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2018-01-13, 06:05 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
Originally Posted by Max_Killjoy
Nothing in my comment even implied a game wherein nothing happens, wherein there are no threats or dangers, no challenges, no consequences.
Maybe it's a language-barrier thing, but what I said was that I don't care about seeking out an intentional story, and have no interest in creating drama -- and that knowing a specific bad incident is coming as a player but having to leave my character hanging out to dry "for story" or "for drama" results in at best zero enjoyment, in at worst an actively negative experience.
Give me mysteries to solve, secrets to uncover, plots to foil, artifacts and treasures to recover, battles to win, allies to aid and enemies to defeat, etc, presented (to the degree possible) as my character would encounter them. If my character knows a problem is coming, they're not going to sit there and wait for it to happen, they're going to try to do something about it.
If I know "drama" is coming but my character doesn't, and it's considered "bad form" to do anything to prevent or prepare or avoid... then that's not anticipation I'm feeling, it's something else entirely.Last edited by Max_Killjoy; 2018-01-13 at 07:22 PM.
It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.
Verisimilitude -- n, the appearance or semblance of truth, likelihood, or probability.
The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.
The Worldbuilding Forum -- where realities are born.
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2018-01-13, 08:09 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
I am not surprised you do not see a difference. This is not a dig at you.
The Edwardian Forge movement mainly did two things.
1) They developed a gaming philosophy and style that they found more enjoyable than the classic approach.
2) They actively sought out to discredit, deride, and eliminate the old style.
I have no problem with the first part. To me, it’s just like when Donald X. Vaccarino decided that the part of Magic the Gathering he really enjoyed was creating his deck, and developed a new game where building your deck took center stage, Dominion.
It is the second part that caused the problems. Personally, I find Dominion much more enjoyable than MtG. But I never felt a need to attack the Collectable Card Game format to promote the new Deck Building Game category.
But that is what the Forgists did. Worse, they did it very effectively. I have no doubt that a large part of the reason WotC coast shut down their forums was due to how effectively the D&D forum was hijacked by people pushing Forge philosophies.
Which is why it is not at all surprising that the first two responses to me describing a typical style of play from before the Forge movement came about is first ignorance “I don’t see the difference”. And then derision. “Playing with your Barbie” as Florian put it.
A relatively small group of very determined and organized zealots worked for this exact result.
Purity is not a word I would use to describe any style. Focused is the term I used, because it does not exclude the existence of other elements, but shows what elements are front and center. In both Dominion and MtG, you need to build a deck. Since MtG is a CCG, a lot of the focus of the Game happens before you sit down to play. Buying, trading and just generally finding the cards you need to build your deck. In a CCG, this is just as much a part of the experience as when you sit down across from another playing and draw your starting hand. MtG can be said to have three focuses. Collecting Cards, building a deck, and playing the game.
In Dominion, the collecting aspect is largely removed. Every player starts with the same starting cards, and have access to the same cards on the field to improve their deck with as the other players. The focus is to use the same resources better than the other players. Dominion is more focused then MtG on the Deckbuilding aspect, but I would not call it a Pure deckbuilding experience. For one thing, there are expansions to collect, and add to your Dominion set base set.
So please, do not think I am advocating for some type of gaming purity. Both Dominion and MtG have a deck building element. But only Dominion is called a Deck Building game, because that is the focus of the game play. Likewise, in recognizing that there are different Roleplaying styles is not advocating for a pure Roleplaying experience.
Now, that does not help in trying to describe what the difference is. Can you accept that there is a difference, even if you can’t spot it right now?
The starting elements are pretty much the same. Like comparing similar math equations:
2+2=4
2x2=4
On the face of it, the only apparent difference between these two statements is that in the first one, the cross like symbol between the twos is upright, and in the second, it is more on the side. Otherwise, same numbers with the same result. So it would appear that there is no difference between + and x, so why bother having different symbols?
2+3=5
2x3=6
A little different, but close enough that we can ask if the difference really matters. But the further we go, the bigger and more apparent the differences become.
6+7=13
6x7=42
A result different enough that you can end up wondering how you thought ever thought they could be considered similar.
