built into it the challenge from the start. While World of Darkness's Vampire became a Gamist war game, it started out with possibilities for Narrativist questioning of how to deal with a hunger which borders on rape/murder as well as Simulationist exploration of what it would be like to a member of a vampire species as envisioned in the Anne Rice novels.

I'm specifically talking about "what the players do during play". Whatever issues may be front-loaded, be they in the setting or on the character sheet or anyplace else, are completely seperate from the act of play. Doesn't matter how much "fuel" you have to find/build/whatever a Nar Premise if you don't do the right things with it during play.

-Chris

[Paganini]

Doc,

Your post is kind of hard to parse, so I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at. Your question about "why do we do it with other people" pretty much applies to all the Creative Agendas, though. I think it's a bit of a red herring. We don't need other people to imagine things; we can do it on our own. I would suggest that even the desires that produce Gamist behavior can be satisfied via solo books, computer games, and so on. (There are elements of Gamism that are inherently social, though, so I'm not entirely sure about this. It's not the main point, anyway.)

Why don't I just go write stories instead of play nar games with my freinds? Well, for me personally, writing stories is a lot of work. I like to pool my creativeness with that of my freinds. Plus, it's a fun time to hang around with them as we engage in an activity that we all enjoy. Sure, we could all hole up and write our own stories, and I suppose that would be fulfilling in its own way.

But also, you seem to be implying that the premise and theme are hardwired ahead of time. That's not how it is. The distinction I was making is that, in a Sim game, Premise may be addressed incidentally, through the maintainance of causality. In a Nar game, the players address Premise in the way that they want it to be addressed, even if causality falls by the way side.

[lumpley]

Nathan:  That's not what the "Story" section's about.  Read the "Story Now" section that immediately follows it.  Together, the two sections say that you can't tell whether it was Narrativism by looking at the transcript, you have to know who authored it.

Story Now requires that at least one engaging issue or problematic feature of human existence be addressed in the process of role-playing. "Address" means:

* Establishing the issue's Explorative expressions in the game-world, "fixing" them into imaginary place.

* Developing the issue as a source of continued conflict, perhaps changing any number of things about it, such as which side is being taken by a given character, or providing more depth to why the antagonistic side of the issue exists at all.

* Resolving the issue through the decisions of the players of the protagonists, as well as various features and constraints of the circumstances.

Can it really be that easy? Yes, Narrativism is that easy. The Now refers to the people, during actual play, focusing their imagination to create those emotional moments of decision-making and action, and paying attention to one another as they do it. To do that, they relate to "the story" very much as authors do for novels, as playwrights do for plays, and screenwriters do for film at the creative moment or moments.

"Resolving the issue through the decisions of the players of the protagonists, as well as various features and constraints of the circumstances" sure doesn't say "violating character integrity" to me.

It might be true that the Premise was totally kicked... but your girl could have done so without ever once thinking "how do I want this to turn out?" She could have spent the whole time thinking "what would my character do next?" This is *exactly* describes the way I played in Mike's HQ game. It's not Narrativist.

Are you, um, sure?

edit: From the "Shit! I'm Playing Narrativist" section in the Sim essay:

Therefore, when you-as-player get proactive about an emotional thematic issue, poof, you're out of Sim. Whereas enjoying the in-game system activity of a thematic issue is perfectly do-able in Sim, without that proactivity being necessary.

Deciding to follow through on your character's crush wasn't proactive?  Wasn't an emotional thematic issue?  The System made you do it?

-Vincent

[Matt Snyder]

It might be true that the Premise was totally kicked... but your girl could have done so without ever once thinking "how do I want this to turn out?" She could have spent the whole time thinking "what would my character do next?" This is *exactly* describes the way I played in Mike's HQ game. It's not Narrativist.

Narrativism does not require you to think "how do I want this to turn out." It may involve you, the player, thinking "what would my character do next" and still be Narrativism. This is Vincent's entire point in his recent rant, I believe. Do you agree?

After the end of a game session, if Premise was Addressed, well, Premise was Addressed. That doesn't mean you were playing Nar.

Um, it doesn't? You've totally lost me here. I believe that is the definition of Narrativism. It's like saying "After a game, if people Stepped on Up, well that's what they did. It doesn't mean it was Gamism." Say what?!?

Or do you mean that, yeah, players addressed premise, but they did other stuff more so, hence it wasn't Narrativism, but likely some other mode?

[Doctor Xero]

Hey Doc,

True. However, I've seen many a Sim game which also has built into it the challenge from the start. While World of Darkness's Vampire became a Gamist war game, it started out with possibilities for Narrativist questioning of how to deal with a hunger which borders on rape/murder as well as Simulationist exploration of what it would be like to a member of a vampire species as envisioned in the Anne Rice novels.

I'm specifically talking about "what the players do during play". Whatever issues may be front-loaded, be they in the setting or on the character sheet or anyplace else, are completely seperate from the act of play. Doesn't matter how much "fuel" you have to find/build/whatever a Nar Premise if you don't do the right things with it during play.

