Pattern Recognition, Metaphor, and Continuity

[Bankuei]

Hi Doc,

I don't think anyone is arguing that there is enjoyment that can be had from either playing with predetermined setting elements, flexible ones, or completely spontaneous ones.  What I believe is causing a great deal of contention is "conclusions" as the one I've quoted before:

All the above leads to one possible conclusion : that the sense of discovery, the pattern recognition, and the personal empowerment  which comes from those, all are impossible in those campaigns in which the gaming reality can be changed at any time by a player.

Emphasis mine-

You are declaring those elements to be completely absent from play utilizing spontaneous elements being introduced.  Now granted- spontaneous elements can be misused and abused by folks within the group, usually tearing down vital Social Contract rules("We're playing cowboys, why are you adding space ninjas?"), but that has nothing to do with the fact that there are completely functional forms of that style of play which strongly include and promote those very things you claim to be absent.  It doesn't take much play of Inspectres or Dust Devils to understand that all of those things are not just possible, but easy to get to in many cases.

Can predetermined elements serve as springboards for play? Yes.  Can flexible elements be abused?  Yes.  Can a can of corn be used as a weapon? Yes.  Just because something is capable of being used in a certain way doesn't limit it to only that use.  There are dysfunctional uses of predetermined elements just as much as there are functional uses of elements spontaneously generated.  

Now, as far as clarifying your position- you've made some extreme statements and have failed to draw a clear line backing up how you came to this one possible conclusion.  If you altered that conclusion to something like, "In any game where all the players consciously know that the elements are being generated spontaneously, they do not have the satisfaction of uncovering a preexisting element", that is something people could say, "Ok, that makes sense."

But as far as producing pattern and myth- whether predetermined or not, people do it all the time, sometimes in play, sometimes after play.  Perhaps you should take some time, compare your idea to some actual play(your own and various accounts, here and elsewhere), then come back with it.

I'm very much interested in the discussion of the use of predetermined elements as tools and devices in play- particularly how they focus play and provide direction- but as it stands now, I can't follow where you're getting these conclusions from.

Chris

[contracycle]

I'm fairly sympathetic to Dr X's argument here.  I think that pattern recognition is an automatic process in animals; there are some problems in computer cognition that imply this, I think.  And this pattern recognition, as Dr X argues, is fundamental to our ability to understand the world.

Bankuei writes:

You are declaring those elements to be completely absent from play utilizing spontaneous elements being introduced.

It seems to mer that this statement is also an extreme.  That is, I doubt the introduction of a single, or a handful, of spontaneous elements would undermine pattern recognition and the sense of comprehension gained thereby.  But I do think that if there is not an underlying logic, pattern, then indeed all sense of discovery is impossible, or valueless.

In fact I think this is rather similar to the "tyranny of structurelessness" thread as well.  Absent a coordinating principle or pattern, all the problems inherent to structurelessness appear in full force, only more so, being extended to the game space and not just the social space.

[Bankuei]

Hi Gareth,

I, nor anyone I've seen on this thread have argued for a Dada-ist approach to play.  What I am saying is that even with zero predetermined elements, and the potential for each and any player to declare, "It was all a dream...", the elements that Doc is saying are impossible given those conditions- do happen.

One word:  Universalis.

The key that keeps it from falling into the trap of the structurelessness is that Universalis gives explicit techniques for the group as a whole to enforce a collective will to protect any patterns and themes produced in play.  Narration trading games such as Dust Devils or Inspectres though technically could suffer from a player choosing to abuse the narration rights are almost always kept in check by the collective will of the group, though without the formal mechanics(Lumpley Principle, Social Contract, in full effect).

The coordinating principle is set up in Social Contract, and applied through system as a vehicle of expression for the group to create the myth on the spot.  The sense of discovery is "How will our collective ideas fit together?", the pattern recognition is the theme developed through play, "Hey, this is turning out to be a love story!" and the personal empowerment is, "We all contributed to making this really good game."

Chris

edited for clarity

[Doctor Xero]

In this thread on mysteries, a couple posts down, I proposed a semiotics-based method for running mysteries.

I remember the thread -- it seemed overall an impressive concept!

