The Lumpley Principle Goes Wading

[ejh]

Just to clarify --

Ed: your main dilemma is easily solved.  The Lumpley Principle is only about actual play, and I never intended otherwise.  It doesn't say a thing about "the game world," whatever that is, whether it even exists.  (I leave discussion of whether the game world exists in some sense outside of actual play to people who get excited by that kind of thing.  Don't bring my principle into it, as it has a small brain and is easily overwhelmed.)

This btw reveals to me that any apparent conflict between what I'm talking about and what Lumpley is talking about is based on our different definitions/assumptions/topics of discussion, not any factual disagreement.

As far as I'm concerned, a "game world" exists in whatever sense any imaginary thing exists, and I'm interested in things that depict imaginary worlds, one of which is what Vincent calls "actual play", and some of which are not what Vincent calls "actual play", and the ones that are and aren't sometimes interact with each other.

Any given mechanic or piece of a mechanic might represent in-game events somehow, or it might not; it must and always will distribute credibility.

BAM!  that's it right there, the only part of the Lumpley Principle I had a problem with, restated in such a way that I don't have a problem with it.  Cool.

It might represent in-game events somehow.  That's all I needed.  I didn't think that was controversial.  Glad it's not. :)

[Marco]

As far as arriving at Z, this is the nature of compromise. When buying a house, the seller may be asking for 100,000 and the buyer offers 80,000. After negotiation, they agree on the figure of 85,500. Neither side originally stated this amount. They arrived at it after negotiating.

When I got to this thread, I was in 100% agreement with Jack--but after examining it, I've begun to see John's point. I still think the Lumpey Principle is an excellent way of describing the role of rules--I don't think it's *invalidated* by John's break point--but the break point is interesting.

In my Gedanken experiment, when the players look in the book, both are surprised to find that the rules--the mechanics of the game-world have superceded both their claims to credibility. Granted, they may ignore the rule--but if they're bound to play by it, the game designer--a non-participant in the shared-imagining (save in a very tenuous manner) has the maximal credibility in that situation.

That is: they don't say "I cast spell A with all 20 power points I had so Event X happens" and the other guy says "No, spell A was cast, but getting 'X' out of it costs 25power-points and you only had 20 so you get X-1." and they look in the book and determine that event X costs 18ppt and arrive "somewhere in the middle." It's that they look in the book and discover that Spell A has an effect utterly like the one ('X') they were negoitating on--a reading of the Spell A says it really does 'Y' for 18 power points and 'X' or 'X-1' as called for doesn't exist.

Another classic example is a mis-remembered map where countries boarders are called into question and the examination of the rules shows that there's not a long boarder nor a short boarder, but no boarder with another small country right in the middle.

This does rely on an inexact knowledge of the rules by both parties--but that sort of thing can and does happen in games all the time. As both a player and a GM I've been surprised to find certain things in the game rules.

At that point the rules, I'd say, are no longer aportioning credibility between the participants but actually claiming it.

Now, resolution of this is tricky--IME we'd immediately re-negoitate on the basis that the characters would know things the players didn't (like what their spell does)--but if the GM is playing in "let the declared action stand mode" then the break point could very well occur.

-Marco

[lumpley]

Marco, I'd put that case very solidly in the "sometimes the game rules do put statements up for negotiation" spot.

Whose statement stands -- player A's, player B's, mine as the game designer -- depends on the negotiation -> consensus process, same as it ever was.

And I agree: it's a very interesting break point.

Ed, I think we're happy, then.  Just this:

Here's a prediction: anyone who sees the Lumpley Principle as obviously true will also think solos are not really roleplaying games, and the converse is also true.

Not me.  I just think that solos, larps, pbms, and crpgs aren't face-to-face tabletop roleplaying games.  They operate on different principles than "consensus rules," sure, but they can still be rpgs if they want.

-Vincent

[Paganini]

Marco,

This does rely on an inexact knowledge of the rules by both parties--but that sort of thing can and does happen in games all the time. As both a player and a GM I've been surprised to find certain things in the game rules.

At that point the rules, I'd say, are no longer aportioning credibility between the participants but actually claiming it.