-Chris

I suspect that many a campaign begins with such opportunities which allow the players through their characters to decide what to focus on.

Some gaming groups will happily confront issues about slavery (probably but not necessarily a Nar response).

Some gaming groups will ignore such issues or wait to see whether confronting such issues fits the genre and mood they want (probably but not necessarily a Sim response).

Some gaming groups will look at such issues almost exclusively in terms of resources and tools for their competition with each other, with the game master, and/or with the system (probably but not necessarily a Gam response).

Doctor Xero

[Doctor Xero]

Your question about "why do we do it with other people" pretty much applies to all the Creative Agendas, though. I think it's a bit of a red herring.

Not true.

In Simulationist play, I need other players with whom to interact most of the time, for the same reasons that there are very few improvisational monologue troupes.

In a Nar game, the players address Premise in the way that they want it to be addressed, even if causality falls by the way side.

If my focus is on acting out exploring and interacting with what I encounter, well, I can't encounter anything I don't already know without other players (including game master), and neither books nor films nor computer game "intelligences" do much of a job of interaction.

However, if my focus is on acting out only what I already know and if I have already decided exactly what I will encounter and exactly how things will turn out, and if I have already decided exactly how all my interactions will go, well, what do I need the other players for?  In fact, they shouldn't be there at all since their presence means they might somehow disrupt my absolute control over everything my player character persona encounters and over every consequence or happening or interaction experienced by my player character persona.

Now, personally, I don't think that fits Narrativist play, but it does fit narrativism as you have described it.

Personally, I prefer the examples of G, N, and S presented in http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=11694

Doctor Xero

[Paganini]

"Resolving the issue through the decisions of the players of the protagonists, as well as various features and constraints of the circumstances" sure doesn't say "violating character integrity" to me.

I'm a little confused by this. I'm not saying that in order to get Narrativism you *always* have to violate character integrity, which is what it sounds like you're arguing against.

It might be true that the Premise was totally kicked... but your girl could have done so without ever once thinking "how do I want this to turn out?" She could have spent the whole time thinking "what would my character do next?" This is *exactly* describes the way I played in Mike's HQ game. It's not Narrativist.

Are you, um, sure?

Well, yeah, pretty sure. :)

edit: From the "Shit! I'm Playing Narrativist" section in the Sim essay:

Therefore, when you-as-player get proactive about an emotional thematic issue, poof, you're out of Sim. Whereas enjoying the in-game system activity of a thematic issue is perfectly do-able in Sim, without that proactivity being necessary.

Deciding to follow through on your character's crush wasn't proactive?  Wasn't an emotional thematic issue?  The System made you do it?

We're reading the same sections of the material, and getting opposite ideas. Fun! See, I was just going to point to this exact same stuff. To me, "getting proactive about an emotional thematic issue" means exactly what I described earlier. Rather than just sit back and see what happens, you take an active hand making it come out the way you want it to come out.

Narrativism does not require you to think "how do I want this to turn out." It may involve you, the player, thinking "what would my character do next" and still be Narrativism. This is Vincent's entire point in his recent rant, I believe. Do you agree?

No, absolutely not. That was the whole point of this thread. :)

After the end of a game session, if Premise was Addressed, well, Premise was Addressed. That doesn't mean you were playing Nar.

Um, it doesn't? You've totally lost me here. I believe that is the definition of Narrativism. It's like saying "After a game, if people Stepped on Up, well that's what they did. It doesn't mean it was Gamism." Say what?!?

Sloppy terminology on my part. The definition of Story from the Nar essay is basically is basically that of "a sequence of events in which a problematic human issue (Premise) is set up and resolved."

All role-playing necessarily produces a sequence of imaginary events. Go ahead and role-play, and write down what happened to the characters, where they went, and what they did. I'll call that event-summary the "transcript." But some transcripts have, as Pooh might put it, a "little something," specifically a theme: a judgmental point, perceivable as a certain charge they generate for the listener or reader. If a transcript has one (or rather, if it does that), I'll call it a story.

That "little something," that "theme," "judgemental point," etc. is Premise and its resolution. Any of the three Creative Agendas can contain Premise and resolution. For there to be Narrativism, the players must be Addressing the premise. "To Address the premise" means that the players are personally involved in setting up and resolving the conflict situation. They don't just sit back and let things unfold. They have an agenda that they try to fulfill.

All I'm saying is, sometimes to get what you want in terms of premise and theme, you have to contradict some pre-established parameter of the SiS. Sometimes, that that parameter is something to do with your character.

Edit to add: Back to the HQ game example, my agenda is not to set up a particular conflict, or resolve it in a certain way. My agenda is to have my character "do what she would do." That's almost word for word one of Ron's descriptions of Sim.

[Paganini]

Well, Doc, what I said wastrue, but it doesn't really have anything to do with this thread. Plus, since your response is a blanket denial, and you ignored my request for clarification, I guess I'm not much interested in discussing it with you. See you around.