Alternative Definitions: Desire, Outcome, Play, Story

[Gordon C. Landis]

Matt,

So . . .  you think Bruce's stuff doesn't cover Story Now, you see Bruce defending that by saying Story Now ain't important to most gamers, and you counter-claim "I disagree about how Bruce is characterizing most gamers."  Am I understanding that right?

And Bruce - is "Story Now ain't important to most gamers" a fair statement of your claim?

In any case, my recommendation is - let's talk about resolving Bruce's story and Story Now, or just agree to disagree about whether Story Now matters.  A "most gamers" converstation is, best as I can tell, doomed to failure - or at the very least, deserves treatment as a seperate issue.

Gordon

EDIT - added "Matt," to the top - don't know what happened to it the first time . . .

[Blake Hutchins]

I strongly echo Gordon's point.  The difference between my position and Bruce's seems very clearly to fall on the "Story Now" distinction.

Best,

Blake

[Bruce Baugh]

First of all, I should note that I personally love "story now" games, and have ever since encountering efforts at them back in the late '70s.

Because they're so far outside the mainstream of gaming as a business, a lot of gamers have never encountered them. So their reactions vary, a lot. If I had to take a stab at an overall reaction, I'd say it tends to be something like "Cool! But can it sustain itself for a campaign as long as I want, and is there enough meat here for the level of detail I like?" But that's...really, really haphazardly guessed, with very little foundation.

The distinction between market and hobby is well-taken. Like I said, this is my job as well as my entertainment, and I'm looking for ways to diversify and strengthen what happens in the retail environment. If I ever act like this is the only goal worth having, I hereby authorize one assault by two full divisions of clown ninja. Particularly since I think that the existing retail customer base in at least partly doomed, and want a lot to spread gaming-related stuff into other audiences. Nonetheless, it's very true that commercial concerns are intimately woven together with matters of personal taste and aesthetics for me, and anyone's free to regard what I say as irrelevant to that degree.

(That is, by the way, not a sneer. What I have to say is irrelevant to some discussions.)

Note that the semi-definition I'm using of story at the start of this thread is not incompatible with mechanics aimed specifically at building the story as such in play. There's still a distinction between the events of play and their meaning to the participants, and since "story" does fit this latter and does apply regardless of the extent to which the mechanics do or do not have story concerns in mind, I feel comfortable keeping mine for the moment.

[Matt Snyder]

It's a fair cop!

[Bruce Baugh]

Thanks for a pleasant and productive e-mail exchange, Matt. Now I have to figure out how best to write up some of the stuff we covered there.

[Jason Lee]

Note that the semi-definition I'm using of story at the start of this thread is not incompatible with mechanics aimed specifically at building the story as such in play. There's still a distinction between the events of play and their meaning to the participants, and since "story" does fit this latter and does apply regardless of the extent to which the mechanics do or do not have story concerns in mind, I feel comfortable keeping mine for the moment.

I don't see an issue, or even a quarrel with GNS, in keeping both definitions of Story.  As long as you're willing to accept that the general definition of Story you've presented, is...well, more general, and encompasses the more specific Narrativist definition (Story Now) as one of the possible ways you could focus the definition down to a more detailed level.

[Bruce Baugh]

Absolutely. I'm very much trying to think of a taxonomy that can encompass the whole range of styles of play I've encountered. Obviously that means working on quite a large canvas.

[Jason Lee]

Bruce,

I think Story was abandoned as a functional term because of competing definitions.  If people cannot agree on a broad definition that applies to all their personal definitions you can't really use the term effectively in discussion.  I think your general definition solves that problem, for me anyway.

You might want to relook at Chapter 1 of the GNS Essay, specifically the definition of Premise that is addressed there.  I think the plan is to start referring to this as Creative Agenda, because the word Premise is so important to Nar (don't quote me on this part).   Using your definition of Story, a player's Creative Agenda will have a major influence on what they look back on and deem interesting enough to include in their Story, and their Exploration priorities should be the dominate elements in the Story.

Just a thought.