GNS and Hierarchy
Adam Dray:
Go for it.
Caldis:
This is the actual play account I'll be discussing. The relevant posts are reply #1 where he talks about the first session the Laszlo experience, reply # 12 where he talks about the second session and reply 14 where he talks of the final confrontation.
Each of the sessions is a reward cycle. In the first they start out with the task they had to accomplish, find the mutant chimpanzee. There are several possible encounters along the way and how they deal with them directly affects the outcome of the situation. If they dont move quickly enough bad things can happen. Their choices, actions, tactics made the difference. Their quick movement allowed them to catch up to the Chimp before he was captured by slavers, the gutsy move by the borg player with a little bit of luck on his side allowed them to escape the slavers and get away with the chimp.
The second group functioned in the same way. Their actions determined how well they did. The Lt's indecisiveness was costing them but the smart play by the others found the information they needed. The fact the other group acted without caution allowed this group to get the information they needed however there lack of though cost them the extra support they could have had in requesting weapons.
So what we have so far is each group assigned a task, through various means they accomplish the task but how well they do affects how capable they are at future tasks. In some of his side comments not directly in the play account the gm tells of how the game could have differed if they hadnt moved fast enough.
Now there is a new task for the groups, the battle to control the chimp. This is the cycle in action. The groups Stepped Up to the tasks on the way they changed the situation and now a new one awaits, one in which once again how well they act tactically and strategically will determine what happens.
Contrast that with the game from your example where it's not how well you did but the meanings of your choices that matter.
I can also do up an example of a Sim reward cycle if you are still interested but that will have to wait for another day.
contracycle:
Quote from: Ayyavazi on August 18, 2009, 05:17:31 AM
Assumption #6: No group can pursue multiple creative agendas within a single game session (even if they are completely united on wanting to do so).
As it happens, a lot of the substance of your argument has been discussed before, although I'm not having much luck locating any of those threads with search terms I can think of right now.
I held quite a similar position, but it was all resolved to my satisfaction by the 'instance of play' and reward cycle criteria. I've picked out this point of yours as a suitable place to make the point.
I think my play rests primarily in one agenda, skirts into another regularly, and largely ignores the third. How can this be, when only a single mode can be present? The thing is that its not necessarily about what you do in terms of this minute, right now; what matters is what is ultimately rewarded and reinforced.
So you can indeed have a "heriarchy" in a sense that one agenda is dominant and another recessive and so forth, and see it that way if you choose. But that actually obscures more than it illuminates. Because ultimately, for the game to actually work and be fun, it will have to prioritise one agenda, even if it allows temporary excursions into behaviour that seems to belong in another agenda.
This is what people mean by techniques not expressing an agenda automatically and in their own right. It is perfectly possible to have, most commonly, gamist style techniques present in a game that is really not G at all. Does this mean the game as a while is a hybrid? No. Becuase, over the instance of play, it will be the other thing, whatever it is, that will get rewarded, that will be recognised as the point of play.
IF such a game rewarded the gamist things, it would be gamist overall. But if instead its just an excursion, and the reward cycle really adressess S or N, then these excurions are just supporting elements. The game still has one agenda, even if it borrows from some of the fun things that the others can do.
Your statement I picked out puts things to starkly. It is indeed possible within a session (and a session may or may not be coterminus with an instance of play) to use techniques that are usually though of as being supportive of different agendas. That is all fine and normal and not a challenge to the GNS model as such. What you cannot do is have instances of play whose cycles actually reward more than one agenda over all. Thus, hybrid play, that is rewarding of two or more agendas simultaneously is impossible, but play with some variation of techniques is not. And when people do branch out into those techniques, they are not really temporarily pursuing a different agenda, because what they are doing is not rewarded and reinforced. It may well be enjoyed and celebrated in its own right, in the moment, but ultimately it is not the point of play.
FredGarber:
Quote from: Ayyavazi on August 18, 2009, 05:17:31 AM
Thanks again everyone. You have all contributed meaningfully to this as far as I am concerned.
2. Creative Agenda is not at the beginning, middle, or end of play, it IS play. Everything within the scope of play, from start to finish (and even beyond) is Creative Agenda in action.
Here I have to disagree with one of your basic assumptions. I would phrase it as this:
2. Creative Agenda is not ONLY at the beginning, middle, or end of play. Anything within the scope of play, from start to finish (and even beyond) might reinforce or weaken the Creative Agenda.
Actual Play:
We're playing "Switch", a PTA game. J--------- is playing Jade, a shapeshifter who lives in hiding in Seattle.
I Produce the show with the Theme (Premise) of "How much can you change to get your goal and still be the same person?"
We had a scene where Jade and Colby found a mysterious book on Jade's pillow. It was fun, since Jade had to search her house for an intruder without letting Colby know what was going on. Colby had to find out what was going on without looking like she wanted to invade Jade's privacy.
But there's no Premise payoff in that scene. The Challenge will come when Jade decides what to do with the information in the book. If Colby gets to read it, then I get a second Premise challenge. It's just a scene to demonstrate the Chekov Gun on the wall in Act I.
As another example, I was Storytelling a WhiteWolf LARP. I got some feedback on one of my fellow storytellers:
"I went out to buy a newspaper, and BB made it a whole scene, with some crazy Greek guy running the newsstand. I just wanted a newspaper, and it took me twenty minutes." The player didn't want a whole scene to happen: It didn't break with their CA, either. They wanted a quick stamp on an item card, and instead they got Exploration, and even a bit of a Challenge. That was an unfun moment, but it had nothing to do with the CA. In fact, they were looking for the newspaper to find out the next clue to StepOnUp to the 'Werewolves in the Sewers' problem.
Two examples where play happened, and in one case it was fun, and in another case it was not fun, but in neither case were the Techniques involved affecting the Creative Agenda of the group.
Secondly, I think you are confusing Incoherence with Unplayable. Incoherant groups tend to short term play only and are a lot of work for a GM to manage. But they can be fun, as long as Pete realizes Randy wants as many fight scenes as possible, and Randy knows Pete wants to focus on the characters becoming part of their village community. If each player accepts the NotFun that comes during the other guy's part, then the game can continue long term.
-Fred
Callan S.:
Just a note on 4E D&D and indeed editions prior, in terms of character creation being gamist? What are you stepping up against? Nothing really - it's just spreading out stats. Can you lose during character gen? No - so it's 20 to 30 minutes of non gamist activity - activity which is probably quite stimulating for someone who has a dream of a certain character. And in terms of play being focused on challenge .... what focuses it? Does something say there has to be a challenge in the next two to five real life minutes of play? Or can someone follow the rules as much as they are and yet large amounts of RL time can pass during play without challenge being presented? 4E isn't dreadfully gamist supportive, in the same way 3E wasn't.
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