Quote from: Manzanaro;883609Tonight I will try to lay out very clearly the way I am using these terms, because I don't think it is as obvious as I initially assumed. But it is a lot simpler than I think some of you are treating it.

Can I ask why the term is so important to you in this case? You've been using it over the course of a fairly long thread and it is pretty clear to me it just isn't a label people want to embrace. So why not just talk about what it is you are looking to do (and not even deal with the language debate). I think you will find it a much more productive discussion if we talk about actual practices rather than what terms to use to describe those practices.

Quote from: Manzanaro;883608There is no experiencing the character. The character is not real. Just like we don't experience the character when we read a book. It just feels like we do. What is actually happening is that the words of the book are creating an imaginary series of events in the reader's head.
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No one is saying they are real. They are saying the experiences are immediate and not narrative in their view.

Quote from: Manzanaro;883608There is no experiencing the character. The character is not real. Just like we don't experience the character when we read a book. It just feels like we do. What is actually happening is that the words of the book are creating an imaginary series of events in the reader's head.

Roleplaying is not reading a book.

Quote from: Manzanaro;883608That's what immersion is,

That's what immersion into a book is, not what immersion into a roleplaying character is.  Immersion has to have a "what you are immersing into".  Immersing into a hot tub, good.  Immersion into lava, not the same.

Quote from: Manzanaro;883608Surely you'd agree that a GM employs narrative techniques in presenting the gameworld to the players?

I mean, hell, even a lot of old school D&D modules have blocks of text meant to be read to the players, and these often seem to aim for more than mere efficient description.

Because there is descriptive text, doesn't mean it's a book.  Because there is language and communication, doesn't mean a story is being told.  Brendan and Anon are right, you switch definitions sometimes mid-sentence using your own terms not caring how others use them and also have the ridiculous fetish of telling everyone else what they do or do not experience in your ever-shifting vocabulary.

For all your decrying of the Forge, you're the most annoying thing the Forge has ever created.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;883613No one is saying they are real. They are saying the experiences are immediate and not narrative in their view.

Yep. I can say the same thing about many books, movies, videogames, and othere mediums that relate a series of fictional events.

As far as why I keep using the word 'narrative'? I believe it is the only word that makes sense. If, after I lay out more clearly what I am talking about, you can suggest a more appropriate word, I will be happy to switch to that new word. "Story" is definitely less accurate as it has connotations of being linear and predefined, among other problems.

CKR, I'm not switching definitions at all. It's just that it's a broad term.

Also, that descriptive text? It isn't just read at random. It is an accounting of what the characters experience, which is part of the relating of events that make up the game.

Quote from: Manzanaro;883616CKR, I'm not switching definitions at all. It's just that it's a broad term.

But that is the heart of equivocation: you take a sufficiently broad term with different meanings embedded in it, and focus on each meaning as it suits your argument to advocate a style of play/GMing. Narrative in the sense of someone describing events and narrative in the sense of telling a compelling story are two very different things (and both can be pulled from the word narrative).

Quote from: Manzanaro;883616Yep. I can say the same thing about many books, movies, videogames, and othere mediums that relate a series of fictional events.
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In the case of books and films though you are experiencing events that already occurred on the page or celluloid. the events in an RPG are more like the events that arise in a board game, card game, party game or other social interaction. They are happening live at the table. So the immediacy isn't just due to a sense of being immersed in the material, it is because you are experiencing them as they arise and you can shape their outcome. Then being not actual events in the real world doesn't make them a narrative.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;883617But that is the heart of equivocation: you take a sufficiently broad term with different meanings embedded in it, and focus on each meaning as it suits your argument to advocate a style of play/GMing. Narrative in the sense of someone describing events and narrative in the sense of telling a compelling story are two very different things (and both can be pulled from the word narrative).

Narrative: a relating of events through symbols such as words, images, and numbers, that are not the actual event itself.

That's how I'm using it. That is how I have used it throughout this discussion.

And yes, not all narrative tells a compelling story. If I didn't agree with that I'd have had no reason to start this thread.

Anyway, hopefully you can understand me better when I explain more fully tonight. I am not going to try to tackle it on mobile, and I don't think this piecemeal discussion is helping much.

Quote from: Manzanaro;883619Narrative: a relating of events through symbols such as words, images, and numbers, that are not the actual event itself.

That's how I'm using it. That is how I have used it throughout this discussion.

ead.

That sounds like a terrible definition of narrative to me. You are sculpting the defining around your argument (I think your reasoning is rather circular here). You are basically creating a defining of narrative that describes an RPG so there is no way to separate the two.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;883618In the case of books and films though you are experiencing events that already occurred on the page or celluloid. the events in an RPG are more like the events that arise in a board game, card game, party game or other social interaction. They are happening live at the table. So the immediacy isn't just due to a sense of being immersed in the material, it is because you are experiencing them as they arise and you can shape their outcome. Then being not actual events in the real world doesn't make them a narrative.

One last point. Playing poker doesn't generate a narrative. Sure we can narrate the play later, but like, when we play poker I don't think we find ourseleves thinking, " So these 3 guys named Jack have moved into a house with a couple fours and have a plan for making money". Poker is not a game that carries narrative in the symbols of play.

Monopoly on the other hand? Definitely creates a narrative outside of the abstract gameplay.

