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Author Topic: A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave  (Read 16881 times)

Koltar

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #135 on: March 08, 2008, 12:44:36 AM »
Good "immersion" should be like good old time radio drama shows.
Your imagination gets sparked if its a really good GM.


- Ed C.
The return of 'You can't take the Sky From me!'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUn-eN8mkDw&feature=rec-fresh+div

This is what a really cool FANTASY RPG should be like :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-WnjVUBDbs

Still here, still alive, at least Seven years now...

David R

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #136 on: March 08, 2008, 12:47:00 AM »
Quote from: Kyle Aaron
There's "getting into character" and then there's "getting into character", if you know what I mean.


There's "getting into character" and then there's "getting the character", if you know what I mean.

Regards,
David R

John Morrow

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #137 on: March 08, 2008, 01:00:36 AM »
Quote from: multipleegos
My personal idea of immersion is very simple -- suspension of disbelief, being 'in the zone', or the 'flow' state. It's also very subjective.


On rec.games.frp.advocacy (which still casts a shadow over how some people use the term), the term was used to replace "Deep IC" which was, itself, a differentiator from IC as a stance or perspective from which to play the game.  Playing the game IC was playing the game from the character's perspective but could involve the player thinking about what the character would do from a third person stance ("What does my character do?").  Deep IC was thinking as the character or in character ("What do I do?") where the "I" doesn't mean the player but their character distinct from the player.  That's what I think of as "immersion".  Finally, there is a related thing that was referred to as "channeling" the setting.  That is, getting so deeply engrossed in the setting that you just know what happens.  It's a sort of thinking in setting.  But as it stands now, it's become like the word "simulation" where it can mean so many different things that it's not a clear or productive word to use in theory discussions.
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blakkie

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #138 on: March 08, 2008, 02:25:56 AM »
Quote from: David R
There's "getting into character" and then there's "getting the character", if you know what I mean.

Regards,
David R

Which one is it again that involves an overweight, bearded mid-aged man squeezing into a Sailor Moon outfit?   (( link to 'classic' cosplay picture kindly withheld :) ))
"Because honestly? I have no idea what you do. None." - Pierce Inverarity

jeff37923

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #139 on: March 08, 2008, 02:28:53 AM »
Quote from: blakkie
Which one is it again that involves an overweight, bearded mid-aged man squeezing into a Sailor Moon outfit?   (( link to 'classic' cosplay picture kindly withheld :) ))


Thank you.

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arminius

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #140 on: March 08, 2008, 02:59:24 AM »
It's late, so I'm going to do this Morrow-style.
Quote from: droog
So, you're saying I don't know how my game was played? That's okay, but let's get it on the table.
Nope, I'm saying that GNS is vague enough on the Sim/Nar divide that you can project whatever analysis you like onto it. But in particular, I do not recall you describing particular instances of play. I may be mistaken in my recollection, but it seemed far more like a rephrasing of the Sim definition, just with Gloranthan particulars. I mean, you wrote that, bit by bit, you call got into the dream--but you didn't describe how that operated, and I don't think you offered any episodes which could be grist for identifying the relative "priority" of "premise" vs. "exploration".

Quote
Why do you think that Ron would lay off my thread if he acts the way you say? Could it be that I actually made a good analysis?
I think largely because you followed the outline of the model. But again, I don't remember evidence supporting the conclusion. It'd be like Newton saying I'd done a great experiment on gravitation because I wrote a report that said "the stone accelerated at a constant rate of 32 feet per second per second"--except I didn't actually present the data. Possibly Ron was only too happy to have an example of functional Sim, given the unusual fact that GNS is predicated on its existence but, in practice, tends to shunt functional play into Nar. (Cue the phrase "with a strong explorative chassis".)

Quote
Note, that if you want to cite Levi's thread, that Levi agrees with Ron's analysis. He doesn't see much use in it, but he agrees.
I seem to recall Levi saying he understood where Ron was coming from, that is, his rationale for saying Levi's game was Nar. Well yes, there was some sort of premise-y thing there, but you've gotta show it was prioritized. Or you need to show a reward cycle--a dominant reward cycle, not occasional "nods"--which is inherently Narrativistic.

Quote
Of course roleplaying preceded D&D. I was roleplaying with my brother when I was 10. We just didn't have a rules-text.
No doubt, and Tom & Huck were roleplaying too. They pretended that they were pirates. What did you do?

droog

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #141 on: March 08, 2008, 04:05:58 AM »
Quote from: Elliot Wilen
No doubt, and Tom & Huck were roleplaying too. They pretended that they were pirates. What did you do?

We shared a bedroom. At night, before we fell asleep, we used to tell stories (and I use that word in a very loose sense) about characters we had made up. We had our own characters that continued from night to night. They were always based on whatever books were exciting us at that time. Thus, for example, we played boys in fifteenth-century London after I read The Wool-Pack. We played boys who lived in the asteroid belt after I read Space Family Stone.

