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  1. - Top - End - #31
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Yeah you can give player's agency while making things you go. Simply take into account their decisions while making things up. That's kind of how reality works (although reality has perfect setting knowledge) and I doubt you could get more agency than that. Just follow all the rules for planning an adventure with good agency except do it a few seconds ahead of time and you should be good.

    On a less logical level: I play kind of like this for the sake of creating a campaign with even more (perhaps excessive) agency in it and I wouldn't like to learn it was all for nothing.

  2. - Top - End - #32
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    SwashbucklerGuy

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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    That's a hairsplitting argument which isn't actually helpful. When creating a game scenario, creating a situation is synonymous with creating choices. When measuring player agency specifically, you want to talk about explicit, concrete choices, because those are what the players can and will actually do at a table.
    What players can and will do is heavily reliant on the players and the system and their avatars within in. I've had groups of highly creative players in frankly un-creative systems, and I've had totally uncreative players in much more open and free-form systems. I've had creative players make PCs who have little agency(like fighters) in the game and utilize them very well, and I've had uncreative players make PCs who have greater mechanical agency(such as magic users) who are completely stumped when any old situation arises.

    Hence my comparison to Battleship. Both sides have limited information, but there are still a lot of pegs, "choices" if you will, on the board for both you and your players to try. Some of those choices will resolve situations "You sunk my battleship!", some of those choices won't. But you can only guess at their ability to find and make those choices.
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  3. - Top - End - #33
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    So long as the players can have their characters respond to what is happening, you're golden.

    Agency is the ability to freely react to a given situation.

    It doesn't mean you can do anything you want.

    A character locked in a jail cell has agency. They can chose to sit and wait, to try to push open the door, to do pushups, tell stories, etc.

  4. - Top - End - #34
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    @False God: you don't need to know exact player ability to measure player agency - not in roleplaying games, not in Battleship.

    To use Battleship as a simplified example, it's a closed game if you are playing on a finite grid. Before a single shot has been called, before you know anything about who's playing it, you can calculate a mathematically exact number of different shots a player can call on first turn. And since any shot reveals more about the state of the game board, any shot is meaningful and counts towards player agency.

    You don't even need to finish counting to answer a hypothetical player asking "so what can I do?". Just looking at the board and saying "shoot at one of the corners" gives them four possibilities.

    Same deal for an improvising GM, such as the original poster. They presumably already know their system and the characters in it - if they don't, they can check their rule book or peek at one of the character sheets. Just using those, they can probably think of four different things their players can do, at a specific moment of their game, and evaluate their impact on the game state, with no further knowledge of players needed. That's enough to determine that the players have (some) agency.

  5. - Top - End - #35
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Democratus View Post
    So long as the players can have their characters respond to what is happening, you're golden.

    Agency is the ability to freely react to a given situation.

    It doesn't mean you can do anything you want.

    A character locked in a jail cell has agency. They can chose to sit and wait, to try to push open the door, to do pushups, tell stories, etc.
    Agency is not simply to be able to chose. It's the ability to influence what happens to you. It's when different things will happen depending on what you do and you have a meaningful way to progress to your desired outcome.
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  6. - Top - End - #36
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Yora View Post
    Agency is not simply to be able to chose. It's the ability to influence what happens to you. It's when different things will happen depending on what you do and you have a meaningful way to progress to your desired outcome.
    I very much agree with this distinction.

    The "agency" to decide whether to do situps or play card games in prison isn't really any agency most players care about, unless the choice between situps or card games affects their ability to leave the prison.

    Players don't care about choosing the red, green, or blue ending while riding the railcar down to the end of the game.

    They want the agency to change where the railcar ends up going, even if that means derailing the car.
    Quote Originally Posted by 2D8HP View Post
    Some play RPG's like chess, some like charades.

    Everyone has their own jam.

  7. - Top - End - #37
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Be fair to Democratus. It isn't hard to imagine a game where even such limited choices impact the game state: trying the door might reveal the warden forgot to lock it, telling stories might increase a character's chance to get a book deal after imprisonment, doing push-ups daily might get them +1 to strength, playing poker with other inmates might win them +100 €, sitting and waiting might let them skip to end of their sentence (etc.)

    If none of the choices matter, it's more often due to omission on the part of GM; the players would care about exercising their agency in such ways, if they had a reason to believe it'd work.