I agree with this totally. I'm on the record way back when Vincent was first posting about this as saying "Dude! Hey, the rules themselves have to be able to have credibility; after all, they're the game designer's only stake in the game." I believe Vincent allowed for this - rules always distribute credibility, sometimes they give it to themselves, right? Of course, the group always has the ultimate final say on whether or not the deisgner's vision is rejected.

Edit: Crossposted with Vincent

[John Kim]

Marco, I'd put that case very solidly in the "sometimes the game rules do put statements up for negotiation" spot.

Whose statement stands -- player A's, player B's, mine as the game designer -- depends on the negotiation -> consensus process, same as it ever was.

And I agree: it's a very interesting break point.

OK, then my objection is lifted.  

I had been preparing an explanation -- so just to explain myself a bit more...  During a session, I will say things and listen to other players (i.e. human statements), but I will also do things like look at my notes or character sheet, look at a map, write things down, and privately consider things.  What I perceived people as saying that that the latter is not part of "actual play" even though it occurs during the session and is (at least for my games) required for the game to work.  

In a more practical sense, it seemed like the subtext from this principle was being used to denigrate games where books are consulted and references used during play -- like, say, HarnMaster, which is crunchy and full of setting details incorporated in the mechanics.  Now, HM and similar games are not everyone's cup of tea, but it is still roleplaying and deserves consideration.

[kamikaze]

Mark, check this:

At any moment during play any participant can stop using the game mechanics as written.  At that moment, whether the game comes to a (likely screeching) halt or continues, changed, is up to the group to negotiate.

If it's still unobjectionable, we're good.

Oh, no.

That may fly in a freeform game, where there are no real rules to start with, but does not happen in most "follow the rules" games, once they've started.

The only "negotiatiation" if someone tried to change or ignore rules in the middle of a game would be shouting "You cheating nimrod!" and pelting the cheater with dice, followed by a Stern Look from the GM.  If you want to change the rules, you can bring it up after the session or in email and we can all sit around and argue about it, but once you agree to the social contract of playing game X with player Y as the GM tonight, you don't get to ignore the rules whenever you feel like it.  And why do people get so upset about cheating?  Simply because when you cheat, you are betraying the contract you made with everyone else, and treachery is poorly rewarded around my table.  "Hangin's too good for 'im!  Burnin's too good for 'im!  He should be chopped up into little bitty pieces and *buried alive*..."

You don't need to negotiate at each decision point because that's been done once, at the start of the game.  "Yes, I'm gonna play by the rules."

The whole point of choosing a system and using it as law is because we don't want to go back to childhood, playing cops'n'robbers and having to call Mom to make a decision whenever someone wouldn't play dead.  I'm mortally tired of arguing over every decision, and thus I play games where we all can learn the rules and play by them, and keeping an eye on your neighbor is a small price to pay for that.

[Paganini]

Mark, John,

There's something that you don't seem to have grasped here, and that is that the amount of rules, degree of crunchiness / freeform-ness is absolutely irrelevant. Doesn't have anything with the Lumpley Principle at all. It's not a valid issue for discussion in this context. It matters not if a game is crunchy or freeform, the Lumpley Principle is *there.* It is always there, even in games that are not RPGs. John, you pointed this out once, but you don't seem to have applied it completely. No one is trying to exclude any particular style of game. The Lumpley Principle is just as relevant to Harn as it is to SOAP. If you uses lots of reference books when you play, that's cool. Doesn't matter. It's not that the Lumpley Principle is somehow exclusive. It's more like it's very *inclusive.*

[ejh]

I suspect that once "the rules apportion credibilty" is specified (as Paganini says) to include "and sometimes they apportion it to the rules themselves/the game designer/whatever" then most objections to it must evaporate, as John's seem to be.

Can you confirm, Vincent, that you're cool with Paganini's stipulation that sometimes the rules apportion credibility to something besides the players but still accessible to them?

E.g. if there are random encounter tables in the rulebooks which are somehow mandatory to use, then the rules are assigning credibility to that encounter table and the dice -- or to say it in a more roundabout way, they are assigning credibility to any player who agrees with the results of the dice as read on the encounter table?


(Because I think a lot of this discussion, especially the portion between Kamikaze and others, has gotten sidetracked into issues of social contract about whether a particular, written, set of rules is to be considered authoritative or not.)

