The meaning of Big-S "System"

[Vaxalon]

Here's a little story about a game group.  The lines are numbered for easy reference.  Please tell me which of these lines refer to an activity that is part of Big-S "System."

01] Alice posted a notice on the internet looking for players for a game she had written.  She listed some details about what her new game was like.
02] Bob, Charlie, and Donna expressed interest in playing it to Alice.
03] Alice, Bob, Charlie, and Donna discussed meeting times and places over AOL IM.
04] They agreed to meet at Donna's house on thursday nights, at 8pm.
05] Alice brought a notebook full of material she had written for the game.
06] Bob and Charlie brought snacks and drinks.
07] Donna had cleaned the house up and put her game table up in the living room.
08] All four exchanged pleasantries.
09] Alice commented on Donna's miniatures collection, and asked if it would be okay if the group used them in the game.  Donna agreed.
10] Alice handed out some character sheets.
11] Bob, Charlie, and Donna talked about what kind of characters they'd like to play.
12] Charlie didn't like Donna's first choice of character, and asked if she'd be willing to change it.  He thought her character was too much like his own.
13] Donna agreed to a compromise with Charlie.  
14] Donna and Charlie made changes to their characters in order to better differentiate them.
15] Alice told Bob that his character really didn't fit into the setting she had written.
16] Bob grumpily tossed it out and made a different character with some help from Alice.
17] Alice asked Bob, Charlie, and Donna for ideas on how their characters might know each other.
18] They all discussed this question, and came up with some possible answers.
19] Alice modified their ideas to fit her setting.
20] Alice put the three characters into a scene.
21] They played out the scene, which led to more scenes.
22] At eleven o'clock, Bob said he had to go, because he had to get up early in the morning.
23] The group finished the scene they were working on.
24] Alice said they'd pick up with the next scene next week.
25] Everyone said goodbye and left.

So what is BIG-S System and what is not?

[xiombarg]

You might want to check out another thread spawned by the same discussion and see if Pag's rant allows you to answer the question for yourself.

Going off of Pag's rant, System is about establishing Authority and Credibility. So, though that lens, the following are part of System, as least partially:

01] Alice establishes certain "details" as being Credible, and everyone agrees.
02] This is part of agreeing to the details Alice put forth.
09] They've established that miniatures will be used as part of determining the SiS, probably in terms of deciding where characters and monsters are, etc.
10] Alice is implicitly establishing certain mechanical details involved in deciding on Credibility regarding characters by handing out character sheets.
11-21] All of this is establishing Authority and Credibility, so is System. For example, there seems to be an implicit Social Contract that it's okay to give input into other people's characters, and that the GM can demand character changes.
23] This involves modifying the SiS, so System is involved at some level. To say it is, itself, System really depends on what's going on -- you're very vague here.

Part of the problem with your scheme here is the different numbers correspond to big lumps of time, some of which may or may not include System, but not for all of it. Also, arguably, you've left out details -- for example, for a LARP, cleaning the house could be part of System, because often in a LARP what is actually present in the play space is present in the SiS as well, so changing the room layout is part of System as it's establishing Credibility for things like "that book is over there" with the Authority being the physical space of the room designated as being part of the play space.

Though, rereading Pag's rant, perhaps it is arguable that ALL of the stuff you posted above is System -- tho I think that depends on a lot of details, which are left out.

[Vaxalon]

So, potentially, ANY activity COULD be part of System, depending on its impact on the flow of events within the game.

A die roll that doesn't have the (implicit or explicit) expectation of meaning before it hits the table is not part of System.

When a player says, "My character grabs the treasure!" and the GM says, "No, it's not your turn," that's clearly an aspect of System.

When a player says, "My character grabs the treasure!" and the GM says, "Your character is a Buddhist monk, are you sure he'd do that?" that's a different part of System.

When a player says, "My character grabs the treasure!" and another player says, "Dude, you're no fun to play with, I'm going home," that's ANOTHER part of system.

When a player buys a magic weapon for his Everquest character on E-bay, that's System too.

When a GM subconsciously allows his girlfriend's character to do things the rules say the character shouldn't be able to do, that's System.