  8. - Top - End - #38
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    Be fair to Democratus. It isn't hard to imagine a game where even such limited choices impact the game state: trying the door might reveal the warden forgot to lock it, telling stories might increase a character's chance to get a book deal after imprisonment, doing push-ups daily might get them +1 to strength, playing poker with other inmates might win them +100 €, sitting and waiting might let them skip to end of their sentence (etc.)

    If none of the choices matter, it's more often due to omission on the part of GM; the players would care about exercising their agency in such ways, if they had a reason to believe it'd work.
    Exactly. Thanks.

    Agency is "the state of acting or exerting power". And a character always has the ability to exert some kind of power.

    Most of the complaints I'm seeing are about a lack of freedom, not a lack of agency. Either that or complaints that the DM isn't putting characters in exactly the kind of story that they wanted.

    Great storytelling can come from characters who have had their freedoms greatly curtailed. Whether it be stories about escape, stories about redefining what is important in life, or stories about finding inner peace. I once ran a 2 year campaign entirely within a prison, and another year-long game entirely within a prison dimension.

    There are players who really enjoy this kind of campaign. And those that do not.

    But if you don't like these kinds of games, the issue is the style of campaign - not with agency.

  9. - Top - End - #39
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Democratus View Post
    Agency is "the state of acting or exerting power". And a character always has the ability to exert some kind of power.
    And Power is Work Over Time, where Work is Force Through Distance.

    We come to the question of what it is we are supposed to be Working On.

    Quote Originally Posted by Democratus View Post
    Most of the complaints I'm seeing are about a lack of freedom, not a lack of agency.
    What Players can use their Agency to Work On is defined by the GM in establishing the scenario. A lack of Freedom correlates rather directly with a lack of Agency.

    You can deny players Agency either by removing their Power to affect change, or by removing the objects they wish to exert their power upon.

    Now, you're not wrong that limited agency can still be plenty of agency. Most RPGs are not free form, so they are all technically limited agency games.

    The real meat of the question is where to draw the limits, which becomes a problem of Justifying the limits you want to set.

    Which brings us back to the prison scenario. How do you justify the prison scenario so players can joyfully accept it as a fun concept?
    Quote Originally Posted by 2D8HP View Post
    Some play RPG's like chess, some like charades.

    Everyone has their own jam.

  10. - Top - End - #40
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    NecromancerGuy

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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Democratus View Post
    Exactly. Thanks.

    Agency is "the state of acting or exerting power". And a character always has the ability to exert some kind of power.

    Most of the complaints I'm seeing are about a lack of freedom, not a lack of agency. Either that or complaints that the DM isn't putting characters in exactly the kind of story that they wanted.

    Great storytelling can come from characters who have had their freedoms greatly curtailed.

    -snip-

    But if you don't like these kinds of games, the issue is the style of campaign - not with agency.
    Agency is the capacity, condition, or state of acting or of exerting power.

    1) But what is Player Agency? Player Agency is like a term of art, in that it has a specialized meaning within a particular field or profession. While the definition of a term of art usually does not stray too far from the definitions of the component words, it does generally stray. Compare "paper" vs "white paper".

    2) However ignoring that cavet, we can see Agency is a magnitude. It is the capability of exerting power. However power in this sense is a magnitude. Therefore the capability of exerting power is also a magnitude. I have the power to choose where I will eat (within some limits) but a prisoner has less power to choose where they will eat. They still have some, but it is not a binary or unary condition. We both have some agency in that area, and I have more.

    This is why you see it used in a similar way as freedom. Agency is the capability of exerting power and freedom is the power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint. They are very related terms.

    3) Now your initial observation is that PCs always have some agency. However different players have preferences for different ranges of agency. Some want more agency that the PC being locked away in a prison, and some want less agency that a sandbox provides. So if a player has a preference about amount of agency, it is about agency.

    Great storytelling can come from characters who have had their freedoms and their agency greatly curtailed, but if a player dislikes that reduced agency, they dislike that reduced agency.
    Last edited by OldTrees1; 2020-11-19 at 10:29 AM.

  11. - Top - End - #41
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    DwarfClericGuy

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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Pleh View Post
    And Power is Work Over Time, where Work is Force Through Distance.


    Which brings us back to the prison scenario. How do you justify the prison scenario so players can joyfully accept it as a fun concept?
    Sitting down to play a game is the justification.

    No matter what the game is: hex crawl, adventure path, tournament module - the justification is the same. "Let's play a game!".

