For example, in Pendragon there are Personality Traits. These are used to define the Character.
A "saving roll" can be used to determine if a Character acts according to the Trait as opposed to how the Player wants.
In real life we see people with addictions, there are a list of classic Sins that real people do.
What is the issue with modelling a game character's actions based on the character Traits?
The Player acts as the Character's will but the body does what it does.
As in real life, people avoid temptation as a way to not do things they feel are wrong (or against their Traits).
Why do many/most games assume that Characters have unbreakable will power?

Why don't more games include a Trait like mechanic? (Or do they and I just missed it?)
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Quote from: Greentongue;1032133Why don't more games include a Trait like mechanic? (Or do they and I just missed it?)
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They do it called having a 3 Charisma. (or 3 Wisdom, etc.)

To answer the main question in the subject:  Because games aren't real life.  

To the extent that the players want the game to be more like real life, they'll want to surrender at least some aspects of player agency for the very reason you give.  To the extent that the players do not, they will be more resistant to it.

Also, "player agency" is not limited to having control over your will.  I'd say that is not even the main focus of player agency. Rather, player agency is being allowed to make decisions.  Those decisions don't have to succeed.  If you are in a game that has a mechanic where your character can succumb to a flaw, then it is not losing player agency to sometimes roll against that mechanic and lose control.  It is losing player agency, for example, if the GM just decides that you don't get to roll against the normal mechanic.*  It is not losing player agency if you decide that your guy just fails.  You made the decision whether or not to fight the temptation--agency.  Then the dice decided you failed.  The character lost agency; the player did not.

* Yes, technically I realize that the GM could decide the outcome here, making the roll superfluous, based on the idea that the situation was so dire you couldn't possibly succeed.  The player still tried to fight the temptation, but the character was doomed no matter what the player did.  What would really be across the line is if the GM decided that your character jumped in whole hog, not even trying to resist.

Quote from: Greentongue;1032133For example, in Pendragon there are Personality Traits. These are used to define the Character.
A "saving roll" can be used to determine if a Character acts according to the Trait as opposed to how the Player wants.
In real life we see people with addictions, there are a list of classic Sins that real people do.
What is the issue with modelling a game character's actions based on the character Traits?
The Player acts as the Character's will but the body does what it does.
As in real life, people avoid temptation as a way to not do things they feel are wrong (or against their Traits).
Why do many/most games assume that Characters have unbreakable will power?

Why don't more games include a Trait like mechanic? (Or do they and I just missed it?)
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Well GURPS is full of personality traits that the player is supposed to roleplay, and require will rolls to resist. Resisting traits generally should be done when there's a conflicting motivation that the PC also has, not so much OOC player impulses. Resisting your PC's traits frequently without good reason is considered bad roleplaying (and can be penalized with negative consequences). Such disadvantages are designed to materially limit "player agency" and to significantly represent characters with certain behavior.

Unless they get added during especially traumatic play (e.g. in a horror game where part of the point is to terrorize PCs and drive them mad), it's usually up to the players (during point-buy character creation) to decide whether their characters have any of those or not, so players who want to have "full player agency" should just not choose those kinds of disadvantages for their PCs.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell;1032142To answer the main question in the subject:  Because games aren't real life.  

To the extent that the players want the game to be more like real life, they'll want to surrender at least some aspects of player agency for the very reason you give.  To the extent that the players do not, they will be more resistant to it.

Also, "player agency" is not limited to having control over your will.  I'd say that is not even the main focus of player agency. Rather, player agency is being allowed to make decisions.  Those decisions don't have to succeed.  If you are in a game that has a mechanic where your character can succumb to a flaw, then it is not losing player agency to sometimes roll against that mechanic and lose control.  It is losing player agency, for example, if the GM just decides that you don't get to roll against the normal mechanic.*  It is not losing player agency if you decide that your guy just fails.  You made the decision whether or not to fight the temptation--agency.  Then the dice decided you failed.  The character lost agency; the player did not.

* Yes, technically I realize that the GM could decide the outcome here, making the roll superfluous, based on the idea that the situation was so dire you couldn't possibly succeed.  The player still tried to fight the temptation, but the character was doomed no matter what the player did.  What would really be across the line is if the GM decided that your character jumped in whole hog, not even trying to resist.

I agree with this. Let's put a trope-y scenario up. A Paladin has to choose between Law and Good. Say, the law of the land is that theft is punishable by cutting off someone's hand. A thief steals a loaf of bread to feed his family. (I said this would be tropey) the paladin catches him. Should the paladin let the guy go, or turn him in for theft, knowing that he might have his hand cut off? Putting a dice mechanic on the decision makes the choice for the player. (Or at least heavily influences it)

Now, the OP's scenario is a bit different. An addiction is something that affects a person both physically and psychologically. So a will roll might be appropriate, when a character is deciding to indulge their addiction to the detriment of other goals. Say saving money up for a castle or whatnot.

