What is Freeform?

[Windthin]

This thread shoots off, basially, of "Stumbling Around a Rebuttal" and "What is a Mechanic".  Somebody mentioned defining freeform... so let's.

Some seem to think of freemform as formless, devoid of system mechanics.  There was a lot of talk about whether something was diceless or freeform, with an arbitary line drawn between the two.  Now, it seems evident to me that when freeform was being spoken of, it was not some chaotic, nebulous void out of which anything could spring.  There were clearly underlying foundations and principles; the world, the setting itself.  Hell, the lumpley principle everybody is so fond of quoting: the agreement between the players and the storyteller that keeps the world going.  So what DOES separate freeform from diceless?  Does anything truly?  Or is the term freeform extraneous, unnecesary... obsolete?

It would seem that the thing that separates diceless freeform is this: diceless does use specific mechanics to aid in determining the results of conflict or random occurences -- it simply doesn't use dice.  Freeform still works within a system, but the mechanics used for resolution are a sharp mind and well-chosen words, and a general concurrence by those involved.  Personally, I don't think freeform works all that well, as it takes a rather responsible group to pull it off; it is the nature of people not to like losing, and that shows through in any situation where they are given the option of determining whether or not they will succeed or fail.  Diceless combines group assent with some other factor; in Amber, you have the rankings, and various definite levels of power and ability.

Conclusion:
Diceless = A resolution based on solid mechanics and quantities that does not involve the rolling of dice.
Freeform = A resolution based on group consent and setting standards that does not involve the rolling of dice or usage of alternate mechanics/quantitive measurements.

That's still a fine line... you can still argue that in freeform, yes, there are degrees of power and ability and so on... you leap to utter chaos, however, what some consider freeform but which isn't really when you think about it, when resolution is based solely on whim and exists entirely outside any mechanics, setting, or social pact.

[Lxndr]

Looking at the definition of mechanic as a step-by-step process (or mechanism if you prefer to be pedantic), I would have to say freeform play is "play devoid of such mechanics."

[jdagna]

I would venture a slightly different definition of the two.

A diceless system provides rules that allow reasonably objective and repeatable decisions to be made without the use of dice.  For example: I hit you because I have a higher skill.

A freeform system arrives at results through subjective criteria so that decisions may be inconsistent.  For example: I hit you because the GM decided that we were about equal in fighting skill, but felt that my character's anger gave him an advantage.

It might be better to say mechanic instead of system, since a game could use a combination of these and other elements.  I didn't just to avoid the question of whether you can have a "freeform mechanic".  It's also worth pointing out that in my experience, most people playing "freeform" actually have an unwritten diceless system.

[lumpley]

It's also worth pointing out that in my experience, most people playing "freeform" actually have an unwritten diceless system.

Yes yes a thousand times yes!

I think "freeform" is hate speech or pride speech depending who's saying it, not a real live thing at all.  We all apportion credibility socially.  We all have Systems by which we come to consensus about things in-game.  They're different in particulars, but not in any essentials.

-Vincent

[Hunter Logan]

It's also worth pointing out that in my experience, most people playing "freeform" actually have an unwritten diceless system.

I also completely agree with this point.

[Lxndr]

It's also worth pointing out that in my experience, most people playing "freeform" actually have an unwritten diceless system.

I agree with this.  This is why I'm happy to see a definition of "mechanic" that's different from "system" - it allows me to define freeform as "a system without any form of concrete mechanic."

[John Kim]

I think "freeform" is hate speech or pride speech depending who's saying it, not a real live thing at all.  We all apportion credibility socially.  We all have Systems by which we come to consensus about things in-game.  They're different in particulars, but not in any essentials.

Hold on.  There is a real live difference between, say, my playing in a straight Champions game and playing in a freeform game where we don't have any rulebook.  For example, consider my playing make-believe with my 3-year-old son using his stuffed animals.  You can waffle about whether this difference is truly "essential", but it exists and is important to many people.  

In common usage, "freeform" means that there is no written or verbal set of rules which people refer to for play.  The question is, how is this different in practice from non-freeform play?  The implication you made is that freeform really uses an unwritten system.  Put another way: if you studied the freeform play, you could write up a finite set of rules, and then using those rules would be identical to the freeform play.  I am skeptical.  Clearly, consensus happens at various times -- so there is some process going on.  But it isn't clear to me that it can necessarily be reduced to something less than a hypothical million-page book of psychology which explains all human interaction.

