Without any limits, absolute freedom tends to result in paralysis or wishy-washiness. I can think of no better elucidation of this point than this clip, from My Neighbours the Yamadas (ignore the first couple of seconds and forgive my shaky phone hand):
Most of the basic structural elements of D&D - character classes, stats, random encounter tables, hexmaps, monster stat blocks, and so on - can be thought of as a framework of constraints within which the imagination can be channelled and given effect. They prevent the DM from doing literally anything he feels like. Paradoxically, this results in more interesting results than most very loose and free-form games, which ultimately tend to achieve rather bland outcomes in actual play (in my experience).
I don't believe that structure is constraint. Take the example of the piano, a keyboard instrument long in the evolution. It is an error to say a composer constrains himself to write a Piano sonata in excluding stringed instruments. The history of solo piano works dwarfs accompanied piano in significance. The string quartet has had enormous success overshadowing works for string trio and string quintet. Why? because we need to discover the structures that work. And this is a different concept to 'constraint helps creativity'.
ReplyDeleteIt is the same with the sonnet. It is of a length and shape which has allowed some poets to flourish. The structure works empirically. Similar seeming constraints of different length and shape didn't work. So the important thing is not the constraint but the structure which works.
So I believe we may discover or slowly evolve structures or rpg rules which aid creativity, but constraints are arbitrary and limit freedom, for example random tables, which are arbitrary finite lists which impede my creativity in the same way that writing a poem restricted to a few hundred words impedes my creativity and is not a structural asset.
It would indeeed be an error to say a composer constrains himself to write a piano sonata by excluding stringed instruments. But he does constrain himself to write within the accepted structures of the sonata form.
DeleteYou seem to be suggesting that there are preordained structures out there waiting to be discovered - as though the notion of a string quartet was somewhere in the ether and we just needed to stumble upon it to find out that it worked. I find that eccentric.
Sonata form is hardly a constraint. It is a structure which aids composition. There is more music in existence because of Sonata form than there would be if it had not been devised.
DeleteYes I believe the success of the String Quartet was stumbled upon by Haydn or whoever. Composers did not decide by force of will that certain arrangements of instruments would work well, they had to experiment onerously and convince musicians to try things out.
I consider a staircase in a tower to be a structure to aid my going up. To my understanding you would be capable of saying 'I was constrained to use the stairs to climb the tower.'
... and I am not nitpicking here. I want to hear you make the argument for constraint assisting creativity but where structural tools are excluded from the notion of constraint. You might be right.
DeleteDelayed written conversation is worthless compared to face to face. It is impossible to know how much consideration to give to a comment. Personally, my eyes glaze over reading comments longer than a tweet unless I respect the author. Then there may be irony, or trolling as a legitimate antidote to widespread stupidity and we need sniffer dogs to vet comments.
DeletePeople have lost the will to form modest local personal friendships (the way it has been forever). These were the accidental fellows I played AD&D with in my teens (unbettered). Christ when I think how lucky my players were to have me as DM, but that isn't my point at all.
Complaining isn't going to make me reply faster.
DeleteHm, while I agree that constraints are good for creativity, I'm not particularly impressed with a lot of the constraints imposed by the structural elements of D&D (stats, character classes, combat & magic systems...). Most of the time DM's just take them for granted and you get the plain standard D&D many people love & some hate, or things quickly get very convoluted often without managing to bridge the gap between the system and what one tries to represent with it.
ReplyDeleteThe problem with freeform rules isn't that there aren't many of them or that they're generally loose, it's that getting anything out of them requires quite a bit of prep and thinking on how to implement & tune the game for what you want to achieve, but a lot of aspiring GM's attracted to these systems don't realize this, and do not put in the work. Still it's better to be able to choose your constraints (or derive them for fiction or history, which then acts as an initial set of constraints) than to have to make due with a somewhat random set of rules that happens to be popular but might not be at all suitable for what you want to achieve.
Well, yes, there is certainly a fine line between constraint which encourages creativity and unhelpful rigidity.
DeleteI'm not at all sure it's such a fine line in the case of D&D. Or at least unhelpful rigidity seems to me the more common experience. Which my explain why in pratice so many GMs modify, ignore or break the rules on purpose.
DeleteIt depends on the goal of the creative process. Rules allow you to capture the way an object interacts with a fictional reality in a way that is vastly more efficient, clear and codified then descriptive language. It also forces greater rigeur and refinement on behalf of the creator when designing said objects. Compare the monsters in Veins of the Earth versus Fire on the Velvet Horizon.
ReplyDeleteYes, that is true.
DeleteAn explanation for the shallow experience of free-form games follows from that. The objects in a free-form narrative game can be manipulated in a much less sophisticated fashion. There's less granularity, factors that must be taken into account and a greater degree of abstraction. The reason these free-form games appear more shallow to you is because they are literally that. Free-form or near-free form is something you might use for games where social interaction, which does not have to be abstracted, is the dominant form of interaction.
DeleteThis is a good blog.
Yes, more or less. Social interaction doesn't need rules, and is actually probably worse for them. Object manipulation and combat need to be made more abstract because you can't physically represent them in reality.
DeleteAnd now a challenge, if you will permit me. I believe that OSR games which are comparatively rules light tend to generate vastly more dynamic, complex and interesting sessions then more rules heavy games (like, say, anything north from D20). Do you agree with this statement and why?
DeleteHmmm...
ReplyDeleteI'll agree that Absolute Freedom (Capital 'A', Capital 'F') may not be as conducive to the creative process as one wherein you apply some parameters and guidelines but too many limits is just as detrimental a situation.
For me personally, a game like D&D isn't built on creativity so much as it is built on limits. Everything needed to balance play and develop a functioning session feels like it was written from the point of what you can't do instead of saying, "Here what you can do with this".
From Race/Class limits to Level caps to uninspired rules for things like encumbrance (a limit on what you can carry) to initiative (a limit on how fights start), D&D and many other games of yore seemed (IMHO and only MHO) to reinforce the 'it's not in the book so it can't be done' and 'it's not on my sheet so I can't do it' mentalities.
I don't think I've ever met a single person who shared that mindset and started with games like Teenagers from Outer Space, Star Wars D6, or even Champions (though that's because if want to be able to do a crazy thing you build your PC so they can do that in the first place).
I dunno if I've ever met somebody who started with something that wasn't D&D or Call of Cthulhu.
DeleteOn a whim I asked my Barking Alien Gaming Group (a Facebook group of all the people in all the groups I regularly game with) what their first game was. There are 30 people in the group. I've known some for as many as 35+ years and some as few as 5.
DeleteI received 17 responses so far. Among them there were 6 people whose first game was not D&D. Answers included Star Trek (LUG Version), Palladium's Rifts, TSR's Marvel Superheroes, White Wolf's Exalted, WEG's Paranoia, and WEG's Ghostbusters.
Of note, one person was female and of Mexican descent. The rest were male, with one being of Puerto Rican descent, one African-American, and the rest Caucasian/Western European.
New York City, I have discovered, throws a wrench into the standard RPG gamer demographics. I know a good number of folks who started with IP or Superhero themed games.