  12. - Top - End - #42
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by OldTrees1 View Post
    Agency is the capacity, condition, or state of acting or of exerting power.

    1) But what is Player Agency?
    The players are humans in the real world. They have as much agency as humans have?

    Characters are a different matter, though. They can be mind controlled by eldrich beasts or put to sleep by an Elven spell. These kinds of things take away the characters ability to think for themselves.

  13. - Top - End - #43
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    RedWizardGuy

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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Democratus View Post
    The players are humans in the real world. They have as much agency as humans have?

    Characters are a different matter, though. They can be mind controlled by eldrich beasts or put to sleep by an Elven spell. These kinds of things take away the characters ability to think for themselves.
    I have never been a fan of using enemies that take away the PCs ability to act. I'm not a fan of forcing the player to sit there while I tell them what their character is doing. Strangely, on the flip side, I have no problem letting PCs have abilities that force NPCs to act against their will.

  14. - Top - End - #44
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    NecromancerGuy

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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Democratus View Post
    The players are humans in the real world. They have as much agency as humans have?

    Characters are a different matter, though. They can be mind controlled by eldrich beasts or put to sleep by an Elven spell. These kinds of things take away the characters ability to think for themselves.
    Player Agency is essentially a term of art. A term of art is a word or phrase that has a precise, specialized meaning within a particular field or profession. In the context of RPGs, Player Agency is the Agency the Player has in the context of the game. This encompasses the agency the characters have, and does not go as far as to include all the agency the human player has in the rest of the real world.

    That said, I believe you skipped the rest of my post.

    Agency is the capacity, condition, or state of acting or of exerting power.

    1) But what is Player Agency? Player Agency is like a term of art, in that it has a specialized meaning within a particular field or profession. While the definition of a term of art usually does not stray too far from the definitions of the component words, it does generally stray. Compare "paper" vs "white paper".

    2) However ignoring that cavet, we can see Agency is a magnitude. It is the capability of exerting power. However power in this sense is a magnitude. Therefore the capability of exerting power is also a magnitude. I have the power to choose where I will eat (within some limits) but a prisoner has less power to choose where they will eat. They still have some, but it is not a binary or unary condition. We both have some agency in that area, and I have more.

    This is why you see it used in a similar way as freedom. Agency is the capability of exerting power and freedom is the power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint. They are very related terms.

    3) Now your initial observation is that PCs always have some agency. However different players have preferences for different ranges of agency. Some want more agency that the PC being locked away in a prison, and some want less agency that a sandbox provides. So if a player has a preference about amount of agency, it is about agency.

    Great storytelling can come from characters who have had their freedoms and their agency greatly curtailed, but if a player dislikes that reduced agency, they dislike that reduced agency.
    Last edited by OldTrees1; 2020-11-19 at 05:03 PM.

  15. - Top - End - #45
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Democratus View Post
    Sitting down to play a game is the justification.

    No matter what the game is: hex crawl, adventure path, tournament module - the justification is the same. "Let's play a game!".
    You're putting the cart before the horse.

    It very much matters what the game is. If players sit down wanting a hex crawl and the GM runs an adventure path, the table is probably going to have significant issues.

    You've got to get player buy in to the type of game you intend to run, not just buy in to any type of game. If the players say they are down for anything, that is a different scenario than if they say they want to play D&D. If they want D&D, you'd better be asking what edition they prefer, not breaking out Fate, Warhammer, or Toon. This is where Justification comes in. Of course we are here to play a game, but are we really intending to play the same game?

    This is why most prison scenarios go poorly. The prison scenario is a very distinctly different set of agency limits that many players prefer to avoid, and GMs often get ahead of themselves trying to apply the scenario before obtaining player buy in. They haven't Justified it.

    It isn't good practice to assume that we have player buy in just because we all agreed to play a game. We have to continually revisit these assumptions and agreements as we progress through the game, as often as the agency shifts or changes.
    Quote Originally Posted by 2D8HP View Post
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    Everyone has their own jam.

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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Pleh View Post
    You're putting the cart before the horse.

    It very much matters what the game is. If players sit down wanting a hex crawl and the GM runs an adventure path, the table is probably going to have significant issues.

    You've got to get player buy in to the type of game you intend to run, not just buy in to any type of game. If the players say they are down for anything, that is a different scenario than if they say they want to play D&D. If they want D&D, you'd better be asking what edition they prefer, not breaking out Fate, Warhammer, or Toon. This is where Justification comes in. Of course we are here to play a game, but are we really intending to play the same game?

