Quote from: Sigmund;466211Heh, I'm close to standing corrected, except 4e is a huge conglomeration of tac mini game, rpg, and story game elements all rolled into one. It's the Frankengame.

But are not all rpgs like that (a fusion of game + story/drama + simulation elements) ?

Quote from: Elliot WilenI think a fairly good rule of thumb on whether a mechanic is dissociated or "associated" is how easily it could be used in the following way:

1. Player doesn't know the rules, but simply describes what they want to do, from the perspective of their character.

2. GM translates that into "game terms" and resolves the results, describing them without reference to the mechanics.

Like I said before, youre using the term "associated-dissociated" here in relation to the simulation of a person in a fictional world. No problem with that, really. Its perfectly valid for defining different playing styles. But for the purpose of defining what a roleplaying game is, shoudnt we base our rationale on all aspects that influences the act of roleplaying (not only on the simulation/immersion aspect) ? Factors like..

Game ("lemme see here on my sheet what weapon inflicts the most damage... hmmm the double-axe does 2d4 while the greatsword makes 1d8.. Ill go with the double-axe!" or "hmm.. for the next campaign we will be raiding the orks land, so I think I will spend my XP on this Fireball spell insterad of raising charisma);

Story/Drama ( "hmm.. this double-axe would crush the bandit easily, but wouldnt be more dramatic/cool if I grab him by the collar and make a loud inspiring speech encouraging all peasants to fight back?" or "this legwork is too boring, Im gonna throw a razor-gang at the players just to shake things a bit")

Fun ? ( "I know, I know, I coud just slit the orks throat, but I wont - I will cut his penis, put in his mouth, and throw a small fireball in his ass. Then we will see him running through his village with a dick in the mouth and his ass on fire" [ok, it was more sadistic than fun, but you got the point] ). )

Do you perceive how all these factors (and the mechanics that may extrapolate from it, be it Classes and Levels, Hero points, Bennies, etc) are all "dissociative" from the immersion/game world simulation aspect that Justin defends? And are not this factors present in the hobby too? Of course they are!

So, I agree that there is a spectrum/scale/gradient for all these factors, and if one or more slides too much to an end of the scale, than you end with a different type of game - storytelling in the case of story/drama, board-/video-/war-game in the case of game, pure simulation in the case of simulation/immersion, tongue n cheek fun in the case of pure fun. But to exclude games that dont rely mainly on the immersion/simulation factor as non-rpgs - and this is the point of Justin article as I see - sounds a bit radical to me.

Yup, I'm just trying to help clarify the concept of "dissociation" as advanced by Justin, particularly in the face of attempts deconstruct it out of existence. ("All mechanics are dissociated" keeps rearing its head in these sorts of discussions.)

As for the rest, of course it's a matter of opinion and personal taste what you want to consider an RPG. For you (or someone else) "dissociation" may factor more or less in a game's RPGness. I'd argue that IC-POV and related concepts like "association" are historically central to the origin of RPGs (though neither of those terms were used at the time). Also that trying to blur "roleplaying" with "storytelling" is intellectually destructive. We have a perfectly good idea what storytelling is. We need a word to represent the unique thing which is role-playing.

But before you or someone else gets worked up over those declarations, I need to reiterate that for present, descriptive purposes (i.e. talking about the hobby as it is) those are subjective matters of taste. The concept of dissociation though doesn't go away just because someone uses it to articulate an opinion that upsets somebody.

Quote from: Elliot Wilen;466214But more important by far is 2. In Dogs in the Vineyard a player can say, "I call him a sonofabitch," but the GM can't do anything with that if the player doesn't directly reference the mechanics to state exactly what dice he's pushing to back up the statement. The mechanics are almost completely dissociated from the fiction at that moment.