[John Kim]

There's something that you don't seem to have grasped here, and that is that the amount of rules, degree of crunchiness / freeform-ness is absolutely irrelevant. Doesn't have anything with the Lumpley Principle at all. It's not a valid issue for discussion in this context. It matters not if a game is crunchy or freeform, the Lumpley Principle is *there.*

You know, this is really annoyingly patronizing.  Your saying it with emphasis does not make it any more convincing.  

Earlier in this thread, Vincent gave a concise form of the Lumpley principle.  The principle as expressed there was wrong or at least incomplete, because it referred only to players making statements.  Vincent corrected this later by adding that sometimes the game rules put statements up for negotiation.  With that correction, I agree with it.  

Does this mean that the "Lumpley principle" was right all along and I simply didn't grasp it?  No, since it hadn't been expressed in that form.  During this thread, people have said many things about the "Lumpley principle" -- some of which have directly contradicted Vincent/Lumpley and each others' expressions of it.

[lumpley]

Mark, um, hi there.  Screeching halt, gotcha, I mentioned that already.

Yes, I know it's potentially game-breaking for someone to change the rules.  Do you see that it's possible for someone to change the rules, in mid-game, even if it's irresponsible, rude, uncouth, antisocial behavior?  And that the fallout depends on how the group handles it?

I think you do, I think your "hardly ever happens" statement shows that you do.

So easy on the tirades, okay?

Anyhow, Mark, John, please rest assured.  I am in favor of agreeing to rules and then playing by them.  I'm a for goodness sake game designer.  I wouldn't write games if I thought blowing them off was the best way to play.  I like my games to be fast and easy to learn, because that's the kind of time I've got to invest, but jeez.  Play Harn, amen!

Ed, Nathan, no, I can't confirm that game rules ever hold credibility.  Here's why:

Case 1: Me, Mitch, and Zoe are playing a game.

I say: I shoot the guy.
Mitch says: Zoe, think he should hit?
Zoe says: Nope.  I think he should miss.
Mitch says: Dude, that's ass.  Vince, wanna shoot the guy anyway?
I say: Oh yeah.  You know it.
I roll damage.
Zoe says:  Hey! I said no!  You cheating pig hogs!  I quit, you can find some other gamer to play with!  And give me back my yoo-hoo!

Case 2: Me and Mitch are playing a game.

I say: I shoot the guy.
Mitch says: Roll for it.
I roll for crap.
Mitch says: Dude, that's ass.  Wanna shoot the guy anyway?
I say: Oh yeah.  You know it.
I roll damage.

Do the mechanics quit and storm out with their yoo-hoo?  Nope.  They're stone silent on the matter.  You can tell they don't have credibility because someone with credibility?  If you treat them that way, it hurts them.  Credibility is social, remember?

Here's more why:

Show me game mechanics that withhold credibility for themselves.  How do they enforce it?  Remember that if they've got some human being enforcing it for them, they aren't withholding credibility, they're apportioning it.

BUT, I think that allowing the mechanics to put statements up for negotiation really does answer your concerns.

-Vincent

Crossposted with John.

[Jack Spencer Jr]

Interesting to see the "solos are roleplaying!" "No they're not!" argument come up.  It seems to me to be a matter of definition, but it sure generates some strong opinions for a matter of definition.

I can see that seeing solos as roleplaying or not would depend on whether you accepted the assumption that "actual play" consists of the verbal consensus achieved by a group in a session.

Hmmm...
I suppose a concensus is impossible on this but consider this, is there a difference between playing with a group and playing by oneself? Is it a significant difference?

Yes, I know it's potentially game-breaking for someone to change the rules. Do you see that it's possible for someone to change the rules, in mid-game, even if it's irresponsible, rude, uncouth, antisocial behavior? And that the fallout depends on how the group handles it?

Grr. I was going to post a thread about the folly of realism with a logic that goes like this. The group decides to play game X. Nearly every game has some failing when it comes to logic, making sense or "realism" Whatever you wish to call it. Eventually a player brings up an objection about how this is not what would "really" happen, so rules fixes, patches and add-ons come out, and eventually it will spell a recipe for disaster. Problem is, not all disasters are explosions. Some are slow burns and become evident at the worst times. In other words, what Vincent had just described, only not so nicely.

