[Norwegian Style] Role-playing epiphany: Characters rule!
greyorm:
Quote from: Callan S. on July 14, 2010, 03:51:46 PM
But I've read functional patterns into forge ideas before, only for them to eventually get touted in insane ways (LP comes to mind), so maybe I don't get the forges use of the word.
I don't know if this is truly the case or not, but my understanding is that your perception is correct. I certainly see it the way you do.
contracycle:
We may be drifting but: Force was coined to remove the connotations implicit in "raliroading" and to therefore be able to discuss whats going on without all that baggage hanging over the issue. I think it's useful in that sense. As I understand it, both Participatism and Illusionism use force, and can do so with consent. When force is applied without consent, and to the detriment of the social contract, then this can be termed Railroading with all the pejorative connotations. So the distinction between I and P is the visibility with which force is used. Certainly, people have claimed reported being happy with, and having stable social contracts in, games which use both sorts of force. The issue only becomes fraught when the GM basically lies about the fact that they are using force to players who would not have consented.
Sure, characters in illusionist games probably aren't full blown protagonists. But note definition (2) for this term in the Glossary; this is a term that is only properly applicable in the sense being used here, i.e. relevant to story, for Narr play. The habitual use of "story" to describe all forms of RPG, when story is conflated with Narr princples, drives me up the fricken' wall, and that is the mistake made here. Characters can still be, as Greyorm describes, enmeshed in situation, without being actual protagonists. If the whole thing is built with craft and skill and aesthetic sensibility, then it can still be satisfying as a play experience even if true protagonism in ther Narr sense is absent (standard caveat applies: to some people).
Friend of mine is slavering at the prospect that the next Assassins Creed is to be set in Rome. He is interested in the period, and visted the city himself, and this all brings an element of relevence and excitement to the idea. If I made a game-at-the-table (as opposed the systematic use of 'game', sigh, another of my bugbears) to scratch this itch, I would not need to construct a full blown premise driven Narr type story; all I need to do is give him an excuse to run around in 16th century Rome. For that purpose, I might well construct a "story" of sorts, but that story is nothing more than an exercise in structure and contextualisation, it is not the point of play as such. Thererfore, Illusionist or Participationist techniques are perfectly viable. But none of that means that the character is unimportant; it still needs its own integrity and coherence, still needs to be wholly owned by the player. Yes I might do something like having the 29 burly guards burst in (although in fact I'd be mortified at having to be so crude, and would hope to be a bit more cunning), but this does not necessarily deprotagonise the character because the character was not primarily a means for the making of that sort decision anyway. Nor does the concealed element of Illusionism undermine the experience; in fact it lends verisimilitude and plausibility to the experience of play, and so everyone is happy and we all hold hands and sing Kumbaya.
Moreno R.:
Hi!
Contracycle is right about the meaning (in forge terminology) of these words (illusionism, force, etc.). The difference between illusionism and participationism is not the consent of the players or their knowledge of the use of Force, but the way that force is used (overtly or using the "Black Curtain" of illusionism, even if the players know about it)
These posts should help clearing the issue for people interested:
Illusionism: a new look and a new approach
Is this Forcing?
[NWOD][VtR] New Game - New Possibilities - New Questions!
For a (long, but useful) discussion about the difference between "Force" and other kind of GM authority, there is this thread:
Bangs&Illusionism - in which Ron beats down Confusion
I am posting all these link hoping to put to rest this side discussion about Forge terminology and helping to return the thread to the original topic.
About which... I have to tell that I agree on some of Jaakko observations, but not on the conclusions. I have played Matthijs' "five characters" and other games where the character was without any depth, and games more in general where the pleasure of play was all about "playing it out", making up dialogue, more impro-like than like a coherent narrative. But I don't correlate this with having a "my character, only mine!" to control absolutely.
For example, many games use group-based techniques to generate characters: in "Annalise", your character has a Secret that you draw from a hat full of the secret written by people at the table. You get the one I wrote, maybe, and I don't know (and you don't know I did wrote it). In "Spione" NO-ONE at the table has a "my character" at all, everybody play everybody. But these two games in my experience, produce the most intense character-based stories.
The difference in my opinion it's not so much in having a character, but in the choice you can make at the table. When you can say if a character will risk his life for freedom or not, no matter if it's "your character" for the entire game of for that moment only... if you can have your say in the matter, the story and the character will matter to you. If not, if you have to play a pre-written part or reduce the choice to a roll of a die... not so much.
Another variable is time. In 15' you will never care a lot about a character, obviously.
Callan S.:
It is drifting - I'll be very short 'The Technique of control over characters' thematically-significant decisions by anyone who is not the character's player.' is like saying if I control white in chess, there's some magic technique where someone else can reach over and move white, and this mystical technique is called force. It's rubbish. Never mind connotations, it's like saying 2+2=3. If the rule is control is assigned to the player, it takes another rule to grant control of a character to another player (or they otherwise just agree to ignore the rules they originally set out to follow). There is no mystical force that transfers this character control. I can't engage any discussion resting on the idea of 'force' as it's just self contradicting bugaboo. May the force not be with us (as a supposed technical term). Nuff said from me.
Moreno R.:
Callan, you are conflating "This is my character" with "I have absolute control on every aspect of this character".
The first phrase mean "In this specific rpg, the game rules give me the responsibility to portray and role-play this character" It doesn't mean that WHAT you role-play was decided by you. This depends on the specific rules of the specific rpg. For example, in AD&D the GM could (and would) control what your character would do in many different ways (using the alignment rules, using the improvement rules, using the character class rules, using the magic rules, or using the monster rules - really, he had a vast choice of techniques to take the control of your character from you. You still had to role-play his choices, because it was "your character").
Even in the games where you HAVE total control of the choices made by your character, that choice can be make meaningless using really simple illusionist techniques.
For example:
- You make a very good tactical choice that the GM didn't think about? He can simply double the (secret) strengths of the NPC (hp, powers, etc.) to nullify the effect.
- You use a spell that the GM didn't think about? The NPC have some sort of magical protection (or he can simply fudge the resistance roll behind the screen)
- You decide to go to city A instead of city B? The GM simply swap the two cities.
- You don't search for clues that you need to continue the GM' story? The clues are given to you by a NPC.
In partecipationist play, the GM let you know (directly or by his or her behavior) what the "right choices" are.
There is really nothing "mystical" in all this. They are simply techniques. Very popular techniques (I believe that every one of these listed techniques is much more used than "stakes" or any other recent technique. Illusionist play is still the most popular one)
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