These games were never literary in that we had hardly any semblance of plot. It was all about imagining a world and inhabiting it (and a certain amount of wish-fulfillment). Proto-simmers, we were. As soon as I discovered D&D, I recognised our activity in it, and my brother was my first player.

Now, on the other issue, you can only win that argument by insisting that I do not know how we played. That's what you're skating close to presently. Do you want to go there? I'm happy to answer any questions in good faith you may have concerning the game.
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The poor still weak the rich still rule
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David R

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #142 on: March 08, 2008, 04:37:40 AM »
Quote from: blakkie
Which one is it again that involves an overweight, bearded mid-aged man squeezing into a Sailor Moon outfit?   (( link to 'classic' cosplay picture kindly withheld :) ))


Neither, but even merely mentioning the picture induces SAN loss.

IME there are two main ways players approach their characters. Some folks "get into character", that is, they think (or so they tell me) in the "skin" of their characters. Others, "get their characters", they already have an idea of how their characters would think and behave - esp characters based on fictional personalities, for example in an action game, a player creates a character based on Vic Mackey from the Sheild.

Regards,
David R

David R

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #143 on: March 08, 2008, 04:39:20 AM »
Double post

Regards,
David R

arminius

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #144 on: March 08, 2008, 05:31:52 AM »
Droog,

Well, I was a bit troubled by what I'd typed above, so before I came back here and saw your post, I had another look over the thread. You have more description than I remembered seeing, but still--you provide a broad overview of the game, over a very long time. If the game was examined at a much smaller scale--the scale I think is typically used to tell someone they're unconsciously trying to play Nar but getting it wrong--I wonder what the results would be.

But no, I don't have to insist you don't know how you played. As I've written in the past: this issue of "prioritize" is where the whole thing slips into subjective impressions based on subjective definitions. RPGs must have "exploration". Ron says that some alleged Sim is "really" Nar with a "strong explorative chassis" and uses this to diagnose unfulfilled Nar yearnings. However, there's really no way to say, objectively, when the "exploration" is being prioritized over the "premise", or vice-versa, because you can't do away with exploration entirely. Try to do so, and you either leave the RPG realm, or the exploration pushes back and gets itself prioritized. Conversely "Nar with a strong explorative chassis" looks suspiciously like gaming which simply can't completely eliminate the "human questions". I sure doubt that yours did--so why is it Sim, again?

And finally, while Ron has claimed to see some games that really didn't concern themselves with "human questions" ("premises"), it has sounded to me suspiciously like someone just didn't appreciate the speed or intensity at which those things appeared. I mean some people think Spielberg is a great director and not at all heavy-handed, those same people might think Tarkovky's films aren't about anything.

To sum up, you know how you played but the language of GNS is too feeble to assist you in communicating it to an audience.

Back to your roleplaying--that's the thing. You were pretending to be characters. D&D offered this in a package, but it added a formal power hierarchy (a GM) uniquely suited to representing the world-character divide. Ron wants to believe that this wasn't central to D&D's appeal and success--that informal worldbuilding in Tekumel & Glorantha, solitary and without individual character focus was "proto-roleplaying". (Why is this different from what Tolkien did? Or any other fantasist?) In my opinion, this is a distortion of history motivated by a desire to portray the world/character split as a contingency, an accident, rather than as the key innovation turning "play pretend" into a viable adolescent/adult activity--and also to deny that "play pretend" (pretending to be your character, or visualizing the situations of the game as if you yourself were maneuvering through them) was the main impetus for RPGs' popularity, as opposed to player-empowered collaborative storytelling.

droog

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #145 on: March 08, 2008, 06:11:14 AM »
Quote from: Elliot Wilen
You have more description than I remembered seeing, but still--you provide a broad overview of the game, over a very long time. If the game was examined at a much smaller scale--the scale I think is typically used to tell someone they're unconsciously trying to play Nar but getting it wrong--I wonder what the results would be.

That's an imponderable, isn't it?

Quote
Conversely "Nar with a strong explorative chassis" looks suspiciously like gaming which simply can't completely eliminate the "human questions". I sure doubt that yours did--so why is it Sim, again?

Because of our priorities. We weren't interested in 'human questions'. I myself was mostly interested in how pre-modern societies worked. The vast bulk of our gaming and conversations about the game were along these lines. Our energy went into maintaining that world and making it richer, not into examining premises and themes. 'Immersing', if you like.

That, in fact, began to break down for me after about twelve years. I simply wasn't interested in those aspects as I had been. I wasn't the same person. Also, we'd done it. We knew the world; it was as solid as it could get. Every one of us could pass an examination on Glorantha — even more, our own personal interpretation of Glorantha. For me it was like, what now? All the research is in place, what do we do with it?