In this, the GM knows only the basics, and nothing else: he knows who dunnit, and basically how, and has an initial scene-of-the-crime or the like established.  Everything else is generated quite freely through the inventiveness of the players.

So with that thread in mind, would you classify such mystery-solving as independent of interacting with continuity?  I genuinely do not know what your answer will be, and I think it will help clarify -- for me at least -- what's at stake in your proposal.

Ah, I think I understand the confusion.  First to answer your question, and then to answer your confusion in the next post.

We've already established pure examples of each pole, just as we establish pure examples of global/holistic thinking and sequential/linear thinking or pure examples of liberalism and conservatism before we go on to note that most people fall on a line in the spectrum between those two poles.  Then we recognize that most episodes will be somewhere along the spectrum.

Personally, I would state that, when it comes to the solution to the mystery, such a game has some fidelity to interaction with continuity, and it uses this continuity as the springboard to determine what improvisations are acceptable.  But it is closer to the middle rather than to either pole of the spectrum.

For comparison, somewhere (on The Forge?  on the Internet?  I don't recall) I encountered someone who borrowed Donjon's basic mechanics for a mystery game.  Players competed to prove their pet theories were correct, and each time a player wanted to find a clue to prove something, his or her degree of success rolled determined whether or not that clue existed and whether or not other players could modify it to fit their own pet theories instead.  Such a game would be a game with little fidelity to interaction with continuity, since there is no pre-existing solution to said mystery.

Next post, I answer your confusion (I hope! *grin*).  But I need to address other posters as well right now.

All the above leads to one possible conclusion : that the sense of discovery, the pattern recognition, and the personal empowerment  which comes from those, all are impossible in those campaigns in which the gaming reality can be changed at any time by a player.

Emphasis mine-

You missed a key phrase -- "which comes from those" -- and without that key phrase, my meaning is lost.   To what does "from those" refer?

If you read the paragraphs which precede my statement, you will notice that I am referring to the sense of discovery, the pattern recognition, and the personal empowerment which come from myth, from story, and from the recognition of metaphor (related to though not identical with the narrativist concept of premise).

But as far as producing pattern and myth- whether predetermined or not, people do it all the time, sometimes in play, sometimes after play.

I have studied mythology and folklore for more than two decades, and in all those years, without exception, what is produced in games with high levels of immediate ad-libbing fails to qualify for the term "myth" according to every definition for myth by any scholar or scientist I have yet encountered.

(Before someone points out the phenomenon of children and adults spontaneously generating mythic tales utilizing archetypes and other universal motifs and tropes, I point out that this only occurs when there is some fidelity, unconscious or not, to said archetypes et al.  Many is the time I've also heard children spontaneously generating nonsense or playing merrily ignoring each other except to argue.  As for adults : stream of consciousness may be brilliant in the hands of a master such as Joyce, but it is still not myth.)

If I had seemed at all aggressive, Chris, if comes from my frustration at seeing the word "myth" misused so badly by those who claim to create it in their games of high spontaneous play.  I am no more nor less perturbed by this misuse of the word "myth" than a political philosopher might by the persistent application of the word "anarchy" to a medieval absolute monarchy -- unless said use were ironic, of course.

If I have allowed my love of mythology to disrupt the clarity of my explanation of my theory, Chris, I apologize and ask you to look past it.

Also, many players don't give a damn whether there is anything mythic to their games, so for them, my statement about pattern recognition and myth and metaphor is irrelevant.

Doctor Xero

[Doctor Xero]

I genuinely do not know what your answer will be, and I think it will help clarify -- for me at least -- what's at stake in your proposal.

Now, to answer your confusion.

The purpose of this theory of frameworks is primarily to help out players, both directly through player advice and indirectly through game design.

The player who likes to build a character that starts out intermeshed with the campaign continuity is the player who wants to operate from a framework of interaction with continuity.  He or she wants the game master or the collective group to pre-construct a continuity or framework within which the player might ground his or her character.

These are the players who ask the game master whether there will be elves in the AD-&-D-ish campaign or to specify how the premise specifically should be inflected through their characters or to describe the operating definition of superheroes for the campaign or to give the names of the established clans to which their characters might be allied.  These are the players who love the way Legend of the Five Rings sets up a framing continuity which tells them, before the first jot of character creation, what the clans are and how they interrelate and what opportunities each clan provides -- a framing within which they can construct their characters as integral parts of the continuity within which they will be playing.