    This is why most prison scenarios go poorly. The prison scenario is a very distinctly different set of agency limits that many players prefer to avoid, and GMs often get ahead of themselves trying to apply the scenario before obtaining player buy in. They haven't Justified it.

    It isn't good practice to assume that we have player buy in just because we all agreed to play a game. We have to continually revisit these assumptions and agreements as we progress through the game, as often as the agency shifts or changes.
    It's more dependent on the table than the game. At the tables I frequent anyone can say, "I'm going to run a game" with zero more information than that.

    Anyone showing up to sit at the table plays whatever is in the offing. It could be D&D 2e, it could be Dresden FATE, it could be DeadLands or even something very different like Microscope. No matter what it is, everyone has already bought in because they showed up.

    Whatever happens after we all take our seats is justified, because someone said "let's play!" and we said okay.

  17. - Top - End - #47
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Democratus View Post
    It's more dependent on the table than the game. At the tables I frequent anyone can say, "I'm going to run a game" with zero more information than that.

    Anyone showing up to sit at the table plays whatever is in the offing. It could be D&D 2e, it could be Dresden FATE, it could be DeadLands or even something very different like Microscope. No matter what it is, everyone has already bought in because they showed up.

    Whatever happens after we all take our seats is justified, because someone said "let's play!" and we said okay.
    My point is that you are over generalizing a specific scenario, when the more general case looking at a wider variety of tables shows that the devil is in the details you are skimming over.

    In a thread talking about the more general state of agency in RPGs, we need to consider more than the small subset of solutions that work for any one specific table. We need to understand the more general function of Player Agency at any given table.

    In general, you need player buy in. At your table, players are expected to buy in to whatever game is offered. That is HOW your table has resolved the general issue of player buy in. But the point is that there are many ways to resolve player buy in and it is worth understanding the pros and cons of various solutions available to us.
    Quote Originally Posted by 2D8HP View Post
    Some play RPG's like chess, some like charades.

    Everyone has their own jam.

  18. - Top - End - #48
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Pleh View Post
    In general, you need player buy in. At your table, players are expected to buy in to whatever game is offered. That is HOW your table has resolved the general issue of player buy in. But the point is that there are many ways to resolve player buy in and it is worth understanding the pros and cons of various solutions available to us.
    Which is why I said it is more dependent on the table than the game.

    I've run at scores, if not hundreds, of different tables since I started large scale GM-ing at at GenCon in the early 90s. I say this only to point out that I have had a fair bit more of a sample set than one home table with one group. Of course, nobody has been at every gaming table in the world. I'm sure there will always be those rare exception players and GMs. But those are the exception, rather than the rule.

    Players complaining about "lack of agency" just hasn't been a big deal at the tables I've seen, whether running a published module or custom material.

    Player buy-in as I have seen it in the real world (rather than forum white-rooms) has been easy to come by. To the point that I can treat it as a given that if someone has taken a seat at the table, they have agreed to take the leap with whatever comes next.

  19. - Top - End - #49
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Democratus View Post
    Players complaining about "lack of agency" just hasn't been a big deal at the tables I've seen, whether running a published module or custom material.

    Player buy-in as I have seen it in the real world (rather than forum white-rooms) has been easy to come by. To the point that I can treat it as a given that if someone has taken a seat at the table, they have agreed to take the leap with whatever comes next.
    I think the forums reflect that when examined. These "forum white-rooms" talk about preferences/agency/buy-in as if it were normal for groups to be doing something that works for them. In a happy group those aspects probably blend in with "game as normal" (just like in your experience). It is the uncommon unhappy group, or the concept of such a group, that creates threads like this. So the white-room discussions are about investigating the hidden assumptions/structure/mechanics of RPGs as social games to help identify why the abnormal unhappy group (real or theoretical) is unhappy and how to restore the normality of everyone enjoying themselves.
    Last edited by OldTrees1; 2020-11-23 at 11:38 AM.

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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Democratus View Post
    Players complaining about "lack of agency" just hasn't been a big deal at the tables I've seen, whether running a published module or custom material.

    Player buy-in as I have seen it in the real world (rather than forum white-rooms) has been easy to come by. To the point that I can treat it as a given that if someone has taken a seat at the table, they have agreed to take the leap with whatever comes next.
    Also, at con games there's typically lower expectations around agency. People know that time is constrained, and so things have to be fairly zippy.

