This is my 1001st post on the Forge and, as usual, I have a crazy idea about the internal structure of some theoretical construct.

*ahem*

Topics and GNS

I'd like you all to harken back to the ancient and hoary essay GNS and other matters of role-playing theory particularly, the GNS page of that essay, particularly the section about "premises." Ron has specifically asked me not to use the term "premise" wrt to present day talk about that concept, because it conflicts with the modern use of premise as specifically related to Narrativism, and so out of respect for that I want to find a new term of what he is talking about, because I have some things to say about it.

I'm going to propose that we use "topic." The use of this will be something like: "The topic of the game was 'which is more important, friendship or duty?" Note that, wrt Narrativist games, topic is directly equivalent to premise.

Thesis is something about games that are played, not about game texts. If any of y'all talk about game texts, I will kick your ass.

Topic is clearly something about the creative agenda of the game that you are playing. There is no "right answer" to a topic question, the game can be resolved either way. Topics structure how players relate to the game as an activity, a communication between the social contract level and the exploration level, if you will. When I started thinking about it, though, I realized that there is a really deep symmetry in this aspect of them.

While looking at the following, check them out with regard to first, whether they have to do with things that are inside the Exploration level or outside it and, second, whether they are resolved by things that are inside the exploration level or outside of it.

Let's look at some Gamist topics:

Can we play well enough such that our party survives the perils?
Can I score more points than the other players?
Can we make our characters fall in love and live happily ever after, despite the fact that the world is against us?

Gamist topics are, as far as I can tell universally, framed with respect to the players of the game themselves. They are not particularly about the imagined content at all. The key to answering the topic question is the players themsevles. Gamist topics are about whether or not you have the guts and skills to compete and win.

Furthermore, Gamist topics are resolved by the actions of the players themselves. Again, what matters is you, the players, and your own abilities and motivations.

So we can say that a Gamist topic is framed wrt the players, and resolved via the actions of the players.

Now let's look at some Narrativist topics:

Is the life of a friend worth the safety of a community?
Is your duty to your wife greater than your duty to your country?

Narrativist topics, to contrast with Gamist topics, are framed with respect to the explorative content. The concern about wife, the concern about the country -- that's a fictional wife, and a fictional country. What the topic is regarding is definitely part of the exploration level. This is true regardless of any meaning or symbolism it has for the players.

Conversely, Narrativist topics are resolved, like Gamist topics, by the actions and judgments of the players. Is the life of a friend worth the safety of a community? That question is ours to poke at and examine and work around and think through, as players, engaged participants in the game. While what our characters think has an important effect on the explorative content, the most important thing is what we think about what they do.

So we can say that a Narrativist topic is framed wrt the explorative content, and resolve via the actions of the players.

Now, how about a Simulationist topic?

What does it feel like to be a vampire?
What does the King of Four Dragons require me to do?
How do various weapons harm or fail to harm a jabberwock, in specific causal detail?

Simulationist topics, like Narrativist ones, are framed wrt the explorative content -- this is not a real King of Four Dragons, nor are we discussing real vampires. This is totally fictitious content that we are addressing with our play.

But unlike the other CA types, Simulationist topics are also resolved, as much as possible, by the explorative content. It doesn't necessarily matter what we, as players, would "like --" the resolution is left up to the setting material, or internal causality, or something similar. (I think. This is the one I'm most unsure about.)

This is an interesting symmetry, to me. Here are some thoughts:

Is there a category of play where the topic is formed wrt to the players and resolved via the explorative content? I'm thinking "no" but I'm willing to be persuaded.

Are my classifications valid? Is there a type of Gamist play, say, where topic is formed wrt the explorative content? (I don't think so, but I'm just checking.)

Does the equals sign run the other way? If all Gamist play has topics that are framed wrt to the players and resolved via the interests of the players, is all play with a topic that is framed wrt to the players and resolve via the interests of the players Gamist? If not, what does this mean?

Am I just wrong?

Other words for "topic?"

Anything else?

