I have been thinking, recently, apropos to lumpley's Arranging the Pieces of the Game as to what really defines Narrativism and Gamism, at a base. I think that there are two issues here, which are of course intertwined, but largely seperate.

I'm going to cheat, and cut to the end point: I think the Gamism and Narrativism are as close to identical as to *almost* make no difference between them. I'm not proposing that they are identical, but rather that almost anyone who enjoys Gamist play will, properly introduced, enjoy Narrativist play, and visa-versa.

(I think that this also might be the "less-talked about" piece of Big Horseshoe -- that Gamism and Narrativism are almost touching, but not quite.)

The two issues here are the exploration and the social function.

First: Exploration

Ron talks about exploration of Premise as the primary engine of Narrativism. I agree with this assessment, by and large, but I want to take a little bit of time to talk about what exploration of Premise actually means.

A Premise, as I can sum it up in my head, is a Hard Question -- "Is the life of one man worth the fate of a village?" say. The point of narrativist play is that the players, by which I mean everyone at the table even the GM hiding behind that little screen over there, have to look at that issue and decide to answer it one way or another. I'd like to note, right now, that a key of a good Narrativist set-up is that the questions are not just limited to "yes/no," but rather allow a full range of options from giving up and watching away to "yes, but..." and "no, unless..." In a real sense, we're talking about Exploring the premise here -- what matters is not necessarily the actual answer which is chosen in play, but the act of poking around inside the moral/ethical conundrum. It could be called, also, Exploration of Hard Choices.

Right, okay, so that's a nice summary of Narrativism, but what does that have to do with Gamism, which is all about competing with each other, right? Well, funny you should ask, I don't think it is. Necessarily. (this ties into point two.)

In a situation of Gamist play, we're going to see the players, sitting around a table, agonizing over a situation in the game, trying to figure out what the best thing that they should do is. Funny, that sounds a lot like Narrativism, doesn't it? Yes. It is. Because Gamism is also founded in Exploration of Hard Choices.

Any decent instance of Gamist play will present a series of challenges and difficulties, and the Gamist players (including the GM hiding behind his screen over there) need to decide how they might best be addressed. A key to good gamist play (and something I hit on in an earlier thread called The Gentleman Gamist is that it allows for the full-range of possible responses to the situation, including "this isn't worth it I walk away," or "I go back to town and buy ten barrels of oil" and not just a matter of maneuvering into positions and attacking.

So, wow, those two things are similar.

Now, point two. I was going to post this in a seperate thread and called it "Narrativism's Dirty Little Secret" but I realized that it doesn't strictly apply to Narrativism, it isn't dirty, it isn't particularly little (actually a pretty big deal) and it's hardly a secret. And it helps me get to my conclusion here.

Ron talks, in his Gamism essay, about a lot of things, but he holds out that the bedrock of all Gamist play is competition to gain prestige among the people at the table. I agree one hundred percent, while at the same time feel that he has missed a major point.

Consider, to pick a human social group at random, a group of Narrativist players, and consider how they might interact with each other. They're going to be bouncing ideas off of each other, talking about the situation, and exploring the ins and outs of the premise like crazy. And, whaddaya know, they're going to be competing for prestige. Because the guy who can get the problem, who can really provide in-depth addressing tha makes you go "cool," the guy who always gets the brilliant scene -- that guy has more prestige. And we all love prestige.

Now, is this the basic engine driving all Narrativist play? No. But prestige competition, I would argue, forms an important part of all human social interaction, which includes RPG play as a subset (caveat -- I am not an anthropologist, I just hang out with them.) Narrativist play can be very competitive, very cooperative, or both. It can be very "step on up and pour out your moral guts" or it can be very friendly and allow people to step back from the events and distance themselves from the choices, and it can lie anywhere in-between. To borrow a term from the Gamism essay, the dials are flexible. But to say that there is no competition is just strange.

Now let's look at Gamist play, and consider how Gamist might interact with each other. They're going to be bouncing ideas off of each other, talking about the situation, and exploring the ins and outs of the tactics (and strategy) like crazy. And, whaddaya know, they're going to be competing for prestige. Because the guy who can get the problem, who can make his duel-flaming scimitar druid who is taking down demigods at fifth level, who can teach you how to make a Martial Artist not suck ass, who can scam an entire kingdom out from a king with only a beggar PC, a cod, and three candles, that guy has more prestige.

The point here is that Gamist prestige is gained by exploring the Hard Choices, and the Narrativist prestige is gained *in the exact same manner.*

Here are some questions:

Given that the two types are very similar, what is the best way to talk about the differences between them? (The best that I can think is that you explore Gamist situations chiefly by cleverness, and Narrativist situations chiefly by moral clarity.)

Does this have implications for Congruent Nar/Gam design?