The player who likes to build a character but who has very little interest in knowing or fitting into campaign continuity is the player who operates from a framework of independence of continuity.  He or she doesn't care what sort of world the game master or the collective group pre-construct so long as it doesn't get in the way of playing his or her character.  Anything which gets in the way of his or her character gets in the way of his or her fun, so he or she wants the authority to remove it immediately, within reason.

If said player is dysfunctional, he or she will demand this authority regardless of how such changes ruin the game for other players.  If said player is a decent enough person, he or she will negotiate with game master and/or other players when changes involve more than him or her -- but this negotiation is done out of courtesy, not out of any interest in fidelity to or interaction with the continuity!

I been involved in games with both sorts, and I think each framework has its strengths although, just as Ron Edwards admits he is partial to narrativism, I admit I am partial to a game master's providing an initial framework within which I might construct my character so that my character is an integral part of the world in which he or she is situated.

Characters built by players who prefer to frame their characters independently of any continuity can be moved easily from campaign to campaign with little change if any to the character.  Since their characters are truly uninvolved in and uninvested in their continuities, they are truly mobile, which gives them character strength but not story strength.
Characters built by players who prefer to frame their characters interactively within a specific continuity can seldom move those characters into any other campaign without radical change, cutting away connections with the original campaign continuity and creating new ones for the next continuity.  Since their characters are truly part of their continuities, they have the power to truly be a part of stories which change those worlds, but they work poorly elsewhere ; they have story strength  but not character strength.

Does this help?

Doctor Xero

[Christopher Kubasik]

Here's what I think is going on.  (I doubt this theory will be well received, but I think it's on the money.)

I think Doc has simply had very different play experiences than Chris (or me, or Ron or a host of other people here at The Forge.)

I don't doubt for a second that in Doc's experience, when the players can add details to the game, all hell breaks loose.  Internal logic is tossed out the window, chaos reigns, and dogs sleep with cats.

And I don't doubt for a second, from the write-ups of plenty of Actual Play games, that when a lot of Forge regulars give plenty of authorial power, chaos doesn't break out.  In fact, the story is stronger for it.

I get the feeling (especially with Doc's emphasis on Con games), that a DM with a strong hand is often needed to keep any kind of world and story logic on the rails.  

I know for certain that many people have found players for their group where this isn't required.  That more power to the players adds immensely to the game.  And I know this addition to the game has none of the effects that Doc claims come about if the players behave in this way.

The fact that Doc conflates players having authorial power and lack of interest in continuity shows he's had some bad experiences with players having authorial power.  However, those are his experiences.  There is no reason to conflate player authorial power and lack of concern for continuity.  For many people, having a group share the adding of detail atop of each others ideas, building with an absolute fidelity to contunity is part of the pleasure of the game... And many people do it very well.

I know that when people have been playing RPGs for a long time its easy to fall into the "nothing new under sun notion."  But the existence of The Forge is predicated on the notion that many players of RPGs have not yet visited many different ways of playing RPGs.  From this thread and other posts by Doc, it seems to me that despite the years in the hobby, there's lots of ways of playing (successful playing) he has yet to encounter.

As for the Myth aspect of this... It seems to me that since everyone's realized Story is now too slippery to lay claim to, everyone's going to rush after Myth to justify "My games are better than your games."  The fact that Doc is waving his graduate thesis doesn't help matters.  As far as I can tell, even the scholars disagree on what the term means.  I don't see it as a word that tells me much.

What I see so far is Doc saying, "The way I play is the play that produces the kind of play I like, which I call Myth.  This play depends on the players not losing track of the continuity I have created, and keeping their input to a minimum to keep it from going off the rails."

There's nothing wrong with this, of course.  Except when it lays larger claims to how RPGs "work" that are contradicted by dozens of threads in Actual Play.

(In particular I would recomend looking at the climatic moment in the Moose in the City thread -- a stroke of thematic and fucking beautiful genius place into the story by a player.  Anyone who is baffled by the threat of Player's ruining a game with authorial input really needs to read, and then re-read that thread.  But there are tons of other examples floating around this site.)

