Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase

[Satinavian]

I have seen the phrase "collaborative storytelling" mostly invoked to emphasize the "collaborative" part. To contrast it with play styles where the GM tells his story and the PCs are supposed to play the part he imagined for them to do.

[Blackjackg]

Personally, I use the phrase "collaborative storytelling" when I am describing roleplaying games to people who don't play them and know nothing about them. When people hear that I'm playing a game with friends, they usually ask some variation of "What's the object of the game?" "How do you win?" "How long does it take to play a whole game?" and I need a point of reference to describe how roleplaying games don't work that way. Sure, it's possible to create a story out of anything, but with roleplaying games the creation of a story is the point of the game.

To those who suggest that what D&D produces is not a story, I submit that you are being pedantic and obtuse. The term "story" has a broad definition that includes stories that are written down to tell over and over again, that are told to others or repeated among the group, or that are experienced once and then forgotten forever. Any narrative or imaginal experience can be a story if it has some semblance of plot.

So yeah, roleplaying games are different from other games in that they have no built-in objective, no specified endpoint, and no winners or losers. I suppose that this definition also includes many video game RPGs, and I'm comfortable with that. Yes, it's possible to create a story from any game, from board games to collectible card games. Heck, I could give names and backstories to all the checkers on my checkerboard. But those games have objectives beyond the creation and resolution of the narrative. With roleplaying games, the point is to create a story, either because you want an interesting story, because you enjoy the process of creating the story, or both.

Now if all I wanted was a story, I could just write it myself and not involve any other writers, any pre-existing system or setting, or any form of random chance. That would just be storytelling. And that's a fine way to express yourself. If I understand Tanarii's definitions from the OP correctly, then this is just narrative resolution without emergent storytelling.

Most tabletop RPGs I'm aware of exist at the central overlap of a four-set Venn diagram representing the contribution of the primary storyteller (e.g., the DM), the contributions of other active storytellers (players), the contributions of the setting and system authors, and the contribution of random chance (traditionally represented by die rolls). If we really wanted to nitpick, we could break down which of the many possible junctions count as "collaborative" and which count as "games," but as long as the object is the creation of a story, then they're all forms of storytelling.

When I choose to play a tabletop RPG instead of just sitting down and writing a story by myself, it's because I'm interested in the ways the story changes when we include other storytellers and random chance; or because I enjoy the process of creating the story collaboratively; or both (usually both). This (again, if I understand Tanarii's definitions accurately) is the process of emergent story that makes collaborative storytelling different from writing a novel.

So, yeah. Storytelling because it's an activity in generating narrative; collaborative because it involves more than one person. Seems pretty straightforward to me.

[Millstone85]

I agree with Blackjackg.

When I told my old mother about roleplaying, the first thing she thought about was a part of her administrative/medical training where you simulate a discussion with a patient.

Not the worst "roleplaying" she could have heard about, of course.

And yeah, I said this one was about stories of magic and such.

[Kaptin Keen]

You're the one who's asserting that you know better than other people what they want, what they're thinking, and what they're doing... you don't get to play the "poor me, I've been insulted" card.

The problem with internet debate is that everyone tries - deliberately - to misunderstand. Now, if you wanna reread my post and try to deliberately understand - rather than the opposite - then maybe we can talk.

Otherwise, thanks for your insights. Happy new year. CYA =D

[Max_Killjoy]

The problem with internet debate is that everyone tries - deliberately - to misunderstand. Now, if you wanna reread my post and try to deliberately understand - rather than the opposite - then maybe we can talk.

No, I'm pretty sure I understood just fine the first time.

Spoiler

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Nonsense.

RPG's consist of two things. Rolling dice and telling stories. Either of these things are possible without the other. If you're rpg'ing with the dice, there is an element of a game of chance in your collaborative storytelling. This is a variable: Sometimes it's more correct to state that there is an element of collaborative storytelling in your game of chance.

So at one extreme of the spectrum, you're all about the dice rolls, and at the other - all about the storytelling.

And what about those of us who value in-character decisions, characters with depth, rich and robust settings... leave chance for when there's real uncertainty... and couldn't give a tinker's damn about "telling a story"?

That would be the story of your character.

"What if I don't care about telling a story, but care about this other non-dice-rolling stuff specifically?"

"That's just story, you care about telling a story whether you realize it or not."