Actually, IME such things happen all the time. I suppose it's all well and good within the Lumpley Princeple, but It kind of devalues the step of deciding on a game to play in the first place. I equate it somewhat to my example above of the house seller asking for $100,000 and a buyer makes an offer of a pig, two chickens and his first-born daughter.

[kamikaze]

Mark, um, hi there. Screeching halt, gotcha, I mentioned that already.

The screeching halt is right, but the "or can continue" is not.  When you say:

Mitch says: Dude, that's ass. Wanna shoot the guy anyway?
I say: Oh yeah. You know it.

In that situation, I would say: "No, didn't ya see my roll?  My gun jammed.  Shit happens and now zombies are gonna eat my brain.  Who's got next init?  Kill me afore I rise again, would ya?"

If I break the rules just because I don't like what happened, it's no longer "real" in whatever sense a game session is "real" to begin with, and I will no longer feel any accomplishment at positive achievements.

Of course, the "tirade" was a funny quote from a movie, and I guess that "whoosh" noise was it passing you by.  Exaggeration for comic effect.  In reality, I hardly ever bury cheaters alive.

Mark, John,
There's something that you don't seem to have grasped here, and that is that the amount of rules, degree of crunchiness / freeform-ness is absolutely irrelevant.

I grasp it just fine, thanks.  You're right, the amount of rules are not relevant, but I never talked about the amount of rules.  I was talking about a social contract that says I follow the rules, however heavy or light they happen to be.  My DUDE system is extremely lightweight, and yet it's intended to be a "follow the rules" game, and that's how I play it.  But take another group with a freeform social contract, and they can play DUDE with a potential negotiation after every action.  I'd think they'd be happier with a game that supported their play style better, but I'm happy for them playing DUDE anyway.

Games aren't the social contract, but they do suggest what kind of social contract they're most appropriate for.  A game with a rule for everything, or a broad resolution system with obvious moving parts and gears and stuff, says "follow the rules".  A game with few rules but a lot of loose, hippy "go with the flow"-ness says "freeform me, baby".

I've seen groups that will run anything freeform, no matter what the books say.  Fine.  The Lumpley Principle does indeed describe what they do, as it was articulated upthread (not the ever-shifting Platonic ideal version that seems to be in some posters' heads).  But for groups like I prefer most of the time, like John seems to prefer, and like most of the people I've ever played with in groups or at cons, it does not describe what happens.

The Lumpley Principle needs a precondition: "In a freeform gaming social contract, every action is explicitly or implicitly negotiated. [insert remainder here]"

Then you need the Kamikaze Principle: "In a follow-the-rules gaming social contract, the players agree to play a specific game by the rules, with one player chosen as the arbiter of the rules." (I'm loathe to use my name for that principle, but I don't reckon I can volunteer anyone else--I don't think of myself as the godwalker of legalistic gaming, but compared to some, I guess I am).

You can't discuss a thing like this without bringing up the social contract, because that's what it's all about.  That's what we call any meta-game agreement between the players about "how we play this game".  Five-year-olds playing Candyland have the same issues to deal with, they just don't know the right terminology so they go to Mom.

[lumpley]

Mark, if you're serious about the conversation and not just looking for a soapbox, please answer my actual question to you:

Yes, I know it's potentially game-breaking for someone to change the rules. Do you see that it's possible for someone to change the rules, in mid-game, even if it's irresponsible, rude, uncouth, antisocial behavior? And that the fallout depends on how the group handles it?

-Vincent

[ejh]

Ed, Nathan, no, I can't confirm that game rules ever hold credibility.  Here's why:.....Credibility is social, remember?

Here's more why:

Show me game mechanics that withhold credibility for themselves.  How do they enforce it?  Remember that if they've got some human being enforcing it for them, they aren't withholding credibility, they're apportioning it.

BUT, I think that allowing the mechanics to put statements up for negotiation really does answer your concerns.

Yeah, it does.  It's the "talking about different things" thing again.  You're essentially talking sociology and I'm talking semiotics, and when we try to pretend we're talking about the same thing we get all cornfused and have to restate things a few dozen times.

