Thursday 28 February 2013

On Theory (Re)Defined, Railroad (Part II)


Let’s talk logical fallacies for a minute. 

Argumentum ad nauseam does not mean “responding to every comment in the thread”, but rather repeating the same argument until one wears down opposition.  I.e., argument to the point of nausea.  Now, of course, recurrent claims that make no attempt to clarify or respond to other posts may indeed be argumentum ad nauseam, as may simply asserting repeatedly that one must abide with a given position, regardless of the reasons stated that one does not.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_nauseam 

Onus probandi is not simply “Making claims without proof, and then claiming that it is my burden to disprove your claims.”  It is making a claim, and then attempting to shift the burden of proof away from your claim, and onto the sceptics of your claim.  When debating any issue, there is an implicit burden of proof on the person asserting a claim. "If this responsibility or burden of proof is shifted to a critic, the fallacy of appealing to ignorance is committed"  In other words, if I make a claim, such as that the definition of railroading is X, and I then attempt to shift the burden of proof to critics of that claim (say, possibly people commenting on my blog), then I am guilty of a fallacy of onus probandi – the burden of proof lies with the original claimant, not the critic.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophic_burden_of_proof

Equivocation is not “misusing 'railroading' by applying your own definition rather than the one in the article”, but rather “the misleading use of a term with more than one meaning or sense (by glossing over which meaning is intended at a particular time)”.  If I am clear about the term that I am using, I am not engaged in equivocation.  If, on the other hand, you make a claim that X is equivalent to Y, and that therefore quality Z must belong to both, when X is not equivalent to Y, then you are engaged in equivocation.  For example, the claim that if railroading applies meaningfully to one subset of games, it must apply to all games, and any definition or railroading which does not therefore apply equally to Dungeon Crawl Classics and chess is a wrong definition is a case of fallacious equivocation.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equivocation_fallacy

Argumentum ad hominem, is an argument made personally against an opponent instead of against their argument” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem), or more specifically, Ad hominem circumstantial, which “points out that someone is in circumstances such that they are disposed to take a particular position….The circumstantial fallacy applies only where the source taking a position is only making a logical argument from premises that are generally accepted. Where the source seeks to convince an audience of the truth of a premise by a claim of authority or by personal observation, observation of their circumstances may reduce the evidentiary weight of the claims, sometimes to zero.”

In other words, ad hominem circumstantial only applies as a fallacy when applied to an argument from premises that are generally accepted; it does not apply in this case.

On the other hand, the attempt to claim that “your behaviour…is becoming inappropriate….You have repeated instances of not taking the time to read what people have written, not only in the original post, but in the comment threads….You continually construct strawmen; both by making broad, easily disprovable claims….and by misrepresenting the very clear points you are arguing against.…..You should not engage in debate which contains logical fallacies”constitutes abusive ad hominem, which is, indeed, fallacious.

You are correct in noting that a straw man misrepresents “the argumentation of those people you are commenting against” (although not “making broad, easily disprovable claims”, which is sort of ironic, considering…), however it is an easily disprovable claim that I misrepresented anyone’s argument in the comments to the article.  http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/straw-man.html

The interesting thing about logical fallacies is that you have to do more than simply throw the terms around; you have to use them correctly, in situations where they apply.

So, let’s take a look at the opening claims.

(1) Games are very specific, very quantifiable things.

This may be true of some games; it is not true of all games.  Unless one means that each individual instance of a game is very specific and very quantifiable, my Dungeon Crawl Classics game is likely to look different from Harley’s Dungeon Crawl Classics game.  After all, it is printed very clearly, at the beginning of the Judges Rules, and in a way to bring attention to it:  The judge is always right. Let the rules bend to you, not the other way around.

