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Quote from: contracycle

Quote from: Marco
I'm just sayin'

Yes Marco, but I think its that nuance that we can now lay to rest.  I fully agree that retrospectively the prodct of sim oplay is something that can rightly be termed "a story" even if one in need of significant editing.  I think however that this casual term is sometimes misleading in the apparent attribution of a story-based CA to sim.  I like Silmemune's construction because it does not exhibit the same conflation.

I am still considering Jay's proposition and, while I think I have some serious questions about it, it's certainly interesting.

However, I do have an issue with what you've said: you talk about story as the "retrospective" product of Sim play. I don't understand that, and I think this concept is important wrt Jay's formulation.

According to the glossary, Story is found in the *Transcript* of play--a re-telling of play after the fact. Therefore, in any game wherein there can be said to be Story, it must be retrospective, whether Sim, Nar, or Gamist.

I believe that the glossary is significantly out of step with the way Story is used in common discourse here (Ron also talks about players who are using Sim play to make stories "just in retrospect or in pre-play prep.")

-Marco

Quote
Transcript

   An account of the imaginary events of play without reference to role-playing procedures. A Transcript may or may not be a Story.

And from Shared Imaginary Space: "see also Transcript (which is a summary of the SIS after play)"

(Emphasis added).

Split from Sim has not be discussed as story but it needs to be so at Marco's request.

Best,
Ron

Quote from: Marco
According to the glossary, Story is found in the *Transcript* of play--a re-telling of play after the fact. Therefore, in any game wherein there can be said to be Story, it must be retrospective, whether Sim, Nar, or Gamist.

I challenge Nar - Nar has Story Now and does not need Story Afterwards.

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I believe that the glossary is significantly out of step with the way Story is used in common discourse here (Ron also talks about players who are using Sim play to make stories "just in retrospect or in pre-play prep.")

Thats unsurprising IMO - the local definition of story in several fields is specific, and ALL of them are in use in the common discourse.  Story as artistic production, story as mere sequential events (my life story by some D-list celeb frex), story as outright lie (he's just telling stories).  As you maty recall, it would be my preference that we referred specifically to formal story when we mean that.

Story has too many meanings to be a really solid term. We all know what it means and yet we don't.  We all know that a news story and a love story are very different beasts, created for different purposes, and with significant differences in structure.

Quote
   An account of the imaginary events of play without reference to role-playing procedures. A Transcript may or may not be a Story.

The step I think you are missing is that a transcript can be storified in exactly the same way as any other event.  That is I could tell you the story about how I broke my nose in a car accident, and in the telling there will be certain details I ommit, and certain details I exaggerate that did not appear important at the time, and certain verbal and presentational devices I employ to lend impact.  And yet none of it will be fictional, as is often implied by the term.

Similarly I could tell you any number of stories of what happened in play and it is highly likely that this narration will not simply be an acount of things as they happened in the order they happened - that raw material will be manipulated to present a viable, actual, story.  The same sorts of dramatic device to enhance or emphasise will be employed.

So it does not surprise me to see the claim that Sim players can in a sense be engaged in the making of story.  What threy are really doing they is playing and then recounting their play experiences in story form.  But this would only happen if and when someone actually recounted it.

Although "Story Now" sounds like it's different than "Story Afterward" it doesn't match what the glossary says. It says this:

Quote
Story Now

   Commitment to Addressing (producing, heightening, and resolving) Premise through play itself. The epiphenomenal outcome for the Transcript from such play is almost always a story. One of the three currently-recognized Creative Agendas. As a top priority of role-playing, the defining feature of Narrativist play.

(Emphasis added)

What this means is that, in fact, with Story Now, the Story still exists in the Transcript--afterward. The term Story Now, despite containing the word 'Now,' does not mean that story, still a property of transcript, appears somewhere else in the game.

When you talk about a Transcript being 'storified,' what do you mean to be saying is different for Nar play vs. Sim play?

-Marco

Quote from: Marco
What this means is that, in fact, with Story Now, the Story still exists in the Transcript--afterward. The term Story Now, despite containing the word 'Now,' does not mean that story, still a property of transcript, appears somewhere else in the game.

OK.  Firstly lets bear in mind that any definition in the glossary was formulated in a specific moment in time.  Things change and it may well be that as a result of subsequent discussion we decide a concept was poor or badly phrased and go back and change it.  I can see some of the quibble you point to in a strict reading of the text but I think its overly pernickety.  see below.

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When you talk about a Transcript being 'storified,' what do you mean to be saying is different for Nar play vs. Sim play?

Actually yes, I think.

Story Now does mean Story Now, story happening right here.  I read the paragraph you site as indicating that the actual transcript after play will exhibit the traits of formal story - things like premise and theme, climax, foreshadowing et al.  Thats because that actually happened in play.  So, Story indeed happened Now AND appears in the subsequent transcript as a reflection of what happened in actual play.