Does this have implications for the creating a vocabulary that Gamist-favoring players and Narrativist-favoring players can use to talk to each other, directly, without using Simulationist-by-habit terms that brand both of them as pariahs?

Given the rooting of both Narrativist and Gamist play in challenging, difficult situations, does this have something to say about the strong emphasis on Sim in mid-80s through mid-90s gaming, the nature of gaming as a geek and social reject culture, and the lack of acceptance of role-play by the mainstream culture?

Other thoughts? Other question? Any disagreements?

yrs--
--Ben

I stumbled on the same thing last week when designing my IGC games. Both Battle of Frozen Waste and Brotherhood are designs very close to the edge, at least in my mind. The former started as plain nar, switched to gam, and came back to nar, while the latter started as a game mechanic, reached terminal velocity before coming to the crossroads and became gamism with a narrativist goal. So yeah, I know all about this feature, and agree largely with your points.

The only significant difference between nar and gam is the source of prestige for the players, or in other words, the goal of play. I happen to think that this is something Ron knows, and it's just that we haven't understood him before. I myself came to have an inkling from playing mucho MLwM last month, and realised this from just trying to design those two games. In other words this thing has been sitting there quite a while, so I'd be surprised if nobody noticed it before.

Ben Lehman wrote:
Given that the two types are very similar, what is the best way to talk about the differences between them? (The best that I can think is that you explore Gamist situations chiefly by cleverness, and Narrativist situations chiefly by moral clarity.)

Does this have implications for Congruent Nar/Gam design?

Does this have implications for the creating a vocabulary that Gamist-favoring players and Narrativist-favoring players can use to talk to each other, directly, without using Simulationist-by-habit terms that brand both of them as pariahs?

Given the rooting of both Narrativist and Gamist play in challenging, difficult situations, does this have something to say about the strong emphasis on Sim in mid-80s through mid-90s gaming, the nature of gaming as a geek and social reject culture, and the lack of acceptance of role-play by the mainstream culture?

Wonderful stuff!

One quickie reaction:

Eero Tuovinen wrote: The proof to a complete sameness would be if any gam game could be interpreted as nar and vice versa. I don't think that this is possible, which would seem to implicate a difference on some level. At first glance it's because the subject matters of the games are different, and there usually isn't any meaningful premises in how many torches one carries against the encumbrance factor.

Rob Carriere wrote: I think you could argue that, say, standard D&D play addresses the Premise `might makes right'.

greyorm wrote:
Standard D&D might hinge around "What would you do to gain power?" or "What trials is the gain of wealth worth?" or anything similar. Properly phrased, the above Premise during the game would be, "Does Might Make Right?" To which the D&D answer is usually "Yes."

Eero Tuovinen wrote: I've generally found out that the same people consistently hate both gam and nar. It's indeed tied to the challenge aspect; many people have thought that they are gamist until they lose, in my experience. Some times they still think so after losing, and the loss was because the GM cheated. In reality a significant amount of roleplayers is indeed on a power trip, which is a type of sim and not conducive to any kind of personal stake. It's one of the more common reactions: whenever someone disagrees with some rule or feature by claiming that it limits the possibilities for roleplaying, the reason is that they find the demand for personal accomplishment limiting. For many people the best kind of game is the one where they cannot be wrong.

Hello,

You guys are all so on target that I don't even know what to say. My personal "Hey! N goes with G, not S!" insight-moment was so re-orienting that it, above all else, prompted me to write GNS and Related Matters of Role-playing Theory as well as the three support essays.

And Eero, especially - Yes, I agree in full.

Best,
Ron

Eero Tuovinen wrote: I don't think you necessarily got Ben's point (assuming I got it, that is)...The point was not that all gamist games would have premise

There's no premise to D&D simply because for about all possible premises the answer has already been given...There's no room for premise as the game is written.

Consider Brotherhood, again...

greyorm wrote:
Actually, here's where I completely disagree. The answer hasn't been given. The answer is encouraged through the mechanics, but it is by no means a forgone conclusion, hence my statement about "depending on the situation in the game."

Everyone--

Wow. Great discussion.

Could we shift the D&D discussion, particularly about whether the hack-and-slay nature of D&D is rooted in the system or in social contract, off to another thread? It isn't that I don't think it's important, it's just that I'm worried about it swamping all other responses. Please post a link form this thread once you start it. Thanks.

More in depth replies later, when I don't have class in ten minutes.

yrs--
--Ben

Eero Tuovinen wrote: I've generally found out that the same people consistently hate both gam and nar. It's indeed tied to the challenge aspect; many people have thought that they are gamist until they lose, in my experience. Some times they still think so after losing, and the loss was because the GM cheated. In reality a significant amount of roleplayers is indeed on a power trip, which is a type of sim and not conducive to any kind of personal stake. It's one of the more common reactions: whenever someone disagrees with some rule or feature by claiming that it limits the possibilities for roleplaying, the reason is that they find the demand for personal accomplishment limiting. For many people the best kind of game is the one where they cannot be wrong.

