Quick question on in game consequence

[Bill_White]

Bill: "There's a vase on the railing of the balcony."
Noon: "I push it off."
Bill: "Roll a d20."
Noon: "I rolled a 1. What happens to the vase?"

My system will tell me which of these is an appropriate response:

I forgot one, but Doug (Tetsuki) reminded me:

(5) NO INTERVENTION
Bill:  "What do you think happens to the vase?"
Noon:  "It falls to ground and shatters into a million pieces?"
Bill:  "Okay."

This is the case that exemplifies how it's not just "Player declares, GM decides."

BTW, how does this fit in with G/N/S, CA, Social Contract etc? Please help the newbie!

This is all at the meta-level, I think:  obviously, it relates to the notion of "Social Contract" in the sense that it answers "What are we doing, and how will we do it?"  Beyond that, I'm not sure there's any reason to worry if narrativist consequentiality works differently than simulationist consequentiality.  The differences emerge further in.

But I'm not sufficiently conversant with the nuances of Forge theory to speak to this.

Bill

[Marco]

You have to remember what Plato once said:  Language isn't magic.  Asking you to pass the salt isn't like casting a "create salt" spell.  In the latter, I get the salt because I say the words correctly.  It's only because there is a social context in which saying "Pass the salt, please" has meaning and a common-sense reaction that I can expect it to be more-or-less effective.

Similarly, saying "I push the vase" is consequential in exactly the same way:  The effects are jointly constructed by participants, mediated by "system" (rules for manipulating language) and indexed to common-sense expectations about how the world works.

Bill

This is very well stated. I would be surprised at a player who actually, emotionally, held the GM equally at fault for the vase's breakage. That's why, I expect that despite acknowledging that the GM in a traditional game was responsible for the handling of system to break the vase (running gravity) they would not be held culpable in the same way the pusher would.

-Marco

[Callan S.]

Like most threads, this is twisting away from the original focus.

There seems to be an expectation that other people will share one's way of thought. So much so, in fact, it'll be just like a real world principle, which is the same wherever you go.

People want to just assume the synchronisation occurs and thus they can move on to assuming it is now essentially the same as a consequence.

The thing is, the RL salt passing example is where readers should be able to see this:

Let me put it this way: Imagine we're sitting at a table, and I ask you to pass the salt, and you do it. In what sense is your salt passage not a consequence of my request? And how is that different from, in a game, you telling me that you're going to push the vase off the balcony?

"Get the salt yourself, you slacker!"
"Salts pretty unhealthy, shouldn't you cut down?"
"Here you go", doesn't look up, passes pepper by mistake.
"What?"
"Okay...oh, Jims passed it since he's closer"
(Ignores request as if not hearing, doesn't like you)

All these are just as valid responces to the request.

Passing the salt is not a consequence because if I push the vase in RL, it will always fall down. It will not occasionally fail to fall and instead say "Don't muck around, get on with something important". Which is exactly what most GM's would say if you keep spending whole sessions pushing vases.

The real life vase falls as a consequence.
The game world vase might fall because a descision was made.

Why is it an important distinction? Because you can't just rely on someone else's descision making process to be syncronised with yours to the extent it can be considered a consequence. Indeed, even if you picture in your head, by yourself, a vase being pushed and then falling, the kind of consequence of pushing a vase in RL is not occuring in your own mind.


Still, you might ask, why is that important? In terms of playing the game or in terms of designing one? If you believe consequence rather than descision is involved? That you will engage with someone else who shares the same sort of system as you?

I'd like to find out where I am on this in relation to general thought at the forge.

[Marco]

Like most threads, this is twisting away from the original focus.

I don't think this is twisting away. I think it's absolutely dead on when it comes to the question of how most people in gaming see the difference between consequence and decision: if you felt wronged by the breaking of the vase, who would you be mad at? The pusher? The GM? Both? Neither?