I think - certainly thinking of my own Sim games this is true - that in Sim story does not happen Now if at all.  That is, play proceeds and the ultimate transcript is mostly just a sequence of events.  When that sequence of events is recounted to someone else, it will be "storified" in the same way we "storify" any given anecdote.

Quote from: contracycle
Story Now does mean Story Now, story happening right here.  I read the paragraph you site as indicating that the actual transcript after play will exhibit the traits of formal story - things like premise and theme, climax, foreshadowing et al.  Thats because that actually happened in play.  So, Story indeed happened Now AND appears in the subsequent transcript as a reflection of what happened in actual play.

(Emphasis added Italics)

I'm not sure what you mean by this. What exactly is going on during the play of a Narrativist game that isn't happening in a Simulationist game that makes something called 'story' happen 'right here?'

(Emphasis added Underline)
Are you saying that a transcript of a Sim game must include stuff the author has made up--which never actually happened in play--in order to make the transcript a story (with theme, foreshadowing, climax, etc.)

Quote
I think - certainly thinking of my own Sim games this is true - that in Sim story does not happen Now if at all.  That is, play proceeds and the ultimate transcript is mostly just a sequence of events.  When that sequence of events is recounted to someone else, it will be "storified" in the same way we "storify" any given anecdote.

Can you expand on this? What makes the transcript of a Nar game more than just a "sequence of events?"

-Marco

Gareth's explanation is exactly how I view the difference between Nar's Story Now and story generated by Sim play.

I think this can be even more exaggerated in story produced by Gamist play.  I remember as a lad playing AD&D and adventuring in a dungeon which was being designed as we played by random rolls on the dungeon generator in the DMG.  We fought monsters suitable to the appropriate level by rolling on the corresponding random monster table.  AND THEN we wrote the "story" afterwards with all kinds of retro justifications for why the dungeon was the way it was and why the monsters were there.  In the part I remember most clearly we decided that the Beholder (encountered in a deep level) was the "boss" of the dungeon and was raising an army of orcs and goblins to invade the surface.  And the Gelatenous Cubes and Carrior Crawlers and the like were brought in by the Beholder to keep the dungeon clean so the army wouldn't die of disease.   Which made for a pretty good story when we were 10...but was totally retroactive since all of those elements were purely randomly generated and had no built in story rationale to them at all.

I think the same process goes on in pure sim play.  The monsters may not be randomly generated but the choices the players make, being not known in advance, serve the same purpose.

I think Illusionist play in many ways is actually Story Before, which is related to the many discussions had elsewhere about the uncomfortable division that exists under the label Sim currently.

QuoteCan you expand on this? What makes the transcript of a Nar game more than just a "sequence of events?"

That's a real softball Marco.  The difference is that the transcript of a Nar game has thematic meaning that was present during actual play and resonated during actual play because the players were addressing premise during actual play.

The transcript of a Sim game doesn't have to have thematic meaning at all for it to have been a successful Sim game, and if it does that theme is typically only recognized and appreciated after the fact (possibly with the aid of retroactive rememberings) and was not featured as part of actual play.

Quote from: Valamir

QuoteCan you expand on this? What makes the transcript of a Nar game more than just a "sequence of events?"

That's a real softball Marco.  The difference is that the transcript of a Nar game has thematic meaning that was present during actual play and resonated during actual play because the players were addressing premise during actual play.

(Emphasis added)

That's a difference in the play of Nar and Sim, not a difference in the transcript, though. According to the glossary, 'story' doesn't exist in play, but is a property of the transcript.

Certainly a Sim game can have thematic elements present during play--they simply aren't the focus of the players--but wouldn't the transcript be identical?

[Aside: I understand your Gamist example and I agree with it--if substantial amounts of data are added after play to make the transcript a story then the transcript has been 'story-fied'--but that seems to me to purely be a mattter of technique used in the play of the game and not CA. I see no reason why Sim or Gamist play couldn't be as true to the transcript as Nar play.]

-Marco

Hi Marco,

I think you're corrupting the definitions in the Glossary a little. By addressing Premise during play, a group/person is creating story in a mindful fashion, at the moment, as a "point," in the sense that Lisa (TheGM) calls "playing on purpose."

If one is playing in any other way imaginable and still manages, in retrospect, to have created a story, then the "other ways imaginable" are not magically transformed into Narrativist play.

There doesn't seem to me to be any controversy or inherent difficulty in these statements.

Best,
Ron

Ron,

At the risk of shifting the dicussion somewhat, I think the real question about Sim versus Nar Transcripts is what distinguishes them. Making the distinction during play is not a solution to this. I've gotten the sense that there should be an observable tendency for differentiation between Sim and Nar Transcripts, even when both are overtly "stories" (i.e. have themes and such).  

Is there a way to describe this difference? Or are Transcripts poor tools to make this distinction? If so, what is missing in a Transcript that gives us the ability to distinguish during play?  Should we then not abandon or upgrade the concept of Transcript so that we may do so?