I don't mind some loss of control... Willpower rolls, Magical compulsion, Sanity loss, disease, addictions and obsessions, possession by spirits, drug-induced malleability/confusion/delusion, imprisonment... but no one I know likes it when the GM just tells you what your PC wants/feels/thinks/chooses with no such reason.

You both appear to be describing character agency.  Player agency has more to do with exercising control over the fiction of the setting.

An example of player exercising player agency would be a player saying something like "I reach out to my street contracts and find someone who will sell me a map of the secret sewer entrance to the castle," when the GM has not established that any such entrance exists.  If the GM allows this action, then they are encouraging player agency.   If the GM disallows this action, then they are limiting player agency.  Another example would be a player creating a character that is a member of the Order of Assassins, when then GM has established that any such Order exists.  Essentially "player agency" means that players are able to contribute facts about setting to the game, which has traditionally been the purview of the GM.

I personally am generally okay with allowing some player agency, with the understanding that any player contribution requires GM permission, and may require some degree of modification before being allowed.  For example, in my last campaign one of the players wanted to play a member of a psychic race from the 3.5 D&D Psionics Handbook.  I didn't want to incorporate this entire race into my campaign, but since the race was essentially a form of modified human, I worked with the player to create a unique character who had been subject to wizardly shenanigans and as a result had all of the abilities of this species and psionic powers, making the player happy without forcing me to add a whole new species to my world.

Edit:  I run HERO System, which has two Complications -- Enraged and Psychological Limitation -- that both remove character agency, but since a player chooses to take complications and gets points for them, it's not removing player agency.  They defined their character that way.

When an alcoholic has the opportunity to drink, does he have a choice or is he compelled to drink beyond his control? That is a question that society struggles with to a large degree. If someone is being tortured, does the victim have a choice to tell the torturer what he wants to hear or is the victim forced to talk? If a married man is seduced by a beautiful woman, must be give in to temptation or can he resist and if he can't resist, then can he be blamed for his infidelity?

Along these lines, is there even such a thing as choice or are we but machines that react to stimuli in an irresistible way based on our hardware and programming? These are pretty deep philosophical questions.

The assumption that most of us live under is that we have choices, but that the above scenarios are hard choices. The problem with hard choices in an RPG is that the player doesn't suffer for make no hard choices like the character does and the player doesn't gain from giving into temptation like the character would. It would be nice if people could role play those hard choices and have the character occasionally show limited to his resolve. Many players will be inclined to brush off such hard choices, since doing so takes no effort for them and they prefer the benefits of resisting.

There are games that model willpower and difficult to resist compulsions. Vampire: the Masquerade does this with Willpower and Virtues. Even D&D does it with Willpower saving throws - which are typically only required for magical urges, you don't usually have to make a Willpower save to get up from bed in the morning or to resist the flirtations of a comely barmaid, even though a real person effectively does both.

I feel torn myself. I like to be able to choose my character's actions but I also don't like it when people no-sell what would be incredibly hard decisions for characters. Maybe there should be the equivalent of Willpower rolls for making hard decisions, but there should be some option available to allow for characters will huge resolves of Willpower not to have to fall to temptation.

One time I was playing a priest character who was extremely devoted to his highly lawful religious, which included a vow of celibacy and chastity. Our party had to go to a brothel to talk to the people there as a part of our mission. My character ended up talking to this high class prostitute there and the DM said that I fell in love with her. Then henceforth I had to act out my love for her, and of course she turns out to be be evil and caused all sorts of trouble for the party, which pissed me off because it completely went against what my character would do. The DM later said that it was part of the module he was running that she was so beautiful and charismatic that anybody who had sex with her would fall in love with her. My character didn't have sex with her, he just talked, but since he was the only male character exposed to her and the DM wanted to play out that plot element, he had me fall in love with her.

Anyway, that was a case where my agency was removed in such a way that I thought it violated rather that preserved realism and I wish I could have been given some option (even a feat or something) that allowed me to resist temptation.

Well, for starters, the OP has seriously misunderstood how Pendragon works, and I'm too fucking lazy to type out a correction.

Secondly, games are about presenting interesting choices to the players.

Thirdly, people differ on what constitutes an interesting choice, which is why not all games are the same.

It seems to me that the absence of good choices in life is the reason player agency is so important in rpgs.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;1032163Well, for starters, the OP has seriously misunderstood how Pendragon works, and I'm too fucking lazy to type out a correction.

I understand that the Traits can be used to track tendencies and not as Save Rolls however, you do modify them on a success or failure, so at some level, it is forcing action/reaction.

My main point is about players representing characters but not accepting character flaws driving action/reaction out of the players control.
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Quote from: Steven Mitchell;1032142To answer the main question in the subject:  Because games aren't real life.

This.  Next question?

Quote from: David Johansen;1032165It seems to me that the absence of good choices in life is the reason player agency is so important in rpgs.

If there are obviously good and bad choices, they aren't really choices.

Because real life doesn't always give it.

Because we play RPGs to do things we don't, and very often can't, do in Real Life.

Because RPGs are a group activity of shared imagination players often want a share in building that imaginary world, not just reacting to it but also contributing to it.