Referees, Adversaries, and Teachers « Thread Started on Aug 8, 2008, 2:13pm »
In reading discussions of RPG history and comparisons between RPGs and miniatures wargames, I've been struck that an important distinction usually goes un-noticed. In all the miniatures games that I know of--and I may be wrong about the bigger picture--referees are just that. I mean that they enforce the rules and adjudicate play between two opponents or sides. In 'blind' wargames they may control the information available to both sides of the conflict, but they don't play one of the sides.
In OD&D, of course, this isn't the case. There is typically only one side--the players, and the referee runs all opposition they face as well as adjudicating the effects of players' actions. Of course, you can play the game with a referee's helper drafted to make decisions for NPCs, but I don't think that's the default mode of play.
This distinction between wargame-referee and D&D referee is obvious but fundamental. I think it lies behind a good deal of the complaints about railroading and referee-tyranny. Some indie game theorists might even argue that it makes the position of the referee impossible to fill well. I think that is wrong, but it does make the ref's job a difficult one: the game has to be challenging enough to be interesting, but not so difficult that it's discouraging. And the ref has to be impartial while determining the actions of one of the parties in the conflict.
What interests me, though, is how referees learned to fill the role. Obviously, by playing the game and seeing how other refs did it. But I've begun to wonder if another model may not have had some influence as well. In some ways, the position of a referee is like that of a teacher. Like a teacher, a referee is responsible for the flow of information to the players (students). Like a teacher, a referee designs the challenges that players/students will face based on that information. In a game these may be traps, puzzles, opponents, and so on; in the classroom they are assignments, problem-sets, tests, etc. Finally, just as a teacher grades the students' performance on the challenges that s/he has set for them, so a referee in OD&D adjudicates how well the players have responded to the challenges that face them--with dice playing a role, of course.
So what? It suggests to me that the apparently contradictory position of the referee is actually something that is actually very common in people's experiences, and probably not as weird or contradictory as some theorists would claim.
Joined: Mar 2008 Gender: Male Posts: 61 Location: Clifton, NJ Karma: 6
Re: Referees, Adversaries, and Teachers « Reply #1 on Aug 8, 2008, 3:21pm »
I don't think the argument is that the referee's job is impossible to fill, but that there is little instruction on carrying it out. As a result, different play styles emerge, and even though you may be signing up for a D&D game, you're still not entirely sure what to expect unless you already know the players.
You're teacher analogy is very good. We've all taken classes at one point or another that we heard the teacher is good/bad and we -- the individual -- come out thinking the opposite. It the same with DMing.
What I think some of the new indie, hippie, forge, story -- call it whatever you like -- games do is either give explicit instructions or grant the players some of the GM responsibilities so the everyone has a clearer expectation and the power to address what they want from the game. Some even do away with the singular GM role.
Again, you hit the nail on the head with your observation that "the apparently contradictory position of the referee is actually something that is actually very common in people's experiences." Although, I haven't come across any RPG theorists or essays that refute your point. In fact, the ones I've read seem very concerned with your same legitimate issue: how the referees fill the role.
Re: Referees, Adversaries, and Teachers « Reply #2 on Jul 28, 2009, 2:36am »
Roleplaying is used by teachers everyday. It's called roleplay simulation. It is why Gary titled OD&D as roleplaying as more than half of all wargames used by militaries around the world are roleplaying games. As it was the only kind of roleplaying known at large by the public in the 70's (and 80's excluding D&D) it was generally accepted as "roleplaying" by the hobby for over 15 years. It wasn't until the arguments over whether diceless games were roleplaying games or White Wolf's Vampire game could in any way be called a roleplaying game that a second storytelling definition began to be used based off of drama therapy - a new title coined in the 80's for Psychodrama and any clinical psychology that used acting in treatment. In this discovery's wake "real" roleplaying for D&D players was retitled "Roleplay Simulation", but, unfortunately, without the change in definition of standard roleplaying reaching through to D&D's players as they left in droves during the early 1990's.
Gary and the designers of D&D knew what roleplaying was very well, but were criticized as having not made an actual roleplaying game by educators as it was "fictional". Of course all roleplaying is fictional even when we are playing those roles unconsciously. But to differentiate D&D from traditional non-hobby roleplaying games (roleplay simulation games remember) he called D&D a "fantasy" roleplaying game not intending it to mean a literary genre at all (to my understanding).