Quote
Back to your roleplaying--that's the thing. You were pretending to be characters. D&D offered this in a package, but it added a formal power hierarchy (a GM) uniquely suited to representing the world-character divide. Ron wants to believe that this wasn't central to D&D's appeal and success--that informal worldbuilding in Tekumel & Glorantha, solitary and without individual character focus was "proto-roleplaying". (Why is this different from what Tolkien did? Or any other fantasist?) In my opinion, this is a distortion of history motivated by a desire to portray the world/character split as a contingency, an accident, rather than as the key innovation turning "play pretend" into a viable adolescent/adult activity--and also to deny that "play pretend" (pretending to be your character, or visualizing the situations of the game as if you yourself were maneuvering through them) was the main impetus for RPGs' popularity, as opposed to player-empowered collaborative storytelling.

I think that's a distortion of RE's carefully nuanced ideas, Eliot. But that's between you and him. I can only say that 'pretending to be characters' is not how I see it. 'Playing a role' is not the same thing. Our Glorantha game was as much about Glorantha as it was about the characters, and my childhood games were similar.

How is it different from Tolkien? Because we weren't writing it down, and it was, in fact, collaborative.
The past lives on in your front room
The poor still weak the rich still rule
History lives in the books at home
The books at home

Gang of Four
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B.T.
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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #146 on: March 08, 2008, 06:50:44 AM »
Do we even know what Pundit is angry about anymore?
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Y'know, I've learned something from this thread. Both B.T. and Koltar are idiots, but whereas B.T. possesses a malign intelligence, Koltar is just a drooling fuckwit.

So, that's something, I guess.

RChandler

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #147 on: March 08, 2008, 10:15:08 AM »
Quote from: B.T.
Do we even know what Pundit is angry about anymore?


The Pundit may be suffering from a condition known as Bewildered Senior Fury (BSR). If you've ever talked to a confused and angry old person, then you know what I'm talking about. Some senior citizens are happy and fun, others are senile, and still others are really really irate about pretty much everything. They start sentences with, "Back in my day..." and they complain bitterly about the rising cost of X, the way that Y is destroying the country, and the absolute failure of Z to live up to expectations.

As far as the Bewildered Senior is concerned, everything is going to hell, and it's THEIR fault (insert group of choice -- could be special-interest groups, or video games, or minorities, or the Illuminati, or Republicans, or Democrats, or Demogorgon). Those who suffer from BSR aren't interested in trivial details like facts, figures, or specific and quantifiable data. It's easier to point the finger at groups, and to paint with broad strokes (no pun intended).

The most tragic aspect of BSR is that it results in a complete and utter atrophy of the part of the brain which controls humor. As a consequence, Bewildered Seniors are all but incapable of jokes, jests, gags, quips, puns, or wisecracks. They are serious, grouchy, and crotchety to the core. They sweat the small stuff, in other words.

This is not to say that they're completely worthless -- Bewildered Seniors are capable of presenting some interesting arguments from time to time, but these are often accompanied by a great deal of vitriol, which can dampen one's enthusiasm for discourse.
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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #148 on: March 08, 2008, 10:44:51 AM »
Quote from: Elliot Wilen

Back to your roleplaying--that's the thing. You were pretending to be characters. D&D offered this in a package, but it added a formal power hierarchy (a GM) uniquely suited to representing the world-character divide. Ron wants to believe that this wasn't central to D&D's appeal and success--that informal worldbuilding in Tekumel & Glorantha, solitary and without individual character focus was "proto-roleplaying". (Why is this different from what Tolkien did? Or any other fantasist?) In my opinion, this is a distortion of history motivated by a desire to portray the world/character split as a contingency, an accident, rather than as the key innovation turning "play pretend" into a viable adolescent/adult activity--and also to deny that "play pretend" (pretending to be your character, or visualizing the situations of the game as if you yourself were maneuvering through them) was the main impetus for RPGs' popularity, as opposed to player-empowered collaborative storytelling.


Very well put. And yes, that is Ron Edward's central Lie.

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A Damning Rebuke of Anti-"immersionists" From Beyond the Grave
« Reply #149 on: March 08, 2008, 11:15:51 AM »
Quote from: RChandler
The Pundit may be suffering from a condition known as Bewildered Senior Fury (BSR). If you've ever talked to a confused and angry old person, then you know what I'm talking about. Some senior citizens are happy and fun, others are senile, and still others are really really irate about pretty much everything. They start sentences with, "Back in my day..." and they complain bitterly about the rising cost of X, the way that Y is destroying the country, and the absolute failure of Z to live up to expectations.


Yes, I think you may be onto something there.  Can this condition arise in people who aren't actually senior in years?
"The difference between being fascinated with RPGs and being fascinated with the RPG industry is akin to the difference between being fascinated with sex and being fascinated with masturbation. Not that there's anything wrong with jerking off, but don't fool yourself into thinking you're getting laid." —Aos