    That's a different scenario from a home game on a regular basis with longer sessions.

    Now, I'm not saying that every home game will have high expectations around agency. They don't. Lots of people are perfectly happy going through and basically consuming content, and that's cool.

    But that doesn't mean that people who do care are wrong or in some way inferior or just being disruptive. They just want different things out of their gaming.

    As far as "gaming like normal" goes, it's a bit of a self-selection problem. A given table approaches gaming in a way that is particular to them. People that stay in that game find the activity, as presented, to be enjoyable, and so of course don't complain about that.

    The problem comes when people go to other games that do things in different ways.
    Last edited by kyoryu; 2020-11-23 at 12:38 PM.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Democratus View Post
    Which is why I said it is more dependent on the table than the game.

    I've run at scores, if not hundreds, of different tables since I started large scale GM-ing at at GenCon in the early 90s. I say this only to point out that I have had a fair bit more of a sample set than one home table with one group. Of course, nobody has been at every gaming table in the world. I'm sure there will always be those rare exception players and GMs. But those are the exception, rather than the rule.

    Players complaining about "lack of agency" just hasn't been a big deal at the tables I've seen, whether running a published module or custom material.

    Player buy-in as I have seen it in the real world (rather than forum white-rooms) has been easy to come by. To the point that I can treat it as a given that if someone has taken a seat at the table, they have agreed to take the leap with whatever comes next.
    I have my doubts that the extremely short shelf-life of convention games have much bearing on a discussion of player agency. As others have stated, at a convention most payers are there to experience what the GM has brewed up. The much longer shelf-life of a regular gaming group's games are where these issues are much more likely to crop up because of the buildup of narrative momentum. If I am participating in an ongoing narrative for dozens of sessions I want to know that my character's choices actually matter, in a single session convention game not so much. Same goes for if I'm GMing a one-shot to try a new system. I'm probably going to present my players with a real run-of-the-mill mission style adventure with basic clear-cut goals for them to complete. For a lengthy campaign I'm going to draw on as much player input and character background as I can so I can ensure the campaign is as player-driven as possible. Besides, if all I was looking for was people to fill seats at my GM show, I wouldn't have started this thread in the first place.

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    Quote Originally Posted by zarionofarabel View Post
    So I don't prepare plots, or adventures, or stories, or scenes, or anything for the PCs to encounter in advance. What I do is come up with stuff on the fly as the game is being played.

    I do have a world that the PCs adventure in, sometimes a published setting, such as the Forgotten Realms or the Star Wars Universe. Sometimes a homebrew world made up in my imagination based on the players desires and the premise of the campaign as decided in Session Zero.

    Between sessions I do daydream about the Imaginationland that the campaign will take place in. I wander around in it and see the sights. I fly above it and watch as the peeps that inhabit it go about their lives. I think upon what has happened so far in the established narrative and how that has affected the world and it's inhabitants.

    But I don't write anything down, or get stats ready, or prepare encounters for the PCs to take part in. I just imagine stuff between sessions, at times even dwell on aspects of the established narrative to make sure that I have that part of the story that was told at the forefront of my mind for the next session.

    So this has made me wonder about the existence of meaningful player agency within my campaigns. If I do not plan ahead and plot out various choices for the players to make, this surely means they lack agency.

    So my question is whether or not a no prep GM such as myself is actually able to offer my players meaningful choices? Or am I actually only offering them the illusion of choice and thus robbing them of any agency they might have in a campaign that has choices plotted in advance?
    Personally I think it's just the opposite of your players not having agency. It largely seems that you are forming a solid sandbox environment and then building the adventure and story directly by what your players are doing. If anything they have the most agency because they are directly leading to the creation and expansion of the world by their own actions and interests.

    One of the issues that seem to crop up for planned adventures is if players don't take an expected path then they either wander away from the "plot" or cannot progress in a meaningful way. Building the adventure dynamically in response to the players circumvents this issue entirely, and even if you are running a pre-planned adventure this is an incredible skill to have mastered since you can very easily adjust things to give your players more agency than pre-planned adventures do.
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by kyoryu View Post
    Also, at con games there's typically lower expectations around agency. People know that time is constrained, and so things have to be fairly zippy.

    That's a different scenario from a home game on a regular basis with longer sessions.
    To add to this, it's not like there aren't dozens and hundreds of awful convention GM stories out there where the GM just completely disregarded player input they didn't want to allow.

