Does Module Play Equal Participationism?

[M. J. Young]

I want to thank everyone for their posts, and particular those that have come since my last entry here. I do now feel as if it's starting to become clear.

Jack, it might help if we go back to the impetus for deriving the concepts of illusionism and participationism. These sprang from an examination of the problem of how people get around The Impossible Thing. I think, if we define them my way, we've identified at least four distinct approaches (and I've probably overlooked something, and I may not have the name right on the fourth, but this is from my recollection):[list=1]The referee controls the bulk of what is happening, including the plot, the survival of the characters, and much more; however, he lets the players provide color in the form of what their characters are doing, none of which really matters. The players do not know that their choices don't make any difference. This has been called Illusionism, and is considered dysfunctional because the players are being railroaded and don't know it. It solves TITBB by taking most of the meaningful power away from the players, but it doesn't let them know this.[*]Similarly, if the referee controls everything in much the same way that he would in Illusionist play, but the players know this and have (implicitly or explicitly) consented to this, knowing that they can create their characters' personalities and give color to the exciting story the referee is telling, this is a functional solution to TITBB. In essence (again implicitly or explicitly) the players have voluntarily ceded power to the referee to control the story. This is Participationism[*]The referee has created a story and told the players where it starts. However, once play begins, his place is solely revealing the world and applying the rules to their actions. He has designed things such that there are clues leading the right direction, but will not force the players to follow that direction. However, the players have (implicitly or explicitly) agreed that their task is to find and follow those clues to reach the end of the story. This resolves TITBB in a functional way, in that the referee cedes control over what actually happens to the players, who in turn commit themselves to trying to follow the story he has prepared. This would be Trailblazing.[*]This last may actually be several different styles which at the moment my mind is failing to distinguish. It includes what Mike earlier called Open Play, so that's what I'm calling it. It certainly includes most of what John describes in his games, Ron's base player in the band analogy, and perhaps Kester's play style. It assumes that the referee has created or presented a world in which "things can happen", but the entire direction is in the hands of the players. I suspect there are differences here between play in which the referee reacts creatively to player choices versus play in which the referee has everything mapped out in advance, but in essence the resolution of TITBB is that the referee has no story and controls nothing but the revelation of the world as the players explore it.[/list:o]These are, to the best of my recollection, the ways in which TITBB is resolved by various gaming groups.

The value in knowing them and in distinguishing them, it seems to me, is very important to game and scenario design.

For example, in Multiverser we make a distinction between "game worlds" and "story worlds". "Game worlds" are places where the place is interesting and there are things that players can do which will lead to adventures, but the referee really doesn't have anything planned. "Story worlds" are the opposite end of the spectrum, in which the referee doesn't really have much of a world outside the plotted events, and things like hooks and illusion become very important as means of drawing the player into what's happening. Since going to press, through writing other scenarios for the game, I've realized that there's a spectrum between these--that there are worlds in which events are happening which will impact the player, but there's a lot of freedom in what he can do; or in which certain actions will trigger story-like plots that will play out; or in which missing the plot leads to exploring very different adventures within the same world. However, understanding that there are different ways to run worlds can help immensely in designing them; and being overt in the text regarding how certain parts of a world should be run can be very helpful for play.

Examples:

[*]My previously referenced quote from the text of one of our published scenarios, in which the player is given the choice of which way to go but will always wind up at the city. Referees unfamiliar with this might think that if the player turns the wrong direction he'll never find the city and so miss the adventure. Making it explicit in the text that this referee technique should be used to bring the player to the beginning of play will make the story work better.[*]Making it clear in designing an open-play world that the referee should not concern himself with preparing stories because something will happen, but rather should follow the player's lead and let the events unfold, will direct referees away from railroading and into this more open play style.[*]The previously described scenario in which the events happen in the order specified regardless of player action is a valid way to run a scenario, even though unusual. Recognizing this in the text may help referees understand what they're doing.[/list:u]
By working through the different ways games can be run, we open our own minds to the advantages and disadvantages of each, and can better point referees to techniques that will or won't work as well for what a particular game or scenario is trying to accomplish.

Jason, thank you for pointing me back to that thread. Although I didn't find "consensual" in the first page, I do think that the overt/covert factor could be shifted significantly. My emphasis on the implicit/explicit agreement suggests this--that it might well be that the group sits down and says, let's play this module or this scenario, you run it, and we'll make sure we do our best to stay on story, or that they might never be aware that they're following any scenario at all, as they are conditioned (from years of this style of play) to look for and follow the clues. I believe someone on some thread mentioned an actual play problem in which he had dropped players into a world in which there were a myriad of possibilities, and the players did nothing because they were waiting for some hint of what the referee wanted them to do. That suggests either participationist or trailblazer players with an open play referee. We could agree openly that this is what we're doing, or it could just be that we fall into it naturally and are unaware either that we're doing it or that there would be another possibility.

