Quote from: Bill White;423565I agree that one of the pre-conditions for that discussion to be interesting would be some kind of elaboration of "narrative authority" such that it was more than merely the concession that people say things at the table and other people let them say it. That's the minimalist read on narrative authority, and really just an acknowledgment that tabletop role-playing involves talking around a table.

Additionally, it would have to proceed differently from arguments that suggest that narrative authority is not shared in traditional tabletop games but is shared in many "story games," and that's the fundamental difference between the two, because otherwise we're talking about turning traditional games into something they are not.

Look, there is a fundamental difference in games where a formal right exists. In the thread I referred to earlier it was called required shared narrative control. You could go farther and point to games that have not only a formal right embedded in the rules but a formal obligation--where players have to "narrate". E.g. Trollbabe explicitly apportions narration duty to players; technically the game can't proceed by the rules if the player doesn't describe their character's failure. But that is a digression: my real point is that we can talk about rules texts as clearly embodying A or B. "This is a story game" refers to a text. Once you get people around a table, it's not fixed like that anymore. "Narrative authority is shared", even if you break it down into absolutes, translates into "story gaming" not "a story game [text]." And of course it isn't absolute. I'm just emphasizing the verbal nature of what's being described.

This is just a preface. I have to stop here because I'm running out of battery power.

Quote from: Elliot Wilen;423627Look, there is a fundamental difference in games where a formal right exists. In the thread I referred to earlier it was called required shared narrative control. You could go farther and point to games that have not only a formal right embedded in the rules but a formal obligation--where players have to "narrate". E.g. Trollbabe explicitly apportions narration duty to players; technically the game can't proceed by the rules if the player doesn't describe their character's failure. But that is a digression: my real point is that we can talk about rules texts as clearly embodying A or B. "This is a story game" refers to a text. Once you get people around a table, it's not fixed like that anymore. "Narrative authority is shared", even if you break it down into absolutes, translates into "story gaming" not "a story game [text]." And of course it isn't absolute. I'm just emphasizing the verbal nature of what's being described.

This is just a preface. I have to stop here because I'm running out of battery power.

Eliot --

That's fine. I won't go any further until you've had a chance to recharge your batteries; I'm interested in what you have to say. But I want to interject that I think I understand your point, which I take to be that there is a very clear technical or operational distinction between games-in-play where the procedures being used allow or require players to introduce things into the imaginary setting other than their character's intention, on the one hand, and those that don't, on the other. Further, for the purposes of this discussion at least, I think I'm willing to concede that the former are by definition "story-games" and the latter are by definition "traditional RPGs."

So the problem that I'm grappling with, in thinking about the OP's question, is what the concept of narrative authority would have to mean if we treat what players do in traditional RPGs as having it. I acknowledge for many people here that will come across as a counter-factual, and I'm willing to proceed on that basis.

I'm thinking about that question seriously, and while I mull on it I'll wait for you to continue with the next thing you want to say.

-- Bill

Quote from: Cole;423619You can always pick and choose whose posts to read and to respond to.

It's true. But sometimes one takes offense.

Quote from: Bill White;423565I personally believe that such a model would focus on "narrative authority" as being connected to the idea that your presence at the table gives you some moral right to participate in the creation of an imaginary world, that it is in fact a power that you possess as player to speak about that world through the medium or instrument of your character's intentions (minimally).

I think that is an excellent description of the idea. And far more elegantly- and distinctly-phrased than my efforts!

The point I was making in the previous thread (that I *think* we have agreed to accept as stipulated in this thread) was that this model is universal, from D&D to The Mountain Witch.

Quote from: Elliot Wilen;423627Look, there is a fundamental difference in games where a formal right exists.

I wouldn't agree that this difference is "fundamental" (see my comment above). But I would agree that it exists, and is maybe a useful way to describe different kinds of games. It's certainly a legitimate distinction to make for purposes of this thread.

But either way, the binary distinction between "traditional games" (no formal rules for narrative authority) and "story games" (formal rules for narrative authority) is present in the rulebooks, but not necessarily at the tables where the actual games are.

(That's assuming that we could really look at every RPG text and place it neatly into one of these two categories based on the language it uses, which I suspect we could not).

Quote from: BWA;423797I *think* we have agreed to accept as stipulated in this thread

Just for the sake of argument, in this thread only. But it doesn't seem there is any real point to this beyond the statement, is there?

Quote from: Benoist;423798Just for the sake of argument, in this thread only. But it doesn't seem there is any real point to this beyond the statement, is there?

I think that defining "narrative authority" as a moral right to participate in play that applies to anyone who's been invited to the table does in fact shift one's orientation to what happens in the game.

