So as I start slowly grinding the gears to think about writing something on structural analysis, myth, and gaming, I'm running immediately against a problem that I think is general for certain contributions to PUSH. I wonder if others have suggestions and/or opinions.

In this post, in reference to a potential book on gaming, I wrote: So basically [chapter] I-II sets up, explains to the academic reader what RPGs are and something of the range, and explains to the gamer reader what I'm doing and not doing. The latter is especially important because gamers will read this book very differently from the way academics will.

In Finnish discourse we have a concrete example of how this goes if you just say to heck with it and let the bets fall where they may. The theory people here routinely speak to each other, offer their work for wider consumption and simply don't care about specifically including the great unwashed masses.

The result: most players simply ignore the theoretics, leaving them to their own world. The results and dialogue slowly penetrate into lower spheres and affect the scene through the deeds of the theory people. For example the Turku enthusiasts would be totally inconsequential for play at large if the exactly same people weren't constantly proving their mettle in actual play. Similarly my own stock took to a sharp rise when I started "walking the walk", that is, importing and publishing the Forge type games about which my theory speaks.

So that's one way to go about it. Simply-don't-care. No idea if it's the best option, but at least it allows you to go on with your work, be heard and in general not to be taken prisoner by the expectations of others.

If you want to hook less theoretic people, I suggest offering the proof first, or at least at the same time as theory. Whatever your theory is about, throw the practical implications out there, too, and in clear language. You know I think that any worthwile theory will have practical use, or at least some interesting concrete illustration.

Let's look at your ritual article as an example. Everybody I know has simply bypassed the article, sure in their expertise that it doesn't speak about anything they didn't know ("Anthropology and roleplaying? Bah!"). But when I start them playing a game where the real-world ritual space is manipulated through the game world and system (a little scenario I concocted the other day), or when I just outline the implications of the article with a couple of examples in clear Finnish, the whole stuff clicks quite suddenly if the person has any ability for anthropological thought at all. When somebody explains your academic text to mean essentially "Here, I've explained why those Turkuist larps work. Here are the tools people have used for ten thousand years for the same effect. How about that?", the interest shoots up.

I don't see this as such a huge problem. The best academic texts the world over have loosened the formal "style" usually asked of undergraduates in favor of representing their ideas in clear, concrete ways. Just do that and write a partner article where you apply the same ideas, and everything should be fine.

Hi, clehrich

Maybe first ask, "What are the objectives of PUSH and who is its intended audience?" That will determine how academic your article is. Are you talking to those new into roleplaying, old hands at it, rpg designers heavily enmeshed in the lingo of the day, etc.

And if your discourse waxes academic, you could write it with sidebars that summarize the theories you're writing about. This tends to helps to get people up to speed quickly on issues you're discussing.

Gary

GaryTP wrote: Maybe first ask, "What are the objectives of PUSH and who is its intended audience?" That will determine how academic your article is. Are you talking to those new into roleplaying, old hands at it, rpg designers heavily enmeshed in the lingo of the day, etc.

Chris, I think you're right -- this is an important question. Who is Push for, really? Who do we imagine will be reading this, and who do we want to address?

I'm not going to answer this myself, at least the "should/want to" part. I have some guesses about who the readership might actually be, and I think it's likely to be a self-selected group, very heavily of Forge readers, unless there's an active attempt to address and promote it with other groups. Jon?

Here's a question -- is it worthwhile to get someone (or everyone) on the job of creating an article on "why theory is good for gaming." Something that takes the pressure off individual articles and just establishes some of the reasons it may be worth someone's time to read the theory. I don't know whether anyone who's likely to dismiss theory would directly read that sort of article, or even necessarily Push, for that matter. I could see people already convinced of the value of theory getting some additional or perhaps clearer ideas about why they think it's worthwhile, which perhaps could be useful to them in future flamewars :-)

Chris, is this also a major issue for the book length treatment? Who would be the publisher (by which I mean, what kind of publication are you talking about)? Who would the book primarily be addressed to? Are you talking self-publication or academic press here? If the latter, I think you could just skip all the "why this stuff is useful to gamers," the "why theory is good," and even the "what these theories mean if you're a gamer looking at them for the first time." Even academic books generally have to introduce the specifics of their approach to an audience of other academics who might be interested but not intimately familiar with the theory in use in the book. The gamers who read your book will get this stuff, and needn't necessarily be targeted beyond the standard introduction that anyone gets to the theoretical and methodological assumptions of the work. If gamers are interested enough (and I think many of them will be), they'll give it a shot. If not, they won't. Some folks might even take pride in figuring it out.

