Vincent's Standard Rant: Power, Credibility and Assent

[Emily Care]

Reactive "system statements" are player statements ceded credibility during play (with modification or filtering) by the system.

Prescriptive "system statements" are author/designer statements encoded in the system, ceded credibility in play by the GM.

This is an excellent and useful description of what's being discussed.

My only remaining quibble is that credibility is ceded by all game participants to the statements or modifications/filtering done by gm or system, respectively.  GM and system authority rest on acceptance and compliance of players and gm.  

If that doesn't fit or sit well, then I very much agree to disagree. No problem.

Added at 10:27am:

I truely feel that there is a bit of Frankenstein complex going on here. That people are responding negatively to the idea of being controlled by a machine or mechanic...(snipped)

Game must eat BRAINS!!!!

No, but seriously, maybe I've been overstating it, but the most important distinction being made is simply that when we use system, it is always by choice and the only reason it "works" so to speak is that we choose to accept the effects it gives us. We're actually more limited by social pressure than the system.  

The issue is that the common "rules are law" contracts of play end up "enslaving" people to system, when a looser approach could allow for a broader apportionment of power.  

I'll move on now, really....

--Emily Care

[Valamir]

I was thinking about this last night, and a quirky little example occured to me.  Bear with me a moment, it will all make sense in the end (I hope).

Take a kingdom.  In this kingdom there is a noble.  The noble has a tremendous amount of power and authority.  The noble appoints a Sheriff (a Shire Reeve).  He vests this sheriff with the authority to collect taxes and round up people who break the Nobles laws.  The sheriff himself is not the source of his own power.  He holds power only because he is acting in the name of the noble, who is the source of his power.  But once appointed he is free to do pretty much whatever he wants.

He can squeeze the people for additional taxes (because what ever he collects in excess of what is expected he gets to keep) he can knock heads, and pretty much do as he likes.  

Until the noble decides he doesn't like what the sheriff is doing, at which point the sheriff might amend his behavior to keep the noble happy or risk being given the boot and replaced with a new sheriff.  But until that happens the sheriff is the man and all the people of the shire go out of their way to do what he says and avoid crossing him.
[/metaphor]

For those waiting for a translation:

The Noble represents the players, the source of all power.
The Sheriff is the game rules.
The Sheriffs behavior is the game rules telling the players what is and isn't allowed.
The Shire people are the players in another form, the form they agree to submit to when they (as the Noble) put the sheriff in charge.

Point of this being to illustrate my view that the rules actually do have real power and real authority until such time as the players (as nobles) revoke it.  Its not an illusionary semantic the rules are just a filter with no actual importance thing.  The rules have real power and real authority and (I would say) real credibility, because the player have vested those things in the rules until such time as they take them back.  The rules are "acting in the players name" so to speak just as the sheriff acts in the nobles name, and because the players have credibility...so does the system.

One thing I like about this illustration is that is also illustrates a common source of discontent in play groups.  That being when 1 (or a few) players act as the noble and choose the system while the rest of the players get to only be the shire folk who are expected to submitt to the system.  

Anyway...kind of silly, but I thought I'd share it.

[Le Joueur]

Thanks for the reply Mike,

Fang we are at an apparent semantic impasse, and I do not see it as a "chicken/egg" thing.

You say that the system can "affirm" or "deny". How is that not authority?

That is Authority, but not a 'statement' from my perspective.  That's why I separated Authority from Credibility in the first place.  The system has the Authority to grant Credibility to a statement made by any person.  Its Authority does not actually becomes statements in and of themselves.  (Thumbs up and thumbs down are not statements but authorization of other statements.)

So you can continue to argue about statements if you like. And you'll be right as it is a semantic thing. The question is not, "Can we look at it that way?" We certainly can look at it that way. The question is, "Does it make for a more useful theory to look at it that way?" To which I would answer, no, not at all. It makes complete sense and is very useful to look at the rules as another entity which the players can place credibility in.

When I read through this discussion it seems to break down into people who believe systems make their own statements and people who only see people making statements.  The whole argument is about the details of whether a system can make Credible statements of its own.

When it comes to looking at whether it make useful theory, I look at it in two potential cases:

Only the Participants Make Statements

The system is employed either by its Authority or by the Authority vested in it by the participants to determine whose statements are valid (Credible) and therefore 'actually happen' in the game.

