Exploration does not equal Bricolage.

[Silmenume]

I broke this off from Xenopulse's (Christian) thread Complications Instead of Failure as I felt this would be too far out of the original subject matter.  A link to the post I am responding to is here.

Hey Jason!

I don't see a conflict between concessions and bricolage either, but I'm willing to accept that's because I probably don't get what exactly is meant by bricolage.  I don't see anything unique in bricolage from roleplaying in general, and I don't think pure bricolage is possible. ...

There are a number topics I wish to try and address – starting with the notion that there is not "anything unique in bricolage from roleplaying in general."  That is a rather tricky argument because I am not sure what is meant by "roleplaying in general."  One on hand we can describe role-play as Exploration as it has been glossed – the sharing of imaginings.  Exploration straight up does not mean a CA is being effectively expressed.  Thus if we are speaking about straight CA-less Exploration (Zilchplay) then Exploration and bricolage are not the same - as conversation and story telling are not the same.

OTOH we could take the path that "roleplaying" means "CA expression".  Using this interpretation I could understand your statement as saying that bricolage is not unique from "CA expression" (roleplay in general).  Again this is not the case.  Bricolage is one of many tools of CA expression but is not self-same with CA expression.  I am not saying that you are saying this, I am just trying to understand where you are coming from.

I agree with you that "pure bricolage" is not possible in role-play.  (It is possible to have "pure bricolage" but that is myth making and not germane to this thread.)  Any "meta-game" discussion is outside the realm of bricolage and that includes good ol' resolution mechanics.  This is not to imply anything bad about mechanics its just an observation. One cannot engage in Exploration and have "pure bricolage," it's a category error. 

...Someone has to be introducing new elements (engineering) or all you'll get is unguided group meditation (or less harshly, Walt's Zilchplay concept).  I don't see why this specific method of introducing new elements impedes such play, when other methods (which must be happening if we are roleplaying) do not?

Yes, someone does have to be introducing new "elements" but who, how and why are very different for the GM and The Players^TM.  But the real question here is what is meant by "elements."  Do you mean the elements of Exploration – Character, Setting, Situation, Color and System?  IOW who gets to introduce a new Character or a piece of Setting or perhaps set up Situation?  That is an interesting question and one I have not fully thought through, yet.  However, lets start with some of the first principles of bricolage.

The Bricoleur must use what is already available to him – that is he is not creating something from scratch to fit a very specific role.  (That is the engineering paradigm).  That is the design of the object must be able to function with what is available or, stated another way, the bricoleur must react based upon what is available.  In Sim role-play terms this tends to mean that the players are in a "reaction mode." That is while they are trying to accomplish something they can only do so with what is or has happened.

Let's take Situation and look at it from the eyes of an Engineer and the eyes of a Bricoleur.  An Engineer would "build" a Situation to suit a specific need.  This happens all the time in pervy Narrativism.  The players are overtly empowered to create Situations of a very specific design so that the Premise question can be posed and responded to.  The manner in which the Premise is addressed, though, is via the entailments – i.e., fallout.  The player trying to do X must choose whether or not he will chose path A or path B based upon the premise addressing entailments/fallout.  The results of the player's course of action isn't as important as the choice among the "costs" involved in making the decision between fallout A and fallout B.  However, to ensure that the entailments are Premise relevant, the players Engineer Situation (i.e., create a specific situation for a specific task) such that the choices that are made available to the player all carry the necessary and desired entailments.  To create the entailment is to Engineer the part.

To the Bricoleur Situation is the milieu where one can engage in bricolage – employing the objects, with their current entailments, that are already available to the player.  Now the players can "propose" via bricolage new entailments as long as they are seen as analogous to previous entailments.  This is different from Narrativism as the Premise relevant entailments are created by the players before they are employed while in Sim the players must deal with the entailments as they are at the time of employment and attempt to have them evolve in a desired pathway through judicious and imaginative employment.  Now Joshua BishopRoy rightly pointed out that objects typically have many entailments and I think this is an asset to Sim play.  Hence most Sim games are really best served by rich source material which facilitates the pre-seeding of entailments before play actually commences.

