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Pen & Paper Roleplaying Central => Pen and Paper Roleplaying Games (RPGs) Discussion => Topic started by: Anon Adderlan on December 28, 2012, 04:40:00 PM

Title: WANTED: Audio recordings of 'immersive' tabletop play.
Post by: Anon Adderlan on December 28, 2012, 04:40:00 PM
Fairly self explanatory really, but to add some exposition, I'm doing research on which procedures actually take place at the table (for example, discussing what a character may attempt mechanically is not usually a procedure in the book, yet on average it takes something like 10% of the time at the table, and IMHO breaks immersion), and which procedures players engage the most (which SHOULD be the same as the parts they ENJOY the most, but this is not always the case).

But I can't do that through discussions or transcribed actual plays. I need the raw audio. And the reason I'm specifically asking about immersion is to see if there are any specific procedures which help or hinder it, because despite what anyone says there doesn't seem to be specific procedures to enable/preserve immersion which are universal.
Title: WANTED: Audio recordings of 'immersive' tabletop play.
Post by: Drohem on December 28, 2012, 11:20:28 PM
Quote from: Anon Adderlan;612432And the reason I'm specifically asking about immersion is to see if there are any specific procedures which help or hinder it, because despite what anyone says there doesn't seem to be specific procedures to enable/preserve immersion which are universal.

You're right; immersion is a personal and subjective experience and I don't think you will find a universal procedure.  However, with that being said, I sincerely wish you all the best in this endeavor because I think that it is worthy of examination. :)
Title: WANTED: Audio recordings of 'immersive' tabletop play.
Post by: RPGPundit on December 29, 2012, 01:23:06 PM
Quote from: Anon Adderlan;612432Fairly self explanatory really, but to add some exposition, I'm doing research on which procedures actually take place at the table (for example, discussing what a character may attempt mechanically is not usually a procedure in the book, yet on average it takes something like 10% of the time at the table, and IMHO breaks immersion), and which procedures players engage the most (which SHOULD be the same as the parts they ENJOY the most, but this is not always the case).

But I can't do that through discussions or transcribed actual plays. I need the raw audio. And the reason I'm specifically asking about immersion is to see if there are any specific procedures which help or hinder it, because despite what anyone says there doesn't seem to be specific procedures to enable/preserve immersion which are universal.

And just what do you think this will prove?

No, there's no way you can just make someone be immersive; anymore than you could have a method that is universally effective at making someone feel empathy, or at turning someone into a good actor, or to put a tennis player into "the zone".  There are certainly things that tend to help, though; and there's also things that unquestionably HINDER immersion.

And what's more, Immersion clearly exists. Putting it in "quotation marks" doesn't make it not exist. Your Forgist bias is showing.

RPGPundit
Title: WANTED: Audio recordings of 'immersive' tabletop play.
Post by: Benoist on December 29, 2012, 02:25:03 PM
What's more, what's going on inside your head as you are playing the game doesn't necessarily register on a voice recorder. :rolleyes:
Title: WANTED: Audio recordings of 'immersive' tabletop play.
Post by: estar on December 29, 2012, 02:48:55 PM
From the few recordings I made, it hard to separate the game from the banter.
Title: WANTED: Audio recordings of 'immersive' tabletop play.
Post by: Bedrockbrendan on December 29, 2012, 03:37:01 PM
Others have raised important concerns. I think another issue is how you measure immersion during play. How will you know when immersion is occuring on the recoding? Wthout some way to gauge this, it will be hard to tell what procedures would be contributing or not.

This may not be the case, but you already appear to have someoint of view on this issue, based on the last couple of sentences in your post. That may or may not be the case. But i would try to account for your biases if you are doing an actual study here (as well as the biases of the subjects submitting the recordings). I would think you might also need some control recodings.

Are you an actual researcher? If so, what field? (I don't doubt you, just curious because I see these sorts of posts once in a while and sometimes its real research, sometimes its someone trying to win an internet debate).
Title: WANTED: Audio recordings of 'immersive' tabletop play.
Post by: danbuter on December 29, 2012, 08:30:40 PM
I don't think this has ever happened in any game I'm in. We are too interested in having fun to be immersed all the time. Not to mention beer and nachos ;).
Title: WANTED: Audio recordings of 'immersive' tabletop play.
Post by: thedungeondelver on December 29, 2012, 08:39:35 PM
Quote from: danbuter;612758I don't think this has ever happened in any game I'm in. We are too interested in having fun to be immersed all the time. Not to mention beer and nachos ;).

Although immersing oneself in beer and nachos...hmm...
Title: WANTED: Audio recordings of 'immersive' tabletop play.
Post by: soltakss on December 29, 2012, 08:45:19 PM
Quote from: estar;612695From the few recordings I made, it hard to separate the game from the banter.

That's pretty much what I have experienced, especially with my current gaming group.

Immersion is possible, to a certain extent, but how you would measure it is beyond me.
Title: WANTED: Audio recordings of 'immersive' tabletop play.
Post by: Kiero on December 29, 2012, 08:49:37 PM
I don't know if you'd class it as "immersive", but my group tries to stay on topic. Our podcast recordings (see here (http://insanitywetrust.wordpress.com/)) only edit dead space at start and finish of the two parts each session, everything else is unedited.

You can hear us playing nWoD Mass Effect, D&D4e and DFRPG.