As far as Failing Forward goes, it's definitely a narrative thing.  

In Criminal Minds, they'll get the bad guy.  Someone may die, someone may leave the show, the bad guy may escape to become a recurring villain, but one way or another things are resolved.

In real life, the Green River killer is apprehended 19 years later, but the Zodiac and Jack the Ripper cases may never be solved.
 
Sometimes in life you just fail, and there is no closure, no explanation, no interesting leads to other things.  What is interesting then is what you do next, something completely new after you pick yourself up off the ground maybe missing a few teeth.  That's life.

Are you playing a game where you are playing the role of a character living in an alternate world living an alternate life?
Are you playing a game where you are playing the role of a character in a story, a creative work of fiction?

Are you immersing in a world over which you have no more control then you do over the real world?
Are you immersing in a story over which, as a player of a character, you have similar control/power to that granted by the literary devices of literary characters.

That's a fundamental difference, and in the end is the narrative/non-narrative divide.  Not RPG vs. Storygame, but simulated world vs. self-aware fiction.

Narrative gaming is essentially 4th Wall roleplaying.  There is always that meta-layer present, it's fundamental to that view of games.

Quote from: CRKruegerAs far as Failing Forward goes, it's definitely a narrative thing.

Dont know, it feels more a gamey thing to me, than a narrative one.

I'm a big fan of fail forward choices as a GM, mostly because it keeps things moving.

I don't see how it's inherently narrative, it depends on your motive for selecting the complication/cost/whatever.

If you think, "Hah, you failed, it would be dramatically appropriate for gryphons to turn up just as you take your freshly crafted earthenware jug from the kiln!" then yeah, this is not an obvious consequence of failing your crafting test and is clearly motivated by some other concern.

But there are a ton of ways that climbing can go poorly, being unable to get to the top is just the most obvious.  You can drop things, get hurt, take too long and become exhausted, etc.

Quote from: fuseboy;679009I'm a big fan of fail forward choices as a GM, mostly because it keeps things moving.

I don't see how it's inherently narrative, it depends on your motive for selecting the complication/cost/whatever.

If you think, "Hah, you failed, it would be dramatically appropriate for gryphons to turn up just as you take your freshly crafted earthenware jug from the kiln!" then yeah, this is not an obvious consequence of failing your crafting test and is clearly motivated by some other concern.

But there are a ton of ways that climbing can go poorly, being unable to get to the top is just the most obvious.  You can drop things, get hurt, take too long and become exhausted, etc.

The reason Fail Forward is inherently narrative is "Why?"

Why are you Failing Forward?  Why are you not just failing and then trying again or doing something else?  Tell me why you're Failing Forward and I'll tell you why it's Narrative if you can't see it.

Quote from: fuseboy;679009But there are a ton of ways that climbing can go poorly, being unable to get to the top is just the most obvious.  You can drop things, get hurt, take too long and become exhausted, etc.

Thus the difference between ACTION and CONFLICT resolution.

If the action you are resolving is climbing to the top then you make it or you don't.  Failure at resolving the action includes not making to the top.

Dropping things, taking damage, being exhausted, can either be consequences of NOT making it to the top or added conditions to making it to the top if success was barely achieved.

Using action resolution, the end goal is a constant. Depending on how you want to tweak things there can be more less degrees of success or failure.

Objective =X
Failure =Y
Stuff that sucks =S
Stuff that rawks = R

If the check results in Y, you don't also get X because you add S.

If the check results in X, you don't also get Y because you add S.

So the question really comes down to; are we resolving the result of this climb attempt or are we seeing what happens in the story when our hero tries to climb a cliff?

Quote from: CRKrueger;679024The reason Fail Forward is inherently narrative is "Why?"

Why are you Failing Forward?  Why are you not just failing and then trying again or doing something else?  Tell me why you're Failing Forward and I'll tell you why it's Narrative if you can't see it.

Because its more fun this way ? Its more fun because it generates interesting new situations from failures ? Its more fun because it guarantees that something always happen when the dice hit the table ? The "why" is: it can make the game more fun.

So, a gamey thing.

Quote from: CRKrueger;678963In Criminal Minds, they'll get the bad guy.  Someone may die, someone may leave the show, the bad guy may escape to become a recurring villain, but one way or another things are resolved.

In real life, the Green River killer is apprehended 19 years later, but the Zodiac and Jack the Ripper cases may never be solved.

"Failing forward" isn't about auto-success.  Some of the games that I've seen/played in that have used it have been some of the harshest games I've played in.  If you're playing "Green River Killer: the Game", Fail Forward doesn't mean you'll catch the Green River Killer eventually.  That's not what it's about.

It's really about two things:

1) Momentum.  Keeping things moving in the game.  In some ways, it's an alternate to the Rule of Three.  The Rule of Three handles failure by presenting alternative solutions.  Failing Forward handles it by making "failure" not something that just stops the game.

2) Making rolls interesting.  It's kind of the mirror image of "Take 20".  If there's always an interesting failure/success, then each roll has something tied to it that the players will care about.