This doesn't make sense to me. Gamist topics and narrativist topics/premise are both about the player & the character, aren't they?

Gamist:
- Can Fred the Barbarian survive the Arena of Death?
- Can I manage my resources so that my character makes it through this challenge?

Narrativist:
- How does Fred the Barbarian manage when he's teleported to the Technocrats of Stella Barbara?
- How do people - and I - relate to the high level of technology in our society?

I guess I'd be with Ben on this one: for Gamism & Nar, the characters are the exploratory tools through which the player expresses their agenda; "Can Fred the Barbarian survive the Arena of Death?" is an exploratory question, and, if it really is the focus of the game, is indicative of simulationism. It's a question about the diagetic action of the SiS, not the skill, guts, etc of the player in strategically risking a resource (Fred) to prove skill. "Can I get Fred to survive the arena of death?" is a gamist question, because Fred is now the resource by which skill can be proved.

Similarly, "How does Fred the Barbarian manage when he's teleported to the Technocrats of Stella Barbara?" is an entirely sim question. It's about an imaginary person in an imaginary situation. As soon as the question becomes "What are the effects of technology on the individual?", we're probably in Nar territory.

The fact that we're using the characters in an imaginary environment doesn't make it "about" the characters.

Ben, I like this formulation a lot. If only because it kills the Beeg Horshoe stone dead (IMHO). The only caveat I have is that Nar questions tend to be in the form of "should" questions rather than "is" questions. "Should love be more important than duty", rather than "Is love more important than duty".

But that's just me.

Brace yourselves for an utter lack of proper Forge vocab....

matthijs wrote: Gamist:
- Can Fred the Barbarian survive the Arena of Death?
- Can I manage my resources so that my character makes it through this challenge?

Narrativist:
- How does Fred the Barbarian manage when he's teleported to the Technocrats of Stella Barbara?
- How do people - and I - relate to the high level of technology in our society?

matthijs wrote:
Gamist:
- Can Fred the Barbarian survive the Arena of Death?
- Can I manage my resources so that my character makes it through this challenge?

Narrativist:
- How does Fred the Barbarian manage when he's teleported to the Technocrats of Stella Barbara?
- How do people - and I - relate to the high level of technology in our society?

Hello,

Ben, I think your distinction between player-agenda and fictional-characters for Gamism and Narrativism respectively is mistaken.

Those premises? "Wife," "country," and all that? Those are not specific to the fiction. They are real issues that only take hold insofar as they rock the real worlds of the real people.

Yes, even if it's set in 3012 A.D. or in a "land that never was." Even if "wife" expresses some kind of gender-bending deal in a triple-sex alien creature. Money is money, a romantic partner is a romantic partner, a community is a community, a message is a message, and a weapon is a weapon.

I consider the "can I get more points than the others" Gamist topic to be socially equivalent to the "can a wife express her love for her husband by cheating on him" (or whatever) Narrativist topic. Why? Because ultimately, both of them must be resolved in the one-time-only fiction, but never philosophically (permanently) for us in real life. And because our fiction, produced communally as it is, reveals ourselves to ourselves. Both Gamist and Narrativist play, in their fullest and most realized forms, are revelatory.

One more brief comment: Beware of parallelism. I've said 100 times that "one of these three is not like the others." If people go haring around looking for Sim equivalents that match the Gamist/Narrativist construction, then they'll hit a brick wall. Why this is, is beyond the scope of forum conversation (at least in the highly debased form that has prevailed in this forum over the last year or so), although for the record, Chris Lehrich came close with his prescriptive vs. descriptive comments.

Oh yeah ... sometimes I think there are two Bens. One is the guy I met at GenCon, the same one who took all that time to explain GNS on his LiveJournal, and the same one who sends me wonderful comments and questions. The other is the guy who gets notions into his head and seizes them, because they're "his," and has a real hard time accepting what another person might be saying regardless of its content. This one is used to being the main intellectual in a group.

I'm hoping I'm talking with the first one.