Entailments are how CA is concretely expressed.  In Nar players create the possible fallouts.  In Gam effectiveness is rated in the successes/failures.  In Sim you have the players' ability to cope with the entailments – those expected and those unexpected.

So who overtly introduces "new" elements or objects into play in Sim?  The GM.  In free bricolage every interaction between Character and Setting (which is Situation) is a potential moment for bricolage.  This is where things get tricky for Sim play.  Every new physical thing has the potential to alter the entailments of existing objects.  Thus there lies an inherent conflict of interest if a player starts introducing new objects into play outside of bricolage (i.e., meta-game processes).  A Sim game can function effectively with player input outside of Bricolage, but the more of that input the less meaningful becomes the evaluation of the player's creativity and effectiveness at dealing with the entailments.  IOW the more things a player puts directly into play outside of bricolage the more watered down the bricolage process becomes.  Like Force in Nar play such input weakens the expression of the CA.

The GM fills the "sheds" and the players engage in bricolage in Sim.

Hey Elliot,

I was hoping to address you comments in the Complications Instead of Failure thread.  You posed some very interesting questions.  I was hoping to explore them directly, but I have rambled on too long here already.

[ewilen]

That's cool, Jay. I'll just set it up for you again and you can whack it off the tee.

First, I note that you refer to "the GM" as the person who overtly introduces new objects into play. In the spirit of the other thread and Forge discussion, I think it might be worth asking if "the GM" is a specific person, or if "the GM" instead refers to someone whom the bricoleur stands in relation to.

You also mention that the bricoleur can "propose" new entailments, and my question is, what determines which entailments get accepted?

In a related question, how can you tell the difference between an entailment and a "new object"?

(Right now I'm thinking that a critical observer can't really tell the difference. All he can do is observe that the participants sort things into one category or the other; he might also be able to gain some insight into the process including its political, social, formal, etc. aspects.)

[Jason Lee]

Well, heya Jay!

By "not unique from role-playing in general" I actually meant "present in Nar and Gam", which I admit wasn't very clear.  Bricolage appears to me to be just one of the fundamental ways in which people interact with the SIS.  People can modify existing elements or create new ones - both actions occur in any role-playing.  So, I suppose I was saying that bricolage is part of Exploration (if we are talking about Exploration as a process and not a collection of objects).  I wouldn't say it was the whole though, because engineering is also part of the process.

By elements I did mean exploration elements, like situation and character.  Though I didn't have a scope in mind, so that could mean a whole new character or simply an aspect of a character that was previously undefined (like what their sixth birthday party was like).

I was going to start talking about ring species, the non-existence of opportunity costs, induction/deduction, negative definitions of Sim, how meta-game concerns are techniques and not agendas, and all sorts of other wackiness that might have gone somewhere... but I think I should check my understanding of bricolage instead:

This is an actual play example from last session...

The previous few sessions went like so:  The characters went to this planet where a gateway to an under/mirror world sprung up and had to fetch someone from the underside.  There was much darkness and boating.  There was a little quarreling over fruit.  It all ended up all being a strange spin on Christianity - if the underside denizens found out about the normal world then the devil would make with the apocalypse.

At the beginning of the session I had to decide what my character would do.  Try to close the portal?  or let the situation lie? 

The next GM was ready to go, and a couple players would've tried to set me on fire with their brains if I started introducing more conflicts.  I wasn't terribly worried about catching fire, but I was also ready for it to end (even though it was quite a bit of fun).  The story had already climaxed, so play would have been pretty weak if we'd tried to pick it back up.  I had my decision.  I needed to let it lie.  The choice was made for both social and dramatic reasons.