Best,

Christopher

[Bankuei]

Hi Doc,

You missed a key phrase -- "which comes from those" -- and without that key phrase, my meaning is lost. To what does "from those" refer?

No, actually, that I took into account.  And yes, I do recognize that many spontaneous creations of myth pattern are based on preexisting archtypes- again, read that article I wrote.  What I am saying is that it is very possible for groups to produce myth mirroring those archtypes with or without overtly discussing it before or even during play, and also possible with a wide distribution of director power.  Does it help if people discuss what's going on? Definitely.  Is it always necessary?  No.

And as I've stated before, and in line with what Chris K is saying- you're making blanket statements about roleplaying that several people, not just myself, have personal actual play experience that contradicts it.  Producing those elements that you have mentioned has happens on a common basis with Universalis, Dust Devils, Inspectres to name a few games that have have the possibility of players altering the SIS at will, along with minimal or no discussion or planning to the myth patterns to be produced.

Theory only holds if it matches with observation.

Chris

[Doctor Xero]

I think Doc has simply had very different play experiences
---snip!--
However, those are his experiences.

This is painfully close to an ad hominem approach.  Instead of countering the logic of my argument, you simply set it aside while grotesquely straw manning it with comments about dogs sleeping with cats.

That's not a very sporting or productive way to address something, Christopher.

Also, I get the distinct impression from your comments that you would prefer that everyone on The Forge hide his or her degrees and accomplishments under a bushel, for every time I support my creds by mentioning anything, you tend to choose to take it as an attack.  I find that a very odd way of looking at the world, personally.  If someone is telling me something I find hard to believe, I would prefer that he or she give me some reason why I should find his or her words more important than those of a child or the village idiot -- and, in that spirit of presenting credibility, I respectfully make reference to my own background.

As for the Myth aspect of this? It seems to me that since everyone's realized Story is now too slippery to lay claim to, everyone's going to rush after Myth to justify "My games are better than your games."

Ignoring for a moment yet another of your ad hominem implications (you make a poor telepath at discerning my motivations, it seems),
I'd like to point out that at the very beginning of my first post I cited three of my primary sources for the definition of "myth".

I made it clear from the start which definition I was using and my sources.

Your insinuations that the term "myth" is too slippery, therefore, really don't hold water in this case.

Theory only holds if it matches with observation.

Actually, there have been a number of studies in which they've found that people alter their observations to fit their beliefs.  This is one of the reasons why eye witness testimony is so dicey.

I don't feel like citing sources, but if I have to, I will.

More importantly, it demonstrates the desperate need for people to be trained in methods to minimize their own pre-existing beliefs.  Since you've made mention of semiotics, I have no doubt I have no need to explain this further.

Doctor Xero

[Doctor Xero]

Theory only holds if it matches with observation.

If you dispute my points, don't throw the names of games at me -- give me solid, logical explanations and syllogisms which counter my arguments.

For example, are you claiming that you have never observed any gamer, whether on The Forge or not, express dismay when it turns out that a mystery doesn't really have a solution and the game master will let anyone make one up if it sounds reasonable?  Are you claiming you have never observed any gamer care whether the puzzle he or she is working through has a real solution or not?  Are you claiming you have never observed any gamer who insisted he or she know all about the campaign world before he or she built a character?  Are you claiming you have never observed any gamer who didn't care one whit about the campaign world so long as he or she was able to play the character he or she wanted to play?

If you honestly make those claims, I imagine that you will find no reason nor logic in most of my theory.  But I can not imagine how you could make such claims if you have really been part of the larger gaming community.

Take a look at Aaron Allston's taxonomy of gaming types.  You will notice that many of his gaming types specifically reference the degree to which the player's character is embedded into the campaign's continuity.  The fact that Allston makes note of Builders and Romantics and character types played by players who want plenty of NPCs with which to interact is clear evidence that at least one other person, in this case a game designer (if Christopher will allow me to cite someone's creds), has made observations similar to mine, albeit using different language.

I also wonder how you or Christopher can state that your observations go against the idea that some people choose to embed their characters within a game's continuity and others choose not to?  I would like a logical explanation of how a person can simultaneously not notice and not ignore continuity, followed by why you would consider said person the norm for roleplayers.