[PhoenixPhyre]

Count me too as agreeing with Blackjacg. I end up explaining role play (especially trying to distinguish the tabletop version from the computer version) and use the collective storytelling explanation.

CRPGs are interactive, branching novels with better graphics. Fundamentally they’re being told a story, not telling your own story. “Open world” games get closer, but even those have a fixed set of interactions.

On the other hand, TTRPGs are only as fixed as your imagination. As a group, you’re creating the story as you go. Each player (including DM) has responsibility for a section of the game world, for which they act as decision maker and voice. The mechanics adjudicate conflicts between game entities and add randomness. This is both telling a story (deciding how the events will unfold, subject to uncertainty constraints) and playing a role (making decisions based on the pre-established characteristics of a character).

It takes a particularly narrow definition of both role play and storytelling to not have substantial overlap between the two.

[Darth Ultron]

For instance, D&D often does have the assumption the players are just along for the ride. But there have been plenty of moments of collaborative storytelling. In my last session I ended up writing an NPC contact because the GM forgot to fill it in. Now this was ultimately flavour text, I did say this was but a moment, but we got a scene about buying bread at a bakery that we wouldn't have otherwise.

But this just proves my point. The DM does 100 things, you as a player did one.

While the DM may be making quantatively more stuff, since everything that happens in D&D games (or at least everything that happens "On-screen") involves at least one player character, or at least the player characters are present, or using some kind of ability they have to do something. The players are, one hopes, participating as much in the actual doing of stuff as the DM, at the very least between them if not individually.

Sure, there is at least one player there doing their 5% or less of involvement and storytelling or such. But again, that is my point.

1)
GM: "This is the situation"
Player: "I do this."
GM: "This is the new situation."

This is the classic way here, the type you find in games like D&D. The DM is doing just about everything, and each player plays a single character.

3)
Player 1: "This happens."
Player 2: "Then this happens."
Player 3: "Then this happens."

Now this is the other type of RPG, the anti-D&D type. Made to not be like D&D. And if you want to have a game with a group of players that all just tell a story together...this game is for you.

I might argue that your 1 and 3 are essentially the same thing, but on different scales.
"This happens" is another form of "This is the situation"
"I do this" is just a more limited scope of "Then this happens", as the "this" in this case, applies to a singular reference point, rather than a broader one.

The 1 and 3 are vastly different and not the game.

1.The DM is in total control and can say and do what they want. The players agree to this, not that it stops them from whining and crying later if they don't like something. And sure you can say the DM ''has to follow the rules''(they don't) and they ''have to do things that make sense''(they don't) or even the far wacky ''the DM can only do things the players agree with" (whatever). BUT, ok, lets just say all of that is true, the DM is following the rules, doing things that make sense and things the players agree with.....even then, the DM can still do whatever they want.

3.Is the random game of all players. Each player just says whatever and whatever happens and each other player just says whatever and whatever happens and on and on and on. And sure, the players have to follow the game rules....but otherwise they can just randomly do whatever they want.

[Knaight]

If an RPG character decides to do something, and events result, and he reacts, and so on, and that's "storytelling", then if a real person decides to do something, and events result, and he reacts, and so on... then that would also be "storytelling" under that overbroad definition.

RPG characters don't decide to do something, after which events result. People decide to describe them doing something, and then people describe events resulting. These descriptions didn't exist beforehand*, people had to make them on the spot. It's the part where people are describing the fictional interactions of characters and/or setting where the storytelling happens. That part doesn't exist when a real person decides to do something for most of what fits in the category "something".

*Absent certain highly restrictive modules with a lot of boxed text run in the most boring fashion possible.

[ImNotTrevor]

I think I'd say that rather than Mechanics and STORY, the split is in the Mechanics and the Fiction.

This is a tad more clear and doesn't carry baggage that will trigger overly enthusiastic naysaying and insistence that suggesting a thing might actually be story is a personal offence to them. (Which is silly.)

Characters are 50/50 splits between mechanics and fiction. The character sheet is their mechanical portion and the rest is the fiction portion.
Basically, if it has a number attached to it and gas an effect on dice, it is probably mechanical.
If you don't need the sheet for it, it's fiction.

Setting also has a mechanics/fiction interface.
Mechanics can inform, break, or enhance a setting.

Fiction is what the setting PRIMARILY is. It's firmly in the fiction side, but it interacts with the mechanical portion.

[ross]

Really? It's certainly an emergent story, at the minimum.