In my opinion OD&D is a fantasy roleplay simulation game. The point is not character exploration or story creation at all, but role performance. RPS games are primarily about one thing: problem solving. And they require a great deal of lateral thinking, planning, and organizational skills to really do well in. D&D is the same way, strategy and team work are paramount to success in the game, the game being a metric of outcomes from an acted out situation. RPS games, both in the hobby and outside of it, are guessing games. We guess at how to act to fulfill a role, roles being based upon other people's expectations. By codifying these roles OD&D and all other "simulation games narrated from behind a screen" test players' abilities to overcome challenges just as teachers do.
Roleplaying in OD&D originally and even now has little if anything do with portraying a personality separate from our own. There are no personality rules (often erroneously considered "roleplaying" rules) as they are irrelevant to roleplaying.
It is for the reasons above almost all of the game design philosophy coming out of the Forge isn't very useful or relevant to OD&D or any version of D&D prior to 4E as their game design objectives for the entire category of "RPG" are different than the category of "RPG" for OD&D's design and it's permeations like AD&D. They aren't guessing games at all and require no strategy on the part their players. One does become very good at storytelling however, but not at the roles the characters play in those stories. It is because of this I believe storygames make it hard to believe one is actually in the situation there character is in. That and the game is about trading off authorship, "playing God", which forces the player out of the situation every time the rules come into effect. It's two different priorities of play and two different definitions of roleplaying and each requiring rather different game design principles.
« Last Edit: Jul 28, 2009, 2:43am by howandwhy99 »
In my opinion OD&D is a fantasy roleplay simulation game. The point is not character exploration or story creation at all, but role performance. RPS games are primarily about one thing: problem solving. And they require a great deal of lateral thinking, planning, and organizational skills to really do well in. D&D is the same way, strategy and team work are paramount to success in the game, the game being a metric of outcomes from an acted out situation.
I wish you had been around in '81 to explain this to me when I started!
Clearly this is what Gygax was talking about when he talked about roleplaying. This explains so well why he decried the "community theater wannabe's" and their effect on the roleplaying community.
I'm not saying that there's no place for character development, just that it isn't the be-all and end-all of the game that so many seem to think it is.
Thank you very much for posting this. I've never studied psychology or education or whatever discipline this comes from, so this was new to me.
Have an exalt for expanding my education on roleplaying!
Joined: Jan 2008 Gender: Male Posts: 2,327 Location: New Hope, MN Karma: 93
Re: Referees, Adversaries, and Teachers « Reply #4 on Jul 28, 2009, 1:50pm »
I'm wondering if you could expand on this:
Quote:
Roleplaying in OD&D originally and even now has little if anything do with portraying a personality separate from our own. There are no personality rules (often erroneously considered "roleplaying" rules) as they are irrelevant to roleplaying.
Aren't alignments "personality" rules? Or do you consider them merely an initial tactical consideration, like what class to play given your spread of ability scores?
Roleplaying is used by teachers everyday. It's called roleplay simulation. It is why Gary titled OD&D as roleplaying as more than half of all wargames used by militaries around the world are roleplaying games. As it was the only kind of roleplaying known at large by the public in the 70's (and 80's excluding D&D) it was generally accepted as "roleplaying" by the hobby for over 15 years. It wasn't until the arguments over whether diceless games were roleplaying games or White Wolf's Vampire game could in any way be called a roleplaying game that a second storytelling definition began to be used based off of drama therapy - a new title coined in the 80's for Psychodrama and any clinical psychology that used acting in treatment. In this discovery's wake "real" roleplaying for D&D players was retitled "Roleplay Simulation", but, unfortunately, without the change in definition of standard roleplaying reaching through to D&D's players as they left in droves during the early 1990's.
Gary and the designers of D&D knew what roleplaying was very well, but were criticized as having not made an actual roleplaying game by educators as it was "fictional". Of course all roleplaying is fictional even when we are playing those roles unconsciously. But to differentiate D&D from traditional non-hobby roleplaying games (roleplay simulation games remember) he called D&D a "fantasy" roleplaying game not intending it to mean a literary genre at all (to my understanding).
In my opinion OD&D is a fantasy roleplay simulation game. The point is not character exploration or story creation at all, but role performance. RPS games are primarily about one thing: problem solving. And they require a great deal of lateral thinking, planning, and organizational skills to really do well in. D&D is the same way, strategy and team work are paramount to success in the game, the game being a metric of outcomes from an acted out situation. RPS games, both in the hobby and outside of it, are guessing games. We guess at how to act to fulfill a role, roles being based upon other people's expectations. By codifying these roles OD&D and all other "simulation games narrated from behind a screen" test players' abilities to overcome challenges just as teachers do.