I think you're right to assume that attempting to convert those already averse to theory would mostly be misplaced effort in a book of this nature. But again, I guess it depends on who you're really writing for. You probably can't effectively address as wide an audience as you'd like to, ideally -- any move to address the specialists might lose the gamers, sure; but too much time spent on the gamers could lose you the specialists. What do you want to write about? Who do you really want to address? I can see personal reasons why I might want to address a book like that to gamers, if I were writing it. But I can also see both personal and professional reasons why I might want to address it primarily to specialists. I'm not sure who you're thinking of in concrete terms as the core audience.

Rich

Rich Forest wrote: Here's a question -- is it worthwhile to get someone (or everyone) on the job of creating an article on "why theory is good for gaming." Something that takes the pressure off individual articles and just establishes some of the reasons it may be worth someone's time to read the theory. I don't know whether anyone who's likely to dismiss theory would directly read that sort of article, or even necessarily Push, for that matter. I could see people already convinced of the value of theory getting some additional or perhaps clearer ideas about why they think it's worthwhile, which perhaps could be useful to them in future flamewars :-)

Chris, is this also a major issue for the book length treatment? Who would be the publisher (by which I mean, what kind of publication are you talking about)? Who would the book primarily be addressed to? Are you talking self-publication or academic press here? If the latter, I think you could just skip all the "why this stuff is useful to gamers," the "why theory is good," and even the "what these theories mean if you're a gamer looking at them for the first time." Even academic books generally have to introduce the specifics of their approach to an audience of other academics who might be interested but not intimately familiar with the theory in use in the book. The gamers who read your book will get this stuff, and needn't necessarily be targeted beyond the standard introduction that anyone gets to the theoretical and methodological assumptions of the work. If gamers are interested enough (and I think many of them will be), they'll give it a shot. If not, they won't. Some folks might even take pride in figuring it out.

I think you're right to assume that attempting to convert those already averse to theory would mostly be misplaced effort in a book of this nature. But again, I guess it depends on who you're really writing for. You probably can't effectively address as wide an audience as you'd like to, ideally -- any move to address the specialists might lose the gamers, sure; but too much time spent on the gamers could lose you the specialists. What do you want to write about? Who do you really want to address? I can see personal reasons why I might want to address a book like that to gamers, if I were writing it. But I can also see both personal and professional reasons why I might want to address it primarily to specialists. I'm not sure who you're thinking of in concrete terms as the core audience.

I don't know, guys. I tend to find people being apologists about theory to be really frustrating, as a reader. I mean, if what you have to say is interesting, then it's going to be worthwhile to read even if I don't see any practical applications right now. Sure, if you can give lots of examples and make me see how this can be applied, it's even better, but I wouldn't worry about it too much, honestly. I figure we just market the book as well as we can, towards people who are interested in thinking seriously about roleplaying.

I'm seeing Push as a book for people who have played at least one indie game and are interested in playing more, but not just for publishers and people who are interested in writing indie games (though group B is doubtlessly included in group A).

Does that help?

Jonathan,

You're right that apologetics are probably unnecessary, but I wasn't really thinking quite that.

See, if Push is aimed primarily at people who play RPGs, perhaps especially Indie RPGs, you get straight into all those tedious questions people raise about the Forge. You know, is it elitist? does this stuff matter? is this so much navel-gazing? etc. Certainly someone who already thinks this strongly isn't going to like Push, would be my guess, but there is a reason for all that criticism.

And in fact, a very common type of debate on the Forge is ultimately about the same set of issues. Not just the Big Model, either -- there is a lot of discussion of what makes theoretical work meaningful and valuable, and there are a lot of different perspectives on this. For example, I tend to look at theory as valuable intrinsically, as a way of thinking and as a way of understanding what gaming really is as something part of a larger universe of human behavior. But I get some flack for that, because a lot of folks feel that theory is validated by its practical value in terms of design, or in terms of understanding why my game isn't working, or in terms of understanding that my game group really wants something they're not getting enough of and could we have more of that please? And so on.

I'd like to see some head-on discussion of these topics, but I also think that one of the best justifications for theory is precisely that there are so many "right" answers to the question, "why theory?" So having an editorial position on theory in a sense undermines that. That's sort of why I thought it might be nice to have some brief essays by various members of the board talking about what they think theory is and what it's for, and perhaps also looking toward where theory can go from here. Apologetics are not useful, but I'd love to hear what various people have to say about what they see as interesting directions in theory, or the state of the field, or how theory has been practically helpful, or whatever.