So, I set myself to the difficult task of motivating my character to let it lie.  I decided that she wanted to close the portal, so that there was no risk to the locals, but she would not because it was the only path to a world that wasn't under the thumb of an evil god.  She couldn't bring herself to extinguish hope even if it would ensure safety.  In the processes of justifying this viewpoint I expanded the concept that the god of the sea (the devil) and the underworld where the same entity.  The locals had made similar statements, such as referring to the god of the sea as the sea itself.  My expansion of the concept was that the god of the sea made the world, and that hope could not exist in a realm created and ruled by an evil god.

I used only existing elements of my character.  I had to make up new elements about the world, but they grew directed out of the existing material.  I had meta-game reasons.  It was obviously Nar. 

Bricolage or engineering?  It looks like both to me, though mostly bricolage.

[ewilen]

Hi, Jason. Um...

ring species

What?

About your example, I don't understand--are you saying that your character decided to let it lie after all because she realized that the god of the sea (the devil) had created the underworld, and thus the underworld was not a path to hope?

Personally, I think it sounds like engineering, because one of the things you had to make up was "This is a good justification for why my character acted (believed/was motivated) in that way."

[Jason Lee]

Hi, Jason. Um...

ring species

What?

That part really wasn't suppose to make any sense...  I was planning to use the concept of species as an analogy for why the concept of opportunity costs doesn't apply across layers in the big model, because the distinction between Exploration, Creative Agenda and Techniques/Ephemera is a useful tool and not a reality of play.   Opportunity costs is the idea, from economics I think, that you only have X amount of resources (brain power in this case) and have to divide them across want you want - so if you explore more you agenda less.  Ring species are a phenomena in evolution that can occur around a "circular" geographic boundary, like a lake or mountain range.  Up at the "top" of the ring you start with a species which spreads out around the boundary in both directions and gets on with diversifying.  You end up with a series of species, in both directions around the ring, that can interbreed with each other, but where the ring finally meets at the "bottom" those species cannot interbreed.  It was meant to be an illustration of how the concept of discrete species is more of a mechanism for human communication than compartments we could say actually exist in nature.  It also reminds me of the Beeg Horseshoe Theory, but that's not really important.

About your example, I don't understand--are you saying that your character decided to let it lie after all because she realized that the god of the sea (the devil) had created the underworld, and thus the underworld was not a path to hope?

Personally, I think it sounds like engineering, because one of the things you had to make up was "This is a good justification for why my character acted (believed/was motivated) in that way."

Yeah, that's what I was trying to get across in my example.

I think it sounds like engineering too, because I intentional created that justification.  However, I only modified existing SIS elements to create that justification.  The intent, the need to justify, was only in my head.  What happened between the people, in play, looks like bricolage to me.

[ewilen]

Ring species...okay, thanks.

If I understand correctly, you're saying that the people, in play, couldn't tell if you were engineering or bricoling. You took stuff in the SIS and used it, unaltered, to create something new in the SIS: your character's actions and, possibly, publicly stated conclusions and intentions.

But since you were after all engineering in your head, I have two ways of looking at things within Jay's paradigm.

1) You were GMing/engineering, and in fact your GMing style was a form of intuitive continuity ("no myth") without the knowledge of the other players.

2) You were bricoling, but only if we take bricolage as applying specifically to objects within the SIS.

[Jason Lee]

Ring species...okay, thanks.

If I understand correctly, you're saying that the people, in play, couldn't tell if you were engineering or bricoling. You took stuff in the SIS and used it, unaltered, to create something new in the SIS: your character's actions and, possibly, publicly stated conclusions and intentions.

But since you were after all engineering in your head, I have two ways of looking at things within Jay's paradigm.

1) You were GMing/engineering, and in fact your GMing style was a form of intuitive continuity ("no myth") without the knowledge of the other players.

2) You were bricoling, but only if we take bricolage as applying specifically to objects within the SIS.

Yeah, it looks like we are on the same page.  I was not the GM at the time, but I was employing some director stance, which is the same as far as I'm concerned.