This sounds remarkably like the elitist and wrong-headed claims that doing nothing but fighting and dungeon-crawling isn't roleplaying.

Correct, that isn't roleplaying.

[Kaptin Keen]

...

You're so intent on picking a fight. I'm not going to give you one. Have a fantastic new years =)

[Max_Killjoy]

You're so intent on picking a fight. I'm not going to give you one. Have a fantastic new years =)

Ah, the feign ignorance response.

If you don't want fights, don't go around randomly insulting people.

[Jormengand]

Sure, there is at least one player there doing their 5% or less of involvement and storytelling or such. But again, that is my point.

Yes, that is your point, but it's not my point. My point is "The players are, one hopes, participating as much in the actual doing of stuff as the DM" and your point is "there is at least one player there doing their 5% or less of involvement" I'm sorry, but if I were in a 4-player party and less than 5% involved in the doing of stuff, I would walk. The whole point of D&D is that it's not just the DM telling his story of how the PCs went on the railroad all the way down to the DM's preplanned story. It's the players participating in the story, and actually doing meaningful things.

[Kaptin Keen]

Ah, the feign ignorance response.

If you don't want fights, don't go around randomly insulting people.

I haven't insulted you. It's possible what I say can be read as an insult. That's not the intent, and I apologize. I should have phrased my reply more carefully.

[Tanarii]

Yes in the sense that it's a different activity from Pratchett and Gaiman co-authoring Good Omen's.

No, because if they said "Football is collaborative storytelling" or even "Monopoly is collaborative storytelling" they'd be wrong. There's something different about the stuff that happens in many RPG's that is different. And it's important. Because of all their inputs stuff happens.

I chose Terry&Neill as an easy example of collaboration in authorship, but as both of them dwell on the importance, ubiquity and togetherness of story, it is quite fitting.

Okay, there's a fair difference between games in general and role playing games. But that doesn't have to mean that RPGs are like stories. In can for ones with a narrative causality focus (meaning a focus on 'what would happen to make e best story'), but it doesn't have to. Instead it can be like real life: what would my character do in this situation. In fact, this summary by kyoryu breaks it down pretty well:

Again, I go to my three interaction types in RPGs

1)
GM: "This is the situation"
Player: "I do this."
GM: "This is the new situation."

2)
Player 1: "I move my piece in accordance with the rules."
Player 2: "I move my piece in accordance with the rules."
Player 3: "I move my piece in accordance with the rules."

3)
Player 1: "This happens."
Player 2: "Then this happens."
Player 3: "Then this happens."

---------------

I'm guilty of using this phrase, though here's my excuse and reasoning for why I'll probably keep using it.

I've played in a lot of groups with one or more new players that are fully up front about not understanding what they should be doing. Telling them that we're telling a "collaborative story" is easy enough to understand and it gets across the basic point of what we're doing.

Yeah, I'd never do that, because it would lead to them thinking I primarily wanted #3 from kyoryu's list above.

I usually tell brand new players something like: the goal is to imagine if you were your character in the game world, with the special abilities the character has, and decide what you would do. This results in #1 from kyoryu's list above. Then as they become more accustomed to the game rules, I get into having them play more than an avatar of themselves, and imagining tweaking themselves a bit more by adding personality unique to the character, making it someone other than the self in distinct ways.

This results in what I think Roleplaying and RPGs are all about:
Tanarii's definition of roleplaying in a RPG:
Making decisions for your character in the fantasy environment.


Note I usually prefer "in-character decisions" (meaning the character is not just an avatar of the player's personality) but that is not required. What's required is a not-real & imagined ("fantasy") environment of some kind, and typically someone to imagine the environment to interact with & adjudicate the player decisions (DM, GM, ST, MC).

Just a suggestion - maybe you should listen to people and what they say instead of just telling them that their desires and preferences are factually wrong. You might learn something.

This wasn't directed at me, but it probably applies in the case of this thread.

For starters, I'm learning there are some definitely people that mean actual storytelling when they say "collaborative storytelling", and not just "a story emerges, if we want to recall it or write it down the events after the fact". The latter being true for most any series of events, although certainly in the case of RPGs we create fertile ground for such emergent stories by seeding the starting environment appropriately. So some people aren't just regurgitating a specific phrase meaninglessly.

[Max_Killjoy]

I haven't insulted you. It's possible what I say can be read as an insult. That's not the intent, and I apologize. I should have phrased my reply more carefully.