There are gamers who want to intertwine their characters into the official continuity of a campaign even before character creation.  If there is no continuity prior to character creation, they can not do so.  And there are gamers who don't care about any official continuity.

Unless you are claiming you have never observed gamers such as those above, yes, such people exist, and yes, my theory explains the phenomenon.

Or are you suggesting that such gamers are beneath our concern?

I honestly do not understand your claims.

Doctor Xero

[John Kim]

I don't doubt for a second that in Doc's experience, when the players can add details to the game, all hell breaks loose.  Internal logic is tossed out the window, chaos reigns, and dogs sleep with cats.

And I don't doubt for a second, from the write-ups of plenty of Actual Play games, that when a lot of Forge regulars give plenty of authorial power, chaos doesn't break out.  In fact, the story is stronger for it.

Well, some of Doc's examples are of chaos breaking out, but I'm not sure that he's saying it's inevitable.  Doc, can you clarify?  Christopher, I agree with your statement here that player-director-stance can strengthen story.  On the other hand, I am also swayed by Doc Xero's core point that lack of such power enhances "sense of discovery" and "pattern recognition".  

To try to take this in a positive direction: Christopher, Bankuei -- how would you characterize the strengths and weaknesses of encouraging director stance in players?  Are there any weaknesses (i.e. qualities like "sense of discovery")?  Or would your position be that player director-stance is superior in every way for all cases?

[clehrich]

Oh, for goodness' sake.  Must we do this?

The Argument
As I understand it, there are really three points here:

[*]Fidelity/adherence to continuity vs.  independence therefrom
[*]GM authority vs.  player authority/dominance
[*]Myth vs.  freeform/improvised story[/list:u]What all three of us Chris's are saying is that you have yet to demonstrate that these things are necessarily linked.  Various examples have been provided to suggest that they aren't.  My experience is also that they aren't.  And I see no argument particularly in your posts to demonstrate that they are.

To be sure, we may be altering our experiences and observations to fit preconceived theory.  But as you are proposing not so much new terms as a particular regular formation in gaming, the onus lies with you to demonstrate such a linkage, since our experience belies this.

Myth

I have studied mythology and folklore for more than two decades, and in all those years, without exception, what is produced in games with high levels of immediate ad-libbing fails to qualify for the term "myth" according to every definition for myth by any scholar or scientist I have yet encountered.

(Before someone points out the phenomenon of children and adults spontaneously generating mythic tales utilizing archetypes and other universal motifs and tropes, I point out that this only occurs when there is some fidelity, unconscious or not, to said archetypes et al. Many is the time I've also heard children spontaneously generating nonsense or playing merrily ignoring each other except to argue. As for adults : stream of consciousness may be brilliant in the hands of a master such as Joyce, but it is still not myth.)

If I had seemed at all aggressive, Chris, if comes from my frustration at seeing the word "myth" misused so badly by those who claim to create it in their games of high spontaneous play. I am no more nor less perturbed by this misuse of the word "myth" than a political philosopher might by the persistent application of the word "anarchy" to a medieval absolute monarchy -- unless said use were ironic, of course.

What's bothering Chris Kubasik is not that you have degrees, although it's certainly impolite (and no more) to flaunt them in this sort of forum.  What's bothering him:

As for the Myth aspect of this... It seems to me that since everyone's realized Story is now too slippery to lay claim to, everyone's going to rush after Myth to justify "My games are better than your games." The fact that Doc is waving his graduate thesis doesn't help matters. As far as I can tell, even the scholars disagree on what the term means. I don't see it as a word that tells me much.

As you know, I also have a graduate degree in this sort of material, and have written on it extensively here and elsewhere.  Now I haven't seen anything in your actual positive definitions that I agree with (though I have more sympathy with the negatives quoted, at least at their literal surface).  I think Campbell is worthless crap, a cheap knock-off of Eliade, from whom we should long ago have learned what there was to learn and moved on.  I think the archetypes of the unconscious is a lot of mystical tripe.  But this is hardly the place to argue the point.

The point, in fact, is that Christopher is dead right: there is very little professional agreement about what myth is, about how to analyze it, about how to identify it, or anything of the sort.  And no degree of whatever sort can grant authority to proclaim on it in that sense.  None.