I guess where my understanding of bricolage is lacking then is that I don't really see the disinction between 1 & 2, because don't we kind of have to assume bricolage is refering only to moments in which the SIS is interacted with, just by definition?  The value judgements of a character action and other intent business that happens inside the head of all players is not necessarily going to be visible, but they can constitute a creative agenda.  So, I'm seeing bricolage more as a Technique/Ephemera, like its dirty little cousins Stance... all assuming I even understand what is meant by bricolage.

[Jason Lee]

like its dirty little cousins Stance...

Actor Stance

[ewilen]

Jason,

If you haven't read Victor's threads on Dethroning the SIS and Shared Imagined Space, Shared Text (particularly the latter) I think they might be worth a look. I'm sure there are other threads including some started by Chris Lehrich, as well some articles by John Kim ("Story and Narrative Paradigm in RPG's" and others). The reason I raise these is that there is a tendency in some Forge discourse to treat the "stuff" outside the SIS in a sort of undifferentiated manner. These threads and articles address the "stuff" and break down its structure and dynamics, shining light on categories such as private imaginings and judgments as well as public utterances which aren't "officially" part of the "game world". There may be contexts in which these distinctions are irrelevent or could even be considered illusory, but in other contexts, such as when we're focusing on the interaction between individual aesthetics/psychologies, they're highly relevant.

In plain terms, I'm not sure I completely understand what Jay, or Chris, or Claude Levi-Strauss mean by bricolage...but I think I can tell the difference between analyzing my character and engineering him or her. Even if that is an illusion, it's a "real illusion", and we should be able to turn our inquiry toward questions such as how such an illusion comes about, and what can be done to foster the illusion (if it's aesthetically desirable).

--Elliot

[Silmenume]

Ok.  Elliot's first up cuz he responded first!

First, I note that you refer to "the GM" as the person who overtly introduces new objects into play. In the spirit of the other thread and Forge discussion, I think it might be worth asking if "the GM" is a specific person, or if "the GM" instead refers to someone whom the bricoleur stands in relation to.

For a number of reasons, which I will try to enumerate, I believe that Sim is best served by having a single player with the vested authority of GM responsibilities.  As mythic Bricolage is the dialectic between "culture" (as embodied in the PC) and "nature" (embodied in Setting and resolution mechanics) having the same player input on both sides of the conflict actually deflates the tension.  To borrow from Valamir –

What does it take to realize the potential Conflict in a situation?

1) At least one player must be interested in the situation and committed to seeing the situation change.  The engine for that change in most role-playing games is the player's character.

2) The situation must involve adversity.  The change that the player desires to see occur cannot happen without effort or sacrifice. Typically it is the player's character that experiences the effort or sacrifice.

3) For a Conflict to be relevant there must be consequences that alter the SiS for both success and failure.  Whatever the outcome, once a Character gets involved, the SiS will be changed.  There must be something at stake.

It is possible to have a situation resolve in a manner that changes the SiS but is not a Conflict because there is no adversity.  For instance, take any background event involving solely NPCs run by the GM, or any situation which is proposed and resolved by the same player.  If the same player is representing both the adversity and the force for change then there can be no conflict because both sides are ultimately in agreement (being run by the same person).  There may be the illusion of conflict.  The single player may pretend to be opposed to himself, but ultimately there is no real adversity.

If there were "floating GM's" there exists the possibility of a potential conflict of interest.  A player could accidentally or purposefully (it really doesn't matter) both set up a conflict (via the introduction of certain Setting elements) and then wind up having his Character face said conflict.

In a related question, how can you tell the difference between an entailment and a "new object"?

I have taken the liberty to answer your 3rd question before your 2nd.  I hope you don't mind.  Basically, an "entailment" is a quality...

We've said that particular things have entailments constituted by their intrinsic properties and their prior uses in bricolage...

An "object" is anything physical.  In ForgeSpeak^TM any physical object that is not one's Character is Setting.