[/list:u]

The System Makes Statements Unique to It

There's this other thing, the system, in there making statements all its own.  The inherent problem I see is defining who the system is, how it makes statements, when those statement are Credible and how, and what 'rights' it has as a member of the narrative.[/list:u][/list:u]Between the two, one adds an extra 'speaker' whose identity will never be accepted uniformly and is thus nebulous; I believe having this 'extra body' at the table is more complicated and this kind of complication, to me, opposes elegance in design and theory, making it 'less useful.'

Hence the offer to agree to disagree.  You appear to be saying that 'statements made by the system' are actually collectively made by the group consensus.  While that isn't as complicated as 'the system makes its own statements,' I still choose the less complicated theory.

(The chicken is 'system over all' and the egg is 'participant empower the system.'  Which came first?  Social contract?  Society?  Civilization?  Mankind?  It's all a matter of opinion.)

Fang Langford

[Valamir]

Interesting Fang.  I actually view the version that has fewer terms, less need for explicit differentiation, and merely treats the system as another participant (albiet a non human one) at the table, as being the simpler of the two.

Its probably not surprising that you select the other...after all you're the guy who introduces latin into your gaming jargon ;) <big grin>

[Le Joueur]

Thanks Ralph,

A analogy is very helpful.

For those waiting for a translation:

The Noble represents the players, the source of all power.
The Sheriff is the game rules.
The Sheriff's behavior is the game rules telling the players what is and isn't allowed.
The Shire People are the players in another form, the form they agree to submit to when they (as the Noble) put the sheriff in charge.[/list:u]

The problem I have with your analogy is that you apply it assuming that the "game rules" make statements.

If I might apply it in the alternative?

The Noble represents the rules, the source of all Authority.
The Sheriff is the person making a statement; the Noble has granted him Credibility.
The Sheriff's behavior is considered sacrosanct until the Noble steps in; when the game rules deny the statement.
The Sheriff is required to perform certain actions (collect taxes, punish criminals); the game rules compel some statements.
The Shire Population is the remaining players, the Noble represents them by heritage.[/list:u]This shows what I have been trying to illustrate as the 'other side' of the agreement to disagree.  The Noble isn't present (he doesn't make any statements), but his Authority is felt in varying measures.

Point of this being to illustrate my view that the rules actually do have real power and real authority until such time as the players (as nobles) revoke it.

I never countered this idea.  In fact, saying that the rules have Authority was my idea in the first place (even though I waited to clarify it).  The alternative analogy I present demonstrates how the rules (the Noble) exercise that Authority without making any statements in the realm of the Shire Population.

It's not an illusionary semantic the rules are just a filter with no actual importance thing.  The rules have real power and real authority and (I would say) real credibility, because the player have vested those things in the rules until such time as they take them back.  The rules are "acting in the players name" so to speak just as the sheriff acts in the Noble's name, and because the players have credibility...so does the system.

And my point is that the rules are not "acting" at all in the latter analogy.  I don't see how this straw man that 'the rules have no authority' came up.  That has never been said nor stood by.  The whole point with my original post was to separate the power, importance, and Authority of the rules from the acts, behaviors, statements, and Credibility of the participants.

Simply, there are these rules, granted Authority by whomever (I don't really care).  It is the Authority to make any statement made by a participant 'real' in the game world.  Things made real are given Vincent's Credibility.  Only Credible things are 'real' in the shared game world.  What I am also saying is that I do not think that passage or veto of participant statements counts as statements unto themselves (and this is the point of semantic disagreement I am offering to agree upon).  Even when the rules indicate that additional material is added to the game, I don't think that this is the rules 'talking,' I believe it is the gamemaster compelled to.

Thus we reach a point to disagree on, agreed?

Fang Langford

[lumpley]

Fewer terms?  Chicken and egg?  Simpler model?  Practical utility?  Agree to disagree?

Guys, it's about what happens at the gaming table.  I'm not theorizing.  I'm describing.

Nobody's put forward an example of a system making a statement.  Walt and Valamir have put forward examples of players making the statements that the system recommends, and Mike has put forward an example of the system supporting an implication of a player's statement.

There might be good reasons to "think of it as though" the system is a fifth player at the table.  Dunno.  There are certainly good reasons not to, the first being that it's not true.

If the new topic is "is Vincent's descriptive level useful to game designers?", then let's take it to another topic.  If it's "are there good reasons to think of the rules as an additional player, even though they aren't?", then ditto.  The topic here is, to paraphrase my original points:

- Nothing's true in the game until a. a player says it and b. all the players agree that it's true.
- System, mechanics, GMs and so on are all just ways to get the players to all agree that things are true.

If you want to refute those, stick around, and come up with some good examples.