Now as it happens, I do agree that children spinning weird yarns isn't myth, and I do agree that gaming has never (that I know of) produced what I'd call myth.  But frankly, who's saying that it does?  You use the phrase "straw man" – you have set one up and lit it afire.  Nobody but you is claiming myth here strongly, so there's no opponent.

Specifics
Returning to the 3 points at the top, the distinction between myth and improvisation is, I think, quite worthless.  One of the few points I think most scholars (though not all, to be sure) agree on is that myth is usually told quite improvisationally within oral cultures.  (See, e.g.,  Parry, Lord, etc.)  So that point appears analytically and empirically out of court as stated.

The archetypal unconscious, or collective unconscious, or all other Jungian (or semi-Jungian) claims of that sort have been much contested and problematized for some 50 or more years now.  That seems to me one of the few fights Lévi-Strauss definitely won, though he was hardly the first or the last.  So founding a myth concept on recognition of archetypes is in that sense baseless.

So What?
The point — my point at least — isn't to refute your concept of myth.  This isn't the place, and I certainly don't have the time.  More to the point, it's irrelevant to gaming, by your definition and that of most others here.  I've made extensive arguments about bricolage and myth in relation to Sim gaming in particular, but I have contended throughout that this is a flat failure: that gaming is simply incapable of achieving myth.

Where that leaves us on myth is this: either you have to define myth formally and clearly, with examples probably, and then demonstrate that this is in some way relevant to gaming, or you might as well set it aside.

So Let's Get Back to Your Logic

The player who likes to build a character that starts out intermeshed with the campaign continuity is the player who wants to operate from a framework of interaction with continuity. He or she wants the game master or the collective group to pre-construct a continuity or framework within which the player might ground his or her character

These two sentences are not connected.  You ask us to look at your "syllogisms," but as a syllogism this does not function.  We have a player who wants to adhere to continuity, by your terms.  Why does that mean that he "wants the game master or the collective group to pre-construct a continuity"?  That's unnecessary.  One of the great arts of more free-wheeling gaming is to lay down the tracks just in front of the train, as it were.  You're claiming here that if the tracks aren't pre-constructed, we cannot adhere to them.

Now on the opposite end, you construct a game-group's nightmare:

The player who likes to build a character but who has very little interest in knowing or fitting into campaign continuity is the player who operates from a framework of independence of continuity. He or she doesn't care what sort of world the game master or the collective group pre-construct so long as it doesn't get in the way of playing his or her character. Anything which gets in the way of his or her character gets in the way of his or her fun, so he or she wants the authority to remove it immediately, within reason.

So what's on the other end?  What you have put on the other end is a reasonable and sane player, but this one is a walking problem.  He "doesn't care" about a lot of things, including the pre-constructions which apparently always exist.

So, first of all, why are such pre-constructions necessary in the first place?  Let's just throw them out the window and do No Myth play.

Second, shouldn't the opposite end be a kind of willing slave to the GM?  I mean, if we're going to construct extreme points, let's actually keep them balanced.

What I see so far is Doc saying, "The way I play is the play that produces the kind of play I like, which I call Myth. This play depends on the players not losing track of the continuity I have created, and keeping their input to a minimum to keep it from going off the rails."

There's nothing wrong with this, of course. Except when it lays larger claims to how RPGs "work" that are contradicted by dozens of threads in Actual Play.

Bingo.  You have not demonstrated that your "theory" is applicable beyond your peculiar gaming range, which seems rather at odds with the experience of the majority voices here.  If your style requires more formality, control, or authority, that's great.  Nobody is saying that's bad.  But you appear to be claiming that the contrary, the more open-ended and improvisational, is flatly incapable of doing things you consider large and important.  So if your description of that end is inaccurate, that's a major problem for your theory.

And as I've stated before, and in line with what Chris K is saying- you're making blanket statements about roleplaying that several people, not just myself, have personal actual play experience that contradicts it. Producing those elements that you have mentioned has happens on a common basis with Universalis, Dust Devils, Inspectres to name a few games that have have the possibility of players altering the SIS at will, along with minimal or no discussion or planning to the myth patterns to be produced.