Ben Lehman wrote: Could we shift the D&D discussion, particularly about whether the hack-and-slay nature of D&D is rooted in the system or in social contract, off to another thread? It isn't that I don't think it's important, it's just that I'm worried about it swamping all other responses. Please post a link form this thread once you start it. Thanks.

Okay -- for the most part, I'd like to say that most of the responses in this thread just make go "yes, yes, that's exactly it." I like this but, like Ron, find that I have little to say about it other than agreement.

However, I think that there are some things about Gamism that need to be cleared up, because they create false distinctions here.

1) Gamism is not, nor has ever been, explicitly about game mechanics. Likewise Narrativism is not, nor has ever been, explicitly divorced from game mechanics. For an example of the first, I hold up Amber Diceless in Throne War mode, and for an example of the second, I hold of Sorcerer. So talking about Gamism in terms of "more focused on rules" or "less creative" is not in the picture.

2) Likewise, Gamism is not, nor has ever been, necessarily about winning. Gamism, I believe, is about the exploration of strategic/tactical choices. This include an option for winning and for losing (see the "Gentleman Gamist" thread for more about this.) What is important about Gamism is the quality of the Challenge -- whether it was a good game. (Now, what *some* gamist groups do is place emphasis on exploration before the decision enters the Shared Imagined Space, thus allowing winners and losers, but I think that this is a subset of this larger exploration category.) A Gamist, I think, will be happy to lose as long as the situation was fair and challenging.
Likewise, Narrativism isn't necessarily about making any choice. There is a type of Narrativism that is about making the right choice, I'm pretty sure, represented by, say religious teaching games. The exploration of the Choice is still there, it just takes place on a metagame level, after the choice is made.

3) My point was not the Gamism and Narrativism are one and the same, but that both are based around addressing difficult questions, and thus very very similar. I think there are differences. The way I phrase it now is perhaps this, which is odd, because it is all in shared imagined space terms:

Gamism is about choices involving the material, which is anything easily grasped and defined.
Narrativism is about choices involving the ethereal, which is anything not easily defined (including morality.)

What do people think about these definitions?

So all you need to do to make a good hybrid is stick these two things together in the same package, like Eero does in Brotherhood.

See my comments in MJ's thread about D&D.

yrs--
--Ben

P.S. Apropos to Gamism and system crunch, I present "the lightest Gamist game in the world:"

You are in a jail cell.

(How do you get out?)

Hmmmmmm... I don't know why, but I'm uneasy about the whole material / immaterial divide there.

To my mind, Gamism is more tied to matching the player against the challenge of the situation in the SiS.

Whereas narratavism is the opposite ;-)

Actually, Nar is matching the player against the premise of the situation in the SiS.

There's certainly a degree of congruence there... especially given that, once a gamist works out a reward system geared to rewarding address of premise, they often migrate very quickly to N play, from G motives.

But going back to my original theme... I've often been in arguments with folks, often on ethical subjects, where winning the argument was more important than being right at the time. To me, that suggests that gamism may be "about" the immaterial or ethical issues, while premise in N games may be about entirely easily grasped material things (I could easily envisage an N game based around economic theory... "Opportunity Cost: the RPG").

Hiya,

Ben, I agree with all your clarifying points in your last post, but not with your material/immaterial distinction.

In my eyes, the distinction between Gamism and Narrativism resides in one of the most important "lynchpins" in the Big Model's structure: the reward system. It's part of System, but you can see its causes "reverberate" down from Social Contract, you can see its integration with many of the Techniques during play, and you can see it pop in and out of play associated with various Ephemera (in fact, noting down "that's a Karma point!" or something is, itself, an Ephemera).

These "reverberations" of the reward system are as close to a material manifestation of Creative Agenda as we are ever going to get. And since causality in the Big Model is considered to operate primarily inwards (i.e. Social Contract as prime mover), then it's Social Contract we should turn to when looking for "fundamental" variables.

So ... all of that is a long way to say that the distinction between Gamism and Narrativism is:

1. Gamist play is rewarded with increased social esteem based on assessing one another's strategy and guts.

2. Narrativist play is rewarded with insight into one another as authors and into oneself via the text (in this case, I mean the SIS/transcript), at the visceral level typically associated with narrative fiction.

I'm pretty sure I said both of those things in the corresponding essays, as well as saying that I think they are procedurally very similar in role-playing.

Best,
Ron

Ron Edwards wrote:
1. Gamist play is rewarded with increased social esteem based on assessing one another's strategy and guts.