And to be clear, a myth or a ritual []is the machine[/i].  It is the result of such a process.  The concrete objects are things in nature, like flowers and animals and such.

Underlining added by me.

The above obviously refers to myth, but in role-play "things" are any physical objects in the SIS.  However in Sim we are not creating a myth, but are engaging in mythic style thinking.

Now...

You also mention that the bricoleur can "propose" new entailments, and my question is, what determines which entailments get accepted?

...this is a very good question.  The empty answer would be to say, "the players."  As a starting point I borrow from Chris again –

We ask, "Is the structure of this thing analogous to the structure of (part of) my CA?"  And "Is the structure of this thing analogous to the structure of (part of) my Social Contract?"  We can answer this question immediately, because the way we got that thing into the game in the first place was by understanding it as a structure, as range of possibilities rather than an iron, so we've already done the structural work.  We just say, "structure A, structure B: are they close?"  Sort of like saying, "this is blue, that's blue, they're both blue."  For the same reason as we can see that both are blue, or both are trees, or both are mechanics, we can also see that this mechanic will not violate CA without ever posing the question directly.

Thus I could say that when the structures are similar enough (that is the new entailment {which is a structure} is judged to be a sufficiently similar structure) the new entailment is accepted (given credibility) and applied by the GM.  One of the consequences of this arrangement is that to the player "proposing" the new entailment it seems like he is discovering something new about the world.  The irony is that it is the proposing player who is actually "creating" something new in the world – all the GM (and by extension of the Lumpley Principle all the players) is doing is validating the new entailment.  Are the players entirely passive in this process if the GM is "making all the decisions?"  No.  In the game I play in, if a player proposes a particularly interesting or creative entailment then players at the table will indicate their approval by high fives, hooting, pumping fists in the air, etc.

Have I addressed your questions adequately?  Let me know!

Jason!  I will respond to you soon.

P.S.  I would like to quickly note that, like the Big Model, I am not discussing what goes on inside a Player's head, but rather what is actualized via Exploration at the table.  For the purposes of this discussion, what goes on inside a player's head is largely irrelevant.  I am talking about what is shared at the table and the form of that sharing.  IOW what are we as players actually doing at the table when we are engaged in those moments that we refer to as those moments of role-play (i.e, CA is being expressed via our input about our decisions that are meant for the "fact space" of the SIS).

[ewilen]

Hey, Jay, I'm going to have to think about your answers later but for now I just want to clarify that one of the above quotes is me, not Chris. ("What determines which entailments get accepted?") Just so that nobody gets confused...

Regards,

Elliot

[Jason Lee]

Jason,

If you haven't read Victor's threads on Dethroning the SIS and Shared Imagined Space, Shared Text (particularly the latter) I think they might be worth a look. I'm sure there are other threads including some started by Chris Lehrich, as well some articles by John Kim ("Story and Narrative Paradigm in RPG's" and others). The reason I raise these is that there is a tendency in some Forge discourse to treat the "stuff" outside the SIS in a sort of undifferentiated manner. These threads and articles address the "stuff" and break down its structure and dynamics, shining light on categories such as private imaginings and judgments as well as public utterances which aren't "officially" part of the "game world". There may be contexts in which these distinctions are irrelevant or could even be considered illusory, but in other contexts, such as when we're focusing on the interaction between individual aesthetics/psychologies, they're highly relevant.

In plain terms, I'm not sure I completely understand what Jay, or Chris, or Claude Levi-Strauss mean by bricolage...but I think I can tell the difference between analyzing my character and engineering him or her. Even if that is an illusion, it's a "real illusion", and we should be able to turn our inquiry toward questions such as how such an illusion comes about, and what can be done to foster the illusion (if it's aesthetically desirable).