For example, these games run very freeform and improvisationally, and they do not run as your model describes.  I wouldn't call this myth, but then I don't think RPGs can do myth at all in the first place, so that's a moot point.

This is painfully close to an ad hominem approach. Instead of countering the logic of my argument, you simply set it aside while grotesquely straw manning it with comments about dogs sleeping with cats.

I disagree with your reading, but I hope I have addressed your arguments head-on and ended the "you said" "no I didn't" portion of the debate.

Also, I get the distinct impression from your comments that you would prefer that everyone on The Forge hide his or her degrees and accomplishments under a bushel, for every time I support my creds by mentioning anything, you tend to choose to take it as an attack. I find that a very odd way of looking at the world, personally. If someone is telling me something I find hard to believe, I would prefer that he or she give me some reason why I should find his or her words more important than those of a child or the village idiot -- and, in that spirit of presenting credibility, I respectfully make reference to my own background.

This is a side issue, but the fact is that the same reason you want people to address your arguments is precisely why an argument from authority is a classical fallacy.  I don't give a damn what degrees you have, and I hope you don't care which ones I have.  I also hope you don't assume that those who don't mention degrees don't have them, nor that they lack learning.  But there are a lot of idiots with PhD's out there, many of them in the academy.  A degree is no proof of anything.

For example, are you claiming that you have never observed any gamer, whether on The Forge or not, express dismay when it turns out that a mystery doesn't really have a solution and the game master will let anyone make one up if it sounds reasonable? Are you claiming you have never observed any gamer care whether the puzzle he or she is working through has a real solution or not? Are you claiming you have never observed any gamer who insisted he or she know all about the campaign world before he or she built a character? Are you claiming you have never observed any gamer who didn't care one whit about the campaign world so long as he or she was able to play the character he or she wanted to play?

Nobody's claiming these things.  Straw men again.  What we're noting is that there is a difference between "never" and "not usually."  What we're noting is that there is a big difference between all these points being correct for a particular game group and their being necessarily connected or linked.  None of which you have responded to.  I note, for example, that when I proposed a piece of very specific logical discussion here on the Forge, you made quite clear that you saw no need to go and remind yourself of its contents.  Why, was it irrelevant?  How do you know?

I also wonder how you or Christopher can state that your observations go against the idea that some people choose to embed their characters within a game's continuity and others choose not to? I would like a logical explanation of how a person can simultaneously not notice and not ignore continuity, followed by why you would consider said person the norm for roleplayers.

All games, like all social activities, exist within social and cultural norms.  These cannot be ignored, nor set aside.  They can, however, be forgotten about.  This is quite a basic principle of the analysis of human behavior, actually.  (See Durkheim and everyone since.)  The norm, then, is that one simultaneously does not notice and yet does not ignore continuity.  Now games further construct ranges of specific norms, through a procedure that I think is essentially ritualization.  One would expect to see a simultaneous not-noticing and not-ignoring of these too.  Anything else would require explanation and an account, as it would be extremely abnormal.

There are gamers who want to intertwine their characters into the official continuity of a campaign even before character creation. If there is no continuity prior to character creation, they can not do so. And there are gamers who don't care about any official continuity.

And there are also continuities that are constructed in-play.  One can adhere to this, even without a prior continuity.  This might be called constrained improvisation.  When people talk about freeform gaming, that's what they mean.  Of course there must be some continuity.  Of course there must also be some freedom.  That's how humanity works.

Unless you are claiming you have never observed gamers such as those above, yes, such people exist, and yes, my theory explains the phenomenon.

Have I observed gamers who really have no interest in the game's thematic, structural, symbolic, or whatever continuity?  No, never.  What kind of maniac would even play the game if he had no interest in any part of it?

Have I observed gamers who want to embed absolutely everything they do entirely within someone else's prior construction and never, ever deviate?  No, though I've heard about them.  People usually refer to them with all sorts of negative epithets.

Does your theory explain the phenomenon?  No, not that I can see.  But by this formulation, at least, I see no phenomenon to explain.

[Bankuei]

Hi John,

To try to take this in a positive direction: Christopher, Bankuei -- how would you characterize the strengths and weaknesses of encouraging director stance in players? Are there any weaknesses (i.e. qualities like "sense of discovery")? Or would your position be that player director-stance is superior in every way for all cases?