Let us look at the introduction of the Holmes Basic set for Dungeons & Dragons, on page 2, where it discusses the need for a Dungeon Master:
“This is absolutely necessary because the game is completely open-ended, is subject to modification, expansion, and interpretation according to the desires of the group participating, and is in general not bounded by the conventional limitations of other types of games.”
How about Tom Moldvay, in his Basic Dungeons & Dragons (1981) intro?
“In a sense, the D&D game has no rules, only rule suggestions.  No rule is inviolate, particularly if a new or altered rule will encourage creativity and imagination.  The important thing is to enjoy the adventure.”
People meant so many different things by “Dungeons & Dragons” that Advanced Dungeons & Dragons made, in part, an attempt to make the game into something more specific and quantifiable.  But Gary Gygax did not expect every AD&D game to look the same; he expected there to be similarities between games, even though what the similarities were between any two games may be different.

This is explicitly spelled out in the 1st Edition Dungeon Master’s Guide.  I would rather not have to type out Gary Gygax's paragraphs of material on the subject, but will do so if anyone doubts this and does not have a DMG of their own to read it from.  "Dungeons & Beavers", anyone?

In Role-Playing Mastery, Gygax wrote:
The spirit of a game cannot be expressly defined in a sentence or a paragraph, and any game designer who attempts to do so is defeating his own purpose.  The spirit of an RPG pervades all the statistics, mechanics, and descriptions that make up the actual rules; it is everywhere and nowhere in particular at the same time.
A game master or player who simply absorbs all the rules and uses them to play out a game adventure may be able to achieve expertise in the play of the game, but in the final analysis, he is doing no more than going through the motions-unless he also perceives, understands, and appreciates the spirit that underlies all those rules.
This is not true of games such as checkers or chess, although the structure of all games includes unspoken assumptions or rules, so that a poker player need not be told that he shouldn't reveal his cards if he understands the game.

Again, Gary Gygax in Role-Playing Mastery:
Because the game seeks to reflect actual life, the campaign world has a scope equal to that of the universe, that is, most probably infinite. Fortunately, the GM needs only to create and develop details according to the rate the player group progresses and demands such details.
So we note that role-playing games are different in form, purpose, and function from other games.  Just as it is nonsensical to discuss card marking outside of the subset of games that use cards, or weighted dice in the context of chess, role-playing games have developed a lexicon of terms that relate to the specific form, purpose, and function of these games (or games that do, or purport to, have the same or similar form, purpose, or function, such as “computer role-playing games”. 

One of these terms is “railroading”.

It is nonsensical to talk of railroading in terms of chess, checkers, Parcheesi, or Monopoly.  No player acts as a judge, or Game Master (and, in a computer-based “role-playing” game, the programmer does so).  If the banker in Monopoly doesn't give you the $200 for passing Go, he isn't “railroading”; he is cheating.

Therefore, any conclusion that relies upon a relationship between railroading and a non-role-playing (or pseudo role-playing) game is built upon a false assumption.

(2) Whatever the game, there are very specific rules.   

(3) Even for those situations where the rules don't clearly cover a corner case, the house rule, resolution, or consensus-based solution is also a quantifiable action. 

Taken together, these seem to mean that whatever happens within a game happens according to its rules (including, one would assume, “Rule 0” type rules that define the codified rules as mere guidelines.)  This would seem to gibe with

(8) The actions you can take are proscribed by the rules of the game.

so I will take that as my working understanding of what is being said here.

In a reply to Mandramas, on February 25, 2013 at 1:43 pm, though, the author states that “They [the players] cannot be railroaded by the structure of the game because that defines what agency they have.”  We shall call this claim (21) Players cannot be railroaded by the structure of the game because that defines what agency they have.

If the statements given in (2), (3), and (8) are correct, it would seem to imply that anything which happens within a game, be it codified rule or uncodified ruling, is part of the structure of the game.  If players cannot be railroaded by the structure of the game, and everything that happens within the game is a product of that structure, we now see that railroading cannot exist.

Personally, I think that the claim structure in statements (2), (3), and (8) are largely correct, but that the claim made by (21) is false.  Either there is no railroading, or railroading must be able to exist within the game structure.  Or perhaps we can claim that (3) is false, and that there exists agency within a game that is not provided by the game structure.

