Valamir's thread has pushed this to the forefront. I've seen some rough guidelines such as "your post must have a point" and "it shouldn't be just a travelogue of what happened" -- but I see no sticky with the forum policy.

But, put forth a specific question (actual play about Actual Play?), I originally didn't post my writeup of the second session of my Shadows in the Fog game here at The Forge, because I thought it would be mostly of interest to me, Chris, and the couple of my players that are participants here.

I'll post it in just a minute. Can I get some feedback on whether it seems clearly appropriate, clearly not appropriate, or in between somewhere --- and why? Is there enough analysis to support the signifcant amount of "here's what happened?" Is there enough analysis that is of interest to those who don't play SifF? Is that even an issue?

thanks,
Lee

Hiya,

In many ways, the lack of absolutely clear guidelines for Actual Play is on purpose.

Because gamers don't really talk much about their actual play. They might talk about various social features surrounding it, or various ephemeral features of it ... they might transform it into Jordan-style fiction at great length ... but actually to discuss ourselves playing and the fictional events as interrelated phenomena, is apparently, historically, very hard.

I don't like that. I frankly think it's unhealthy. I think it's closeted, neurotic, messed-up behavior. However, what is the alternative? How is this done?

The forum is designed to discover how we can discuss actual play, in full recognition of the Big Model (or anything like it which acknowledges that we are socially creating fictional stuff).

The recent sticky is the result, based on Tim Alexander's basic idea of what leads to the best sorts of discussions.

Best,
Ron

At the very least, I think I've been posting some of my ideas to the wrong thread. More than a few of the threads I've started are based in my own experiences with reading and playing RPGs, and I instinctively went over to RPG Theory because I didn't give a play-by-play description of events, nor do I always have a problem in need of "fixing," and RPG Theory and GNS Discussion garner the most replies. However, in light of what Ron just said, I think I may transport some of my more interesting and applicable posts over there.