[Hunter Logan]

I don't know about the term freeform being some sort of hate or pride speech. I do know I've been conducting some experiments in remarkably minimalist roleplaying with decidedly not-roleplaying-oriented-people, and I have been amazed by just how little in terms of rules and/or mechanics are required to change a game of freeform storytelling into a recognizably minimalist rpg. And I admit, the experiences forming my opinions are personal, that I can't really use it as more than anecdotal evidence, etc, etc, etc... But that said, it is enough to help me form the opinion that even the most apparently freeform, mechanic-free, soft, squishy arrangement for play ends up with... If not mechanics, then at least a set of rules and boundaries that form the structure for a very light and squishy system. I am fairly certain that articulating the basic tenets of those rules would not require a million-page manual, but I am equally certain the rules would change from group to group and maybe even session to session with the same group.

[jdagna]

John, I think freeform can be reduced to unwritten diceless because of past play, not because of psychology or social factors (which are still important).

Think of it like the legal system.  Early legal systems had the two parties appeal to the chief, who made a decision based on what he thought - freeform justice, if you will.  But how long do you think it took before someone said "Hey, wait!  When Joe killed Fred's cow, he was only fined two cows, but you're fining me three cows!"?  I imagine it took only a few years at the most.

It's at this point when things are no longer freeform.  The longer you play, the larger the body of precedent becomes, and the more you use precedents the more they start looking like rules.

This isn't to say that freeform play is impossible (as I think lumpley was) but that maintaining it as freeform is very unlikely.

[lumpley]

John, Justin, exactly the opposite.  I'm saying that all play is freeform, essentially, but some play is freeform with mechanics.

Every actual game would require a million pages to write.  Every game is about social interaction.

Really what I'm saying is that "don't fuck up Vincent's fey woods" is exactly the same kind of bug, where it matters, as "roll to hit."  

-Vincent

[jdagna]

John, Justin, exactly the opposite.  I'm saying that all play is freeform, essentially, but some play is freeform with mechanics.

I understand what you're saying - all types of games draw heavily on similar elements, especially the social.

However, for the sake of making words useful, I would just make the following distinctions:

- what you call "freeform play" is in fact just "play" and thus "freeform with mechanics" is just "play with mechancis"
- what you'd call "play without mechanics" is just "freeform"

Without these kinds of distinctions, it seems like you're hurting RPG theory by collapsing more and more meaning into fewer and fewer words, making it increasingly difficult to discuss anything.

[lumpley]

Justin, maybe.  Why are we distinguishing between play where some of the rules are mechanical and play where none of the rules are mechanical again?

Irritable rhetorical questions, forgive me:  How many mechanical rules per unit time does it take to make a game not freeform?  Or is our commitment to using mechanical rules to resolve conflicts sufficient, even in a game session where the need doesn't arise?  Or is play freeform moment-to-moment except when mechanical rules have been immediately invoked, so a typical game session lurches from freeform to not whenever anybody picks up the dice?

I think that, for discussion, we ought to be explicit about considerations of social vs. mechanical rules.  Check this out:

"We decreased our reliance on the mechanics in the book in favor of overt inter-participant consensus-building."

"We decreased our reliance on the mechanics in the book in favor of subjective dice-interpretation on the part of the GM."

"We drifted toward freeform" could mean either.  It's casual and convenient and I don't have any problem with it as such, but it doesn't describe what actually happened in a discussion-facilitating way.

In other words, I'm not calling anything "freeform play".  I'm calling play "play", and treating the types of rules you use as a variable on top, to be specified at need.

-Vincent

[M. J. Young]

On the subject of what is freeform, I'd say this:

[*]A freeform system uses strictly drama resolution.[*]In a freeform system, no one vetoes a declared event or action, but merely modifies it through other declared events or actions.[/list:u]I think those are the essentials.

John has me questioning this.

I do think that freeform is something of a pride word for pure drama play; I don't think it's impossible to play that way. I agree that it's the sort of play that breaks down easily over social contract issues.