Happy to see this thread come back from the dead, so to speak. I hadn't thought specifically about the use of roleplaying in education when invoking teachers above, but it's an excellent point. As you note, roleplaying in education long predates roleplaying hobby games--by centuries, really, if we include things like 'moot court' or mock trials, which law schools have been using for a very long time.
This makes me wonder if there is not another connection lurking here. Some roleplaying games used in the classroom are simulations mainly in the sense that the participants simulate being lawyers (or city planners, or whatever) as preparation for fulfilling that role in reality. The aim of the game is, as you say, solving the problem--say, winning the case. In other educational RPGs, though, the real payoff is not practice in fulfilling a particular role; it is understanding the dynamics of a complex situation or process by simulating and participating in it. I remember such a game that used to be used in Junior High Civics classes, where teams of students played different states' representatives to the Constitutional Convention. Although the point as players was to achieve goals set for the delegations, the overall aim of the simulation--the knowledge one was supposed to gain--was deeper understanding of the underlying issues and compromises necessary in the Constitution's drafting.
I wonder if there could be a connection between such 'deeper goals' for classroom simulation RPGs and what is sometimes called 'simulationism' in hobby RPGs--that is, recreating in some way the experience of living in a particular setting? Maybe not.
It has been consistently misunderstood since day one.
(That's my opinion, anyway.)
Well, okay, but then that's a tactical consideration, right? I mean, think about picking up magic swords of a different alignment, whether or not a particular cleric will heal you, the consequences of having your alignment changed, etc.
Actually, you could almost say that your definition is a description of a "personality" rule, abeit a weak one---what side you're on is going, to a greater or lesser degree, determine facets of your (character's) personality.
Joined: Sept 2007 Gender: Male Posts: 942 Karma: 27
Re: Referees, Adversaries, and Teachers « Reply #8 on Jul 28, 2009, 5:44pm »
My impression is that originally -- in the Blackmoor campaign -- the purely adjudicatory, more literally "referee" aspect was fairly significant. Players made plenty of trouble for each other, and characters included monsters (such as Sir Fang the vampire).
Alignment tied into that. The Egg of Coot, Duchy of Ten, Men of Maus etc., were on the "evil" side; the Great Kingdom, Earl of Vestfold, Northern Lords, etc., were allied as the "good guys"; the Regent of the Mines, Wizard of Mi-Karr, Blackmoor, etc., took the stance of neutrality.
As I averred in the "kickers and bangs" thread, I see the main warrant for the RPG game master -- as, really, is also the case in a war-game campaign -- founded in the necessity of limited information.
I do not see that as pertaining to a game of "story telling", which is both where a lot of "indie game theory" interest lies and where "railroads" become a big issue.
The "dungeon game" gets dismissed as passé in some quarters, but I consider it brilliant -- perhaps the keystone of the seminal RPG, embodying a lot of fundamental and perennially pertinent wisdom.
One of my favorite old board games is one called Black Box. It's sort of like Battleship, in that one player has a hidden map of objects the other tries to locate. Instead of calling out grid coordinates, though, the seeker sends in imaginary "rays" from locations around the edges of the map. The rays interact with the objects according to well-defined rules, each resulting either in a "hit" (not coming out), a "reflection" (coming out at the point of entry) or an "exit" (coming out at some other point). Based on the accumulated data, the seeker tries to infer the positions of the objects. Once all are found, the players swap roles; whoever required the fewer rays and guesses (the latter actually counting as several rays each, I think) wins.
The dungeon is basically a sort of puzzle the DM presents to the players -- although "solving" it entirely is usually not to be expected. I have heard of cases in which a couple of people took turns running dungeons for each other.
There must be some consistency, some rules, so that players can draw reasonable inferences. It's no fair to set up a rigged shell game. If that means the DM must make up rules and hold himself or herself to them, then that's part of the game.
If one wants to play a game about shaping a narrative with "authorial control" -- as opposed to utilizing the limited information and powers of a persona to "build a story" just as one does with a real life -- then the chief competition, the game-challenge, lies in securing that control.
The players could all be on the same side against "the game" itself, as usual in an RPG. However, that would -- without a new approach to the design -- tend to pit them against a GM who by default "holds all the cards".
In such a case, I think it much better either to reduce the GM's role pretty strictly back to being an umpire ... or else to do away with the position.
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Re: Referees, Adversaries, and Teachers « Reply #9 on Jul 28, 2009, 6:25pm »
More "new school" concepts of campaign structure and game balance tie into the problem.