    Conversations about player agency become fundamentally unproductive when you gloss over the edge cases where it breaks down, much for the same reason all analysis breaks down when you stop examining exceptional cases just because the system works most of the time.

    The point is that we examine the breakdown points to learn what causes them, so that we can prevent them at our tables.

    If you aren't having trouble with it, good for you. But it is still worth talking about *why.*

    Null solutions are valid solutions, but they're also extremely limited in their application. Ot is no help to people struggling with player agency issues to tell people there should be no problem if they do it right. We have to be able to identify the source of the problem and actions that can be taken to remedy.
    Quote Originally Posted by 2D8HP View Post
    Some play RPG's like chess, some like charades.

    Everyone has their own jam.

  24. - Top - End - #54
    Ogre in the Playground
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    Mar 2020

    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by zarionofarabel View Post
    I have my doubts that the extremely short shelf-life of convention games have much bearing on a discussion of player agency.
    Convention games don't have "extemely short shelf-life" as any kind of inherent feature. The contemporary standard of self-contained one-shots is a result of them being easy to make, and not much else.

    To give some contrast for that standard, the longest-running local campaign for a yearly convention has been running for 25 conventions - that's 25 years of commitment from the GM. It's had children of the original players show up to play the game!

    My own current convention campaign, a comparatively meager effort, is as of now 4 years old, and has been played in 10 conventions, with average of 2 session per convention, for a total of 20 sessions, plus 5 sessions held at other hobby venues.

    As far as player agency goes, the feedback I've received has been highly interesting: players have, for example, criticized my games for being difficult to get into because it's hard to tell what they're supposed to do in them, commended them for having more freedom than comparatively more restricted Pathfinder Society games, and recurring players have stated it as one of their motivations to return to the game that they wanted to see how their actions helped shape the events in their absence!

    Another GM I know has been running a BECMI campaign for 60+ games now, at conventions and hobby venues. Last I heard, the characters of that game are going through the late Champions, with a goal of playing all the way to Immortals.

    Lesson of the day: if you want to talk about what long convention games tell about player agency, talk to players and GMs of long convention games.

  25. - Top - End - #55
    Halfling in the Playground
     
    RedWizardGuy

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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    Redacted to save space
    Not much for TTRPG conventions where I have lived. The few convention games I have been witness to (never played in one) were very short scenarios that were one-shots. As for the multi-year convention games, well, that would basically be a regular home game just with a single session per year, right? As in each single session the GM would takes notes, then the next year the same players would meet and play the next session, right? Or is it the same one-shot scenario played over and over again by different players in different locations and in different years? Just curious cause I do know a guy who runs a campaign wherein he and his players only meet once or twice a year but the narrative continues to build upon the narrative from previous sessions. Anyway, just curious how these long convention games work. How do they work?

  26. - Top - End - #56
    Ogre in the Playground
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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    They don't work in any single way. Each campaign is designed by their GM to suit their whim.

    The three long-runners I mentioned all have a different schema:

    The 25-year-old campaign has a simple rotating cast: each player makes their own character, and they either make it to a session or don't. This means some players and their characters have stayed in the game for years, others have come and gone. Continuity is based on the campaign following the events of a real war.

    My campaign makes no assumption of who makes it to a session. Who plays which character varies: returning players can resume their old characters or make new ones, new players may make new characters or be handed surviving ones. The continuity of the game is based on players of one session writing notes for the GM (me) and me passing those notes to players of the next session.

    In the BECMI game, the characters are set (untill they die, at least). The players vary, with whoever shows up assuming the role of one of the characters. Continuity of the game is based on cataloguing the history of these characters.

    For yet another campaign model, look up Paizo's Pathfinder Society and Starfinder Society.

    Finally, I don't consider repeating one-shots to be campaigns, but they are pretty common too: one of the longest-running multi-year repeater locally was Cube, based on horror movie of the same name, which had gotten to 30 sessions last I checked. My personal record for repeating one-shots is 12 sessions, for LotFP's Tower of the Stargazer, with Death Love Doom taking the second place with 10 sessions. These have mostly different players and characters, with some exceptions. (Some people want to go through the same module again with a friend who hasn't played it yet.)

  27. - Top - End - #57
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    HalflingRangerGuy

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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    The problem I always have is how subjective Agency is. Some tables say the DM has godlike control over the narrative, but if players can decide in-scene actions like going left or right or choosing to flee instead of fight, that's agency. Others (I fall into this camp) say that players need to have some pull on the direction of that narrative or even on the setting as well, like being able to veer away from the current plot or even having players make up their own village or something.