Am I correct on these counts?

[Christopher Weeks]

I hope this ends up being a nicely explanatory thread.  Truthfully, I would have said 19-21 are System and that I'm not sure how 12-18 shake out.

Chris

[xiombarg]

So, potentially, ANY activity COULD be part of System, depending on its impact on the flow of events within the game.

Yeah, if I'm understanding it correctly (I hardly claim to be an expert on the matter), anything that impacts the SiS in actual play is System, because it's part of how you Get Things Done. And while it may seem radical, as Pag says, it's less radical than you think -- all it's really saying is System is what you use to do what you do, and how you decide who gets to do it and when. Who has Authority, and what is Credible. This is usually mediated by what you call system -- published game rules -- but this isn't always the case. Hence the riding animals metaphor from the other thread. Just because you're not used to riding a mule doesn't mean it's not a riding animal. Just because it's not a published ruleset doesn't mean it's not a System.

For example, consider this System, a common rule in freeform tabletop games, but one that is rarely explicitly stated:

The GM is final Authority on what happens. If you describe something as happening and he doesn't condradict you, it happens. What the GM describes as happening implicitly happens.

Actually, that rule is in a lot of Systems, but on its own -- and particularly as an unstated assumption, as it often is -- it's not a published ruleset but it's certainly System if it's used in actual play.

[Vaxalon]

Now let me put forward what we in the Mathematics business call "pathological cases"...

The GM has a character written up, who has the attribute 'strong-3'.  The character has been in play for some time, with that attribute, though the GM is the only one who knows the actual number.  The GM's girlfriend comes over one night, and carelessly destroys the sheet beyond recovery when she uses it to light her mother-of-pearl Meerschaum.  When the GM re-creates the character from his sex-addled memory, he assigns the NPC the attribute "strong-4'.  At the next game session, it goes into play that way, the players accept it, though they notice that the NPC seems to be whacking them harder with his cricket bat than he used to.

Clearly, the girlfriend's action has had an impact on the SIS... this character has gotten stronger.

Does that make her action part of the System?

[xiombarg]

In my personal opinion, no, since no actual play was going on at the time. But the GM's decision to quietly re-make the character, and the fact that the players accept his Authority to do so, is part of System.

[lumpley]

Anybody who says yes gets subjected to my "why 'Shared Imaginary Space' is fuckin' broken terminology" rant.

The girlfriend caused a change to one of the many things the group considers as it negotiates events in the game.  The NPC whacking a PC is an event in the game.  The group negotiates it and its outcome according to System, which may or may not include considering some numbers written on some paper, which may or may not be subject to change in a variety of ways, but anyway don't ever actually mean anything to the imaginary events of the game except through the players' active, moment-to-moment consideration.

-Vincent

[John Kim]

Clearly, the girlfriend's action has had an impact on the SIS... this character has gotten stronger.

Does that make her action part of the System?

It's a good question.  This really mirrors many discussions which I have seen over what "systemless" play is.  I think that the more common definition (i.e. small-s system) is that system is only formalized rules, and thus "systemless play" is possible.  I think it isn't yet clearly defined how broad Big-S System is.  

Now, everyone will admit that there are influences on what happens which go way beyond the formalized rules.  For example, Joe eats all of the potato chips and didn't bring a snack himself.  This makes me mad at Joe.  Even though I don't explicitly take that into account, my emotions are bound to have an affect on the in-game SIS.  We can roughly break influences up into three levels:

1] Explicit formal system (i.e. small-s system).
2] Implicit and/or informal agreements between the participants.  The combination of #1 and #2 is what we called "group contract" in rgfa.  
3] External influences which are not a part of consensus agreement.  

Obviously there are very fuzzy borders between these three.  But it helps to see the continuum, I think.

[Mike Holmes]

If we're going to clean this up, can we also address a common meaning for the term Rules?

Mike

[Vaxalon]

If we're going to clean this up, can we also address a common meaning for the term Rules?

Can that be a separate thread, please?

[Mike Holmes]

If we're going to clean this up, can we also address a common meaning for the term Rules?

Can that be a separate thread, please?

Yep. New thread here: http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?p=129728

Mike