That is what the difference between character focused and story focused game styles is like. You can have the same elements, but because you are dealing with those elements using different processes, the results are different. Both results are correct, it is simply a matter which style is more enjoyable for you. What becomes important is recognizing that there are different styles, and being able to tell what style of game is being run.
Actually, all I did was point out that the connotation exists, I went no further than that. I did not - for example - accuse you have deliberately selecting the word to push a one true way of gaming agenda.
But, I do understand that pointing out that such a connotation exists carries its own connotation that you did so deliberately. Instead of flipping it back around again and saying that you taking it as a reprimand speaks more on you than me (in the “finest” tradition of internet debates) let me instead say that it was not meant as a reprimand.
Since you enjoy writing, consider this some unsolicited feedback on how word choices can carry meanings you do not want to convey to your readers.
Which is why I tried to pick more neutral terms when describing the difference in the game styles. Character focused vs Story focused seems fairly neutral. If you were hearing about Roleplaying games for the first time, and someone said that some Roleplaying games are character focused and others are story focused, than neither sounds inherently superior or more correct.
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2018-01-13, 08:36 PM (ISO 8601)
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2018-01-13, 09:06 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
"Sleeping late might not be a virtue, but it sure aint no vice. The old saw about the early bird and the worm just goes to show that the worm should have stayed in bed."
- L. Long
I think, therefore I get really, really annoyed at people who won't.
"A plucky band of renegade short-order cooks fighting the Empire with the power of cheap, delicious food and a side order of whup-ass."
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2018-01-14, 04:44 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
Please separate player and character for once.
Each group will have their social contract about what to game, how to game and play it, methods used, etc. pp., else you can't have a (functioning? good?) game. I think we know how badly it can end when this is not talked about beforehand, like coming up with an agreement the likes of "You may act "in character" as long as that doesn't disrupt the game." or "Create characters that are actually eager and willing to participate".
What you apparently mix up is "game" and "method". As a player, you know what will happens if you agree to join a game of "Temple of Elemental Evil" and the first thing you say is: "Well, my character would never leave Hommlet or willingly go into danger, he rather will get a job as apprentice to the blacksmith". It takes no special meta-game knowledge to see that you, right there, announced that you don't want to participate in the game.
There's an even easier way to highlight the difference. We can play D&D as "Combat as Sports" or as "Combat as War". Choosing one over the other will have a huge difference when it comes to "rules for conducting the game", meaning how the "in-game rules" are going to be used and, more important, what "methods" work well for the game and which will break it, ie. CaS will have you to abstain from certain things that might be "in character" or, more often, "logical" because the results runs counter to the more "gamey" rules behind it.
So, to pick up your example, if you join a group where "drama" is the "game" and you either create a "Teflon Billy" or a character that would squash drama to prevent it, being "logical", it´s more like failing to want to participate in that game, nothing to do with the character (which still doesn't exist and is not sitting at the table).
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2018-01-14, 05:07 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
Ok, DU, did you notice that I'm using a lot of quotation marks to mark technical terms and keep repeating some of them over and over, mainly "game", "method" and "exploration"?
You keep misusing the word "railroading", when what you mean is "setting exploration" and what you do as a gm is creating obstacles and challenges to interact with and overcome that are "set in the fictional game world". I agree with you that this stance will create a "game" that needs the players to use certain "methods", like "Method Acting" (what I talk about with Max here) and cannot handle players going into full "author stance" because it will break down then.
But, and that is the important point here, other combinations of "game", "method" and "exploration" lead to different results that can handle an "author stance" really well and actually need it to function.
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2018-01-14, 10:01 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
The character is my one point of interface with everything going on inside the setting / "secondary world". Or at least, that's how games work for me.
Some of these other gaming styles make the game actively worse (for me) by trying to break that connection -- by treating the character as a plastic game piece or narrative element, and/or by trying to get the player to engage the "secondary world" from outside the character via what are sometimes called "narrative mechanics" or "narrative rules".