    For me personally it all comes down to info, as a player. If your DM/GM gives you enough info to make decisions with, whatever those decisions, then your level of player agency will be significant, rewarding. If the info you get from your GM/DM is instead extremely limited it doesn't matter how big a decision you make, you'll always find you regret at least some of them after you learn more.

    So, again for me, player agency is largely dependent on engagement with the person running the game. Put another way, the GM/DM's attitude about the revelation of info in the game and allowing players to see "behind the veil" so to speak is a major determinant of player agency.

    So to the OP, if you don't prep anything ahead of time but you have a feel for what the overall narrative and setting are, how you REVEAL those narrative and setting details will strongly influence whether your players have agency or not, in my opinion. This is why I always encourage GM's/DM's to be wordy and open with plot and setting. Obviously if you're running a mystery or the antagonists depend a lot on surprise attacks don't reveal a lot, but otherwise go nuts.

    Say you have no idea what monsters are coming up next in a D&D game session, but you know that the current mission sees the players going from one town to another. Give yourself 5 minutes to honestly think about what they might encounter, or what's going on in the setting at the time that might be of note. For example, say you know that the only thing you DID daydream about this past week between games was that there's a big ol' empire that rules the town the PCs are heading towards with an iron fist.

    RUN with that, and give the players the info to react to that fact.

    As the PCs travel the road they come across banners of the empire, or soldiers at a toll booth. Have the characters meet some travelers leaving the imperial area that badmouth the oppressive nature of the government. You could even describe the change in the road and scenery to illustrate the tone and theme you want associated with the empire.

    If the PCs stop and ask the soldiers or travelers about the empire... answer them. Don't hold back or be coy, reveal the setting to the players when they ask. By you engaging with the players and revealing solid, actionable intel about the empire it arms them with the tools to make choices like how they'll act in Imperial lands, if they care to help any feeling oppressed by the government and so on. The players get involved or choose not to based on the fact that you gave them that info up front.

    On the other hand, if they enter Imperial lands without any prior knowledge of how strict or oppressive they are, the players may unknowingly perform some actions in town that puts them at risk of getting attacked by soldiers. What has been commonplace for them til now, like parking their horses outside the tavern or not registering with the town magistrate or whatever may suddenly be a death warrant that comes out them out of left field. Had they been forewarned they may have still made the same decisions but the players would've understood the risks. They would've had agency to make the choice, rather than having it made for them.

  28. - Top - End - #58
    Halfling in the Playground
     
    RedWizardGuy

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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Kimberfrost View Post
    Redacted to save space
    I try to do the thing where the players at least get a heads up that the empire is bad. I hate info dumps cause I can see peeps eyes glaze over when I tried it in the long ago past. Besides, it's much more fun to reveal info about the setting from in setting sources. Also, I don't think I have ever just attacked the PCs out of the blue for breaking laws in an evil empire where they didn't know the laws, or something like that. That's a total **** move, and my number one rule as GM is DON'T BE A ****!

  29. - Top - End - #59
    Halfling in the Playground
     
    RedWizardGuy

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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    Redacted to save space.
    Those are a very strange way to run TTRPGs and definitely not something that would interest me, but thank you for detailing them!

  30. - Top - End - #60
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    DwarfClericGuy

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    Default Re: A Question Of Agency?

    Quote Originally Posted by Kimberfrost View Post
    On the other hand, if they enter Imperial lands without any prior knowledge of how strict or oppressive they are, the players may unknowingly perform some actions in town that puts them at risk of getting attacked by soldiers. What has been commonplace for them til now, like parking their horses outside the tavern or not registering with the town magistrate or whatever may suddenly be a death warrant that comes out them out of left field. Had they been forewarned they may have still made the same decisions but the players would've understood the risks. They would've had agency to make the choice, rather than having it made for them.
    This is a common trope in storytelling and in gaming. And it can be a very fun one. There was even an entire episode of Star Trek TNG dedicated to it.

    In your example the characters have total agency. They lack knowledge and must then deal with the consequences of it. But how they deal with it (flee from authorities, fight the guard, explain themselves to a judge, start a rebellion to overturn the ruler, etc.) is entirely up to them.

    Lack of Knowledge != lack of Agency.

    If it did, there would be no games with mysteries to solve or hidden villains working behind the scenes.

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