That's important because it illustrates the difference between theory and practice. I expect that the practice is that very few people in traditional games would blame the GM, even though, in theory, the GM has an equal or prerhaps even greater hand in breaking the vase.*

-Marco
* This isn't really theory and practice--it's a matter of context and perspective, IMO.

[Callan S.]

No, it's twisting away. It's pursuing the idea that the GM or other user wouldn't say something silly, they'd never do that thus an assertion will have a reliable consequence in much the same way it does in reality. The twist then comes when posters decide this is established, deciding to move on and work out the details of this idea that's been presented.

However, this 'reliable consequence' relies on blame for a bad call or such, to weed out nonsense and that means your left with something that makes sense.

Which is supposed to make the consequence as consistant as the governing blame (or whatever weeding method suggested).

Blame or responsibilty...these are just more decisions people make in what they assert (about what someone else did), just as others choice of what to narrate for a consequence is another descision. Arbitrary descisions (blame) governing arbitrary descisions (consequence), doesn't create a concrete mechanism for the vase always falling and smashing. If the vase is falling and smashing it isn't because "it'd be stupid if it didn't". That "It'd be stupid" is just one assertion among many. It isn't a mechanism that's used to produce the smashed vase result, it's just one of many inputs to another mechanism entirely.

But were twisting away from that, establishing 'common sense' and blame as the control mechanism and then moving on to work out the problems. I think there are problems because it's a false assumption.

[Andrew Martin]

The real life vase falls as a consequence.
The game world vase might fall because a descision was made.

No. In real life, there's only the one vase on a balcony, one vase pusher, one force of gravity and so on.

In the game, there's an imaginary vase in each player's imagination, so in the example, there's two imaginary vases, one in the player's imagination, the other in the ref's imagination. When the player states, "I push the vase off the balcony." that's the communication from the player to the other players in the group that ecourages the other players to update their own copy of the vase using the group's agreed upon system. If the system is designed well and understoond by the players, then each player will know how to change their own imagination of the vase, the player character, the balcony and so on. Using the system will effectively impart "time" to the distributed imaginary space, and (usually) allows the other players opportunity to take action (or not).

What happens next is described or encoded in the rules the players are using. That could be an implicit assumption in the rules that the balcony no longer supports the vase because the vase is now over empty space. Or it could be any other assumptions, like a dream sequence rule that states "all pushed vases morph into butterflies and flutter away", or the vase grows legs and arms and hangs on for dear life (cartoon fantasy movie).

Just like Valamir's recent post of offers, implicit acceptances, counter-offers, rejects and so on. Which is here: http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=12181

Does that help make things clearer?

[Bill_White]

No, it's twisting away. It's pursuing the idea that the GM or other user wouldn't say something silly, they'd never do that thus an assertion will have a reliable consequence in much the same way it does in reality.

Oh.  No, that isn't really what been's going on here:  you absolutely misunderstand.  Notice that your set of possible responses to a request for the salt corresponds to my list of possible interventions to a statement by a player that his character's pushing a vase.  In both cases, the mechanism that shapes the "consequence" is not like the cause-and-effect of one billiard ball smacking into another.  It's more like the please-and-thank-you of conversation.

Aside to Tetsuki:  I've been thinking about your question, and it seems to me that the paradigms of Gamism, Narrativism, and Simulationism in this context serve as orientations that help establish the appropriate response to a particular declaration, in the sense that each points to the features that are salient to attend to in the situation.  So:  "I push the vase."  Gamist Response:  "It misses."  Narrativist Response:  "How does that make your character feel?"  Simulationist Response:  "It smashes into 2d100 pieces."  

The fact that this system of utterances and responses is different from how physics in the real world operates is something that we're all agreed on.  What, then, is being argued?

But we're twisting away from that, establishing 'common sense' and blame as the control mechanism and then moving on to work out the problems. I think there are problems because it's a false assumption.