2. Narrativist play is rewarded with insight into one another as authors and into oneself via the text (in this case, I mean the SIS/transcript), at the visceral level typically associated with narrative fiction.

Hi Ben,

Everyone always focuses on the "social esteem" part of that definition. The real thing to focus on is the strategy and guts part.

I do think that the social esteem issue is present in the other modes, but is required in the Gamist one.

Best,
Ron

Well, I'd nitpick Ron to say that social esteem is a necessary engine for all social intercourse, and thus a (possibly muted) driver of all play regardless of CA, but gamism is driven by a more open acclaim than most sim play, and much nar play.

Am i right in saying that the only reason social esteem appears in the Gamism definition is that G play is about winning something, and in a socially co-operative past-time the only thing worth winning is esteem of your peers?

Anyway, we're all singing star spangled banner to the same tune, just arguing over whether it's "oh say can you see" or "oh say can you see".

Ron Edwards wrote: Hi Ben,

Everyone always focuses on the "social esteem" part of that definition. The real thing to focus on is the strategy and guts part.

I do think that the social esteem issue is present in the other modes, but is required in the Gamist one.

Ben:

I don't think anyone's disagreeing over the "social esteem in all agenda" thing here... but I also don't think that jockeying over social esteem (and in some cases there, losing it for each other) is as closely identified with competition as you seem to.

Frex, the breakdown you describe over "doing sim wrong" seems like a deep disagreement over techniques: i don't see where competing for social esteem comes into it, except as a means to win the argument over which techniques are to be used.

In fact, I'd say the problem there was Gam-Sim clash: complaints about "mixing in and out game" and "not playing in character" sound to me like sim disapproval of gam tactics.

Could it be that when everyone's in Gam mode, the clash goes away because the sim players relax their insistence on pure diagetic play?

I'm seeing you say competition where I think I can see plain old disagreement... And I still reckon "guts" are more important to gam play than any other. but that may be the groups I've been with. Competition =/= disagreement.

I'd have to agree with Pete.

In what way is throwing a tantrum and winding up on non speaking terms over a tif about playing in character competition for social esteem?

Does your group actually hold up in high esteem players who act like twits?

I suspect not. In fact, I'll venture (let me know if I'm overstepping here) that you generally disparage such behavior and have lots of rude things to say about someone when they act like this.

So I'm not seeing this sort of behavior as being competing for social esteem. Its seems to me to be regular old disagreement where one or more parties are using incredibly childish debating techniques.

Am I missing something?

I have problems with the terms as they stand very similar to Ben's.

What I fund frustrating is that a lot - I mean really, a lot - of gamist play is totally non-competitive and has no element of social esteem at all because there is nobody there to observe it. If I'm playing Civilisation, my board-tokens are competing with other baord-tokens, but there is not and never will be an audience for my success or failure. Theres just me, playing for my satisfaction.

There I disagree that the social esteem issue is REQUIRED for Gamism. Its not, IMO. Its one of the things that gamists may engage in, just as it may be one of the things that any agenda practitioner may engage in.

I guess what bugs me about this is that it impies that if there is a gamist player about, then social esteem competition will necessarily be a part of play. And I don't buy that. There does not seem to be any room for the self-satisfied gamist whose assessment is SELF-esteem based instead of socially based and who thus poses no threat to anyone, and will not be trying to score points off anyone. They can sit there, into the Zen of their own performace, not much giving a damn what anyone thinks about what they are achieving or otherwise.

My understanding is that when self-esteem is at stake, that's just as validly Step On Up as when esteem in the eyes of peers or audience is at stake. "Social esteem" as a phrase might be a bit misleading (and the Gamism essay only uses it once); saying "esteem that exists at the social level" as the essay generally does might make it clearer that self-esteem qualifies.

I also believe it is possible (and not necessarily uncommon) to play conventional games, especially solo games, in a completely "non-gamist" way, playing without any esteem (self- or otherwise) at all at stake, playing for the sensory and cognitive experience, or the "flow" of it, alone.

- Walt

contracycle wrote: I guess what bugs me about this is that it impies that if there is a gamist player about, then social esteem competition will necessarily be a part of play. And I don't buy that. There does not seem to be any room for the self-satisfied gamist whose assessment is SELF-esteem based instead of socially based and who thus poses no threat to anyone, and will not be trying to score points off anyone.

In the Gamism essay, Ron wrote: Think of each level having a little red dial, from 1 to 11 - and those dials can be twisted independently. Therefore, four extremes of dial-twisting may be compared.

1. High competition in Step On Up plus low competition in Challenge = entirely team-based play, party style against a shared Challenge, but with value placed on some other metric of winning among the real people, such as levelling-up faster, having the best stuff, having one's player-characters be killed less often, getting more Victory Points, or some such thing. Most Tunnels & Trolls play is like this.