I really don't get what you're trying to prove here. If a player declares "I thrust my sword at the goblin" in D&D the GM is waiting for the player to back it up with a d20 roll. In DitV instead of rolling a die it's assigning dice from a pool to become the raise that represents how painful the insult/punch in the face/gun shot is. The author stance in DitV can surely be "dissociative" in many ways. But the very mechanic you quoted seems off mark for this conversation.

Quote from: jhkim;466218Maybe this has changed with other editions, but my copy of Savage Worlds (2003) says in big print on the front cover "FAST!  FURIOUS!  FUN!  FOR BOTH MINIATURES AND ROLEPLAYING GAMES!"

On the back cover, it says "Welcome to a revolution in gaming - Savage Worlds - a merger of the best ideas in roleplaying and miniature games!" and later "Savage Worlds works as a miniatures battle game as well as an RPG.  That means you can fight out your heroes' epic battles to save the world right on the table-top!  Or you can play a competitive battle with troops of your own design!"  

I think that's what the previous posted meant when he said that Savage Worlds is explicitly both a miniatures game and RPG.

Of course. So is D&D 4e, although it doesn't say so as clearly as SW. However, for Savage Worlds (and the rest I mention) to be played as a miniatures game, many of the rpg mechanics are ignored, because they are not needed for a tactical minis game. Dragonquest and TFT are also games that contain enough tactical miniatures game rules to be played that way, but they are still rpgs because when many/all the rules are used that's the experience the game provides. I don't see how that contradicts, refutes, or invalidates what I've posted. I do see how the nits are being picked though, so unless an actual point arises out of this line of argument I won't respond to it further.

Quote from: silva;466231But are not all rpgs like that (a fusion of game + story/drama + simulation elements) ?

Not really. Some games are just games that try to provide strictly "simulation" mechanics. Of course, as wildly varied as the term "story" gets defined by folks in these types of arguments I have no idea how you might view this. I can only talk about how I view it.  Rpgs are varied in their approach to providing a rpg experience... like most other types of games.

Edit: Also, while I'd agree tac mini game elements in a rpg could be viewed as "simulation elements", they are not all of what encompasses "simulation elements". While all rpgs I'm familiar with contain "simulation" mechanics they don't all contain tactical mini game elements like D&D 4e does.

Something that hasn't really come up yet XP systems. When you choose your advancement (whatever it is) you are making a decision about the story rather than roleplaying the character aren't you? We don't choose what we learn from a situation, isn't it kind of storytelling that we players decide what our Characters learn?

I think It depends.

If you use your XP only to optimize your character capabilities, youre basing the decision on "pure-game" factors. If you use XP to only give color to the character/develop its concept/as an extension to his background, so yes, I think your basing your decision on a "pure-story/drama" factor. And the systems that makes you get good in what you practice (like Runequest and Pendragon) base its concept mainly on "pure-simulation" factor. In general though, I think its a mix of all these factors.

Quote from: SigmundEdit: Also, while I'd agree tac mini game elements in a rpg could be viewed as "simulation elements", they are not all of what encompasses "simulation elements". While all rpgs I'm familiar with contain "simulation" mechanics they don't all contain tactical mini game elements like D&D 4e does.

Dont know.. you see, "Classes and Levels" and "Armor Class" and "XP for Kills" are Tac/mini/war-game mechanics for me. And they exist since OD&D.

Quote from: silva;466174Class and Levels.

In my vision, these concepts are totally "dissociative" from the act of playing a role in any given world, since my mind have difficult in translating it to the in-game evironment. Its an abstaction make by the system to facilitate the gaming aspect, but one that doesnt feels intuitive or coherent to me, nor one I can relate to while playing my character in-game. These concepts make me feel like Im playing an boardgame action figure, or a wargame miniature, or a WoW videogame - not a human being. Thus, any system based on this concept breaks (or at least difficults) my immersion in a given role. The same goes for concepts like Armor class, XP for killing stuff, etc. - all "dissociative" mechanics in my vision.