Let's see:  We've agreed that, whatever else is going on, it's not like real world physics.  We've both shown that a major difference is the possibility of contestation, from intention all the way to effect.  Andrew's post supports this as well.  So the argument at this point must have to do with the nature of the "control mechanism" that shapes the outcome or "consequences" of in-game events.  I've suggested it's like any other language use:  our utterances are propositions that map onto to a cognitive model of "the world" (real- or game-) and which are "adjudicated" through a set of rules for symbolic manipulation ("language" or System).

Where is the problem with this approach?  That is, how is role-playing different from using language more generally?  I don't think you'll say it is, so where's the problem?  

In re-reading your posts above, I think maybe the issue you're getting at is, "But how can we be certain the vase will fall every time just like in the real world?"  And the answer is, well, obviously we can't.  What we can be sure of is that if there's a consensus that the fall of a vase is something we need to be worried about, we'll worry about it.  I think that's the best you can do.

Bill

[Marco]

No, it's twisting away. It's pursuing the idea that the GM or other user wouldn't say something silly, they'd never do that thus an assertion will have a reliable consequence in much the same way it does in reality. The twist then comes when posters decide this is established, deciding to move on and work out the details of this idea that's been presented.

However, this 'reliable consequence' relies on blame for a bad call or such, to weed out nonsense and that means your left with something that makes sense.

The problem I see with this is that you picked the vase example. Maybe you wanted to illustrate a gray-area where the GM and the players reach consensus through discussion and mutual input. You can look at my sample dialogue in your previous thread about a group deciding on the time to repair a starship engine.

But here you picked a pretty black-and-white case to try to illustrate that all action is collaberative.

Well, it is, in an academic sense.

But it's not in an actual-play rubber-meets-the-road sense where the GM faciliates a black-and-white handling of the laws of physics and the players pretty much expect/require him or her to do exactly that.

This is clearly seen by the way one would assign fault in such a situation. When people behave as we ask and expect them to (and in a competent fashion) we rarely fault them--and in the conditions where we do most people agree that that the responsiblity lies with the asker and not the person who responded as asked (some legalities like hiring a hitman aside).

If you want to start another thread with a serious gray area and ask "how long does it take to fix the starship engine" then you'll have a different mechanic--one that can show different techniques for decision making.

But in this case, I think the answers show that in simple cases a traditional GM is not held as a co-conspirator to PC's actions.

-Marco

[M. J. Young]

Given that we have agreed to a real-world physics governing shared imagined space object interactions:

I see the vase sitting on the stone railing of the balcony, and strike it with my ten pound war hammer.

If the vase breaks, it is my fault; I initiated the action which calls system into play resulting in breakage of the vase.

If the vase does not break, it is the referee's fault; he interrupted the natural flow of system with some added action or information which prevented the strike of the hammer from breaking the vase.

Caveat: this has been simplified by removing the questions of whether I must roll to hit the vase and whether the vase may save versus crushing blow if I succeed.

If I hit the vase, I am not responsible if it does not break, because I did what I could to break it. If the referee does not prevent it from breaking, he is not responsible for it having broken, because he did not call the system into play to bring the change in state to the vase.

Responsibility is divided precisely because we've agreed in advance to certain functions of the system within the shared imagined space, and if someone acts to put those functions in play they are responsible for having done so. The system will then be engaged by the agreement of all players together in the destruction of the vase, unless one of them, such as the referee, intervenes in some way. That intervention is a distinct action which initiates system in a new way to save the vase.

The final condition of the vase is consequent to the action of system upon it. The individual who initiated the action of system is responsible for that consequence.

--M. J. Young

[Doctor Xero]

After reading all this, I would have to suggest that the question of what real world social/interactive/creative mechanisms are "responsible" for the consequences of pushing a vase becomes overtly relevant only in games which do not attempt to mimic real world physics in easily examined situations.

In a game which attempts to mimic real world physics, if I want to argue with my game master that a vase will fall if I push it, I can push a plastic vase from the table.  We all watch it fall; we all know that the physics of  the real world and the physics of the game world are supposed to be as identical as we can manage within gaming; so we know it will fall.  Since the "question" is so easily resolved in this specific situation, it becomes moot.