Best,
Ron

matthjis -- See Alan and Pete's responses. I think what you've done is take some Gamist and Narrativist topics and turn them Simulationist.

Ben, I like this formulation a lot. If only because it kills the Beeg Horshoe stone dead (IMHO).

Ron Edwards wrote: Hello,

Ben, I think your distinction between player-agenda and fictional-characters for Gamism and Narrativism respectively is mistaken.

Those premises? "Wife," "country," and all that? Those are not specific to the fiction. They are real issues that only take hold insofar as they rock the real worlds of the real people.

Yes, even if it's set in 3012 A.D. or in a "land that never was." Even if "wife" expresses some kind of gender-bending deal in a triple-sex alien creature. Money is money, a romantic partner is a romantic partner, a community is a community, a message is a message, and a weapon is a weapon.

I consider the "can I get more points than the others" Gamist topic to be socially equivalent to the "can a wife express her love for her husband by cheating on him" (or whatever) Narrativist topic. Why? Because ultimately, both of them must be resolved in the one-time-only fiction, but never philosophically (permanently) for us in real life. And because our fiction, produced communally as it is, reveals ourselves to ourselves. Both Gamist and Narrativist play, in their fullest and most realized forms, are revelatory.

One more brief comment: Beware of parallelism. I've said 100 times that "one of these three is not like the others." If people go haring around looking for Sim equivalents that match the Gamist/Narrativist construction, then they'll hit a brick wall. Why this is, is beyond the scope of forum conversation (at least in the highly debased form that has prevailed in this forum over the last year or so), although for the record, Chris Lehrich came close with his prescriptive vs. descriptive comments.

Oh yeah ... sometimes I think there are two Bens. One is the guy I met at GenCon, the same one who took all that time to explain GNS on his LiveJournal, and the same one who sends me wonderful comments and questions. The other is the guy who gets notions into his head and seizes them, because they're "his," and has a real hard time accepting what another person might be saying regardless of its content. This one is used to being the main intellectual in a group.

I'm hoping I'm talking with the first one.

Hi Ben,

Interesting. I tend to focus very greatly on the real-person elements of fictional engagement, and word-choices that diminish that focus are always charged for me.

Another point: you may be shorting Gamist Exploration. In chess, yes, it's about Bobby checkmating Sam and the pieces are effectively irrelevant as entities aside from the rules they represent for Bobby and Sam. But in role-playing? I suggest that Gamist play often does employ and enjoy the distinctive imaginative "character in situation" fictional elements of role-playing.

I think a lot of people's troubled histories with Gamist play lead them to think otherwise, and perhaps these same folks' joy at discovering other agendas leads them to say, "Oh, these are the ways to play in which we care about our characters." (White Wolf texts are cetainly snooty about this issue in just this way.)

My suggestion then, is if Narrativist play is easily understood by you to be framed with reference to the fictional content, then that Gamist play is too - except perhaps in forms of Gamist play which are extremely charged with ruthlessness, i.e., the Hard Core and similar. Perhaps you've simply never enjoyed high-Explorative, low-Points of Contact Gamist play?

And as for my outlook, I tend to find Gamist and Narrativist play to be framed very well - outside of play itself - with reference to the real people and the easily-grasped, highly-engaging social bases for each of these modes of play.

Best,
Ron

Ben Lehman wrote: Is there a category of play where the topic is formed wrt to the players and resolved via the explorative content? I'm thinking "no" but I'm willing to be persuaded.

I'm surprised that Ron has come so quickly to a conclusion on this. I'm still thinking about it. Particularly in view of Alan's suggestion concerning therapuetic play filling that fourth slot, I am considering it.

That's not to say I'm persuaded; it's just that I think I see the distinctions being made, and they seem to hold in many instances.

--M. J. Young

I'm not sure I buy this. Here's why...

In Story Now, the topic isn't the wife or the country or what have you. Those are the "chess pieces" the player manipulate through the game.

The Topic (or Topics) are the subjects the Players are making statements about with their PC's actions. In the example of wife and country, it might be obligation, or commitment, or what have you. The Players will negotiate these topics -- both for themselves and within the network of the group.