Probabilistic tables for encounters, treasures, NPC reactions, and so on can help to keep a referee "honest". The more that they -- rather than the DM's whims -- dictate what happens, the more the role is really one of rolling dice and applying the results impartially.
Right from the start, though, DMs were urged to exercise some discretion: to over-rule the rules.
That's a slippery slope. It's one thing when a dice-roll on a table indicates an encounter with overwhelming enemy force, and further rolls result in a massacre of player-characters. The DM then can truthfully say, "It's not my fault" -- and likewise when on some other occasion a lucky player gets the better of a pathetic kobold and pockets a powerful magic ring.
The calculations of "level appropriate" challenges and rewards seen in recent designs, and the structuring of scenarios to limit sharply deviations, are products of clear-eyed acceptance of the power and responsibility vested in the DM as creator, not mere implementer, of the game structure.
That clerics are limited to blunt weapons, magic-users to daggers, and thieves to leather armor, are factors bound up with the treasure tables. Start making magical maces and hammers common, or provide magical leather armor (or better than +1 in AD&D) -- and you change the balance of the game.
A lot of rules in the old games are like that.
The "war-game" structures in OD&D can help keep the DM in the old familiar role of referee to the extent that they are consistently applied. Where the need arises, one can add another roll of the dice with probabilities dictated by some consistent rule.
The more one turns away from that and toward "DM fiat", the more one injects oneself into the game as a sort of "super-player".
I am not condemning that, just calling attention to what seems the inescapable risk of slipping -- even subconsciously -- from impartial rulings into "fudging" in order to get one's way (whatever that happens to be at a given moment).
When that happens, one is no longer refereeing a game for the players to play.
Joined: Sept 2007 Gender: Male Posts: 942 Karma: 27
Re: Referees, Adversaries, and Teachers « Reply #10 on Jul 28, 2009, 6:45pm »
One hedge against the peril that I have long found helpful is not to limit information that does not need to be limited, and not to take on sole responsibility for rulings when adjudication can be shared.
Most of the time, I roll dice in the open. When a PC gets hit and killed, or a monster resists a spell, the proximate cause is evident.
When a situation arises to which no established rule applies, there is rarely a reason that the players should not be as well informed as I am about the factors involved. Nor is there likely to be any reason I should create a rule to which they object, provided that it is applied even-handedly.
Once we have agreed to a rule, I will stand by it. That does not mean that exceptions cannot later be called for; but I will not change it unilaterally, much less keep the players in the dark about the change -- unless such an arbitrary course is indeed necessary (which would probably require the warrant of exceptional circumstances).
At the soonest opportunity, I will inform players of changes to which (for whatever reason) they could not previously be privy, and the reasons why.
Re: Referees, Adversaries, and Teachers « Reply #11 on Jul 28, 2009, 10:50pm »
Kesher, Coffee has it right in one regarding alignments. Alignment is an old wargaming term. It's not a tactic, but the side you're on. Chaotic clerics don't heal Lawful characters when they can help it, magic swords with alignments are characters, and nothing can change a character's alignment except the player according to who they ally with. I personally keep alignment for PCs on a sliding chart with movement on it a result of players' actions in the game. Killing an ally will put a PC on the enemies' side PDQ.
Klamath, I don't see why not. Many RPS instructors have looked down upon fantasy roleplaying, but when the hobby began many, many players found an entrance to it through teachers using the game in their classrooms. It's not like the U.S. Army exactly dissuaded it either. Heck, I've even read an account of a guy introduced to D&D when a nun ran it in his private catholic school.
Dwayanu, Quote:
In such a case, I think it much better either to reduce the GM's role pretty strictly back to being an umpire ... or else to do away with the position
I agree with the above. Either simply play a collaborative storytelling game with rock-paper-scissors (a different "RPS" acronym) where gamemaster is a meaningless title or recognize the DM is an objective responder in a guessing game and not a player.
I disagree that players should be informed of the "rules". I don't think they are rules at all, rather guidelines in a guessing game in the same manner an encyclopedia may be used in a game of 20 Questions. Players could certainly request some measure to be accounted for in game, a house rule so to speak. But I believe the best answer by the Ref is simply "Okay" no matter if there already was a rule in place or not. Can players ask for the world to work a certain way? Sure, but that determination is back to storytelling not playing a role, something they don't determine. The same request by players could be said of choosing Tunnels & Trolls rather than D&D or any one or group of particular modules. Modules also being guidelines, game "rules", which the players could not read beforehand without ruining the game. It would be like looking at a crossword's answers or copying the answers to a test.