2. Low competition in Step On Up plus high competition in Challenge = characters are constantly scheming on one another or perhaps openly trying to kill or outdo another but the players aren't especially competing, because consequences to the player are low per unit win/loss. Kobolds Ate My Baby and the related game, Ninja Burger, play this way.

3. High competition in both levels = moving toward the Hard Core (see below), including strong rules-manipulation, often observed in variants of Dungeons & Dragons as well in much LARP play. A risky way to play, but plenty of fun if you have a well-designed system like Rune.

4. Low competition in both levels = strong focus on Step On Up and Challenge but with little need for conflict-of-interest. Quite a bit of D&D based on story-heavy published scenarios plays this way. It shares some features with "characters face problem" Simulationist play, with the addition of a performance metric of some kind. Some T&T play Drifted this way as well, judging by many Sorcerer's Apprentice articles.

Walt Freitag wrote:
I also believe it is possible (and not necessarily uncommon) to play conventional games, especially solo games, in a completely "non-gamist" way, playing without any esteem (self- or otherwise) at all at stake, playing for the sensory and cognitive experience, or the "flow" of it, alone.

Hello,

Why does everyone persistently ignore the crucial variable in my definition of Gamist play?

Personal strategy and guts.

It's not just about social esteem, it's social esteem about these qualities specifically, in application. What is so hard about understanding that?

Best,
Ron

Well, I think Walt's saying you can play non-rp games (computer, etc) either for the journey or the story, not necessarily the challenge.

So, not gamism, yeah?

And where comes this idea that gamist play involves some zero sum game of competing for social esteem? It's all about the group approval (which, as you rightly say, is a necessary component for all CA) for display of tactical skill & risk taking. Now, that's grabbing for social esteem, but not necessarily competing for it in terms of "beating the other players."

And sure, there's room for the solipsistic, self satisfied gamist, just like the self satisfied sim and self satisfied nar ("heh. I'm adressing my premise and nobody knows, ehehehehehehe"). But unless it's affecting the expression of the game, unless it affects play, it doesn't matter to the model.

EDIT: cross posted with Ron. What he said. The social esteem stuff is right up there at the Social Contract level of the model, we like playing with folks who like us.

Those are 2 seperate points he's making Gareth.

1) Yes you can play solo gamist because self esteem is at stake.

2) But not all games played solo are played gamist with self esteem at stake, they may also be being played simply for the experience.


I don't know how you play Civ, but when I play it (and I play a ton of it) its and odd admixture.

I hate and resent it when a freaking computer pastes me. Particularly when it was my own fault. That's the gamist self esteem element.

But I really really hate multiplayer Civ, because there are alot of Gamey strategies to the game that surface when people are playing to win that detract from the overall experience of the game.


What that tells me is the step on up dial is cranked to different levels. In multiplayer Civ where the primary goal is to prove how many hours of your life you've wasted getting really good at a computer game (step on up cranked high) players are willing to sacrifice the experience for the win.

I avoid multiplayer (and generally do with other games like Age of Wonder etc, to) because the Step on Up is cranked higher than I like. When playing solo I can "step on up" only to extent I need to satisfy my own esteem issues and can then enjoy a more leisurely viable came play.

Why do I say it's non-gamist? Simple. "No esteem (self- or otherwise) at stake" equals no Step On Up equals not Gamist.

Of course, this is in reference to something other than role playing games, which means Agenda Theory desciptors like "Gamist" and "Not Gamist" are applicable only as loose metaphors. Taking it too literally would be like debating whether a tree is liberal or conservative (or whether John Kerry leans more toward deciduous or coniferous).

If self-esteem is construed as social, then I don't know what else to say. It seems we permanently circle back to the necessary starting point that gamists are primarily engaged in a form of social status competition. But as has already been pointed out, the same could be said for any public exercise under any agenda - recognition of the veracity of sim, recognition of a profound answer to premise. Surely, all these procure some sort of social prestige - at which point ALL agenda's must be identified as a form of esteem competition. It seems circular to me.

Ron Edwards wrote: Why does everyone persistently ignore the crucial variable in my definition of Gamist play?

Personal strategy and guts.

It's not just about social esteem, it's social esteem about these qualities specifically, in application. What is so hard about understanding that?

Hi Walt,

I've never supported the business about making others laugh as a Gamist approach. My claim all along is that humor is a secondary element of whatever Creative Agenda is under way, and that it can augment or overtake any of them. So I think that's a red-herring issue.

I also don't grasp how to apply your point about strategy & guts in other, non-role-playing activities. Sure it applies to other activities. And its application to role-playing is very similar. When it applies, and when it's the key variable for the social-status thing, then that's Gamist play.