(My standard example of a "narrative rule" -- in FFG's Star Wars, there's a higher-tier Talent that allows the player to cause a technological device to fail or malfunction. This requires no action on the part of their character whatsoever, no cause-and-effect at all, and the player might explain why it happened with some little tidbit like "the normal technician was out sick and the guy who took his shift forgot to clean it" or whatever that their character had nothing to do with and will never know about.)
Reasonable so far.
I have no idea what you're talking about with "game and method"... which makes it hard to mix them up.
I've never in my life of gaming encountered a group who was "playing a game of (insert module name here)" -- it would always have been "We want to play D&D, and run through ToEE."
The person who creates a homebody craftsman... after struggling with that a few times, my response as a GM became "OK, you've created Bob the Blacksmith, who wants to stay home and perfect the crafting of horseshoes. Cool. Now, you can play that character, and come watch and hang out if you want, but don't expect any attention to your character, because this campaign isn't about blacksmiths or crafting or staying at home with the family, and most of it won't be taking place in that one town. Or... you can create a character who will want to travel with the rest of the PCs and 'have adventures' and can actually contribute to fighting and exploring and investigating and so on".
We had a couple of players who were so bad about it that we ended up with a name for it -- secondary character syndrome. For some reason, certain players seem to want to make "secondary characters". Comparing to fiction, it would be the character who appears three times in the entire novel and never gets a POV scene or chapter.
There has to be a better way to express what you're trying to say here than using the word "rules" two different ways at once -- especially when "rules" will for many people specifically mean "game system and subsystems", "the mechanical part of the game", and/or "how the characters and setting are 'mapped' and allowed to interact non-arbitrarily."
(E: this is why I use and "game" and "campaign" of "game" and "game" as well, to avoid confusion between "game meaning the ruleset" and "game meaning the activity at the table". )
"CaS" and "CaW" are both kinda tangential, IMO... the feel and lethality of any particular combat should be determined by the setting and circumstances and characters involved.
If the entire point of the campaign is "drama drama drama", and there's going to be metagaming / author stance involved to deliberately make drama occur, then I wouldn't join in the first place. That's never going to be a campaign I'd enjoy. I'm not entertained by drama, and why would my character complicate their life with drama that they can avoid? (Don't confuse "drama" specifically with any and all forms of complications, challenges, setbacks, etc.)
In my experience, however, "drama" hasn't been the point of the campaign, it's part of the assumptions or preferences that some players bring to the table, and it's possible to give them what they want without forcing the other players to deal with it too. It's not necessary to cram the exact same thing down every player's throat, and each player's experience can focus on what they enjoy the most. The old group here had the player who wanted drama and intrigue, and the player who wanted to solve mysteries and uncover plots, and the player who wanted to hit stuff, and so on... and somehow, whether it was the other GM or me running a campaign, we managed to give each player what they wanted while not forcing the other players to get too deep into things they weren't interested in.Last edited by Max_Killjoy; 2018-01-14 at 03:20 PM.
It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.
Verisimilitude -- n, the appearance or semblance of truth, likelihood, or probability.
The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.
The Worldbuilding Forum -- where realities are born.
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2018-01-14, 02:03 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
I noticed, but if that is your writing style...
Right...so you agree with me, but don't want to agree with me, so you say you don't and then just do.
And I guess your saying, like I have also said, there are the specifically made collaborative storytelling games. Where everyone is a Player/Author/Game Master and everyone just takes a turn saying ''and then'', and after a set time everyone stops and links all the ''and thens'' together to get a story of what happened in the set time. And you get the worst type of story possible: the pile of linked ''and thens''.
The vast majority of games are action adventure games, and players should know and understand this. This is a bit of the unavoidable metagame: the players will always know they are playing a game.
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2018-01-14, 02:39 PM (ISO 8601)
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2018-01-14, 03:05 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.
Verisimilitude -- n, the appearance or semblance of truth, likelihood, or probability.
The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.
The Worldbuilding Forum -- where realities are born.
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2018-01-14, 05:28 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
And that is what everyone will say, but it does not seem to be true. It's more just people don't like the ''way'' I put it, or simply people just don't want to agree with me.
A Real Story, not just the Basic Account of What Happened for a set Time Barley a Story, takes time and effort and most of all an good deal of control, predestination and outline.