As far as the cliff example, why is that terrible?  I really don't see it.  I don't see it as any worse than the idea that "either you climb to the top of this cliff totally unscathed with no complications, or you never make it off the bottom of the cliff."  I sure as hell don't see it as any less realistic.  Just inventing random stuff appearing?  Yeah, that's kind of crappy.  But dropping things, getting hurt, all other types of things that could happen on a cliff climb gone wrong?  Seems just as realistic to me as "either you make it or you don't".

And heck, "failing forward" doesn't even have to mean "success with complications".  It just means that something happens that keeps stuff moving.  So you failed to open the door?  No problem.  But in your attempts to open the door, you made enough noise that a nearby patrol heard you and busts down the door.  You've failed, but there's still movement.

I'm not saying you should or shouldn't like it, but at least dislike it for non-strawman reasons.

Yup, what robiswrong said.

Quote from: silva;679030Because its more fun this way ? Its more fun because it generates interesting new situations from failures ? Its more fun because it guarantees that something always happen when the dice hit the table ? The "why" is: it can make the game more fun.

So, a gamey thing.

The tyranny of fun.

Fun is subjective. If your group finds fail forward fun then use it. Not everyone will.

Nothing to do with "tyranny of fun", but with how a given author/designer envision its game being more interesting according to his own tastes/opinion. Doesnt mean everybody will like it. Nor that its objectively true or some bullshit like that.

Quote from: CRKrueger;679024The reason Fail Forward is inherently narrative is "Why?"

Why are you Failing Forward?  Why are you not just failing and then trying again or doing something else?  Tell me why you're Failing Forward and I'll tell you why it's Narrative if you can't see it.

Mostly because I like gameplay to retain momentum; I usually (not always) find telling the players that their course of action comes to nothing and that they need to think of a new one less satisfying than a costly partial success.

So, I guess I'm saying that like to interpret binary pass/fail mechanics as "success" and "partial failure".  (This doesn't seem inherently narrative, any more than Amber's resolution is always "average".)

Partial failure is such a rich ground for interesting stuff to happen - you jam open the secret door (but you blow the roll) and the rusted hinges let out a squeal that echoes through the entire dungeon.

I free admit this is a "game play" concern, which I see as different than a narrative (e.g. "story quality") concern.

More specifically, I think there is a miscommunication about simple failure.  

Quote from: Archangel Fascist;678667I actually like the concept of "failing forward" in an RPG.  There are some times when a failure is just a failure, and there are times when a failure can be something more interesting than a binary yes/no situation.  It also renders gameplay more interesting, particularly when you are trying to do a grim-and-gritty Warhammer-style game.  You succeed, but you also fail at the same time.

(emphasis mine)

Quote from: CRKrueger;678963As far as Failing Forward goes, it's definitely a narrative thing.  

In Criminal Minds, they'll get the bad guy.  Someone may die, someone may leave the show, the bad guy may escape to become a recurring villain, but one way or another things are resolved.

In real life, the Green River killer is apprehended 19 years later, but the Zodiac and Jack the Ripper cases may never be solved.
 
Sometimes in life you just fail, and there is no closure, no explanation, no interesting leads to other things.  What is interesting then is what you do next, something completely new after you pick yourself up off the ground maybe missing a few teeth.  That's life.

The OP clearly specified in defining "failing forward" that he was talking about sometimes failure being simple failure, and sometimes failure being different.  I think that's just a misreading of the topic.  

(I don't recall hearing the term "failing forward" in my story games circles - is it a reference to something in particular?)

Quote from: jhkim;679043(I don't recall hearing the term "failing forward" in my story games circles - is it a reference to something in particular?)

I see it mainly from folks who don't want the story interrupted by failure or like the pacing it generates. I've seen it on enworld but no idea where it originated. I think it has two types it tends to appeal to: people who want to soften the consequences of bad rolls (not necessarily for narrative or story purposes) and those who feel it bakes in drama or conflict by using failure to increase the tension and excitement.

The recurring top defense of this narrative device has overwhelmingly been "keeping the game moving forward".

Lets look at that for a moment. That phrase implies a simple failure brings an entire group of thinking human beings who (presumeably) enjoy games of the imagination to a standstill. Why?

Perhaps because after being spoonfed a couple decades worth of storygames being led around by the narrative, players aren't accustomed to ever needing to come up with a plan B. If the story is always set up to to allow plan A to muddle through, perhaps with consequences, there isn't a need.

Can't get past a particular door? Leave it and do something else. This isn't rocket science. All this keeping the game moving forward nonsense only applies to hoop jumping railroad fests not games where the players control their own fates.

Why does the game need to move forward along a particular path? Why can't the game continue on a divergent path, perhaps taken because of certain failures?

It's not a term I would use but as I understand it, it's about not letting failure just mean 'oh, nothing happens'. So failure therefore introduces some new penalty, consequence, or complication that keeps the game moving forward in the sense of 'here's something new to put in the mix'. It's nothing to do with tyranny of fun or spoonfeeding or any of that bullshit.