As part of my own personal Fantasy Heartbreaker, I've been working on formalizing collaborative setting creation. I've had a few thoughts that I'd like to present here for discussion & debate. I'm having a hard time nailing down exactly what I want to happen with a formal setting system and I think it might help if I get some theory straight in my head first.

So, the following are the assumptions I'm starting with. I'm open to any comment.

An element of setting is not part of the SIS until it enters play.

Old-standard is to include a list of setting elements as part of the Text and are incorporated into the SIS by way of the formal rules or by the GM and agreed upon by the players.

e.x.; If we're playing D&D and it's agreed that we will use the Forgotten Realms setting we have not yet incorporated the city of Westgate. Not until the city of Westgate is incorporated into play, even though the city is plainly outlined in the book.

Some texts, especially modern Forge texts, include formal narration collaboration rules which allow players other than the GM to introduce elements of setting. Some of these have formal rules for determining if the element is accepted or discarded.

Unfortunately, I'm only familiar with games like that from listening in on conversations. I don't think I've yet played a game like that.

Crap. Unfortunately I have to fly. I'll add to this later.

-Eric

Sorry about that. I thought I was going to have plenty of time to work and I suddenly got called back to my plane.

Ok so... back to it.

I've begun thinking of setting elements on three different levels of scale. First are the core elements, those bits that are essential to the game and are often included in hard-wired rules. The Matrix is part of the setting of Shadowrun and is a core element. You aren't likely to play shadowrun without being affected by it.

Secondly there is the known world, or the big picture. Sticking with Shadowrun, in the known world we start with a dystopian future based upon real world politics, add in a sudden upheaval of magic, and a huge dose of technology, etc, etc. The California Free State is part of the known world of Shadowrun. It's written into the setting, but if it's forgotten about or re-written, there's no real change on the rules.

Finally, on the smallest scale, are the stage dressings. The things that we see from scene to scene, like the office complex we're shooting up, the time of day, the weather at the moment, etc. In complex texts about complex settings there are often suggestions for stage dressings, but those are so easy to ignore that... well... they often are. Anyone out there read the ol' Seattle Sourcebook backwards and forwards? The Big Rhino and Dante's Inferno were regular mission meeting places in every game we ever played. But then, so was this one tenement block out in the Barrens. That tenement block was right from our own creation. As were and are most things that fall under stage dressings.

What I'm concerned about for FH8 are the second tier; The Known World. I want every campaign to start off with each player having ideas for elements that they want to incorporate. Then I want the players to formally negotiate back and forth, eventually turning out a setting that no one expected (I think).

So, as I consider the question: How do I formalize creating these elements of setting? I realized; I don't have a firm enough grasp on when those elements of setting REALLY become part of the SIS. Does anyone have any insight on this? Maybe I need another perspective. Maybe I just need someone who's got a solid grasp on all things theory to reassure me that I'm correct when I say that elements of setting don't enter the SIS, and therefore may as well not exist, untill they enter play.

And how would you describe the default system for how elements of setting are introduced and accepted into play?

-Eric

"Enter play" and "in the SIS" are basically synonymous, so yeah. Something can't be "in play" without being in the SIS, nor in the SIS without being in play. (Unless you have a more specific definition of "in play" like, "being interacted with in detail at this very moment".)

A default method for setting entering the SIS? I don't think there is or can be. Every instance is different. Still, in broad strokes you maybe have three main sources of setting: (1) published material, (2) notes prepared ahead of time, often by the GM alone, and (3) on-the-fly suggestions that get approved--usually silently when they're done by the GM and more vocally otherwise. Frex, "Shouldn't this tenement have a basement?" "Uh, yeah, sure."

Have you seen Universalis? That's all about negotation of elements entering the SIS, in a very transparent way. When you say "negotation," do you mean negotation to modify or disallow someone's ideas, or negotation over when an idea is brought to the forefront of play? Or both? In the first case, it seems like bidding might be a good way to go. In either case, some associated resource could gaurantee that no one gets their ideas defeated al the time.

Naw, unfortunately, I haven't seen Universalis. I really just need to invest some $$ in buying up all the buzzworthy games, if only just to read them.

When I mentioned negotiations, I meant both. But... well, we might be on the same page, but your example of a basement in a building makes me wary. See, I'd file that under the third scale of setting elements, where what I'm concerned with is the second. Instead of negotiating if there was a basement in this building, I wanna be able to negotiate if people are in the habit of making basements at all.