In a Classic Game(like D&D) the DM makes the Story, and the players play through it. The Players can not (and don't want to) know all the story details and outline, as ''Ok everyone encounter 5, where all your characters will get captured. Everyone have your character trip or something and drop their weapons'' is the worst possible sort of non-game.
The only other way is everyone is a player/storyteller/GM. And that is just each person in the game, saying and doing whatever they want. Sure you can build on what the player before you just said..but you don't have to. And after a set time..say a couple hours...you stop and look at the Barley a Story that everyone sort of made together.
Though, guess somewhere here is the Casual Sandbox, where no matter what the players do, the DM just makes the story right in front of the characters. This type of Random Game does not need the DM to make a Story..or do much of anything else.
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2018-01-14, 08:59 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
From the comments section below the article from The Alexandrian I linked to earlier (comment made by the author of the article):
Long answer: Deciding to take an action is not the same thing as exercising, obtaining, or determining narrative control. If I tell you a story about going fishing last week, it doesn’t follow that I was engaged in narrative creation while fishing. Similarly, if I tell you a story about the events in a roleplaying game, it doesn’t follow that I was engaged in narrative creation while roleplaying. (Although I might have been, it’s not inherent in the game.)
If I’m playing a storytelling game, OTOH, I am engaged in narrative creation while playing the game. It’s inherent in the mechanics — and thus the playing — of the game.
There seems to be a natural tendency to conflate the concept of “fictional” with the concept of “creating a story”. But stories don’t need to be fictional and roleplaying games open up a realm in which fictional actions can be taken outside the act of story creation.
To put it another way: Take the roleplaying out of it. If I tell you a story about this amazing game of Monopoly I played, it doesn’t mean that “roll 2d6 and move that number of spaces around the board” suddenly became a narrative control mechanic.
I'd never bothered reading the comments before, but note the parts I bolded.
Huh.Last edited by Max_Killjoy; 2018-01-14 at 09:05 PM. Reason: formatting problems
It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.
Verisimilitude -- n, the appearance or semblance of truth, likelihood, or probability.
The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.
The Worldbuilding Forum -- where realities are born.
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2018-01-14, 09:26 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
Are those conditions for a real story necessary, sufficient, or both, and how did you arrive at this determination?
Why is this the worst possible sort of non-game?
Why is that barely a story?
Why is that the worst type of story?
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2018-01-14, 10:11 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
Or, you know you could use the rules (which most of these games have) to help define bits of the story. Take fiasco, where the game itself leads to a climax, and helps provide prompts and restrictions. Or, you know, players could talk and negotiate out what happens.
(Also, in a Classic game like DnD, generally the dice determine if a PC drops their weapons. If the GM is deciding that, it's more a "frustrated novelist storytelling experience." than a game)
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2018-01-15, 01:56 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
So just to make this clear, I'm about to describe my own favorite way to play and run RPGs, and I say this with love:
The name of tonight's dungeon is My Character is a ****ing Idiot Who's Ruining His Life. If you want to build a Smart Character Who's Handling His Life that can be you're secondary character, but if you want to interact with this campaign please build a life-ruining-fool who will do dumb **** to create drama.
When I see this stuff as a whole campaign, it's because the one thing I don't want there to be is a choice between being a damn idiot and progressing the campaign. Productively going deeper into the campaign should be something I can accomplish by being as dumb as humanely possible.
More realistically, there's a kind of game setup where everyone is doing something like "what the DM does in a sandbox game". Whether or not the DM in a sandbox game creates story is something that I see we disagree on, but suffice it to say that you're wrong about everything.Last edited by Chauncymancer; 2018-01-15 at 01:56 AM.
Non est salvatori salvator,
neque defensori dominus,
nec pater nec mater,
nihil supernum.
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2018-01-15, 07:50 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
I find that the Alexandrian has a major error in his analyses, that's why the conclusion is also faulty.
We have two major and distinctive layers to talk about:
1 - "Rules for running a game of D&D" aka "playing D&D"
2 - "Rules for playing a character in a game of D&D" aka "roleplaying a D&D character"
The fault is, that any decision made for (1) can also result in "rules elements" that will find their way into (2), else you'll get a dysfunction.