This is, as John implies, exactly the sort of let's pretend play kids do as LARPs--cops and robbers, or whatever. It breaks down when someone uses his social position to "beat" the other players, and they don't like it. If we can achieve continuing consensus, we're good; if we disagree, we have no fallback, unless there's a drama rule apportioning credibility to one person who gets to decide whose depiction of events will be considered correct.

So I don't think it's "freeform" that's really the problem; it's "diceless". "Diceless" is used for a catch-all for any system that doesn't use fortune mechanics, placed in opposition to any system that does. That means it's really a negative definition: Diceless=Devoid of fortune mechanics. It doesn't tell you what mechanics are in use; they could be mostly drama, mostly karma, or very balanced between the two.  "Freeform", despite the use by those who think it superior, is a better term, as it suggests total drama-based resolution.

Justin, I'm struck by the fact that you also thought of precedent in relation to drama. However, as I noted on the other thread, the decision as to whether precedent is binding is itself a foundational mechanic in drama systems, and you can have such a system in which it is not important.

--M. J. Young

[Halzebier]

So far, I never associated the term "freeform" with diceless play (rather the opposite, but that was a result of not seeing a formalized diceless game such as Everway for many years).

I've played quite a bit of what I'd call "freeform", most of which came down to "write down a couple of strengths and weaknesses for your character" and "roll a die, high is good, low is bad". Should these be called rules and the games be labelled as "not-freeform" as a result?

Please note that the principle "high is good, low is bad" was occasionally inverted during our games. This usually happened after no dice had been rolled for a while (after a pizza break or long dialogue, for instance) and people had forgotten about the original 'convention'.

Similarly, different dice were used at different times - whichever were at hand first, really.

I guess that, for me, "freeform" has so far meant that no rules - written, implied or planned - exist *at the beginning* of the game, but are made up as one goes along.

Such newly created rules will usually cover only the situation at hand. They might be reused when the same situation crops up again, but they may fall by the wayside just as well (e.g. if the group desires a much quicker or more detailed resolution this time around, to name two typical motivations).

(If what I have described above is generally not considered freeform at the Forge, then what is it? Is there a term/definition?)

Regards,

Hal

[jdagna]

In regards to your rhetorical questions, Vincent, I would say with some confidence that the mere commitment to mechanical rules/resolutions is sufficient to prevent play from being labelled free-form.

We could qualify this using the same vague "instance of play" definition used for GNS modes.  Thus, you could have freeform instances intermingled with mechanical instances depending on exactly what scale you use.  However, no mechanical game says "You must not do things the rules don't cover" so I see these small pockets of freeform play as being well within the mechanics, bringing us back to the previous paragraph.

Why discuss this at all?

For one thing, I think play with mechanic rules is significantly different from freeform play (in the way that Narrativist play is significantly different from Gamist play, even if they share some common elements).  Mechanical rules state up front that doing x gets you y (with differing amounts of certainty depending on the resolution system).  This guarantee affects player behavior.  

A simple example: a goup of players have disabled a dragon and can take its treasure without killing it.  In D&D, the experience mechanic affects behavior - players are almost guaranteed to kill it.  In a Palladium game, you might actually get more experience for letting it live, making that option more likely.  In a freeform game, without the mechanical x begets y, players are more likely to weigh the choice in totally different terms.

Mechanics changes the nature of the game for better and for worse, so I find it very worthwhile to examine play without mechanics.  It appears that most mechanics offer consistency in exchange for freedom.  I'm sure a political science major would find this fascinating as a parallel to Leviathan.

Anyway, I agree that you can't just say freeform and know exactly what people are doing.  But this is true of almost every term we use.  You can't say Gamist and know exactly what people are doing either, just that they're likely to be using some subset of behaviors associated with Gamist modes.


M.J. - I'm in total agreement that precedent need not be binding, which is why I feel like I can make the statement that freeform play is still possible.  

I first became really aware of its importance in a game we called freeform (but was really diceless, since we had a simple system in place).  After a few years of play, a few of us noticed that precedents had accumulated to the point where the written rules probably constituted less than 10% of the actual rule set people were playing with.  Furthermore, another group of people had stolen my rules for their own game and had tacked on their own unwritten precedents.  Our written rules were almost identical, but I literally couldn't figure out what they were doing half the time.