However, if my character pushes a vase off a ledge in a near-zero-gravity situation in an SF campaign, even if the SF campaign is intended to mimic real world physics, we can't easily test out the effects.  So it becomes a matter of discussion.  In some groups, it becomes a matter of some players googling up zero-G experiments while the local physics pimp pulls out his old grad school physics textbooks and the game master pulls out her hair strand by strand while waiting for the game to restart.

(Of course, if no one can imagine any reason why anyone should care about the consequences of that particular vase being pushed at that particular time by that particular character, then the question becomes irrelevant, and any player who wants to pursue it is usually asked to save his onanism for his alone times so that the rest of us can get on with the game.)

In a surreal game, such as when the player characters are adventuring through a dream reality of erratic physics, or when everyone is playing high level WoD mages whose subconscious impulses have begun shaping reality around them, the question of what and/or who determines the consequences of a player's character pushing a vase off a ledge becomes relevant.

In such cases, it is usually the game master : we hold the game master responsible for the verisimilitudinous continuity and regularity of the imagined reality into which he or she has invited us, and if he or she continually fails to enable us to suspend disbelief, we usually find a new game master.

Of course, the important thing to remember is that the player's character pushes that imagined vase off that imagined ledge; the player can never push that vase off because there is no vase in the real world (except in LARPs, sometimes)!

EDIT:

If I hit the vase, I am not responsible if it does not break, because I did what I could to break it. If the referee does not prevent it from breaking, he is not responsible for it having broken, because he did not call the system into play to bring the change in state to the vase.

Responsibility is divided precisely because we've agreed in advance to certain functions of the system within the shared imagined space, and if someone acts to put those functions in play they are responsible for having done so. The system will then be engaged by the agreement of all players together in the destruction of the vase, unless one of them, such as the referee, intervenes in some way. That intervention is a distinct action which initiates system in a new way to save the vase.

The final condition of the vase is consequent to the action of system upon it. The individual who initiated the action of system is responsible for that consequence.

Actually, I really like the way M. J. Young put it!

Doctor Xero

[ErrathofKosh]

...verisimilitudinous continuity...

Wow!  :)

[Callan S.]

Let me put it this way: Imagine we're sitting at a table, and I ask you to pass the salt, and you do it. In what sense is your salt passage not a consequence of my request? And how is that different from, in a game, you telling me that you're going to push the vase off the balcony?

Hi Bill

If you don't mean consequence like a billiard ball smacking off another, you'll have to be clearer since I've been using 'consequence' in association with the real life pushing of a vase and it's (consequential) fall.

Even in the way you ment 'consequence' I still don't agree. Someone else made a descision to pass it to you, that's what was to be understood from the variable responces (to the request) I listed. It's so it can be understood it's a descision on the other persons part. It's not something you did, it's something they did. They may have made a descision based on something you said (your request), but that's no reason to frame it as a consequence of what you did.

What were looking at here is the illusion we use in every day life for practical purposes. For example, if I buy some milk and hand over some money, I expect change. I take it for granted that it WILL be handed over.

But the thing is, it's still a descision on the other persons part. They aren't a robot...there is no 'It WILL happen' involved. But we all pretend there is, so we don't have to get ready to draw swords to get our change...we can concentrate on the bigger things instead of this tiny stuff. We also hope everyone else operates on this principle...usually they do, because in real life there are certain rewards for sticking to such a system.

Yes, weve agreed it's not real world physics. But the 'I WILL get my change' illusion from above is being asserted as a working principle. It's not, people in real life stick to that system because it has rewards (they expect change at some point as well, for example). Now, in a roleplay game, WHY are they going to share this same system (PS: Not talking about System)? How can you assert that they always will use it? Even for something as obvious as a vase falling? Well, they will likely use the same system as the asserter if there is a reward (even if the reward is just to avoid the sillyness of a vase not smashing).