Kinda sucks to have someone insist that your thoughts and intentions are X, when you tell them plainly that your thoughts and intentions are NOT X... doesn't it?

[Max_Killjoy]

For starters, I'm learning there are some definitely people that mean actual storytelling when they say "collaborative storytelling", and not just "a story emerges, if we want to recall it or write it down the events after the fact". The latter being true for most any series of events, although certainly in the case of RPGs we create fertile ground for such emergent stories by seeding the starting environment appropriately. So some people aren't just regurgitating a specific phrase meaninglessly.

Then we have the flip side, where some gamers, including some who use the phrase to mean actual storytelling, insist that there's no other way to approach gaming and that it's always about actual storytelling -- and will even tell you that you're wrong about what's in your own head if you tell them that's not what you, personally, are doing.

"I'm not thinking of a story, I don't intend to tell a story, and I don't care if it becomes a good story."

"Yes you are, yes you do, and yes you do, even if you don't realize it."

[Blackjackg]

Then we have the flip side, where some gamers, including some who use the phrase to mean actual storytelling, insist that there's no other way to approach gaming and that it's always about actual storytelling -- and will even tell you that you're wrong about what's in your own head if you tell them that's not what you, personally, are doing.

"I'm not thinking of a story, I don't intend to tell a story, and I don't care if it becomes a good story."

"Yes you are, yes you do, and yes you do, even if you don't realize it."

Have you considered the possibility that while you're insisting that you don't care about story, the parts of the game that you do claim to care about fall within the working definition of story that we are using?

Like if you said "I don't care about breakfast, I just want to eat waffles and bacon in the morning," one might be justified in saying that what you're describing sounds like breakfast.

I don't think anyone has been saying that the way you play the game is wrong, or that you're caring about the wrong things. I also like developing rich, interesting characters and vibrant settings, and making decisions for fictional persons. But those things are all part of the definition that I (and I think most of the other folks on this thread and in the world at large) have for storytelling.

[Kaptin Keen]

Kinda sucks to have someone insist that your thoughts and intentions are X, when you tell them plainly that your thoughts and intentions are NOT X... doesn't it?

I've stated opinion. You've stated opinion. The difference is that I'm not insulted by yours. I haven't uttered even one word about any intention of yours.

And if that, once again, is insulting to you, then once again, I appologize. In advance.

[Tanarii]

---

But those things are all part of the definition that I (and I think most of the other folks on this thread and in the world at large) have for storytelling.

That's a great example of a meaningless definition for storytelling!

Those things are often part of storytelling, but they're also part of many things that are not at all storytelling. Thus, irrelevant to a less meaningless definition of storytelling.

For example, several times in my life I filled it with rich, interesting people and vibrant settings. But that didn't make living my life telling a story in any way.

[Florian]

I find it hard to differentiate here, especially since some of the english terms don't transfer well to german.

As I see it, a "story" is a finished thing with a beginning and an end. It is about what happened to get from that beginning to that end, maybe also involving some narrative techniques, like an act structure along the way.

In plain mainstream roleplaying, it´s mostly the gm defining the adventure, which in turn will produce the story of how the heroes did x, y and z. What I wouldn't say, is that there is a marked collaborative element to it, because it´s simple the concept of the game to role-play a character (or troupe) thru it, using gaming elements to facilitate it.

To be considered collaborative, it must be a conscious effort to create a game that will lead to a certain story featuring a cast of characters, with the players also in the role of author and with tools to correct the ongoing happening or aimed for story / narrative structure.

[Tanarii]

I find it hard to differentiate here, especially since some of the english terms don't transfer well to german.

IMO it's more a case of some people use English terms with specific meaning in a way that doesn't match the strict definition (one of which is closer to what you described), to other things. Which is fair enough, that's how language changes. The problem is the things they're being applied to are also things that aren't stories, so it can be confusing, meaningless, or actually inaccurate.

[kitanas]

If, after you get home, someone asks you how your day went, and you tell them, are you telling them the story of how your day went? And if so, when was that story created?

[Tanarii]

If, after you get home, someone asks you how your day went, and you tell them, are you telling them the story of how your day went? And if so, when was that story created?

Yes. It was created when I told it. That's a simple example of an emergent story.

[kitanas]

Yes. It was created when I told it. That's a simple example of an emergent story.