Director stance is neither better nor worse for roleplaying- its a matter of taste.  In regards to Doc's statements- all the feelings of pattern recognition, discovery- etc.  can and do happen with director stance.  That's the only point I'm making.

Chris

[Bankuei]

Hi Doc,

For example, are you claiming that you have never observed any gamer, whether on The Forge or not, express dismay when it turns out that a mystery doesn't really have a solution and the game master will let anyone make one up if it sounds reasonable? Are you claiming you have never observed any gamer care whether the puzzle he or she is working through has a real solution or not? Are you claiming you have never observed any gamer who insisted he or she know all about the campaign world before he or she built a character? Are you claiming you have never observed any gamer who didn't care one whit about the campaign world so long as he or she was able to play the character he or she wanted to play?

I have never made those claims.

I also wonder how you or Christopher can state that your observations go against the idea that some people choose to embed their characters within a game's continuity and others choose not to?

I have never stated that either.

I would like a logical explanation of how a person can simultaneously not notice and not ignore continuity, followed by why you would consider said person the norm for roleplayers.

And I have never claimed that someone would not notice it, not ignor it(?), and have never claimed that to be the norm for roleplaying.

Here is my only argument, restated for clarity, for you:

-"A sense of discovery, the pattern recognition, and the personal empowerment" are possible to acheive with little or no prepared or previously agreed upon elements and/or director stance shared by the group as a whole.  I personally have experienced them as a regular feature of play.  Others have equally attested to this in Actual play accounts.  Therefore, your claim that

All the above leads to one possible conclusion : that the sense of discovery, the pattern recognition, and the personal empowerment which comes from those, all are impossible in those campaigns in which the gaming reality can be changed at any time by a player.

does not match SEVERAL people's observations.

I have stated my case and there's really nothing more on my part to say.  If you care to discuss it further with me, you are free to clarify your position provided you can do so by giving me the common courtesy of reading my post without adding further "claims" or arguments that aren't there.  

I would be very interested to hear illuminating examples of concrete accounts of play, observations that show us what manner of social posturing and memory revision is going on with folks who show up without a prepared set of elements, who then proceed to create them during play, and utilize director stance, and relate having experienced pattern recognition, discovery of myth themes in play, and personal empowerment- I'd like to hear exactly what they are doing to mystify themselves and revise their experiences.  It would be an insightful look into the power of human conditioning.

Chris

[Christopher Kubasik]

Well, Chris and Chris already... you know, said everything I possibly could have said in reply.  And said it better than I could have.

But I feel compelled to point out those bits in the last post where Chris (Bankuei) says, "I never said that"  -- I never said those things either.  I have no idea where Doc's coming from in those last couple of posts of his.

John,

I do think there's something interesting to be said about the different sense of "discovery" that occurrs in a Participationsim game.  I know of a group that is more than happy to let the GM guide them through all sorts of astounding locations, situations and set-pieces one session after another.  And certainly I've enjoyed that sense of interacting with the world beyond my ability to retro-fit it to my own designs and piece together the GM's imagination and thinking.

But in this thread the discovery of what exactly is a tangle of yarn.  (For example, I'd have no idea if I was finding "mythic" thinking; I always assumed I was piecing together what the GM's brain was like last Tuesday when he prepped the game.)

Perhaps the discussion of this one specific aspect of play could be brought up somewhere else.  For now, I think there's too much vague and muddled baggage attached to the concept.  (cf. all of the points made by Chris and Chris above.)

Best,

Christopher

[Marco]

John,

I do think there's something interesting to be said about the different sense of "discovery" that occurrs in a Participationsim game.  I know of a group that is more than happy to let the GM guide them through all sorts of astounding locations, situations and set-pieces one session after another.  And certainly I've enjoyed that sense of interacting with the world beyond my ability to retro-fit it to my own designs and piece together the GM's imagination and thinking.

Best,

Christopher

Are you limiting this to text-book hard-core Participationism (i.e. the players are simply being told a story and sometimes roll dice, where the numbers that come up have no effect on said story) or just using that term as a traditional players-and-GM's set up?

-Marco