Tim, it would be dysfunctional play if the referee is trying to run a game by setting up clues for the players to follow and the players are ignoring the clues. As to whether there is anything to do beyond what the referee has set up, this is a more confusing question.

I think that I was probably trailblazing when I hooked my players into traveling the several hundred miles from where their characters were to where I'd established the Keep on the Borderlands would be. I set up a few pointers, and off they went. Now, my world was pretty detailed, and I'm actually a very flexible referee who moves between styles pretty freely. Had they stopped in one of the towns on the map between those two points, things could well have happened there. I might have had a world complex enough that there would be several trails of breadcrumbs leading off in different directions (I actually do have such a world in Multiverser development) and the players could choose which one to follow. At the point that the players stop following the bread crumbs, it ceases to be trailblazing; if the referee is limited to that style, play becomes dysfunctional, as he would be unwilling to force his story--the most he can do is give more blatant clues, and if they're ignoring his clues and he can't shift to another mode of play such as open play, the whole things can't progress.

If you were playing the Volturnus modules in Star Frontiers, and you decided you didn't want to join the Ul-mor and let them take you out of the desert, according to the module you'll die in the desert. That's not really participationism, I think, because it doesn't say that the Ul-mor will attempt to coerce you to follow them or that the referee should try to get the players to go that direction. Rather, it's trailblazing: the referee has provided the clues as to which direction the story goes next, and the players can take it or ignore it, but if they ignore it nothing else happens. The degree to which the referee can accommodate players "off story" may vary, but trailblazing requires that the players are at least attempting to stay on story, or that the referee be adaptable enough to set up a new trail in a different story when it appears that the original story is lost.

First of all, I think that M.J.'s phrasing here is poor. I suspect when he says "dysfunctional" that he means "dysfunctional for Participationism" -- i.e. it just indicates that particular style isn't working, but it could actually functional non-Participationist play. Your original statement, at least, suggests that your play isn't in the style M.J. is describing.

One of the points of this discussion is that the GM plays different roles depending on your style. The GM isn't neccessarily there to point out the "right direction". For example, my style in my Vinland game is pretty clearly to not have a "right direction". I will regularly throw in events to spice things up, but more often direction is determined by the PCs.

Spot on.

Why don't people see The Impossible Thing as impossible? Because they've already resolved it one way or another. Illusionism, Participationism, and Open Play are all common resolutions. Trailblazing is yet another. Each of them is about the degree to which the power of one participant trumps the power of another. Trailblazing, at least, is also about the commitments the participants make to each other in exchange for that power.

I almost always run open play games; when I don't, I trailblaze more than anything else. I do use Illusionist techniques at times--mostly for those sections of the story I consider plot exposition, since Multiverser doesn't really allow me to have those moments in which the referee tells the player what happened to him that brought him to this point (and I don't use that in my AD&D games either--the interludes are played out, not spoon-fed). I think that recognizing the different techniques has helped me immensely in my game running and scenario design.

Are we done?

--M. J. Young

[Jason Lee]

Jason, thank you for pointing me back to that thread. Although I didn't find "consensual" in the first page, I do think that the overt/covert factor could be shifted significantly. My emphasis on the implicit/explicit agreement suggests this--that it might well be that the group sits down and says, let's play this module or this scenario, you run it, and we'll make sure we do our best to stay on story, or that they might never be aware that they're following any scenario at all, as they are conditioned (from years of this style of play) to look for and follow the clues. I believe someone on some thread mentioned an actual play problem in which he had dropped players into a world in which there were a myriad of possibilities, and the players did nothing because they were waiting for some hint of what the referee wanted them to do. That suggests either participationist or trailblazer players with an open play referee. We could agree openly that this is what we're doing, or it could just be that we fall into it naturally and are unaware either that we're doing it or that there would be another possibility.

You're welcome.  For better or worse I left concensual/non-concensual/concensual-ness unknown out.  Because I consider non-consensual play dysfunctional, or at the very least having to become consensual once the illusion is revealed or be doomed to failure.  Which also makes covert/overt a switch that exists in all styles.  However, I do realize this doesn't clearly label one of the Impossible Thing solutions (Illusionism).