In Sorcerer, for example, Humanity checks are made for gains and losses -- depending on what the Players have their PCs do -- to themselves and other characters. But what constitutes a Humanity roll (either for gain or loss) is often up for discussion. (That's why the OOC chatter is so important for understanding what happened at the game.)

Was is loyalty? What is violence? What is selfish and what is an honest need? These are the Topics of Story Now. And they're open to honest discussion and exploration at the table. That discussion and exploration is the purpose of play.

And it's the Players that are doing the discussing and the exploring. They're making points to the other players, learning from the choices of the other players, challenging the other players (both IC and OOC), making statements NOT about the way the world is, but how they -- the Players -- see the issues of the living life as a human being -- at least at the moment.

Christopher

Ron Edwards wrote: My suggestion then, is if Narrativist play is easily understood by you to be framed with reference to the fictional content, then that Gamist play is too - except perhaps in forms of Gamist play which are extremely charged with ruthlessness, i.e., the Hard Core and similar. Perhaps you've simply never enjoyed high-Explorative, low-Points of Contact Gamist play?

Hi Ethan,

I have no idea what you mean.

In Sorcerer, for example, Humanity is often defined as a concept. Then the players use the fiction characters, objects and situations to put Humanity into concrete motion.

I mean, people do exactly what I'm talking about every time they play Sorcerer or Riddle of Steel (SA's are of course abstracts and need to be negotiated to one degree or antother) and Story Now HeroQuest play (relationships, attributes like Honerable and what not.) It happens every day. I'm not zooming out to far. I'm stating precisely, in practical terms, what happens at these games.

And the thrust of the point is that when Ben writes, "Gamist topics are, as far as I can tell universally, framed with respect to the players of the game themselves. They are not particularly about the imagined content at all," he's using this on contrast to, in his view, the imagined content of a Narrativist game -- which he states is what a Narrativist game is about.

Which simply isn't true. The recents discussions about violence and what violence is that spread out across several sites recently make it clear that people think the "Warrior Spirit" (or justice, or honor, or courage, or whatever) are concrete to the people who care about these things. They're also not concrete enough that they don't require exploration. But that[i/] is what Story Now is about. Not the "wife," not the fictional "country," but the actual positions the players are taking at the table about these abstract issues.

If we had taken those discussion and that need to make oneself clear (to others as well to ourselves) and dumped them actively into an RPG session, we would have had kick ass game sessions of Sorcerer, or HQ or RoS. Yes?

But it would be the Player's engagement with the issues at hand, not the fiction elements, that would matter most.

Now, what "wife" means to a player, what "country" means to a player figure in to Story Now play as well. To the Players.

I'll quote Ron here: "I tend to focus very greatly on the real-person elements of fictional engagement, and word-choices that diminish that focus are always charged for me."

Exactly. Ben might say, "So we can say that a Narrativist topic is framed wrt the explorative content, and resolve via the actions of the players," but I wouldn't.

I'd say the Topic is framed wrt to the players, whatever they bring to the table about these issues, the real true content of what they care about violence, wives, family, and resolve via the actions of the players."

Ben's right. The wife and the country aren't real. But what the people actually care about the wife and the country are. And that's what makes Story Now play work.

Christopher

Chris -- your grammar (use of "but..." and so on) makes it look like you're disagreeing with me, but as far as I can tell, you aren't.

Framed with respect to..., in my post above, refers to exactly and only that the wife and the country aren't real.

Resolved via... refers to the rest of the stuff that you are talking about.

Did you read my first response to Ron, above? I thought that I clarified a lot of this stuff there.

yrs--
--Ben

Hi Ben,

When you write:

"Gamist topics are, as far as I can tell universally, framed with respect to the players of the game themselves. They are not particularly about the imagined content at all."

and...

"Furthermore, Gamist topics are resolved by the actions of the players themselves. Again, what matters is you, the players, and your own abilities and motivations."

I can easily see simply slipping in the word Narrativist in place of Gamist.