In any event, it should be crystal clear that statements (2), (3), (8), and (21) cannot all be true. 

Next time, we will look at sources; other objections to the definition –C supplies for railroad, railroading, and player agency; and what these terms actually mean in general usage.  If the goal really is to allow “designers to communicate clearly about the structure of a game,” it follows that terminology to be clearly and correctly defined.  And that correct definition must be usable in a meaningful way.

Assuming, of course, that one is not simply trying to equivocate (in the fallacious sense) the term you are using with the term as it is generally used.

14 comments:

  1. Raven, I think the idea is more that "following the rules" cannot be describes as railroading. So you cannot claim that forcing a wizard to sleep before he can recover his spells is "railroading", because the rest to replenish spells is part of the game structure. The wizard can decide to keep adventuring without spells or to stop adventuring to rest and regain them. Railroading would be forcing them to choose one of those options.

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    1. That is an argument that can be made (and which will be examined as this series goes on), but if that is the argument being made, then propositions (3) and (8) need to be reexamined in that light.

      I would imagine that few people would claim that forcing a wizard to sleep before he can recover his spells is "railroading", not simply because the rest to replenish spells is part of the game structure, but also because the rest to replenish spells is part of the fictional game milieu that has no correspondence to reality.

      On the other hand, I would argue that rules which limit actions that have correspondence to reality in such a way that the player is unable to make decisions based on the "stance" or expected world-view of the character played can railroad, or contribute to railroading.

      As a clear example, imagine a game system in which you are playing a human character, but for some reason the system only allows you to jump three times each day. By putting a fourth obstacle in the game, which can only be cleared by jumping, and which must be cleared or gotten around within the same game day, the rule either railroads or contributes to the railroad of whatever secondary solution is being forced upon the players.

      Imagine similarly a game in which no rule exists that allows characters to run, but a base move speed is given. Unless one goes beyond the rules system itself, and considers what Gygax calls "the spirit of the game", the movement rules automatically prevent characters from taking normal actions within the fictional milieu.

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    2. In any event, again, it should be crystal clear that statements (2), (3), (8), and (21) cannot all be true.

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  2. So you would be saying that you throw in a 4th obstacle to force them to join with a wizard who can cast "extra jump" or something, otherwise the game does not continue? I agree, that would be railroading. But following the rule itself "you can only jump three times" is not railroading. Similarly, telling the players that to get over an obstacle they have to jump is not railroading. It is telling them that they need to cross the obstacle, and not letting them choose whether or not to jump that begins the onset of railroading.

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    1. Obviously, I disagree.

      Perhaps a clearer example: A game in which everything is narrated by the rules, except your choice at a single point, which determines HOW you reach the next section, but does not otherwise effect the following sections, which then reach a pre-scripted conclusion.

      If it is true that you are playing a game so long as you have any agency, then this is a game. If it is true that the rules cannot railroad, then this is not a railroad.

      You may claim that it is not, but then you will not be using the term "railroad" as it is commonly meant. You will be attempting to redefine the term in a way that precludes the common meaning.

      Assuming that the goal is clear communication, you would not want to do so.

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    2. It should be quite obvious that the rules of a game themselves can throw in a 4th obstacle to force them to join with a wizard who can cast "extra jump" or something, otherwise the game does not continue. If that circumstance is something you agree would be railroading, it is not less so because the game designer, rather than the GM at the table, set it up that way.

      Indeed, if one accepts the propositions being discussed above, it makes no sense to also differentiate between what the game designer and the GM does in terms of what railroading is. In both cases, they determine the agency allowed to the player, and, if one accepts the basic premise -C is selling, then in both cases the player cannot be railroaded, because the agency of the player is determined by that which determines what agency the player has.

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    3. One last thought: attempting to rationalize what agency is granted by the game rules, and what agency is granted by the GM, as separate things becomes even more problematic when those rules specify (as is the case with role-playing games in general) that the GM determines what agency the players have.