But sometimes there isn't going to be a reward in it for them, even if it's a bleeding obvious outcome like the vase should have (that's why I chose the vase example, because even though its obvious it's flawed to say the same systems will be used between users). It's going to matter to design and play, because you will have drop outs in how people will intereact. Because system rewards matter. Because system matters.

I've suggested it's like any other language use: our utterances are propositions that map onto to a cognitive model of "the world" (real- or game-) and which are "adjudicated" through a set of rules for symbolic manipulation ("language" or System).

(emphasis mine)

I suppose I'm a bit Ron like here in emphasising the word 'are'. It's a pivotal word, because why are they going to use the same set of rules as you? Is there always going to be a reward for doing so? More to the point, is the reward always going to be more than any other reward desires a player or GM might have in relation to the assertion. Ie, if the GM's actually written a whole lot of material on this very specific vase and doesn't want it lost...which reward outweighs the other, the reward of non sillyness of a vase breaking as expected, or the reward of not having to flush all that work?

I didn't put this concern in my first post in this thread, but really only a few responces actually accomidated this sort of issue. Many others almost did then took a right turn with just a few words (like the word 'are' from above). The issue should always be accomidated I think and I wanted to see how out of sync the forge and I were (especially since my 'it must make sense' thread) without triggering hand waved 'of course, varying factors might change things' which doesn't say anything.

I guess in the end, like SIS consists of many little IS (one per user), System (yeah, the lumpley type) consists of many little systems (one per user). Whether people will use the same system as each other/syncronise depends on their reward for it. And a synced System can still actually introduce rewards that encourage loosing sync. By loosing sync, I mean things like the vase not shattering, will happen.


Hi Marco,

No, 'finding fault' is just a reward method...well, punishment system (lack of reward). It's just one punishment along side many other punishments and rewards being employed.

As I said above and basically by the example itself, I wanted an example with a clear cut result. Because it's to identify that the causality that sense suggests, isn't actually present. It's because people use the same method of thought/system to figure out what happened, because there is either a reward for doing so or punishment for not doing so. This is like what your saying, but your just mentioning one type of punishment (making the game silly), and isn't automatically bigger than any other punishment or reward that may come into play.

An example might be the old D&D jump off a 100 foot cliff to avoid the killer bad guy. Quite silly, but you live rather than die at the bad guys hands which = big reward. Bigger than the punishment stick for sillyness.

If you assume fault or sillyness is the biggest punishment, then you might find what you've designed to produce perverse results in someone elses hands, because of your blind spot. The blind spot being the thought that they will think not being silly is enough of a reward to outrank being killed.

Responsibility, etc? They're just more sticks and carrots. They wont tell you what happens to the vase...by themselves. Once all sticks and carrots present are added up (by whatever means), that will tell you what happens.

[Marco]

Hi Marco,

No, 'finding fault' is just a reward method...well, punishment system (lack of reward). It's just one punishment along side many other punishments and rewards being employed.

As I said above and basically by the example itself, I wanted an example with a clear cut result. Because it's to identify that the causality that sense suggests, isn't actually present. It's because people use the same method of thought/system to figure out what happened, because there is either a reward for doing so or punishment for not doing so. This is like what your saying, but your just mentioning one type of punishment (making the game silly), and isn't automatically bigger than any other punishment or reward that may come into play.

An example might be the old D&D jump off a 100 foot cliff to avoid the killer bad guy. Quite silly, but you live rather than die at the bad guys hands which = big reward. Bigger than the punishment stick for sillyness.

If you assume fault or sillyness is the biggest punishment, then you might find what you've designed to produce perverse results in someone elses hands, because of your blind spot. The blind spot being the thought that they will think not being silly is enough of a reward to outrank being killed.

Responsibility, etc? They're just more sticks and carrots. They wont tell you what happens to the vase...by themselves. Once all sticks and carrots present are added up (by whatever means), that will tell you what happens.