That is so clear, and so straightforward, that I can only guess that people are still trying to ratchet other things they want or don't want to be Gamist into the conversation. I'm pretty sure you're not guilty of that, though, so color me confused.

Best,
Ron

Ron,

You've also indicated that if you remove the personal strategy and guts element and have the social esteem competition independent of the imagined elements of play then you still have Gamism, albeit of the hardcore variety. It's inevitable for people to move from there to seeing the social esteem competition as the sine qua none of Gamism and the personal strategy and guts as being an optional extra.

Hi Ron,

I'm pretty sure I'm the one who's confused. My question (and it's not rhetorical, it's real curiosity) is:

1. Gamist play is rewarded with increased social esteem based on assessing one another's strategy and guts.

2. ____ play is rewarded with increased social esteem based on assessing one another's play.

What behaviors relevant to role playing are included in #2 but excluded in #1? In other words, what error occurs as a result of overlooking the "strategy and guts" stipulation as you've warned us not to do?

And, as an entirely separate question, am I correct in telling Gareth that it's valid to add a parenthetical "(or one's own)" after "one another's" in definition #1?

- Walt

Hello,

Ian, I think you're confounding the social esteem issue per se with competition for social esteem. In my essay, I try to make it clear that competition is based on a very specific, identifiable phenomenon: when the "pool" of esteem relies on conflict of interest (if one goes up, someone or everyone else has to go down). This is not definitional for Gamist play; it is merely a very powerful auxiliary/optional engine which may be added to it, often in a positive way.

Step On Up = social esteem is at stake based on personal strategy and guts

- it may or may not include conflict of interest and therefore competition for that esteem
- it must concern the "strategy and guts" being demonstrated by the real people

Hard Core Gamism doesn't deviate from these standards. It is indeed about (a) social esteem based on (b) personal strategy and guts, but (c) removes the relevance of the Exploration except as a shuttlecock to be fought over among egos. It's a modification of Gamist play that does not require changing the definition. And how can it not be about strategy and guts? It's about nothing but! It concerns my (the person's) strategy and guts relative to the rules-set and to one another's egos in terms of social dominance (bullying, spurious logic, etc). Same issues + absent to minimal Exploration + willingness to harm another's social standing = Hard Core Gamism. I don't see how it causes the "strategy and guts" element to disappear at all - emphatically to the contrary, in fact.

Walt, let's see ...

1. Gamist play is rewarded with increased social esteem based on assessing one another's strategy and guts.

2. ____ play is rewarded with increased social esteem based on assessing one another's play.

What behaviors relevant to role playing are included in #2 but excluded in #1? In other words, what error occurs as a result of overlooking the "strategy and guts" stipulation as you've warned us not to do?

And, as an entirely separate question, am I correct in telling Gareth that it's valid to add a parenthetical "(or one's own)" after "one another's" in definition #1?

As far as social-esteem and Gamism, I don't know if I can add much more after Pete said:

Pete wrote: And where comes this idea that gamist play involves some zero sum game of competing for social esteem? It's all about the group approval (which, as you rightly say, is a necessary component for all CA) for display of tactical skill & risk taking. Now, that's grabbing for social esteem, but not necessarily competing for it in terms of "beating the other players."

The only thing I'm really competitive about when I play RPG's is my groovy ideas: when I come up with a new idea or concept in the setting, and people jump on it and start riffing on it, I feel very gratified. Obviously, this works best in games where I have some directorial powers and make up cool stuff.

As far as being effective in combat, making people laugh... I can do those things, but they're not a big deal. I like it when people want to play with my toys.

So that's clearly a form of metagame reward, but it doesn't seem to fit the GNS breakdown very well.

Speaking as a quack GNS consultant (hey Ron, can I charge people for that yet?)... sounds to me like DannyK is grooving on sim to me. Coming up with new stuff to explore, and getting well deserved kudos from other folks exploring them.

cruciel wrote: I?m struggling to get a across what probably just boils down to "A creative agenda is simply a compilation of Techniques."

Ron

I think the source for my confusion here, and I think in earlier discussions with Ralph, is that your position here is contradictory to the venn diagram.

* if the strategy and guts does not have to refer to the the rules of the game because gamism can be expressed purely as social bullying
* AND if the strategy and guts do not have to relate to the imaginary events of play or the ruleset.

Then this contradicts the Venn Diagram.

[Social Contract[Exploration[Creative Agenda---->[Techniques[Ephemera]]]]]

For the above to be true about Gamism the Creative Agenda box would need to sit between Social Contract and Explaration.