-Eric

Okay, but what's fundamentally different about that? Instead, "Let's go take control of the mountain-based cyber defense grid." "There's a mountain-based cyber defense grid? Hm...okay." But probably with some intervening diolog. But maybe not. The thing is, I'm not sure I can perceive the three-tiered layering of setting elements you've outlined if there isn't a written source to get them from. If they're all made up by the individual group (or at least levels 2 and 3 are) then nothing is going to be ignored any more or less -- there's nothing to ignore. Am I being clear?

The difference that I see is the difference between 'Is there a mountain-based cyber-defense grid here?' and 'Is there any such thing as a cyber defense grid of any kind in this setting? For that matter, is there any such thing as a mountain for it to based upon?'

If we agree to the first one, then we've agreed to the second one, but if we've agreed to the second one we haven't necessarily agreed to the first one.

-Eric

Technocrat13 wrote: An element of setting is not part of the SIS until it enters play.

*snip*

e.x.; If we're playing D&D and it's agreed that we will use the Forgotten Realms setting we have not yet incorporated the city of Westgate. Not until the city of Westgate is incorporated into play, even though the city is plainly outlined in the book.

So, in more brief terms - use general estimations of setting, but don't assume anything beyond that unless the players encounter something, or a player or GM mentions it?

So, if you are playing in a real life setting, don't assume that France is in Europe unless someone talks about France, or the players travel through France. And if you happen to travel to where France would be, and it's actually Japan, this is what is true for terms of the game?

Or are you proposing more of a systematic way to go about this, and less assumed?

Noon wrote:

Technocrat13 wrote: An element of setting is not part of the SIS until it enters play.

*snip*

e.x.; If we're playing D&D and it's agreed that we will use the Forgotten Realms setting we have not yet incorporated the city of Westgate. Not until the city of Westgate is incorporated into play, even though the city is plainly outlined in the book.

Just to spin you a bit, do you think something like that city enters play if someone casually says "And uh, yeah, all that stuff in the book is part of the world"?

Possibly one way of checking if something is in the SIS, is if it's actually used. The above statement doesn't mean much, until a player declares for example, that their PC is heading to Westgate.

Justin wrote: So, if you are playing in a real life setting, don't assume that France is in Europe unless someone talks about France, or the players travel through France. And if you happen to travel to where France would be, and it's actually Japan, this is what is true for terms of the game?

Or are you proposing more of a systematic way to go about this, and less assumed?

Eric, I understand your distinction now, thanks for clarifying.

I disagree that a player saying "I'm heading to Westgate" hasn't entered Wetgate into the SIS -- presuming that no one immdiately raises an objection. Even though his character isn't actually at Westgate yet, interacting with it in some way, everyone at the table now knows Westage is there to be interacted with. It would be strange for someone to later say "Okay, you arrive at what you (the player) thought would be Westgate, but I've decided it's actally Toledo."

As for agreements about using a play-text, it seems like the difference is having ideas about the SIS and the SIS itself. And of course they're not the same.

For your system, how about giving each player two kinds of setting-manipulation points: one pool for entering things in at a general, 2nd tier level; and another for set-pieces. When someone proposes a change, he has to spend 1 point from the appropriate pool. But anyone can object by spending a point to counter him, and bidding ensues between those who want the change, and those who don't. Players can form temporary alliances and negotate with the player who proposed the change, saying something like "I don't like that, and I'm ready to bid 2 points against. But if you change it slightly, I'll throw 1 point toward it instead." After all is said and done, all the points that got "bid" are tossed out. This encourages players to propose things they think will be accepted, and not to challenge things unless they really don't like them. You could also have an inter-change between the two kinds of points, say at a 1:5 ratio.

If the player declares that his character is heading to Westgate and then changes his mind before any story actually occurrs there, did Westgate ever enter the SIS?

Your suggestion for the setting-manipulation points is pretty similar to what I've currently got in mind. Problem is, is that's adressing the negotiation aspect of incorporating setting elements, and what I'm currently struggling with is when an element should be proposed and what elements should be proposed to be negotiated, and how the system should prompt the players for that what and when.

For example, I could propose that there's an abandoned city a few miles north of where our characters are. At what point is it appropriate and useful to make that proposition? How should the formal system of my game prompt me to propose an abandoned city? All this has to occurr before my fellow players agree with or object to the existance of the abandoned city.

I'd like to point out that despite the fact that I'm using lots of geography as examples, geography is just one type of element that I have in mind. I also propose that cultures, histories, technologies, theologies, and every other aspect of the known world is open to be created in this system. Just because we've already established a feudal China flavored setting so far dosen't mean that I can't propose a steam-powered, lightsabre-weilding, ninja-android that looks a lot like a mindflayer to be the ferryman that takes the a PC across the river.