Even if you are just recounting what you did and chose? Because I think that might be one of the divides here. Is a story of events created as the events happen, and simply retold later, or is the telling the creating?

EDIT: I don't mean to imply that there is a right or wrong answer here, just that these are different ways of looking at storytelling

[Blackjackg]

---

That's a great example of a meaningless definition for storytelling!

Those things are often part of storytelling, but they're also part of many things that are not at all storytelling. Thus, irrelevant to a less meaningless definition of storytelling.

For example, several times in my life I filled it with rich, interesting people and vibrant settings. But that didn't make living my life telling a story in any way.

I disagree with the implication that because a definition is broadly applicable, it must be meaningless. Pretty much everything around us is matter, but that doesn't mean matter is a meaningless term. Maybe it doesn't bear mentioning all the time, but when someone says "I don't like matter," it's not unreasonable to remind them that all their favorite stuff is made out of it.

Ok, I can acknowledge that even with my fairly broad definition of story, it is possible to create settings and characters without it being a form of storytelling. I could paint a picture, or write a character synopsis; create a static work. But the moment that something happens in that scene, or the character does something, that is a story. It could be a good story, or a bad story, or a pointless story, but it is by any reasonable definition a story.

When I choose to share my characters and settings in the form of a tabletop roleplaying game instead of as a painting or synopsis, it is because the story is, on some level, the point. I feel that these things are most interesting when they are presented in a particular order, or interacted with in some way. If you can suggest another reason someone might choose the RPG medium over any other that does not describe the creation of some kind of narrative, I'd be interested to hear it, because I am wracking my brains trying to think of one.

[Knaight]

---

That's a great example of a meaningless definition for storytelling!

Those things are often part of storytelling, but they're also part of many things that are not at all storytelling. Thus, irrelevant to a less meaningless definition of storytelling.

For example, several times in my life I filled it with rich, interesting people and vibrant settings. But that didn't make living my life telling a story in any way.

If you use only part of the given definition you can make a broader category that includes other terms, yes. In this case it comes from omitting the "developing" part and the making decisions for the characters, both of which are essential parts of the definition. Also omitted was the implication of fiction.

On top of that, you're applying an excessive requirement here. A word isn't meaningless if it has a definition that isn't perfectly precise, and outside of math definitions generally fail to meet that standard.

[Aliquid]

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That's a great example of a meaningless definition for storytelling!

Those things are often part of storytelling, but they're also part of many things that are not at all storytelling. Thus, irrelevant to a less meaningless definition of storytelling.

For example, several times in my life I filled it with rich, interesting people and vibrant settings. But that didn't make living my life telling a story in any way.

So if I read a biography, I’m not reading a story?

Living your life isn’t “telling a story”. But it is a story waiting to be told.

The difference with the RPG and your life experiences is that with an RPG we are actively “telling” the entire time we play.

So, no those things don’t make a story in and of themselves. They become a story when you narrate them.

[Tanarii]

Even if you are just recounting what you did and chose? Because I think that might be one of the divides here. Is a story of events created as the events happen, and simply retold later, or is the telling the creating?

The telling is the creating. I assure you that as I live my life, I am neither living nor creating a story.

The difference with the RPG and your life experiences is that with an RPG we are actively “telling” the entire time we play.

Not necessarily. It's entirely possible to play an RPG by making decisions as your character, and not telling anything. However, I agree that's a major diffence between life and an RPG. It is possible to tell what happens directly, and it's also possible for the GM (or whatever) and even players to resolve with an eye to what will make a good story.

My argument is not that it's not possible to tell stories of life's or an RPG games events after the fact, clearly you can do that, it's emergent storytelling. Similarly, you can play with narrative resolution, the GM keeps an eye towards what will make a good story. Or narrative mechanics giving player control over things that would normally be the GMs realm of influence.

But those things are not required, nor are they, in my opinion, typically what people mean when they trot out "Collaborative storytelling" as a description on an RPG.

[Blackjackg]

The telling is the creating. I assure you that as I live my life, I am neither living nor creating a story.

Ok, maybe I'm being the psychological nitpicker on this, but I can guarantee that you are. We all tell ourselves stories about our lives constantly. When I reflect on my past, or make predictions about how my future will go, I am creating a story, if only for myself. Seriously, there's a whole branch of psychotherapy built around this. Even that bit up there, where you say "as I live my life, I am neither living nor creating a story" is a story.