Because the issues of "Marriage" or "Violence" are not "imaginary content." They're real things that the players really bring to the table. The games aren't about the fictional wives. They're about what people really think and feel and about wives.

And, again, what matters for the Narrativist play is "you, the players, and your own abilities and motivations."

See?

Christopher

PS... yes, I did read your response to Ron. I still think you're not grasping a vital point about Narrativist play.

Christopher, we're not talking about what happens at these games. We're talking about Topics, which are a very specific thing.

Bottom line: "Duty" is not a topic, or premise as defined in ye olde GNS essay. A topic is a focused question that raises an issue. It isn't an overarching thematical idea, as you seem to suggest in your first post in this thread. A topic is a question, like, "Is your duty to your wife greater than your duty to your country?"

If you zoom out to anywhere above that question, you're no longer talking about what is defined as a topic.

Does that make sense?

Yes, Ethan, exactly.

But it's what the actual players bring to the actual table with their actual concerns about these actual abstractions that actually frames the topic.

The imaginary events don't frame the topic. The imaginary events are the chess pieces.

What frames the topic is the Players. Not the imaginary events.

Christopher

Chris --

I'm saying framed with respect to

NOT

framed by

I agree with everything you say.

Now I gotcha.

I was getting hung up on this:

Christopher Kubasik wrote: In Story Now, the topic isn't the wife or the country or what have you.

Here's an interesting little footnote on topics.

I had the hardest time, for a while, coming to grips with the relationship between Gamism with challenge and competition. Because challenge and competition exist in all modes of play, right, just like they exist in any human social situation. So, in a Narrativist game, there is this competition to be the one who does it right, and a challenge to see if you can really address that premise.

But, hey. If you didn't do that, it wouldn't be fun.

For a topic to be a topic, it needs to be addressable; it needs to not have a predetermined ending. A gamist game, played by good sports, can be fun win or lose. A narrativist game can't be fun if the players fail to meet the challenge of addressing that topic.

Any topic which can be boiled down to "Do we have fun or not?" isn't really a topic.

Gamism is the only mode of play where challenge and competition are part of the topic, not just part of the general social arena.

*click*

This is tangential to the Chris/Ethan/Me conversation that's going on here.

Yeah, I thrashed at that concept a while back. I started the discussion poorly (no surprise there), but I was pleased with where it ended up.

I dig your conclusion in a big way:

Gamism is the only mode of play where challenge and competition are part of the topic, not just part of the general social arena.

Ben,

So, can I change your statement to be "Gamism is the only mode of play where challenge and competition are the key to the topic, not just part of the general social arena"?

Because then, I think (with appropriate substitution) we can use that statement for all the CA's, and your use of "topic" becomes synonomous with (if you'll pardon the OO programming-speak) "specific instantiation of a CA." Which currently has the label Premise for Nar - "premise" was at one point used in this way for all CA's (you could say "Gamist premise", once upon a time), but when it moved (back?) to Nar-specific, I don't recall there being a replacement for the other agenda. Topic might serve that purpose well - but my main objective here is to make sure your "topic" is positioned where I think it is. So let me know if I'm missing something.

I'm not sure about the framed with regard to explorative content vs. real people stuff. I think it would be possible to frame the topic for G, N or S in either way. And the answer to "resolved via" seems to me to be "always resolved via both" - that's what RPG play is, right? Real people, engaging in Exploration? So they have to resolve it via both?

Gordon

Gordon C. Landis wrote: Ben,

Because then, I think (with appropriate substitution) we can use that statement for all the CA's, and your use of "topic" becomes synonomous with (if you'll pardon the OO programming-speak) "specific instantiation of a CA." Which currently has the label Premise for Nar - "premise" was at one point used in this way for all CA's (you could say "Gamist premise", once upon a time), but when it moved (back?) to Nar-specific, I don't recall there being a replacement for the other agenda. Topic might serve that purpose well - but my main objective here is to make sure your "topic" is positioned where I think it is. So let me know if I'm missing something.