Arguably, the position that players' contributions must be validated by the GM merely explains a procedural aspect of play without making any kind of normative commitment to how the GM should run the game. But people do take that position as a value-statement: if players don't like how the GM validates or fails to validate their input, they can take a hike, some people say. Notice how that value-judgment is warranted or justified by the procedural statement--but arguably this is a mistake along the lines of "might makes right."

Conceding that players have "narrative authority" (where narrative in this case means "having to do with describing events in an imaginary world" and authority means "an officially recognized capacity or office") when understood in this way thus amounts to a normative commitment to a kind of "good sportsmanship" of role-playing. It provides a principled basis for pursuing play that's collaborative, inclusive, and fair to all participants that emerges from the ethos of role-playing itself rather than having to be imported from somewhere else.

So if there's a point to stipulating that players possess narrative authority both in traditional RPGs and in story-games, that's got to be it. It may not seem like much, but there you are.

Of course, I've said that we're treating it as a counter-factual--we're merely stipulating its existence and then seeing what must be true given what we already know. The only test that I can think of to see what's true in the real world is to examine how people actually play (or how they talk about play) to see if they act as if they have a right to engage in the game or if they don't. If the former, then maybe this conception of narrative authority is a real thing; if the latter, then maybe it's not.

Quote from: Bill White;423841It provides a principled basis for pursuing play that's collaborative, inclusive, and fair to all participants that emerges from the ethos of role-playing itself rather than having to be imported from somewhere else.

Why do you hate fun?

Quote from: Bill White;423841It provides a principled basis for pursuing play that's collaborative, inclusive, and fair to all participants that emerges from the ethos of role-playing itself rather than having to be imported from somewhere else.

So your point is that "narrative authority" is for anal-retentive whiners who either don't have the balls to tell their GM he sucks at his task, don't have the balls to just leave the game table and play with other people, or just don't have the balls to run games of their own.

They don't have the balls to do any of these things, so they stick together on the internet to develop theories that hopefully will fuck trad games in the ass, destroy concepts like immersion or emulation which are, you know, what makes TRPGs worthwhile to play in the first place, so they can overcome the memory of that one asshole GM who was a shit to them so many years ago.

OK. Gotya. I'm glad we cleared that up.

Quote from: Bill White;423841Conceding that players have "narrative authority" (where narrative in this case means "having to do with describing events in an imaginary world" and authority means "an officially recognized capacity or office") when understood in this way thus amounts to a normative commitment to a kind of "good sportsmanship" of role-playing. It provides a principled basis for pursuing play that's collaborative, inclusive, and fair to all participants that emerges from the ethos of role-playing itself rather than having to be imported from somewhere else.

I think that even in a traditional model, play that is "collaborative, inclusive, and fair to all participants" is desirable, but I don't think it's strange or problematic that it is "imported from somewhere else" when that "somewhere else" is in fact the good sportsmanship, and cooperation of the participants. This does not depend on the "ethos of role-playing" but on basic human decency, and will not emerge from role-playing itself if not already there.

If the GM's putative "narrative authority" can potentially be damaging to the collaborative quality, inclusivity, or fairness of play, equally so can any given player's, if they have "narrative authority," or frankly, if they do not. System can help structure play, they can help model the imaginary situation, and even help provide an disinterested means of settling certain disagreements that pertain to the imaginary action of the game. I remain entirely unconvinced that system can cultivate good sportsmanship, much less generate it when it is absent from the people at the table.

Quote from: Benoist;423856So your point is that "narrative authority" is for anal-retentive whiners who either don't have the balls to tell their GM he sucks at his task, don't have the balls to just leave the game table and play with other people, or just don't have the balls to run games of their own.

They don't have the balls to do any of these things, so they stick together on the internet to develop theories that hopefully will fuck trad games in the ass, destroy concepts like immersion or emulation which are, you know, what makes TRPGs worthwhile to play in the first place, so they can overcome the memory of that one asshole GM who was a shit to them so many years ago.

OK. Gotya. I'm glad we cleared that up.

Hey, I'm just talking. You make it sound like you think gaming is all about asserting machismo--manning up, grabbing your balls, waving your dick around--and if you think about that it way, then I guess for you it is. I think that's great, but it's more than a little ironic, considering the mass media imagery of the role-playing sub-culture:

Quote from: Michelle Nephew (2006), p. 128 in _Gaming as Culture_The dominant culture's attempts to feminize and desexualize participants in the RPG fan culture can be seen in the yearly media coverage of GenCon, the United States' largest role-playing convention. Full-page color spreads of convention-goers dressed in medieval armor or as Klingons regularly decorated the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel's City pages before the convention moved to Indianapolis in 2003. Other photos showed awkward, aging boys with Dungeons & Dragons t-shirts stretched taut across their bellies, holding up their prized custom-painted fantasy miniatures for the camera. Year after year, the media coverage of the event did, indeed, portray male RPG fans as de-gendered, asexual, and impotent.