The rules can and do depict the game world, but in terms of "play" (where "play" means "how people interact and talk their way through a story"), that depiction is significant in that it provides a way to help people establish a group consensus about events in an imagined world.

[Paganini]

Responding to a bunch of people in one post.


Vince,

BUT, I think that allowing the mechanics to put statements up for negotiation really does answer your concerns.

OK, I can buy that.


Ed,

The rules can and do depict the game world, but in terms of "play" (where "play" means "how people interact and talk their way through a story"), that depiction is significant in that it provides a way to help people establish a group consensus about events in an imagined world.

Yeah; the rules can (but do not have to) represent the game world. Even when they *do* represent the game world, however, represnting the game world is not the *function* of the rules. I see that the wording in my previous post is imprecise; Appologies.


John,

Does this mean that the "Lumpley principle" was right all along and I simply didn't grasp it?

Yes. I've been describing it those terms for over a year. I believe (but I am not certain) that it was described in those terms in the reference link I included at the top of this thread.

I use emphasis because it doesn't seem like you're getting what I'm saying. You are treating the Lumpley Principle as though it's an attitude or an approach. The Lumpley Principle is a general observation about the way things behave during play. It's not a technique or a point of view that you can use if you want. It is, by definition, always there. If you can find an instance where it is not in effect, then maybe you can invalidate it. But treating it as though it's something that you can turn on or off is just a red herring. The objections you keep raising are about issues that the Lumpley Principle doesn't relate to. That indicates that you don't understand what the Lumpley Principle is actually about.

It's like, Vincent notices that things fall to earty. "Aha!" he says, "I'll call this the gravity principle!" Then you come along: "But! But, I like to go up in freefall! The gravity principle doesn't work there! It leaves me out."

It's not that I think you're stupid (just the opposite), or that your preferences are unworthy; they're just unrelated to the issue. If you want to discuss something different, that's fine; start a new thread. But don't tell me I'm patronizing; you're drifting my thread, and I'm trying to keep it on topic.


Mark,

I grasp it just fine, thanks. You're right, the amount of rules are not relevant, but I never talked about the amount of rules.

Well... OK. Your statement about freeform games not having rules led me off the track.

With that said, however:

The Lumpley Principle needs a precondition: "In a freeform gaming social contract, every action is explicitly or implicitly negotiated.

"

See, it doesn't, though. The Lumpley Principle is an observation about *all play.* If it doesn't work, it doesn't work, period. I say again, it is by definition not something that you can turn off or on at will, or use as a technique or approach. The Lumpley Principle deals with how social contract opperates, and where system fits into the social contract.

The only "negotiatiation" if someone tried to change or ignore rules in the middle of a game would be shouting "You cheating nimrod!"

Emphasis added.

This is just not true. That might be your own personal reaction, but that's all it is. It is by no means the only reaction possible. With this sort of argument, you're telling me that my own personal experiences have not happend. So, whatever. Please note, though, that your shuting "Cheating Nimrod" is actually an example of the Lumpley Principle in action.

I think you might be hung up on the "negotiation" issue. Negotiation doesn't mean that everyone sits around and verbally argues at every decision point. Negotiation just means that at every decision point, something must be decided, one way or another. The rules can tell us how the designer intends for us decide, but the rules cannot enforce themselves. A game can only be a "follow the rules" if the gaming group chooses to follow the rules; and they can, at any point during play, choose not to follow a particular rule. Think of it like this:

I'm playing in a game with you. Before we start, we both agree to use the FUZION game system. This is a social contract issue - we both now have invested stake in following the rules: we each said we would. At some point in the game a die result, or a table lookup, or something results in something that I don't like. So I say "I don't want to imagine that; let's have something else happen." "Cheating nimrod," you roar!

Woohoo! Now we've got conflict - two possible courses of imagination, only one of which can be incorporated into the game space. You are backed up by the rules, because your statement is in agreement with them - Lumpley Principle in action; your statement is more credible than mine. Does that mean your statement will automatically happen? Nope. Credibility is not absolute. It means that either:

1 - I convince you to go disregard the rule in this instance
2 - You convince me to go with the rule
3 - Neither of us convinces the other and play halts.