Modules don't make any sense in a game where the intent of the players is to jointly create a story. Why would they buy another person's story just to emulate it with the one they create? Or worse, be railroaded through the other? Maybe someone who knows storygames better than I can point out game adventures published by that community?
« Last Edit: Jul 28, 2009, 10:57pm by howandwhy99 »
Joined: Sept 2007 Gender: Male Posts: 942 Karma: 27
Re: Referees, Adversaries, and Teachers « Reply #12 on Jul 29, 2009, 12:19am »
Quote:
Modules don't make any sense in a game where the intent of the players is to jointly create a story. Why would they buy another person's story just to emulate it with the one they create? Or worse, be railroaded through the other?
Bingo! A situation can be very handy for a role-playing game, in which the "story" is whatever happens in play. (And some modules are just that: situations, not set stories.)
In a story-telling game, I suppose that a particular plot-line could be the "victory condition", against which the situation (and possibly other players) is working. I still think it would be much better simply to pursue a final outcome, leaving a wide variety of potential paths to it. The difference here is that, as in a well-run RPG, it should be up to empowered players to choose tactics and arrive at whatever outcome those (and luck) produce.
Getting herded through a predestined course by an all-powerful Director might be entertainment -- but it is not a proper game!
Re: Referees, Adversaries, and Teachers « Reply #13 on Jul 30, 2009, 2:16am »
I mean no animosity here. What you seem to be talking about is storygames where the objective is to tell a story. I'm talking about roleplay-simulation games where the object is to play a role. These are your basic guessing games with reference materials and a simulation game played behind a screen (to keep them secret).
Situation is determined before every kind of game and every player in the game helps determine where it goes. The difference in a guessing game is the responder (the Referee in OD&D) does not get a choice in how he or she is to respond. They have to answer truthfully every time.
Plenty of people will say "But you could make it all up as you go along". That's simply a truism for every guessing game. Whether it be trivia (a one guess per person game), 20 Questions, riddles, or whatever. The fact is what is needed to be created is only what is pertinent in order to give clues for what is being guessed at. In the case of RPS games these are the predefined roles attempted at by the players.
RPS games, both in the hobby and outside of it, are guessing games. We guess at how to act to fulfill a role, roles being based upon other people's expectations. By codifying these roles OD&D and all other "simulation games narrated from behind a screen" test players' abilities to overcome challenges just as teachers do.
This is interesting. I wonder if you would expand on the equation of role-playing simulations and guessing games. I see some connections, but also some differences, for both educational rpgs and hobby ones.
In pure guessing games, like '20 questions,' or 'hangman,' all the player does is ask questions to which the referee (so to speak) responds truthfully. The game is drawing skillful inferences from the responses.
In classroom rpgs, there is a lot more going on. I don't think it can entirely be reduced to "guess how the referee/teacher thinks I should play this role," for a couple of reasons.
First, rpgs for professional preparation (like moot court) are often competitive. There is another side in play and its actions have to be taken into account in your strategy. More significantly, in such games it is not just a question of asking the referee/teacher for information, but of actually practicing the skills you will need 'in the real world.' So, a law student doesn't say 'I will question this witness.' He or she actually questions the witness, makes opening and closing arguments, cites relevant precedents, etc. Indeed, in a moot court or similar role-playing exercise, essentially all of the information needed for the game is presented to the sides before play begins--the question is what you do with it, and how well you do it.
I'll admit that you could argue that the point of the game is to guess what the teacher/judge will consider the best way to handle the case and proceed accordingly. I'd say this is true on a certain level, but not very helpful, because at that standard of generality almost everything social that anyone does could be described as a 'guessing game.' Getting an article accepted by a scholarly journal then = 'guessing' what the editors want and will accept, for instance. True, in a sense. But you also have to have the skills necessary to create what the editors want, and you actually have to do the work as well. There's a lot more going on than just 'guessing'.
Hobby RPGs add another layer of difference to this because they usually involve random elements. These are unpredictable--you may be able to guess what the referee intended or thought was the 'right' way to deal with a situation, but the dice may prevent you from following it--or they may award victory to those who chose the 'wrong' answer, through dumb luck.
Finally, unlike a simple guessing game, the information that the referee gives in a hobby rpg is not fixed beforehand. The referee, after all, has to decide what the opposition is doing, and this involves reacting to the player's initiatives. And in practice, I think few referees make up all the relevant information/details for a dungeon or scenario in advance. A fair amount is often generated in play, based on what occurs to the referee as the game progresses, based on its flow and what the characters are doing.
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