Quote from: Elliot WilenBut the perception of "what we're doing", the product of which is 'a story', is completely different between the two.

Yes: in one case you might be consciously directing the events according to the aesthetic preferences of a clearly OOC perspective, while in the other surviving the individual tasks and challenges encountered during the adventure takes precedence. However, the process of generating the story remains the same, and merely the emphasis placed on it by the players varies. In neither case is that story a retrospective retelling composed after the conclusion of all the events which proceed from the initial circumstances, even though it can only be finished after those events have been resolved in a way which the group finds acceptable. Again, it's quite possible, and indeed inevitable, to be "in the middle of a story" during a gaming session.

So it's just a semantic quibble to you, then? That's a relief...but again it doesn't really address the conceptual division that's the basis of this thread.

Maybe you've just never encountered strongly "motivated" GMing and/or players who expect it. Ditto for Rob/estar, IIRC you both claimed earlier in the thread never to have seen the type of gaming Sett's talking about.

Quote from: Elliot WilenSo it's just a semantic quibble to you, then? That's a relief...but again it doesn't really address the conceptual division that's the basis of this thread.

I prefer to think of it as a continuum, not a dichotomy. Near one end "roleplaying" games concentrate a player's control on a single character's actions within the setting and ultimately disregard entirely their out-of-character framework in favour of immersion, whereas in the other direction "storytelling" games focus on tools to intentionally shape the emerging narrative and ultimately become purely impersonal exercises in crafting fiction. All of these games that we play fall somewhere between the extremes on this scale, so that for instance D&D lies somewhat closer to the former and Universalis the latter, but they can still borrow elements from the opposite side: say, a conventional cliche to restrict the structure of a roleplaying game, or a pivotal protagonist to serve as the focal point for a storytelling game. So while I don't really see the attraction of following a predetermined script of any kind and can't remember meeting anyone who plays in that way, that wouldn't prevent me from recognizing someone who enjoys such games as being in the same hobby. It's just a matter of tastes and preferences, that's all.

Zounds!  It's still going!

One side thought I had: modern story telling has often become trapped by the beginning, middle, end paradim.  Indeed, life is not nearly as clear cut as most modern fiction.  This is one of the places where rpgs completely blow the novel, the movie, and the comic away as a story telling medium.

The story is what happened.

In an rpg it twists and turns in your hands driven by multiple conflicting interests and random chance.  Perhaps this is  partly Sett's contention.  That roleplaying games are not entrapped by the conventions of form that bound other story telling media.

David: I think that's part of the issue. Haffrung suggested something similar in one of the other "Story" threads (here), that it's the quality/unpredictability of the tale that really matters.

But I don't think that's everything. Why? A lot of people look for a "virtual reality" experience, which in turn blends into a desire to be able to to "overcome challenges" by manipulating the internal logic of the fiction. I.e., they see RPGs as a sort of Frei Kriegspiel at the individual level.

GrimGent: yes, a continuum works. But within a certain level of framing I believe you can get very close to one end of the scale. E.g., simply embarking on a particular campaign or scenario is an "out of character" decision. But once a scenario begins, the players can operate completely within the "in character" framework, and the GM can operate completely "neutrally", interpreting the scenario without pushing it in a particular direction. The classic example is a prepared dungeon. Men Against Fire is another example; it might be questioned whether it's actually an RPG, but you could do something pretty similar with virtually any RPG system. (In fact you could see MAF as a framework for creating a cross between a "dungeon" and a "Braunstein", only set in the middle of a WWII firefight.)

At the campaign level of course this gets harder, and I'm not sure I've ever seen a real example of "clockwork" campaign world laid out completely in advance, which the GM then simply "administers" like a dungeon. But I think you can get closer to that end of the scale by various methods, such as laying out a broad framework, sketching the major campaign-level conflicts and factions, including some sort of metric for their resources.

And once again, David hits teh nail on teh head.

Quote from: David JohansenThe story is what happened.

In an rpg it twists and turns in your hands driven by multiple conflicting interests and random chance.

Yup. As the advice in Nobilis puts it, roleplaying is great as a social activity but "a terrible medium for getting stories 'just right'", according to some carefully prepared script in your mind. The beginning of it all is just about the only thing that you can be certain about.