I have to admit that I don't exactly get this. My suggestion of an examination of  "fault" was in the case where the vase fell and broke--how is there some sort of silliness there? Where does reward or punishment factor in?

The reason I suggested you look at fault was because it shows you what is materially important when it comes to looking at the interaction of the three people involved (you, the pusher, the GM).

If you (and I suspect every gamer will) hold the pusher and not the GM responsible then it suggests you (IMO, rightly) see the pusher as kind of like his character and the GM as kind of like gravity.

As I've said this several times, I don't expect you to suddenly understand what I'm trying to convey--but my question (and posed situation) has nothing to do with adjudication or invocation of system (i.e. silly outcomes). It has to do with the preception of roles and responsibilities of the GM.

If you try answering the question* for yourself (let's say you decide you'd hold the GM responsible for your--as a player--anger since the GM was the one who adjudicated gravity and broke the vase, then we see a different implicit dynamic than I think is the common one).

-Marco
* And, yes, in this situation I'm stipulating what happened to the vase--I realize that--but I'm using "assignment of blame" as a tool for illuminating the psychology that I think commonly exists in traditional role-playing to suggest that there's a reasonable answer in your example from an immersed player perspective.

[John Kim]

Let me put it this way: Imagine we're sitting at a table, and I ask you to pass the salt, and you do it. In what sense is your salt passage not a consequence of my request? And how is that different from, in a game, you telling me that you're going to push the vase off the balcony?

Even in the way you ment 'consequence' I still don't agree. Someone else made a descision to pass it to you, that's what was to be understood from the variable responces (to the request) I listed. It's so it can be understood it's a descision on the other persons part. It's not something you did, it's something they did. They may have made a descision based on something you said (your request), but that's no reason to frame it as a consequence of what you did.

What were looking at here is the illusion we use in every day life for practical purposes. For example, if I buy some milk and hand over some money, I expect change. I take it for granted that it WILL be handed over.

OK, I agree that it is an everyday expectation.  I don't agree that it is an illusion.  I don't think that a person is inescapably forced to hand me the salt or to give me change.  I don't think any normal person does.  In other words, there is no illusion here.  By the same token, I don't think anyone is disagreeing about what happens in game.  i.e. No one thinks that the GM is physically compelled to say that the vase breaks.  

I think this is simple difference in terminology.  You only consider something to be a "consequence" if it is physically absolutely certain that the result will happen.  Other people use the term to mean things like getting change -- i.e. a likely result, but not a 100% physical certainty.  I think we just need to use terms which distinguish these two.

[keithn]

I have to address the issue from the POV of how it would happen in a game if I were GM. IF a player pushed the vase off the balcony and I said "it bounces back up again, it was a rubber vase" then I might expect the player to respond saying "Oh, I won't do it then" and there might be an exchange along the lines of "..but you didn't know it was rubber" and then there might be some agreement about how accurately a rubber vase ight represent a ceramic one and some agreement would be reached on that. THEN, the players would be wanting to know why the vase was rubber, was it normal in this galaxy, if it were normal it would not have been pushed, and so on as I guess what we call the imaginary space is shared between the participants. So questions from the players to establish an agreed reality but also, less immediately, a GM response depending on the situation. To me, as GM, it would be impossible for a player to have his character push a vase off a balcony for no reason. The reason might be crazy (he might be a crackpot!) but it must make some sort of sense. The most Gamist one might be to test out the effect of gravity, or see how much damage a vase does, or how accurately it can be pushed. From a Narrative angle, as GM the vase does not get pushed without narrative consequence, just as a gun in scene 1 of a play will inevitably get used later on in a play. The consequence will be a story: whether vengeance of the vase-makers, a hidden treasure discovered,  the death of a passerby crushed by a deadly vase, or just a large bill from the hotel balcony owner.

I wandered off my point a bit, which was that the result is less clear cut, and if there is a dispute on the how and whys of the event they are agreed upon by mutual consent.

Keith Nellist