I agree with the dysfunction arising from a Participationist or Trailblazer player with an Open Play referee.  I've seen it happen, and it's rather funny.  We've got a player who always searches for the plot, whatever that may be, regardless of his character's desires, always trying to figure out what the GM wants him to do.  When the GM presents an Open Play situation where you've got two or more decisions that could all be right (or disasterously wrong) and the GM has no obvious prefence for what you decide he kinda stumbles around in character saying thing like 'uh, if we do this then, but if we do this then, uh, but then, uh'.

[Jack Spencer Jr]

Jack, it might help if we go back to the impetus for deriving the concepts of illusionism and participationism. These sprang from an examination of the problem of how people get around The Impossible Thing. I think, if we define them my way, we've identified at least four distinct approaches (and I've probably overlooked something, and I may not have the name right on the fourth, but this is from my recollection

I agree it can be looked that this way and acknowledge it might even be helpful. But I prefer to look at the distinct varibles that make up these distinct styles of play, which I have done in the The switches and dials formerly known as Illusionism. I personally find this more useful that find many distinct combinations of these variable and the possibility of discussion of sub styles like Trailblazing-lite or particillusionism fills me with a kind of dread.

[Kester Pelagius]

Greetings,

Hope you had a fun in the sun happy week end.  Kids well?  Wife happy with that thing you finally did she'd been bugging you to do?

Great times!

Hold on. If your GM is purely a rules referee and doesn't determine story, then the simple answer is that your style has not been "Participationist". M.J. is not advocating Participationism here as the one true answer -- he is simply describing a style which some people play in.

It seems to me that it is much more common for GMs to be more than a rules arbiter. Most traditional RPGs suggest that the GM work before the game itself to design or adapt "adventures" which the PCs go through...

Yes, key words "which the PCs go through".  As GM, whether using a module, random encounter charts, or doing a Tarot reading based on the creases in the seat of my pants ;) I, as a GM, should be arbitrating the rules as based on the characters actions.  The game should evolve out of the characters actions thus, if a GM rolls on encounter chart that the characters meet a 10' Tall Green Amazon looking giantess. . . well the story flows from what the characters decide to do, not what the GM would like them to do.  Same holds true for modules and fly by the seat of the GMs pants (or skirt) fun.  :)

OK -- I am guessing based on the positive tone here that you do foreshadowing. However, this involves being more than just an arbiter of the rules. In order to foreshadow, you have to have some idea about where the story is going to go, don't you?

Not Necessarily.  If the evening's game is totally impromptu (meaning there was no before hand preparation) one could easily roll up several random encounters and thus "appear" to know what is going on, but all that is really known is the order in which encounters are going to potentially happen.  I did this a lot.  The players seemed happy, most of the time, and these games were much fun.

Even the one's where the "throw away" enconters snowballed out of all proportion to what I thought would/might happen. Then such is the random joy of players and their characters.  :)

Now, back to the "foreshadowing" reference.  I really mentioned it only to show that, yes Virginia, there mist already exist useful terms and idealogues that could fit with the theory being developed.  But it's not my theory, thus the terminology is not mine to coin.  Not that I don't think MJ isn't doing a fine job.  Doing quite nicely.

(game description snipped)
Given the current theories being discussed how would you classify this?

I can't tell from what you have said.  I would recommend starting out with some more basic things: what do you do to prepare for a session?  What generally happens?  What sort of activities do the PCs engage in?[/quote]

Well that largely depends on a number of factors, which really are neither here nor there.  (Thus the casual readers are spares a thrity page diatribe that probably would have meandered up hills and down dales into lanes of memory, some dingy and grey, others. . . well, you know. heh)

If you go back and re-read the end bit what I was asking was, based on how the put things together, on the fly, how (if at all) would this mode of GMing fit in the current theories being constructed.  Keeping in mind that what I did was essentially fuze together various threads of ideas and established background history for two disparite campaigns to fit a third, thus establishing a "reality" (of sorts) which technically did not exist until I put it all together and told the players "this is how the world is" sort of thing.  *pauses to take breath*

Welp, much reading to do, but thought I should answer this first.

Skoal!


Kind Regards,

Kester Pelagius

[Kester Pelagius]

Greetings M. J. Young,

Wow, wrote quite a bit there.  Sounds like you are winding down on everything though so. . .

...and perhaps Kester's play style...

Actually I was referencing my experiances as a Game Master, but some view that as much the same thing.  Certainly with certain Idie games role-playing can be a fun experiance for everyone at the table, just like most good board games, if not better.

"But in the ancient of days," old man Kester intones, "when I used to play why things were..."

The sound of old man Kester's aged voice softens as he wanders off, muttering to himself.

M.J. sighs in relief.

;)

Are we done?

If you feel everything has been said that needs saying then, yep, guess we are done here.

It's been a hoot!  Really.


Kind Regards,

Kester Pelagius