-Vincent

[Mike Holmes]

That is Authority, but not a 'statement' from my perspective.  That's why I separated Authority from Credibility in the first place.  

You mean why I separated them in the first place. Your one and only thread before I came up with that division says nothing about authority (other than to mention how it's not applicable in relation to something about proprietorship).

In fact I was laboring under the idea that you did not accept the distinction at all. I cannot see in that original post where you do any such thing as talk about authority. You merely say how you apportion credibility in Scattershot. Which is just an example of what all rules systems do. Looking at any post prior to this, I cannot see any point at which you even jumped on this bandwagon.

You say at one point that we are mangling Vincents original meaning. And you are right, we are. That's the whole point. We do not agree that his model is complete. Which is why I suggested the Authority/Credibility split. Authority being what agent has power derived from the participants, and Credibility being the willingness of the participants to accept a particular decision made by any agent at the moment it's made.

And that is the model that I think works best. Because it does simplify things. Otherwise we have to make all these other rather artificial distinctions about what constitutes a "statement", etc. The model that I refer to says that communications occur as part of creating a shared imaginative experience, and the extent to which any agent has teh ability to alter it is the extent to which it's communication is accepted or Credible. And that statements tend to be more Credible when they are made by an agent that's been invested with authority.

In such a model, the players can give authority to the system ("Hey, let's play D&D") and the system can give autority to the players ("The DM is the final arbiter"). The system can make Credible communication to the players ("Druids are Neutral") and players can make Credible statments ("Johan walks to the door"). Note there is no effective difference in this model between system and human participants. Which makes it simple.

Otherwise you have to constuct that the system is not making "statements" and that as such it is not Credible, all of which gets me nowhere. Because in addition to being more complicated, it means that I am now not allowed to speak about how the system affects play directly. I cannot using your model say that the system informs the players that they should be about killing things. I have to say that they system has authority to give credibility to players only such certain things that they are thereby informed that the game is about killing things. Which seems like a long way to go to say the same thing, and is confusing.

How is my model confusing? Do you think that people are going to mistake systems for humans? ;-)

Mike

[Mark D. Eddy]

The topic here is, to paraphrase my original points:

- Nothing's true in the game until a. a player says it and b. all the players agree that it's true.
- System, mechanics, GMs and so on are all just ways to get the players to all agree that things are true.

If you want to refute those, stick around, and come up with some good examples.

-Vincent

OK... Here's a refute for the 'a' portion of your first point. And it will hold, unless you claim that the system is a player. In a game of GURPS Traveler, the rules say that a Vargr is a canid of a height of roughly 5'6". So Vargr exist in a game of GURPS Traveller, whether the players talk about it or not. A similar premise holds true for  "Grandfather" in the same setting. All the players (especially in my game) know that "Grandfather" is out there, doing whatever project has caught his attention, but it's never come up in my game.

I suppose I'm arguing that setting has its own credibility. Genre Expectations (a la Scattershot) have their own credibility as well.

[Mike Holmes]

Mark,

My bet is that the other side will claim that there is an implicit statement amongst the players that agreeing to playing Traveller means agreeing that all the information in the sourcebooks is true. And that as such only upon utterance of said statement implicit in the agreement to play Traveller, that this is where the "player said" comes in.

But I'm on you're side. That seems a long way to go just so that we can say that the text is not an agent in determining in-game truth. Good example.

Mike

[contracycle]

In a game of GURPS Traveler, the rules say that a Vargr is a canid of a height of roughly 5'6". So Vargr exist in a game of GURPS Traveller, whether the players talk about it or not.

I disagree.  The players may choose to talk about it and agree that Vargr do not in fact exist.  This would not alter their independant existance in a physical product - but it would alter their existance in an actual game.

I think the as-writ rules have a "default" credibility; but it can easily be overuled by the participants.  at may be that such a decision by one group would lower their credibility in the eyes of other Traveler players, though.

[Le Joueur]

That is Authority, but not a 'statement' from my perspective.  That's why I separated Authority from Credibility in the first place.

You mean why I separated them in the first place.

That's absolutely right.  My poorly phrased comment was supposed to be read as "That's why I separated Authority from Credibility, for myself, originally."  I had no intention of claiming ownership of the act of separation, in fact I originally posted "mangled Vincent's terminology" in support of your idea of the separation (which seemed to be getting lost).

Later when Vincent posted, "I'd like to adopt Fang's use of Authority and Credibility." I felt that I needed to make a clear statement about what that was.  You'll note any differences between your and my splits have only become obvious recently.