That's why I mentioned the CaS / CaW divide earlier as an example. 3E acknowledge that both exist and offered the option to play CaS by using the CR structure, or play CaW by ignoring it. The result is that CaS-based games lack in verisimilitude a bit, while CaW-based games can't manage balance. The dysfunction is that you simply cannot have both at the same time.
So the conclusion is faulty as it´s based on the assumption that for "classic play", (1) cannot directly influence (2) - which would be "disassociate mechanics" - while things are fine and acceptable when staying "hidden" by making it the GMs job to handle.
So it´s like saying "I want to play a high adventure game, but please hide the fact that we're playing a high adventure game from me, else I cannot enjoy it"
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2018-01-15, 08:11 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
It´s more like you just don't seem to have first-hand experience with the subject matter and repeat some BS you have picked up somewhere, because what you describe doesn't match with experience and reality of people that actually gamed it that way and can tell about it.
I also suspect that this might be because early story-based games really were a bit odd and hard to stomach for the "classic D&D gamer", but things changed a lot on that front, just have a look at, say, Shadowrun: Anarchy as a damn good story-based alternative to regular SR 5.
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2018-01-15, 09:52 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
You keep talking about "rules for running a game of D&D aka playing D&D" as if that's an established thing everyone knows about and that no one will object to as an assumption or concept. What exactly are you referring to with that?
Is this simply the idea that there should be communication between everyone at the table before the campaign, with discussion of the particulars, such as setting, tone, system, etc? Because this hardly strikes me as something that needs a formalized set of rules.
Or is it something else?Last edited by Max_Killjoy; 2018-01-15 at 10:22 AM.
It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.
Verisimilitude -- n, the appearance or semblance of truth, likelihood, or probability.
The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.
The Worldbuilding Forum -- where realities are born.
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2018-01-15, 10:08 AM (ISO 8601)
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2018-01-15, 10:22 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.
Verisimilitude -- n, the appearance or semblance of truth, likelihood, or probability.
The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.
The Worldbuilding Forum -- where realities are born.
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2018-01-15, 10:28 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
Even in quotation marks, the "classic D&D gamer" comment is at least reminiscent of one of the fallacies that's repeatedly been committed by some in two different camps... that there's "D&D" and then "whatever style of gaming the person is arguing for or against".
I'm not a fan of "story focus" / author stance, storygames, storytelling games, "narrative mechanics", etc.
I also washed my hands of D&D, D&D-like games, the entire d20 thing, etc, in the early 90s. There are too many elements in D&D that are antithetical to my enjoyment of RPGs.
So, either I'm neither a "storygamer" nor a "D&D gamer", or you mean something by "classic D&D gamer" that has nothing to do with D&D.It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.
Verisimilitude -- n, the appearance or semblance of truth, likelihood, or probability.
The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.
The Worldbuilding Forum -- where realities are born.
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2018-01-15, 10:56 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
Ok cool. so your whatever this thing we don't know is that isn't one of these two things, and therefore must be a third thing of probably many things. Are you kind enough to define yourself from other things, or are you going be unhelpful and say your a thing thats not these other things we do know of in confusingly righteous defeat of this fallacy?
cause if you don't, its just like dude, we have words for a reason, you want to discuss this, define your position other than "not these things".
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2018-01-15, 11:19 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
So unless I'm able to offer up a neat little term, I'm not allowed to object to what appears to be a tenacious and pernicious false dichotomy?
If nothing else this thread should have demonstrated in spades that terminology is a minefield. I've had to tiptoe around words and phrasing just to avoid added confusion. I can't use "fiction" to describe the imagined / not-real-world elements of the game because people conflate "fictional" with "telling a story". I can't use "simulationist" because people think that means stifling minute intricate rules for every little aspect of the game and "secondary world". Etc. Etc. Etc.
So no, I can't offer a neat little definition that doesn't end up causing as much confusion as it avoids or clears up.It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.
Verisimilitude -- n, the appearance or semblance of truth, likelihood, or probability.
The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.
The Worldbuilding Forum -- where realities are born.