And, of course, when I propose that ferryman I'm hoping that the other players cheer for the existance of the ferryman, but then they might just tell me to belly up to the bar and get ready to show them how much I like all those new elements, cuz they don't plan to put up with it.

Should I be allowed to propose steam power, lightsabres, ninjas, and androids all in the same breath? Should I be able to propose them mid-play, or should those elements be proposed at the beginning of a session? Before any play begins at all? At what point can the other players expect me to incorporate one of those elements?

That's what I'm working on right now.

As I see it, it makes no difference if someone later changes his mind and doesn't want to go to Westgate. Because the instant he said "I'm goign to Westgate" everyone else then imagines a city called Westgate, and probably a few things about it -- it's in traveling distance, etc. At this moment, Westgate is vague and ill-defined, but it still exists in that form (in the SIS).

All this is assuming that Westgate actually means something to the players. Westgate's a published city in some source material somewhere? Assuming that's the case, then merely mentioning it enters a lot about it into the SIS, even if vaguely or a bit tentatively. But if none of the players have heard of Westgate, and the player going there doesn't elaborate, then maybe it doesn't enter the SIS -- since it's just a word then, not a real idea. If the player at least says "the city of Westgate," that's enough.

Technocrat13 wrote:
Well, sort of. Like I was saying above, if we've all agreed that it's a real world setting, then we've agreed that France is in Europe. But if our characters never go to France, and NPCs never come to France, and none of the characters ever talk about France, then France isn't part of the SIS.

Jasper,

I've spent a few hours pondering your post, and I'd like to know if you'd agree with the following;

If Westgate exists in the text, and everyone in the group has accepted the text as acceptable, but only one player has read the section on the City of Westgate, then when that player announces the intent to travel to Westgate the city becomes part of the SIS if and when the mention of the city has some effect on the role playing that follows.

If the mention of Westgate is met with a resounding negative response and the mentioning player immediately gives up the idea, has Westgate had any effect on play? If so, what effect?

Marco,

I think we're in disagreement on the 'shared' part of the SIS. You appear to be of the opinion that if everyone coincidentally imagines it at the same time then it's part of the SIS. That would be one defination of 'shared'. However, looking back to the glossary entry for SIS, I don't think that's what was intended.

The Provisional Glossary wrote: Shared Imagined Space (SIS, Shared Imagination)
The fictional content of play as it is established among participants through role-playing interactions. See also Transcript (which is a summary of the SIS after play) and Exploration (a near or total synonym).

I think we need to look at the utility of our definition here.

Marco is right in that there is no such thing as an SIS outside of our theoretical framework for analysis. It's a tool that allows us to look at certain phenomena and talk about them. Something's going on when people roleplay--they create some sort of story or sequence of fictionary events, and while that's shared in general, some details may well vary in the imagination and recollection of the players involved.

So instead of talking about which definition is right, it might just be useful to recognize the reasons that the definition is somewhat troublesome, and those reasons are obvious in the thread so far:

- Some concepts are shared by players explicitly. Someone says something, people agree, future contributions take it into account. That content is what we usually consider the SIS, for purposes of analysis.

- Some concepts are shared by assumption and implication, but they are not absolute. Someone gets shot in the heart in the fictional events, everyone assumes they're dead. It might be introduced later that they are a vampire, so the assumptions change. Therefore, until there has been agreement on the assumed fact, it might be shared, but it's still changeable.

- Some concepts are shared by reference and by agreement that the reference is reliable. The GM introduces a town. The social contract includes that printed materials are used without major changes. As soon as the town is introduced, material is shared insofar as people know it from their own reading. However, depending on the social contract, the reference is either an assumption that needs to be made credible, or an authority by virtue of prior agreement that people can use to support their credibility later.

Now, does it matter whether a fact is "in the SIS" for the purposes of this analysis? It matters whether a fact is explicitly agreed upon or not. It matters whether references have been given authority through the social contract. And it matters for play what kinds of assumptions players make, even when they are not explicitly validated yet.

Even previously established facts can be changed, if the group agrees to it. Therefore, what we're really dealing with here is a matter of the degree to which a fact has been authoritatively established among the group, from not introduced over assumed over tentatively adopted to fully established (and still revokable). We're analyzing how people play and what the outcome is, and while we surely yearn for something "absolute" to come out of it, it seems to me that we have a never final flux with a lot of hard overlap, some gray zones, some soft overlap of assumptions, and some individual assumptions.

