What is Dramatism?

[John Kim]

I agree. I don't know that Dramatism or Virtuality by themselves are especially good tools for "understanding" role-play by themselves, without other elements of theory.

So what other elements of theory does it need?

I'm not Marco, but I agree with him on this point.  The rgfa Threefold and GNS are each only three labels.  There is a very limited amount of understanding or description that can come with three labels.  Further parts of theory would be things like Stances (Director, Actor, etc.) or the Interaction Model of Campaign Morality, and things like that.  

I don't think there's any point at which theory is "complete" -- and we're certainly far from that point currently.

[Marco]

I'm not Marco, but I agree with him on this point.  The rgfa Threefold and GNS are each only three labels.  There is a very limited amount of understanding or description that can come with three labels.  Further parts of theory would be things like Stances (Director, Actor, etc.) or the Interaction Model of Campaign Morality, and things like that.  

I don't think there's any point at which theory is "complete" -- and we're certainly far from that point currently.

Something that I have realized that is key to me is to know (or be able to discuss) how the GM will be making decisions during play.  This is relevant in several dimensions:

1. The GM's appreciation of literary structure of the transcript.
2. The GM's attention to plausibility of in-game events.
3. The GM's commitment to player choice.

These may interfere with each other--but, even when they don't there are important things that I as a player want to know about how the GM sees these things.

-Marco