  - Mendel S.

Hi Mendel,

The transcript tells us nothing about the processes of play, or more specifically, what made it fun for the participants. It is 100% worthless for this purpose. That's the theoretically-sound, fundamental answer. I suggest giving up this idea:

QuoteI've gotten the sense that there should be an observable tendency for differentiation between Sim and Nar Transcripts

... entirely. I have no idea where you "got the sense," but it has potentially poisoned your understanding of the issues.

All of the above holds when we compare one transcript against one another.

Now let's expand our focus to multiple (theoretically, all) historical instances of Simulationist and Narrativist play. Yeah, that's a lot, isn't it? I submit that of those two pools, we would find more "hey, story" among the transcripts of the latter. I also submit that the stories in question (again, compared across the two pools) might have a broader range of topics and theme.*

I don't think that's difficult to understand, nor do I think it creates any problems, of any kind, in understanding my point about the one-on-one comparison.

Best,
Ron

* Clarification: broader does not necessarily mean better. I think I'm now going to have to put up with years of misunderstanding about that, after posting this. I can't wait ...

Quote from: Ron EdwardsHi Marco,

I think you're corrupting the definitions in the Glossary a little. By addressing Premise during play, a group/person is creating story in a mindful fashion, at the moment, as a "point," in the sense that Lisa (TheGM) calls "playing on purpose."

[snip]
Best,
Ron

Hi Ron,

When a Narrativist playing in Author Stance takes an action to add a thematic element to the game's narrative (and therefore transcript) he could be said to be "mindfully" creating story--no argument. But what about when a Simulationist playing in Actor Stance takes an action that adds a thematic element to a game's narrative (and therefore the transcript).

We can say he is not 'mindful'--but can we say he is not 'creating story?'

If one kept a running transcript of play during a thematic Simulationist game, looking at it at any point during play would show just as much 'story' as a Narrativist game, wouldn't it? If so, then what is the meaning of 'retroactive story?'

Some people here seem to be saying that an honest transcript of play from Sim wouldn't usually (reliably?) contain thematic elements. This is what I think contra aludes to and what Ralph describes with his AD&D game's retrofit. I think this is misleading: whether your play reliably has thematic elements or a literary structure will depend on the techniques you used rather than what you enjoyed about it and I see no basis for assuming dishonesty (incompleteness, selective remembering) in a transcript judged to be a story.

-Marco

Hi Marco,

When you say,

QuoteWe can say he is not 'mindful'--but can we say he is not 'creating story?'

... it's a bit like saying, "When I connect two wheels with an axle and push it around, am I not creating a vehicle?"

Yeah, I am. Such an act is potentially "utterly unmindful," but frankly, the chance of such a thing occurring in this way, or failing to become mindful in the near future, seems low to me. Low as in "vanishing."

When Sim play creates story, it is probably rare-to-vanishing that it does so in the "monkeys flew out my butt" way - no mindfulness, just "happening." As I see it, far more common is having one of the participants begin with a story in mind, then share it with, instil it in, or inflict it upon (views differ) the other participants. Also common is having this participant conduct this authority/influence during play itself in a more improvisational fashion. And also common is having this participant retrofit the play-itself into more story-like form as a form of prep for the next session.

Therefore I don't spend a lot of time considering the process/product issue that you're raising here. I don't think it's of much consequence, in terms of an actual phenomenon.

Best,
Ron

Quote from: Ron EdwardsHi Marco,

When you say,

QuoteWe can say he is not 'mindful'--but can we say he is not 'creating story?'

... it's a bit like saying, "When I connect two wheels with an axle and push it around, am I not creating a vehicle?"

Yeah, I am. Such an act is potentially "utterly unmindful," but frankly, the chance of such a thing occurring in this way, or failing to become mindful in the near future, seems low to me. Low as in "vanishing."

When Sim play creates story, it is probably rare-to-vanishing that it does so in the "monkeys flew out my butt" way - no mindfulness, just "happening." As I see it, far more common is having one of the participants begin with a story in mind, then share it with, instil it in, or inflict it upon (views differ) the other participants. Also common is having this participant conduct this authority/influence during play itself in a more improvisational fashion. And also common is having this participant retrofit the play-itself into more story-like form as a form of prep for the next session.

Therefore I don't spend a lot of time considering the process/product issue that you're raising here. I don't think it's of much consequence, in terms of an actual phenomenon.

Best,
Ron

I think I'm a bit confused by this. Are you drawing a distinction between Sim play where the GM functionally, and mindfully preps a situation with inherent theme in the conflict (a technique, I would think) and play where he does not? I agree that Sim play with certain techniques won't reliably produce story in the transcript--but if the group is using techniques that do reliably produce story under Sim I'm not sure what relevance that choice has to saying 'story is created during play.'

-Marco