The bolded bit is a good point. I still think that the underlying foundation of SIS is being treated as a real thing when, despite the interaction bit, it isn't. In my example, I described and interaction that led to a shared imagining of material based on knowledge that was *not* in the SIS (i.e. that France exists and that exotic cheeses come from there).

No interaction is going to nail down exactly what is going on in people's heads. And very few interactions are going to be explicit about what they "introduce" into people's imaginary space (a hit in D&D establishes a strike and damage but it looks different to everyone who imagines it and while we can say that only the strike and damage was "introduced" I think that rapidly becomes a very limited view of the experience the real people in real play are undergoing).

The appeal to transcript is something I understand (we look at an IRC game and construct a model of SIS based on what's there, in type)--however, functionally, this is not a suitable basis for all analysis.

We can ask what facts were nailed down by interaction amongst the participants--but, ultimately, what's important, IMO, is what I imagine and what you imagine--and unless there's clarification or a clash, we may never know how similar those really are.

That's why I suggest looking at what is established as expectations rather than what is "put into SIS." I think that the important thing (what is imagined) is often determined far more heavily by material that is not entered into the game by RPing interactions than what is (i.e. if I am playing WoD then I come with a massive raft of expectations that someone may or may not consider "in SIS" depending on how they view the content of the interactions).

Edited to add: My conclusion is that if we can look at my example and say "France is not in the Shared Imaginary Space" even though, upon tests, all the players imagined Frace (by name) and, perhaps, acted on that imagination in a profitable manner then what does that buy us?

How do we profit from saying France wasn't in the SIS (other than having a term which, literally, does not mean 'shared imaginary space' in a manner most people would expect it to).

We can look at assumption clashes where explicitness was a problem and decide where greater literalism is necessary, sure. But there are numerous examples of GMs or Players being explicit (fairly) and everyone still imagining different things. As such, I think that SIS needs to remain a theoritcal concept that should be treated that way--and not as a distillation of "facts" from a transcript that (in most cases) doesn't even literally exist.

This isn't meant as a slam or a rant. I think asking how do we interact with each other when we're all imagining things that may not be identical is a very important question--but limiting the discussion to established facts in in the game-space is, IMO, arbitrary and, IME, missing a big piece of the puzzle--such a big piece that the puzzle itself doesn't make sense without the other pieces (data which sets expectations that has not been formally introduced).

-Marco

Christian wrote: Now, does it matter whether a fact is "in the SIS" for the purposes of this analysis? It matters whether a fact is explicitly agreed upon or not. It matters whether references have been given authority through the social contract. And it matters for play what kinds of assumptions players make, even when they are not explicitly validated yet.

Eric,

Sorry for writing so convolutedly that you needed to work hard to understand what I was saying :) But yeah, that's what I meant.

*L* Totally not your fault. Suddenly the conversation took a turn I was neither expecting nor prepared for. But I realized that you were totally right, so all is kewl.

But I'm dissapointed that you didn't further comment on my last attempt to nail it down. Or did you when you said that that's what you meant?

Cuz more thoughts are coming....

-Eric

Technocrat13 wrote: Nope, I don't think that casually accepting a text means that all the elements in the text have entered play. We may agree that we're going to use the FR setting book. It may be part of our agreement that, once we've accepted that book that it cannot be contradicted. We've given permission to each other to bring elements of setting from the text into play, but haven't yet actually brought all the elements from that text into play.

I'm not 100% sure that just being 'used' enters an element of setting into the SIS. In your example, where the player declares the PC headed for Westgate, it seems that all the player has done is declare their intention to incorporate the city into the SIS, without having actually done so yet.

Well, I thought I had plenty more questions to bring up, but having been involuntarily seperated from the keyboard for a few hours those questions seem to have evaporated. Or, perhaps, given time to consider, I just found questions for the answers I had. I intend to go back to work on FH8, applying what I've learned here in the past couple of days. If that dosen't bring up more questions for me, then I've almost certainly got my head around creating setting.

Thanks to everyone.

-Eric

Oh, I gotta jump in here, even if I'm late to the party.

Marco, saying "SIS doesn't exist" is as confusing as what you're trying to clear up with that statement. As an abstract concept it exists just as well as any other. It is misunderstood, true, but saying that it doesn't exist, and then discussing it - well, that's just not really helpful.

It's probably more accurate to say that as a construct it's not helping in this discussion. Which is what you intimate, but don't say.