I had not read Victor's thread, so thanks for pointing it out.  I went ahead and read it, then I reread John's essay, then I mowed my lawn.  I hate mowing my lawn.  I should probably reread everything Chris ever wrote.  There is a lot of insight in those posts, but it's hard to remember all the details.  That'll probably have to wait until I have a few free months.

I don't intend to discard player actions and thoughts that can be classified as outside the SIS, but I don't think they are applicable to bricolage.  I'm actually rather preoccupied with how to create similarity among the perceived events that exist in each individual player's heads - enough similarity that when those players "touch" the SIS they do so at the same point.  The bricolage/engineering dichotomy seems to be specifically concerned with how elements in the SIS and molded are moved about, so I think that intent is simply outside its scope.

I was going to start an actual play thread sort of related to this about cliche and genre, but I think I'll wait and give Jay the opportunity to respond first.  I guess I should give him a head start.  My thinking is:  cliche is to genre, as entailment is to myth.  In other words:  genre is akin to myth, and the use of genre is bricolage.  So a very common example of bricolage in role-playing is the use of genre.

[Silmenume]

Sorry about the mix-up Elliot... and thanks for the clarification!  All that cutting and pasting is bound to gum up at some point or another.

Hey Jason,

I'm actually rather preoccupied with how to create similarity among the perceived events that exist in each individual player's heads - enough similarity that when those players "touch" the SIS they do so at the same point.  The bricolage/engineering dichotomy seems to be specifically concerned with how elements in the SIS and molded are moved about, so I think that intent is simply outside its scope.

You are half right.  The thing is that the bricolage/engineering-analogy does reach into thinking processes.  At one level both "processes" are methodologies of knowing.  The basic difference between the two, as I understand it, is that the bricoleur (such as the myth maker) can only play with memes using tools are already available to him and deals with the "odd fittings" as an intrinsic part of the process while the "engineer," if he has an idea that is not readily represented by what tools already exist, will create a new tool specifically designed to address that need and only that need.  In a round about way one can say that the engineer is actually paring down any entailments before the tool is used while the bricoleur tries to find ways, using already existing tools, to make the entailments manageable while doing so in an aesthetically pleasing way.  In Sim terms the aesthetically pleasing part is the wow factor while the already existing tools include the entirety of Character history and Setting history (with Mechanics sitting in there in an oddly uncomfortable sort of way).  The intent of both means (bricolage and engineering) are the same, but how they go about creating "knowing" are very different.

My thinking is:  cliche is to genre, as entailment is to myth.  In other words:  genre is akin to myth, and the use of genre is bricolage.  So a very common example of bricolage in role-playing is the use of genre.

I've spent some time thinking this over and I'm not getting it.  I think part of it stems from not being sure what is meant by "genre" and "cliché."  For example, bricolage is a process while genre is a quality or thing depending on the definition.  One could possibly say that Genre is very loosely analogous to Setting (specifically culture) and like culture does provide a background of meanings that seed the mythic bricolage process.  However, culture (or in the case of Sim – the Dream) is a product of the mythic bricolage style process as people try and make sense of the physical world and their relationship and/or place in it.

I'm not sure I'm helping – I'm no expert myself, but that is my understanding.

[Jason Lee]

You are half right.  The thing is that the bricolage/engineering-analogy does reach into thinking processes.  At one level both "processes" are methodologies of knowing.  The basic difference between the two, as I understand it, is that the bricoleur (such as the myth maker) can only play with memes using tools are already available to him and deals with the "odd fittings" as an intrinsic part of the process while the "engineer," if he has an idea that is not readily represented by what tools already exist, will create a new tool specifically designed to address that need and only that need.  In a round about way one can say that the engineer is actually paring down any entailments before the tool is used while the bricoleur tries to find ways, using already existing tools, to make the entailments manageable while doing so in an aesthetically pleasing way.  In Sim terms the aesthetically pleasing part is the wow factor while the already existing tools include the entirety of Character history and Setting history (with Mechanics sitting in there in an oddly uncomfortable sort of way).  The intent of both means (bricolage and engineering) are the same, but how they go about creating "knowing" are very different.