Quote from: Manzanaro;883623Monopoly on the other hand? Definitely creates a narrative outside of the abstract gameplay.

Nope, you do.  As a conscious act every bit as overt and constructed as the one you create to narrate what happened last weekend at the basketball court, or the roleplaying table, or the card table.

Quote from: ManzanaroI did say in my OP that the point was to talk about techniques for getting a good narrative from a simulationist game right? Heck it's right there in the title!

Quote from: Anon Adderlan;883584The only people who talk like this are the people who have been exposed to RPG theory but didn't bother to actually read any of it. Simulationist is a dead giveaway as that term is near exclusively a product of Forge theory with a very specific meaning, and 'Right to Dream' replaced it as the preferred term ages ago.

Quote from: Manzanaro;883593Anon, suffice it to say that simulation as a term for talking about RPGs existed well before Ron Edwards appropriated the term and used it to mean "things Ron doesn't like".

People like you sticking to his crappy definitions (or lack thereof) is what makes it difficult to have any sort of interesting discussions without someone jumping in to say that that was not what Ron Edwards meant.

Yeah, Anon. It seems like you're betraying your ignorance of RPG theory more than Manzanaro. Very few people except Ron Edwards has ever used the term "Right to Dream", while there are loads of people who have used "simulationist" - including even some published books and real academic papers.

Sadly, because of the confusion that Edwards introduced by his own inconsistent use of the term, it's best for people to clarify what they mean when they use it. Most people usually mean the original definition that Edwards reiterated in his original use in Sorcerer and "System Does Matter" - creating a little pocket universe without fudging, striving for accuracy, treating the game world as a reality of its own. Later, he flip-flopped around about what it meant - cowardice, exploration, dreaming, and/or celebration.

Likewise, with the term "narrative" -

Quote from: Manzanaro;883619Narrative: a relating of events through symbols such as words, images, and numbers, that are not the actual event itself.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;883620That sounds like a terrible definition of narrative to me. You are sculpting the defining around your argument (I think your reasoning is rather circular here). You are basically creating a defining of narrative that describes an RPG so there is no way to separate the two.

Unfortunately, "narrative" gets mixed up with "narrativist", and even within the OP, I think it gets muddled, such as:

I do not tend to like games where narrative principles are too heavily encoded in the rules of the game.

vs.

But I DO want the events of the game to be compelling, dramatic, suspenseful, involving and all the other things that are hallmarks of a good story.

I think there is something to talk about here, but the term "narrative" is confusing to it.

Quote from: jhkim;883628But I DO want the events of the game to be compelling, dramatic, suspenseful, involving and all the other things that are hallmarks of a good story.

I think there is something to talk about here, but the term "narrative" is confusing to it.

The thing is, compelling, suspenseful, exciting, emotional, all the great things you might call the hallmarks of a good story, are only hallmarks of a good story because they're also hallmarks of an interesting life.

In other words...

Me
Life - Roleplaying
Life - Stories
Two different types of semblances of life.

Others
Life - Stories - "Roleplaying"
Filtering one semblance of life through another semblance of life.

In other words instead of immersing into a semblance of life, many people seem to be immersing into a semblance of a semblance of life.  

Another way, instead of immersing into an alternate world, they immerse into a story they see themselves creating about that world.

Any way you slice it, these are not the same thought processes.  How similar they are seems to be the contention that results in much fall of blood.

Quote from: jhkim;883628I think there is something to talk about here, but the term "narrative" is confusing to it.

And this is the point I was trying to make. It is why when I am with a group of gamers and story or narrative are thrown around casually to mean "stuff that happened" I don't take any issue. It is also why I don't care when someone says they want a good story in an RPG. But when there is equivocation going on (intentional or unintentional) around a word like that and it in some instances it means "stuff that happened" and in others "a good story" and yet others "narratives play style" then it gets confusing and also feels like the person is trying to force me to agree with them by controlling the language of the discussion.

Quote from: Manzanaro;883623One last point. Playing poker doesn't generate a narrative. Sure we can narrate the play later, but like, when we play poker I don't think we find ourseleves thinking, " So these 3 guys named Jack have moved into a house with a couple fours and have a plan for making money". Poker is not a game that carries narrative in the symbols of play.
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Again, you are using a definition of narrative here, that I don't think I agree with. I don't believe RPGs produce a narrative either. Nor do I think monopoly does. I think you can construct a narrative after the fact (but you could also create a chronicle).

Either way, I really have no further interest in debating the words story or narrative (especially with the definition you are offering). I'd be happy to talk about actual practices in GMing to produce an exciting game.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;883633Again, you are using a definition of narrative here, that I don't think I agree with. I don't believe RPGs produce a narrative either. Nor do I think monopoly does. I think you can construct a narrative after the fact (but you could also create a chronicle).

Either way, I really have no further interest in debating the words story or narrative (especially with the definition you are offering). I'd be happy to talk about actual practices in GMing to produce an exciting game.

I hear you. It sure was not my intent to discuss semantic categories either.

But I have been told enough over the course of this thread that I am:

switching definitions constantly

vague

unable to comprehend real theory

and basically just talking out my ass,

that it is drowning out any other discussion.

And so I am going to break that shit down, and just be able to say, Refer to post xx.