I'm honestly struggling to figure out how you're using the term "dissociative" here. It clearly seems to have little or nothing to do with the term "dissociated mechanics" as it has been defined.

Possibly you're trying to use it to indicate "a mechanic which breaks my sense of immersion"?

I'm afraid I can't help you much there. I don't use the term "immersion" very much because it's a word that has come to mean so many different things in the RPG industry that it means absolutely nothing at all. It seems to mean everything from "I'm really enjoying myself" to "my thoughts and the character's thoughts are one" to "I had a real emotional reaction" to "my suspension of disbelief wasn't broken" and everything inbetween. Immersion is an anti-word at this point in this industry -- using it simply creates confusion instead of clarifying meaning.

But for most definitions of immersion, I would agree: Immersion has pretty much jack-shit to do with whether or not something is a roleplaying game.

Quote from: Ian Warner;466286Something that hasn't really come up yet XP systems. When you choose your advancement (whatever it is) you are making a decision about the story rather than roleplaying the character aren't you? We don't choose what we learn from a situation, isn't it kind of storytelling that we players decide what our Characters learn?

Virtually all character creation and advancement systems are dissociated mechanics. The exceptions are few and far between.

But while storytelling mechanics are dissociated, not all dissociated mechanics are storytelling mechanics. Using a point system to build a mecha unit for a wargame isn't "a kind of storytelling", and there's no reason character building for an RPG needs to be (although it can be).

Quote from: Ian Warner;466286Something that hasn't really come up yet XP systems. When you choose your advancement (whatever it is) you are making a decision about the story rather than roleplaying the character aren't you? We don't choose what we learn from a situation, isn't it kind of storytelling that we players decide what our Characters learn?

Speak for yourself.
My pc's only get experience in the skills they use.  They don't choose advancement, they become through what they do in the game...

Quote from: boulet;466269I really don't get what you're trying to prove here. If a player declares "I thrust my sword at the goblin" in D&D the GM is waiting for the player to back it up with a d20 roll. In DitV instead of rolling a die it's assigning dice from a pool to become the raise that represents how painful the insult/punch in the face/gun shot is. The author stance in DitV can surely be "dissociative" in many ways. But the very mechanic you quoted seems off mark for this conversation.

It's really very simple. In D&D the player says he tries to hit the goblin, and then it's obvious that a d20 is rolled; it doesn't matter who rolls it, so the GM can, or just tell the player to roll the die and read the number. The player's description of fictional action doesn't require any additional, purely-mechanical decisions. In DitV how in the world would the GM determine, out of the pool of dice at the PC's disposal, whether to push a pair of d4s worth 2, or a pair of d10s worth 18 or 19? The fact that the mechanics don't translate easily into fiction or vice-versa is what makes them dissociated, as I understand the term. (I've used  other terms in the past, such as "non-representational", but "dissociated" seems to have legs so I'll stick with it.)

Getting caught up on the character perspective part of what I wrote is largely missing the point. It's important, but the main distinction is that mechanics either translate into dynamics within the fiction (or world), or they function as a separate "game" whose dynamics bear little relation to in-world cause and effect, and where player decisions/manipulations at the mechanical level don't map to in-world decisions.

Elliot, what youre saying about DitV can also be applied to dice pool systems, right ?

Quote from: LordVreeg;466336Speak for yourself.
My pc's only get experience in the skills they use.  They don't choose advancement, they become through what they do in the game...

Yes, this applies to RQ as well, and to other games where "getting better at X" comes either from doing X, or from getting in-game training in X.

I cited advancement in original D&D above because there are very few out of character decisions involved there, either. AD&D IIRC has weapon proficiencies; I don't think there's much else, but one could nitpick about the general training rules, I suppose.

Quote from: silva;466347Elliot, what youre saying about DitV can also be applied to dice pool systems, right ?