I suggested the Authority/Credibility split. Authority being what agent has power derived from the participants, and Credibility being the willingness of the participants to accept a particular decision made by any agent at the moment it's made.

And I took up the banner (I thought) but later came to express it differently.  Authority is the power (derived from wherever), not the agent, that grants Credibility to the statements of the players.  Credibility is the 'truth value' of these statements in the game world.

I can see how you believe that Authority is held by an agent, but I don't think that distinction is even necessary.  I agree that ultimately Authority 'goes from' the participants, but the only 'destination' that seems important is the Credibility of the statements.  Introducing an agent to wield this power only complicates matters because there doesn't seem to be a way to agree on what form that agent takes; I say, 'skip the middle.'  It starts at the players and (by mutual agreement) ends at their statements.

I don't think Credibility is the willingness, but [/i]the result[/i] of the willingness of the participants.  Because you're willing to believe, I have Credibility.  Like I said, power from the participants to their statements; no agent needs be conceptualized.  Otherwise an agent must be invoked for each statement, if only tacitly; "I get up," rules consulted, "okay."  I say the agent is the maker of the statement and the Authority passes Credibility to them implicitly, without interference.

You consider the rules a 'fifth player' at the table.  That's just two ways to consider the same terminology.  A perfect place to have our disagreement, non?

Fang Langford

[lumpley]

Mark,

Nice.  Excellent example.

So that leaves us, as far as I'm concerned, with:

- Nothing's true in the game until all the players agree that it's true.
- System, mechanics, GMs and so on are all just ways to get the players to all agree that things are true.

In removing a. from my first point I've implicitly added:
- The game (meaning System, Setting, Situation, Color, Character) can make assertions, which the players then may or may not make true by their assent.

Cool with everybody?

Some of you have been saying this all along.  I wasn't convinced until Mark's example.

-Vincent

[Mike Holmes]

I don't think Credibility is the willingness, but [/i]the result[/i] of the willingness of the participants.  Because you're willing to believe, I have Credibility.  Like I said, power from the participants to their statements; no agent needs be conceptualized.  Otherwise an agent must be invoked for each statement, if only tacitly; "I get up," rules consulted, "okay."  I say the agent is the maker of the statement and the Authority passes Credibility to them implicitly, without interference.

Yep.

Right after I wrote that, I realized that it is the fact that is created consensually that's important.

Anyhow, I think that an important idea is that these things are a sort of currency of transaction in RPGs. That is, if I violate my authority and make a statement about something that oversteps those bounds somehow, then the Credibility of the statment can be nil. For example, as a player in a game in which there exists the "traditional" GM/Player power split as authority, and I say something like, "I find a +10 Sword of Death!" That statement may have no credibility at all. As I have not been given authority to give my character such an item. Further, I can make statements of such abuse of authority that I lose authority. For example, if I am reading my dice close up, and cheat, and I am discovered, I may then be reqired to roll where all can see. My authority to roll and interperet said roll away from the table has been lost.

A lot of dysfunction can be described using this theory, I think. Railroading comes to mind as a case where the GM may be abusing his authority to make decisions for the PCs either openly or using poor Illusionism technique, etc. The GM is still being given authority despite the fact that the players resent having their authority taken from them.

Classic example, player, "I run for it!"
GM, "If you do you'll probably die from getting shot by crossbowmen that suddenly pop up all over; they look high level."
Player, "OK, I submit."

The player's credibility here to make the first statement has been challenged by the GM who has used his authority to create in director stance (as it were), abusively to make a reduction in that credibility.

There, is that the sort of analysis that this model is desingend for? I hope so, because it seems a powerful tool here. In the example, one could speak to solutions that reapportioned authority, etc. Cool?

Mike

[Mark D. Eddy]

Note: Quote edited for relevance to my next point.

- Nothing's true in the game until all the players agree that it's true.
- System, mechanics, GMs and so on are all just ways to get the players to all agree that things are true.

In removing a. from my first point I've implicitly added:
- The game (meaning System, Setting, Situation, Color, Character) can make assertions, which the players then may or may not make true by their assent.

Cool with everybody?


-Vincent

I'm unable to put a finger on it, but it feels like there may be an implicit statement that "the GM is not a Player" in your two premises. Is this your intent? If so, then I may have more problems with your thesis. Otherwise, I'm happy.

If you are claiming that the game master is *not* also a player, it leads, by reductio ad absurdum, to the argument that something in a game exists if the players all agree, even if the GM does not, and I don't believe you have argued this point.

[lumpley]

Oh no.  The GM is most definitely a player.

-Vincent