Does that clarify the difference?

Yeah, it does.

I tend to view theory as one of the "Things that makes you go HWAT!" (an expression that developed out of a IRC conversation I had about a month ago, when we were talking about Anglo-Saxons). That is, provocative ideas that really get you excited about roleplaying, whether because it illuminates the possibility of new techniques and play styles, or because it makes you understand something that you didn't really get before. I want to come out of a theory article jazzed about roleplaying, ready to hit the ground running, with some sort of new schema or revelation in my head.

If you think that talking a bit about that kind of thing would be helpful, we could easily create an introduction like that, where a bunch of people each submit a few paragraphs about what makes them get out of bed in the morning and start thinking about roleplaying theory.

I was sort of thinking that about 2 pages each would do it, but you'd only have one thing like this per issue. I mean, meditating on theory is interesting and valuable, but if you have a whole lot of it in a block you tend to lose the readers.

For example, I'd be happy to put together 2 pages on what I think is interesting in RPG theory and where I see things going at the moment, as well as what I'd like to see more of. In the next issue, you do one, or Eero does, or Rich, or whoever. And so on. It'd be a regular feature that way, and once we run out of editors, or run out of editors willing to do this anyway, we solicit pieces like this from Ron and Greg Stafford and so on. I think things like this would also be a little autobiographical, saying a word about who you are and where you're coming from. Community-building, you might say.

I think this could be a real draw, frankly. The articles are always going to be a little scattered, because we're not at the moment talking about special issues on WoD or whatever. But you always know that in the front there's going to be some brief discussion about the state of the art in terms of theory. I know I would always read that part, and then dip into articles as they seemed interesting or caught my eye. Kind of like a column but without a regular author, a sort of column in reverse if you see what I mean.

What do others out there think?

Jonathan Walton wrote:
I tend to view theory as one of the "Things that makes you go HWAT!" (an expression that developed out of a IRC conversation I had about a month ago, when we were talking about Anglo-Saxons). That is, provocative ideas that really get you excited about roleplaying, whether because it illuminates the possibility of new techniques and play styles, or because it makes you understand something that you didn't really get before. I want to come out of a theory article jazzed about roleplaying, ready to hit the ground running, with some sort of new schema or revelation in my head.

Jonathan Walton wrote: I figure we just market the book as well as we can, towards people who are interested in thinking seriously about roleplaying.

I'm seeing Push as a book for people who have played at least one indie game and are interested in playing more, but not just for publishers and people who are interested in writing indie games (though group B is doubtlessly included in group A).

Does that help?

That's pretty sweet, actually, Gary. Thanks! I might put a bit of spin on it, but something like that would be much more clean than "A Journal of Progressive Roleplaying" or whatever the title is now.

Chris, consider your proposal approved. What about calling the column "The Story So Far" after our original handbook title?

Jonathan Walton wrote: Chris, consider your proposal approved. What about calling the column "The Story So Far" after our original handbook title?

I just wanted to add that I like the looks of this.

In the interest of helping whoever's writing these, what say we start a new thread where we all brainstorm recent developments in roleplaying theory, and then the person in charge of writing a given installment can draw on a bunch of this stuff, as well as their own thinking, and try to talk about general trends or specifics, or whatever interests them and why theory makes them go "Hwat!."

Sound cool?

I was finalizing a business plan and putting in some charts when I realized that the explanation of rpg theory could benefit from the.

General thoughts:

A one-page timeline showing the progression of roleplaying from the 1970's onward. Show it starting with miniatures, then dnd, then branching out every few years... Show roleplaying's progression as it splits into two paths, one more rules-centric and one more storytelling (White Wolf). Continue to progress it further, noting milestones along the way. Include rules-lite appearance (Ghostbusters to RISUS), diceless (Amber), and niche within niche games like Deadlands. Within the chart you could note the basic gamist, simulationist, etc. theories and how they've evolved.

End with the evolution of DnD back to miniatures and the new player-driven Indie-games that are surfacing. Make sure to include Sorceror, Dunjon, MLWM, etc.

Okay, this might make a good two-page spread vs. a one-page. If nothing else, just defining the chart would help clarify and simplify all the ideas that have surfaced and evolved over the years.

Any thoughts?

Gary