I don't disagree that differences in thinking are involved in bricolage/engineering, just that the behavior, the process, is really what bricolage refers to.

I've spent some time thinking this over and I'm not getting it.  I think part of it stems from not being sure what is meant by "genre" and "cliché."  For example, bricolage is a process while genre is a quality or thing depending on the definition.  One could possibly say that Genre is very loosely analogous to Setting (specifically culture) and like culture does provide a background of meanings that seed the mythic bricolage process.  However, culture (or in the case of Sim – the Dream) is a product of the mythic bricolage style process as people try and make sense of the physical world and their relationship and/or place in it.

I've went ahead and made my cliche/genre post:  Cliche, Genre, Theme, Myth.  Maybe that'll explain where I'll coming from.   To simplify, I'm saying that genre is myth.  Bricolage creates them both, and their use and growth is also bricolage.

Sim has been problematic since its conception.  To date, only M.J.'s discovery/learning definition seems logically valid to me.  I just still can't figure out whether or not it actually exists.  Fortunately, the current state of the Big Model allows us to talk about Creative Agenda in the abstract - I can believe in 2 agendas and Harvey can believe in 24 and we can still communicate.

When I say bricolage seems like a Technique, I say so with a certain amount of discomfort.  That seems like the correct classification within the Big Model, but I don't feel the concept fits well into the model.  Much of the stuff Chris went into doesn't map to the Big Model well.  It's not suppose to.  I don't think bricolage will provide an identify for Sim.  From what I can see, it doesn't meet the criteria for a Creative Agenda nor is it a process unique from Nar or Gam.  It is, admittedly, difficult to discuss anything around here without it being mapped to the Big Model somehow - whether or not it actually fits.

The concept of meta-game free play is just fine, but within the Big Model that classifies as a Technique and not a Creative Agenda.  I also don't think meta-game free and bricolage are all that related.  There is always a purpose, a need, of some kind (an agenda if you will).  Concessions can be built from existing material, just like my hope example.

[Silmenume]

So, Mister Lee, we meet again!

I don't disagree that differences in thinking are involved in bricolage/engineering, just that the behavior, the process, is really what bricolage refers to.

Well, yes and no.  Because the "process (or behavior)" of bricolage does exhibit a distinct behavior from that of an engineering based process to achieve similar goals (a working solution to a problem) it follows, ipso facto, that bricolage uses a different methodology of thinking as well.  However, I must take some blame for not being entirely clear (of perhaps just plain lazy) for not using the full term, "mythic bricolage" or "mythic style bricolage;" which does carry some very important additional connotations.

When I say bricolage seems like a Technique, I say so with a certain amount of discomfort.  That seems like the correct classification within the Big Model, but I don't feel the concept fits well into the model.  Much of the stuff Chris went into doesn't map to the Big Model well.  It's not suppose to.

I'm not sure I should speak on Chris' behalf, but if you look at his Bricolage APPLIED thread he very explicitly marries bricolage with many concepts of the Big Model.  However, I too believe that bricolage does not fit well with the Model – as it stands.  My prelimiary thoughts right now are something along the lines of –

[Social Contract [Exploration [Creative Agenda --> [Techniques [Ephemera-->[Bricolage]]]]]].

I believe this last (proposed) layer has never been really noticed because given that both Narrativism and Gamism function so effectively at the concept level (engineering paradigm) that there was never really a pressing need to spend much time here.  I mean, what would such thinking avail given how effectively the Big Model does function?  The Big Model is process oriented which is one of its greatest values.  It very successfully and elegantly describes and accounts for many, many behaviors – especially the difficult to comprehend but rather straightforward idea of Creative Agenda and how to diagnose it as well as design for it.