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  3. I see what you are saying now, thanks for the second example :) (though I might not call the game you are describing an RPG, though from what I have heard, there were some modules basically like that).

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    1. Remember that the original article posits that being able to choose your fighting stance prevents Final Fantasy games from being railroads. My second example is slightly more extreme, but what I arguing against here is explicit in -C's POV in the article.

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  4. Also remember that -C posits (19) If you were being railroaded, you wouldn't be playing a game, because by definition your agency is being invalidated.

    IOW, it is impossible to both play a game and be railroaded.

    Let that one sink in for a while. ;)

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  5. I think (2), (3), (8), and (21) can all be true.

    (2) Whatever the game, there are very specific rules.

    (3) Even for those situations where the rules don't clearly cover a corner case, the house rule, resolution, or consensus-based solution is also a quantifiable action. (I assume this to mean that they are equivalent to rules.)

    (8) The actions you can take are proscribed by the rules of the game.

    (21) Players cannot be railroaded by the structure of the game because that defines what agency they have.

    This seems to point to railroading being when a player (including the GM) does not follow the rules of the game, whether they are text-based*, house rules, or consensus-based.

    e.g. Wandering monsters are called for every 3 turns, as a rule - house rule, game text, consensus-based, it doesn't matter. If you as GM don't roll for the wandering monsters unless the PCs are doing something you don't like, you're railroading - taking away agency from the players - taking away choices from the players.

    * - text-based meaning rules in the game text.

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  6. Hi Dave, and thanks for your response.

    You don't answer my objections, so I cannot tell where you think they are at fault. I quote:

    "If the statements given in (2), (3), and (8) are correct, it would seem to imply that anything which happens within a game, be it codified rule or uncodified ruling, is part of the structure of the game. If players cannot be railroaded by the structure of the game, and everything that happens within the game is a product of that structure, we now see that railroading cannot exist.

    Personally, I think that the claim structure in statements (2), (3), and (8) are largely correct, but that the claim made by (21) is false. Either there is no railroading, or railroading must be able to exist within the game structure. Or perhaps we can claim that (3) is false, and that there exists agency within a game that is not provided by the game structure.

    In any event, it should be crystal clear that statements (2), (3), (8), and (21) cannot all be true."

    That last statement is predicated on "Either there is no railroading, or railroading must be able to exist within the game structure."

    If you are going to argue that railroading does not exist (and even -C admits it exists overtly, while attempting to define it away in each instance), then you can indeed claim that propositions (2), (3), (8), and (21) are true, and you can do so while holding a consistent opinion.

    But when you do so, you should also be willing to admit that you don't believe that a game or a GM can railroad players. You will also, I think, find that "Railroading cannot, and therefore does not, occur" is a non-starter for anyone who has played these games on more than an extremely casual basis.

    Good luck with it!

    Even in your wandering monster example, when you say, " If you as GM don't roll for the wandering monsters unless the PCs are doing something you don't like, you're railroading - taking away agency from the players - taking away choices from the players" you are conveniently ignoring that what the GM decides IS the game in this instance. If the rpg rules do not explicitly give the GM the authority to do this as part of the rules structure, they do so implicitly.

    In a game where the GM's judgement exceeds the authority of "Wandering monsters are called for every 3 turns" as a matter of the rules, "house rule, game text, consensus-based, it doesn't matter," either railroading occurs within the framework of the rules, or this is not railroading.

    You cannot have it both ways.

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  7. Or another way to look at it:

    If the amount and type of food you get is dictated by me, and you are starving, you are right to take your complaints to me.

    If the amount and type of agency you get is dictated by the rules, then you are right to take your complaints about lack of agency to the rules.

    You cannot both say that rules determine what agency you get, and that the rules are not responsible for lack of expected agency. It must be one way or the other.

    That should be crystal clear to just about anyone.

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  8. Thanks for the replies, RC. I am thinking this over.

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