No one here but us geeks. In fact, I think my argument provides support for your idea that, instead of having to walk away from the table when the DM is a dick, the players have a moral right that emerges from the nature of the activity itself to say that he's doing wrong. EDITED TO ADD: In fact, in the past I've sort of done that.

Quote from: Cole;423859I think that even in a traditional model, play that is "collaborative, inclusive, and fair to all participants" is desirable, but I don't think it's strange or problematic that it is "imported from somewhere else" when that "somewhere else" is in fact the good sportsmanship, and cooperation of the participants. This does not depend on the "ethos of role-playing" but on basic human decency, and will not emerge from role-playing itself if not already there.

I don't know. I think that how one understands a situation has a vital role in shaping one's behavior in the situation; how could it not?

QuoteIf the GM's putative "narrative authority" can potentially be damaging to the collaborative quality, inclusivity, or fairness of play, equally so can any given player's, if they have "narrative authority," or frankly, if they do not. System can help structure play, they can help model the imaginary situation, and even help provide an disinterested means of settling certain disagreements that pertain to the imaginary action of the game. I remain entirely unconvinced that system can cultivate good sportsmanship, much less generate it when it is absent from the people at the table.

Don't read anything into what I wrote that isn't there. The whole basis of the argument is not that there's something missing from traditional gaming, nor that the DM is a threat. I'm not saying that we need rules or system to guarantee that the players get narrative authority. Remember, this is all in response to the OP's question: what if "narrative authority" (for players) exists? So I'm saying that if we have it, then we have a right to exert it. I always get to play my character, no matter what the DM does.

Note that--pace Eliot!--this is entirely separate from the procedural issue of what kinds of things the game system lets me describe. It has to be, by virtue of the OP's question.

The problem with letting all the players take turns running the game is that you are much more likely to have someone introduce some really dumb ideas or go blatantly against the flow that everyone else is using. Basically, in any group, there's going to be one idiot (or "loner that no one understands"). I prefer to avoid that.

If you are lucky, and have an entire group of mature players who aren't trying to rock the boat, then player authority will be great. Otherwise, it's a recipe for a dead game.

Quote from: danbuter;423900The problem with letting all the players take turns running the game is that you are much more likely to have someone introduce some really dumb ideas or go blatantly against the flow that everyone else is using. Basically, in any group, there's going to be one idiot (or "loner that no one understands"). I prefer to avoid that.

If you are lucky, and have an entire group of mature players who aren't trying to rock the boat, then player authority will be great. Otherwise, it's a recipe for a dead game.

Dan -- I agree, but the issue at hand right now is tackling the question in the opposite way. It's not, "What if we give players more power to influence in-game events?" It's, "What if we treat what players do in traditional games as having a kind of 'narrative authority'?" where narrative authority has to be defined as "the capacity to introduce things into the game per the rules of a given [traditional] game." -- Bill

I do that informally. At the end of every session, I ask the guys what they thought, and did anything really stand out. Usually, at least one cool idea will come up as everyone talks about the game.

Getting my players to speculate about the troublesome shit that might happen in future games is one of my biggest sources of inspiration for said games. When a player says "oh wow, we would be totally screwed if X happened," I put that shit in there.

Quote from: danbuter;423907I do that informally. At the end of every session, I ask the guys what they thought, and did anything really stand out. Usually, at least one cool idea will come up as everyone talks about the game.

I've done that too, and I've seen something similar recommended as a technique even in play; as your players speculate on what's going on, you listen in and if you hear something really cool that fits in with your prep, you incorporate it. Arguably, the way you do it is better from the perspective of this philosophy, because it acknowledges the contribution of players as a contribution. But I like stealing players' ideas, so I'm not sure what to think now ;-)

Quote from: Bill White;423890Hey, I'm just talking. You make it sound like you think gaming is all about asserting machismo--manning up, grabbing your balls, waving your dick around--and if you think about that it way, then I guess for you it is. I think that's great, but it's more than a little ironic, considering the mass media imagery of the role-playing sub-culture:

Hey mate, I'm just talking!

Now sure, if you want to see my remarks that way, go ahead.

Quote from: Bill White;423890No one here but us geeks. In fact, I think my argument provides support for your idea that, instead of having to walk away from the table when the DM is a dick, the players have a moral right that emerges from the nature of the activity itself to say that he's doing wrong. EDITED TO ADD: In fact, in the past I've sort of done that.

That's cool. You shouldn't take it personally, though. Have you?