Except it does not effectively account for Sim.  It does not describe an observable, describable and unifying process of play for Sim play.  We know for example that Nar play is ultimately centered around or harnessed to the Address of Premise.  How incredibly liberating!  Because we have this anchoring concept we can go hog wild with creating all sorts of new mechanics systems because there is this important and relatively easily understood anchor.  It gives the designer either a starting point or an ending point or merely a reference point, but it does anchor the process.  Callan has been doing some interesting theorizing opening up the understanding of Gam via his theorizing about Challenge.  I believe this too will lead to some exciting new Gamist facilitating game designs.  This is all possible because we have a decent and growing understanding of what sits at the core of both those Creative Agendas.  Its all pretty straight forward because both the Big Model and the expression of the G/N CA's are "concept" oriented.  IOW they "speak" the same language.  The problem is that Sim is not "concept" oriented but "structure" oriented and thus is not well served by the Big Model – it just doesn't have the tools yet to describe Sim effectively.  Sim is a big question mark precisely because the Big Model is concept oriented, which also explains why the "last layer" has never really been resolved to any great resolution.  We call it the SIS but the tools provided by all the previous layers of the Big Model are inadequate to the task of describing what's going on in there.  With G/N it wasn't really necessary to delve into this layer as they functioned very effectively on the concept level anyway.  If it ain't broke – don't fix it!

Yet it is broke – for Sim.  This is most certainly NOT the result of some inborn prejudice on any level, rather I think it is because Sim is such a cultural anomaly.  Let's look at the Venn diagrams with the action of the CA's substituted for the placeholder "Creative Agenda." –

• [Social Contract [Exploration [Addressing Premise --> [Techniques [Ephemera-->[Bricolage]]]]]].
• [Social Contract [Exploration [Addressing Challenge --> [Techniques [Ephemera-->[Bricolage]]]]]].
• [Social Contract [Exploration [Mythic Bricolage --> [Techniques [Ephemera-->[Bricolage]]]]]].

I don't think bricolage will provide an identify for Sim.  From what I can see, it doesn't meet the criteria for a Creative Agenda nor is it a process unique from Nar or Gam.

Actually mythic bricolage intrinsically encompasses both an aesthetic as well as a process – which does qualify it as Creative Agenda.  The hard part to understand is that the aesthetic is based upon the source Setting material.  Setting – not just objects but as the various "structures" implicit – both physical and most especially social.  I don't think that the short post here will sufficiently explain what I am trying to communicate and I hope to be able to post something that is more coherent and in depth in the future covering all of this as a constructive whole.

The concept of meta-game free play is just fine, but within the Big Model that classifies as a Technique and not a Creative Agenda.  I also don't think meta-game free and bricolage are all that related.  There is always a purpose, a need, of some kind (an agenda if you will).

I do not believe that Sim is entirely meta-game free, rather I think thepriority of mythic bricolage discourages or at least attempts to deny the existence of "meta-game" activities.  However, I do believe much of what could called, "meta-game" does occur – at a time other than the game itself.  There is nothing in mythic bricolage that says that it is without a purpose – actually mythic bricolage is brought to bear because there is a "need" – it most certainly does have an agenda!  I think the difficulty people have wrapping one's mind around the idea of mythic bricolage is that it is structurally based, not concept (engineering paradigm) based.  That is only a preliminary conjecture on my part, but I think there is merit to it.

Concessions can be built from existing material, just like my hope example.

I am sure they can be, but that wasn't my point.  My point was that the players, as opposed to the GM, are NOT the ones building the concessions/entailments in Sim.  Building concessions is an engineering process.  That is the players would be creating their own fallout.  The methodology of bricolage is such that the players must deal with the fallout as it is exists.  They must make their choices with the costs (as it were) as they are.  This is analogous to the bricoleur scavenging for his parts and having to make do with what he has on hand as opposed to milling and machining a part to meet his specific need; which is an engineering process.  So, yes, concessions could be built from existing material – but the critical point is that the players are not the ones building the concessions.  This is definitional of bricolage.

I hope this makes my position a bit clearer.  Let me know!