[Social Contract[Creative Agenda---->[Exploration[Techniques[Ephemera]]]]]

(none of which I see as inherantly problematic - except insofar as it suggests Gamism exists entirely independently of roleplaying and thus suggests that for gamists rpgs exist merely as a venue, as a kind of soft play area)

Wow.

This thread exploded while I was out.

Okay. I'm not going to try the misguided approach of responding to each post individually, but I'm going to respond to the general ideas.

1) If your thinking "I agree with Ron, Ben is is a dolt" or "I agree with Ben, Ron is a dolt," you're not reading my posts carefully enough, becuase I (seem to) agree with Ron. It's just that he *way* he talks about things makes my skin crawl, and I'm trying to tell him (because he asked) why this is the case.

2) Regarding my background, no it isn't a mix of the Game and Sim with competition at the sim level -- the Gamist underlying was really just jocular minimaxing. Really. The social competition was totally sim-level, and by "not talking" I mean social expulsion and ridicule, not isolated tantrums (rather, a big group of people having a tantrum at once.) And, yes, I know its dysfunctional. I'm trying to explain why Gamism doesn't seem very competitive to me, not dis Sim.

3) Ian (latest post) I think you're on to something, but I don't think that a rule-less Gamism is necessarily about bullying at all. Remember -- it's not zero sum. Let me say that again: it's not zero sum.

What I think you're on to is that the competition knob is at the Social Contract level of the model, and that the Gamism switch is at the CA level, and thus the relationship between competition and Gamism is whispy at best.

4) Danny K: Yes, that's competitive Sim. Thanks for some evidence it's existence (I'd love to see an actual play post about this...)

5) Ron: If, as you say by way of Walt, "All play is rewarded with increased social esteem based on assessing one another's play," why did you single out Gamism and the Gamist essay to talk about this? In other words, I'm hip to your meaning, but I still can't fathom the presentation.

yrs--
--Ben

The way I see it, gamism grooves on using tactical expertise & risk taking to try to gain something... which could well be illustrated by a meta game reward, whether it's currency or just Oog (thanks, Great Ork Gods), or it could be a diagetic improvement in the situation of the character, it could be candy from the GM, but none of these have to be rpesent, becuase they're just place holders for the important thing, which is the acclaim of your peers.

Which, sure, is what we all want from all CA... but if gamism is tactics & risk to gain something, we ought to say what that something is. Sure, it's the same as the other CA, but it's what's being rewarded and approved that defines the CA, not what's being given. Look back at the list of stuff the Gamist can be getting for "good play": the same list can be used to reward Sim or Nar play. So the reward is less important that what's being rewarded.

I'm still slightly foxed as to what or who DannyK is competing with in his Sim invention... perhaps striving is a better term than competition: but then, striving is one of my favourite terms in all games analysis (any situation without striving is dull, dull, dull)

pete_darby wrote: but none of these have to be rpesent, becuase they're just place holders for the important thing, which is the acclaim of your peers.

I'm still slightly foxed as to what or who DannyK is competing with in his Sim invention...

EDITED TO REMOVE UNNECESSARY SARCASM

Gareth, I'm talking about role-playing games as a creative, social past time, so I don't think Solitaire is relevant.

But you could do worse than searching on "solo adventure" for previous discussions on that sort of thing in RPG's.

pete_darby wrote: Gareth: I'm talking about role playing games... what are you talking about?

Ah well, agree to disagree time... RPG's are qualitively different to other games, and their rewards and methods are peculiar to them, to my mind.

The whole of the model being discussed here is predicated on RPG's being social, collaborative pasttimes. When folks are grooving entirely on the personal satisfaction of doing, they're missing a whole load of fun that's unique to RPG's.

Why call it gamism? Tactics & risk, the same as in other games, are being tested, but the rewards and methods are different.

And, please, where's the tactics & risk in Solitaire? Pitting your wits against a deck of cards? I'd barely even call Solitaire a game.

And, please, where's the tactics & risk in Solitaire? Pitting your wits against a deck of cards? I'd barely even call Solitaire a game.

pete_darby wrote:
The whole of the model being discussed here is predicated on RPG's being social, collaborative pasttimes. When folks are grooving entirely on the personal satisfaction of doing, they're missing a whole load of fun that's unique to RPG's.

Why call it gamism? Tactics & risk, the same as in other games, are being tested, but the rewards and methods are different.

And, please, where's the tactics & risk in Solitaire? Pitting your wits against a deck of cards? I'd barely even call Solitaire a game.

With Ron subsequently filling in the world 'All,' I wrote: 1. Gamist play is rewarded with increased social esteem based on assessing one another's strategy and guts.

2. All play is rewarded with increased social esteem based on assessing one another's play.

Gareth, just to pick up on one bit... sure, you're exploring setting and character, but to what end? To find out more about the character or setting (sim) or to extend tactical options, or to put something at risk (both gam). That's one fairly unique aspect of RPG's: pretty much everything's done through a lens of exploration of a shared imaginary space, but that doesn't mean that exploration is or isn't the point.