Give me an example. Dice pool is often used to group a bunch of systems whose relationship is only that you roll a bunch of dice. Burning Wheel is a dice pool system but there's nothing about how it uses them that makes resolution dissociative--not until you get into the subgame of spending Artha. Based on what I've read, the Godlike system, I forget the generic term for the family, strikes me as fairly dissociative. You can't just say what you're doing and then see how it comes out, you have to match pairs and triples or whatever and decide how to assign them, which bears very little structural resemblance to the in-game stuff. A GM would have to lay out all the options to the player using natural language; it would get very messy.

The dice pool system Im most familiar with is the one from 2e/3e Shadowrun, where you have to distribute dice for attacking, defending or saving for some unexpected event. So, there is this "mini-game" of dice alocation involved, managed only by the player, and not directly relatable to the character in-game. Thus, the "dissociation". (or not? :confused: )

Quote from: Justin

Quote from: silvaClass and Levels.

In my vision, these concepts are totally "dissociative" from the act of playing a role in any given world, since my mind have difficult in translating it to the in-game evironment. Its an abstaction make by the system to facilitate the gaming aspect, but one that doesnt feels intuitive or coherent to me, nor one I can relate to while playing my character in-game. These concepts make me feel like Im playing an boardgame action figure, or a wargame miniature, or a WoW videogame - not a human being. Thus, any system based on this concept breaks (or at least difficults) my immersion in a given role. The same goes for concepts like Armor class, XP for killing stuff, etc. - all "dissociative" mechanics in my vision.

I'm honestly struggling to figure out how you're using the term "dissociative" here. It clearly seems to have little or nothing to do with the term "dissociated mechanics" as it has been defined.

Possibly you're trying to use it to indicate "a mechanic which breaks my sense of immersion"?

I'm afraid I can't help you much there. I don't use the term "immersion" very much because it's a word that has come to mean so many different things in the RPG industry that it means absolutely nothing at all. It seems to mean everything from "I'm really enjoying myself" to "my thoughts and the character's thoughts are one" to "I had a real emotional reaction" to "my suspension of disbelief wasn't broken" and everything inbetween. Immersion is an anti-word at this point in this industry -- using it simply creates confusion instead of clarifying meaning.

But for most definitions of immersion, I would agree: Immersion has pretty much jack-shit to do with whether or not something is a roleplaying game.

Yup, I used the term "dissociative" in the way you put ("a mechanic which breaks my sense of immersion"). And I agree that "immersion" may not be the best word. Actualy I just tried to show you that your concept of "dissociation from the game world" may be kind of relative from person to person. But honestly, I dont know if I understood your concept of "associative mechacanics" right in the first place. Sorry if thats the case, I may ve missed somthing. ( I think I must read the article again. )

Quote from: Elliot Wilen;466344It's really very simple. In D&D the player says he tries to hit the goblin, and then it's obvious that a d20 is rolled; it doesn't matter who rolls it, so the GM can, or just tell the player to roll the die and read the number. The player's description of fictional action doesn't require any additional, purely-mechanical decisions. In DitV how in the world would the GM determine, out of the pool of dice at the PC's disposal, whether to push a pair of d4s worth 2, or a pair of d10s worth 18 or 19? The fact that the mechanics don't translate easily into fiction or vice-versa is what makes them dissociated, as I understand the term. (I've used  other terms in the past, such as "non-representational", but "dissociated" seems to have legs so I'll stick with it.)

Getting caught up on the character perspective part of what I wrote is largely missing the point. It's important, but the main distinction is that mechanics either translate into dynamics within the fiction (or world), or they function as a separate "game" whose dynamics bear little relation to in-world cause and effect, and where player decisions/manipulations at the mechanical level don't map to in-world decisions.

As well as mapping to Justin's model on dissociation, I remember seeing Vincent Baker discusses this in his theory on 'Clouds and Arrows' - further elaborated on in a podcast here (show #059). Its interminable and I haven't listened to it fully, but there's some discussion around the 10 minute mark and 23:55 on.