Indeed, what everyone is grasping is that there's an extent to which people assume that something exists in the setting being used that's important to how they conduct their ongoing play. Does everyone agree that Westgate exists? Well, maybe not. But in the example where the player states that they're going to Westgate, this establishes certain things that will affect player's play. First, everyone will probably agree at this point that the character in question at least believes that such a city exists. Which implies other things as well, like either the city does exist, or the character is crazy, or at least misinformed.

Yes, you can say that an entire text, unread, is in play, and players can agree. Players will respond accordingly. They might read the text, or guess what's in it, or ask before making decisions.

Players must extrapolate somewhat. The idea of "entering into SIS" gives a picture that, as somebody alreay debunked, that the only information being operated on is that which has been explicity registered somehow. In fact, given the vagaries of communication, absolutely nothing can be said to absolutely fit this bill. To some extent, all communication has to do with assumption. Right down to assuming, for instance, that a word used by the speaker has the same meaning for him that you assign to it. Practically, problems don't start occuring until a much higher level of complexity comes in however (though the homonym problem is a fun one that comes up regularly).

To worry about the practical problems, there are some really grey areas that most forms of declaration do set up. Universalis was fun to design, because we came across all sorts of these things. The one that comes up most often is, in fact, related to the example. Let's say that I narrate a character saying, "The city of Westgate exists." Well, does it then exist in any practical way? Or is the narration simply that someone spoke the words? They could be lying, after all, or incorrect, or insane, or any of a number of things.

It's impossibly complicated to handle on a case by case basis. You have only two options that I'm aware of. The first is the standard used by most games, and it's to limit what the effect of a declaration is in as clear a way as possible. For example, you don't pay at all for character narration, and everything they say is subject to change possibly. Instead you only pay for "facts" about, say, geography which are then entered on a map which is sacrosanct. That sort of limit.

This has a problem, however, in that players will try to influence things by having characters narrate their characters saying things that sound factual such that to ignore their narrations will be tantamount to creating a fact that the character is insane or somesuch (actually, in play I don't think this is really a problem, but the unexploited opening can seem uncomfortable). So the second solution is what we did with Universalis. Basically what must be paid for is itself negotiated during the course of play. That is, basically, you pay for what you feel you should pay for. And then if other players disagree that you've paid too much or too little, they then use their currency to challenge your creations. What happens is that through the course of play, a standard emerges from the players that's acceptable to everyone.

It's sorta like the concept of jurisprudence, where the rule about what's acceptable evolves over time by cases being tried.

Here's another important thing to consider, however. How do you create adherence to the creations of the other players. This is not to say that players will intentionally ignore the play of others, but accidents happen. Player A creates a Mountain that's said to be 15000 Meters tall, and the tallest mountain in the land. Then Player B creates a 16000 Meter tall mountain. Player A points out that his mountain is supposed to be tallest, but that Player B's is in violation of this fact. Player B points out that his mountain is actually in the next "land" over (dunlikus), and not in this land (anvilania). Player A says that when he established the fact, he meant continent when he said land, not country.

Which player gets their way? There are a number of ways to adjudicate this sort of situation, actually, but you have to have a method for doing so.

Mike

Hi Technocrat,

there is a device in computer games that I have wondered about in terms of generating bits of setting on the fly. Some objects are designed to spawn gobbets of bits when say a critter is killed, or bits of debris when an object is destroyed. So these are objects that exist purely for the creation of other objects in response to player activated triggers.

Conceivably a similar sort of device, constructed by system, might be usable in RPG. A system which might be able to govern, for example, the generation of an NPC from an order or group or similar, or a building from the wealth of a town and its architectural technology.

The point here is to eastablish a relationship in which [this thing] can be used to generate [these kinds of things]. By making it a sort of point-buy or random generation system you prevent it from being specifically and precisely what the player wants, but also allow the player to make realisable requests to the setting.

Hi Technocrat,

there is a device in computer games that I have wondered about in terms of generating bits of setting on the fly. Some objects are designed to spawn gobbets of bits when say a critter is killed, or bits of debris when an object is destroyed. So these are objects that exist purely for the creation of other objects in response to player activated triggers.

Conceivably a similar sort of device, constructed by system, might be usable in RPG. A system which might be able to govern, for example, the generation of an NPC from an order or group or similar, or a building from the wealth of a town and its architectural technology.

The point here is to eastablish a relationship in which [this thing] can be used to generate [these kinds of things]. By making it a sort of point-buy or random generation system you prevent it from being specifically and precisely what the player wants, but also allow the player to make realisable requests to the setting.