Why do people persist playing games that they're "bad at"? Perhaps because, despite them not "winning" in the terms the game describes, they're being rewarded either internally or externally for having tried to apply tactical thinking and taken risks. Esteem, again both self and other, as driver. But, in a social past time, I think we've got to talk about social esteem.

Or perhaps they like the space they're exploring in the game, or they're crafting heart rending stories of staggering beauty on the quake servers. Maybe they just like to hang with the guys. Maybe the game doesn't matter, but the folks do.

Walt... I guess it's a common cause of peer approval, and is a good example of a gamist aspect to sim play, but still I'm seeing the preservation of the dream (the right idea at the right time) as being the main thing approved of here. And hey, I'm still pushing for striving to be used in general cases: all CA consist of striving for esteem in the group, but what's being esteemed is the clincher. In Walt's example, it's the quality, appropriateness and unpredictability of the suggestion that's rewarded, which certainly take guts to present, and perhaps a little tactical thinking about presentation, but it seems to me isn't the focus, the source of the approval.

Quoting Pete Darby, Ralph wrote:

And, please, where's the tactics & risk in Solitaire? Pitting your wits against a deck of cards? I'd barely even call Solitaire a game.

There are tactics to solitaire, but I believe it would be more accurately categorized as a puzzle than a game.

Later, Walt wrote: In a game with a creative Sim agenda, someone makes the perfect "catbus" contribution into the imagined space -- an imagined element that's completely unexpected, and yet completely fitting. I load them up with social esteem. Why? Because I'm impressed and grateful. Why am I impressed and grateful? Because they've done something that's not easy to do or not frequently done well. Why is it not easy to do or not frequently done well? Because doing it requires, among other things, strategy and guts (more so the latter, in this case).

M. J. Young wrote:
That's a fine line; I tend to think of it as a game, and have learned much from playing it.

MJ:

Damn good point there about "what do we mean when we say strategy or tactics?"

Gamism is, to my mind, concerned with the Costikyan definition of games, where strategy and tactics are concerned with management and manipulation of resources and risk.

Now, in sim games, you've still got your resources to manipulate and put at risk, but that's not as important as the preservation, expansion and exploration of the SiS: good management and manipulation of resources is only socially rewarded as far as they support the Sim agenda. Same with nar, you got resources and risk, but they're important as feeders for story now & address of premise, not so much for the elegance of their management.

But I get the feeling that, for satisfying play, there has to be struggle, and for struggle there has to be some element of personal esteem "on the line", at least as an opportunity cost as opposed to an actual loss. But that's just a long winded was of saying "we play to get approval of our play from the whole group (including ourselves), and gear our play to maximize that." Which is kind of the point of the whole of Ron's theory...

pete_darby wrote: But I get the feeling that, for satisfying play, there has to be struggle, and for struggle there has to be some element of personal esteem "on the line", at least as an opportunity cost as opposed to an actual loss.

But my point was that in all play in RPG's, not just Gamist, there's an element of risk. In Gamism, it's more quantified, but in Sim it's the risk that your exploration won't gel with the other folks in the SiS, in Nar it's exposure of your own values. And there's my own crazy attitude that any creative endeavour involves some effort towards improving the endeavour, which is what I mean by struggle, and risk in that the effort may be misguided, or wasted. But this is getting very waffley, and should wait until I can express it properly.

In the example you gave... if no-one's grooving on approving optimal tactical play or risk, are you sure you're not exploring system in a Sim style?

But, how do you mean, play a good game? Exhibit tactical thinking? Take risks?

And, in terms of the big ol' theory, you may be grooving on the tactical thinking, but if other folks don't appreciate that's how you're playing, you can sure end up with a lot of strife. So the social esteem, or at least approval, is important for an ongoing game to stay "fun".

pete_darby wrote:
In the example you gave... if no-one's grooving on approving optimal tactical play or risk, are you sure you're not exploring system in a Sim style?

Well we're into things like the difference between sport and games (IMVOO, I think you need to be able to directly affect the other guy to make it a game, and golf don't qualify), and the difference between reading and writing a story, and the difference between solo activities, observing activities and participating activities, all of which have differing methods and rewards.

I'm not saying group esteem is the only reason anyone does anything (that would be crazy talk), but it is, to me, the reason they do social things, to get warm fuzzies from the group, as opposed to lone wolf activities.

And hey, some folks do read books they hate just to show off to their friends...

Hello,

In fact, I think the more general topics should be taken to off-list discussions now. This thread has certainly more than served its purpose regarding RPGs.

Best,
Ron