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2018-01-15, 11:32 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
I'm not saying you can't object. I'm saying just objecting on its own doesn't really help. I'd rather have three definitions than two, and I'd rather have you define yourself than have someone define your for you whether you like it or not, despite how arbitrary labels are in general, because you need something to communicate things no matter how arbitrary the communication is, because otherwise we're stuck dancing around this with descriptions without getting any hard progress on getting a spectrum of viewpoints rather than a binary definition we're currently stuck in.
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2018-01-15, 11:53 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
With the word "about" used in the phrase "X is about Y" comes up I always affix a "IMO" in front of it because you can never truly say that something is about something. Is Moby **** about a whale? Obsession? Fate? Divine knowledge? There are as many "RPGs are about" statements as there are gamers... okay, that's a touch of hyperbole however that is only due to using a limited shared language. Given a perfect unlimited language there would be as many "RPGs are about" statements as there are gamers because there is no authority or truth that we can test the statement against.
For the middle section that may very well be where we are forced to disagree and indeed it exemplifies the difference between how we view these. An account is merely an oral or written description of events, whether real or fictitious. Within the fiction events are occurring however in the real world an account of the events is occurring. Just like listening to a ball game on the radio. "Now, Derocher gets back in again. Vander Meer has a new ball. No balls, two strikes, two out, three on. The pitch. It's a high fly ball going into medium centerfield. Harry Craft comes under it, sets, and takes it, and it's a double no-hitter for Vander Meer." This caused me some confusion since I have the opposite point of view as stated in your paragraph. Whether or not you could call the events in a session "storytelling" at least I can see the opposing side. But I don't quite see how one could not call it an account of events.
For the latter part it depends on the format and how it is presented. Namely, is it being presented in an oral or written form or in some other manner? Let us take Zork for instance, a classic example of the genre interactive fiction. I would absolutely call that an account of events. You describe an action and the game gives you an account of the events which occur as a result.Firm opponent of the one true path
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2018-01-15, 12:22 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
That's very reasonable
For the middle section that may very well be where we are forced to disagree and indeed it exemplifies the difference between how we view these. An account is merely an oral or written description of events, whether real or fictitious. Within the fiction events are occurring however in the real world an account of the events is occurring. Just like listening to a ball game on the radio. "Now, Derocher gets back in again. Vander Meer has a new ball. No balls, two strikes, two out, three on. The pitch. It's a high fly ball going into medium centerfield. Harry Craft comes under it, sets, and takes it, and it's a double no-hitter for Vander Meer." This caused me some confusion since I have the opposite point of view as stated in your paragraph. Whether or not you could call the events in a session "storytelling" at least I can see the opposing side. But I don't quite see how one could not call it an account of events.
At least we know exactly why we disagree, in clear terms now.
For the latter part it depends on the format and how it is presented. Namely, is it being presented in an oral or written form or in some other manner? Let us take Zork for instance, a classic example of the genre interactive fiction. I would absolutely call that an account of events. You describe an action and the game gives you an account of the events which occur as a result.
But to me there's no real difference in terms of what's going on underneath the scenes between:
- a player using a vocal control interface to control their character, and the DM determining outcomes and consequences.
- a player using a hand control interface to control their character, and the computer determining outcomes and consequences.
What is different is in a TRPG the player isn't limited to a set of pre-programmed approaches and intents, and the DM isn't limited to a set of pre-programmed outcomes and consequences. And of course that the DM can improvise the world and challenges in it on the fly, as opposed to them needing to be arduously programmed. But in regards to "events happen" vs "account of events", an RPG can easily be analogous to both a CRPG or the real world in terms of how you play, as opposed to an interactive book or a movie.
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2018-01-15, 12:37 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
Reference to old-school point-and-click adventures. You know, here's a scene, there is stuff in it to interact, make the right choices and you proceed to the next scene (Door, Orc, Pie...)
So, the "story" is basically told and will reveal itself when you succeed at playing the game. (I kick in the door, kill the pie and kiss the orc...)
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2018-01-15, 12:45 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
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2018-01-15, 01:08 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Why collaborative storytelling is a meaningless phrase
Firm opponent of the one true path
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2018-01-15, 01:15 PM (ISO 8601)
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