Fictional Logic

Not ‘Narrative Logic’

Some games specifically run on a kind of narrative logic, where the rules exist to mirror specific story-telling rules. Let’s take Fate and Realis as examples^[1].

In Fate, Aspects are fictional tags that can be applied to any object. Most players first encounter them during character creation, where they serve as both useful bits of characterization and important gameplay mechanics. Your character’s aspects define things that are always true, but they aren’t mechanically relevant unless you spend a metacurrency called a Fate Point. The best explanation I’ve seen comes from this unattributed blog post attached to the Fate website (emphasis mine):

But that’s the fundamental reason that aspects are “fueled by” Fate Points. […]

Fate Core, as far as I can see, tries to emulate fiction. That doesn’t just mean “a physical simulation of fictional worlds”. That means the flow and structure of fiction. That means that when we look at how a game of Fate ‘should’ flow, our reference point should be ‘does this play out like a book, or a movie?’ rather than ‘does this work like how it would work in the physical world’?

A slippery, ice-covered surface, in fiction, doesn’t mean that every description or shot of people on it involves them slipping and sliding around. That’s boring. What it probably means is that at some key moment, somebody will slip because of the surface creating some dramatic moment. And that’s what Fate tries to emulate -how the dramatic elements work together, not the actual effects of fighting on a slippery surface. It follows the rules of fiction regardless of realism, not reality -even ‘cinematic’ reality.

In Fate’s model of fiction, details are established and then used only when dramatically necessary. Fate Points serve as the game enforcing a pacing mechanism, so that each player has some control over those dramatic moments.

In Realis, objects of great power or usefulness may be represented as Ephemera. From the Ashcan, on page 49 (emphasis mine):

When you gain an Ephemera, write its Sentence down on your sheet and draw three empty circles next to it. Every time you successfully use a piece of Ephemera, put an X in one of the circles. Using an Ephemera as a Means to overcome even unopposed uncertainty counts as a successful use. Once all three circles are filled, it can no longer be called on as a Sentence.

This does not necessarily represent the destruction or loss of the Ephemera in question. Instead, it means that whatever special advantage that the Ephemera once gave you has been accounted for by the ever-fluctuating, narrasoulic equilibrium of Realis. What was once a dramatic new development to the narrative weave of the Thousand Moons is now simply another part of the quilt. You may continue to wield your ancient runic blade, but its shine simply does not impress as it once did.

While Ephemera are not nearly as core to Realis as Aspects and Fate Points are to Fate, this rule feels remarkably similar. Your Ephemera, fictionally, is not depleted by its use. Narratively and in the rules-logic, it is.

This sort of system has never been my preference, but I’ve had trouble explaining why. I certainly prefer something like Fate to something like a big-box D&D.

Where I think I’ve come down is that I’m very interested in games that act as a kind of sandbox for discovery, especially through emergent behavior of systems. As a player, I want to learn things about the world and my character through play. As a GM, I want to be surprised and delighted by the actions the actions of the party and how the world moves in response. When games run in these very narrative-forward modes, possibility feels somewhat prescribed to me. I feel like I’m seeing through the matrix, where Fate characters quickly transform from a collection of fictional descriptors to a pile of “justifications for a +2 bonus on a die roll”.

Not ‘Game Logic’

Some RPGs run on a core logic of ‘balanced gameplay.’ For instance, let’s see Firebolt from D&D 5e:

You hurl a mote of fire at a creature or object within range. Make a ranged spell attack against the target. On a hit, the target takes 1d10 fire damage. A flammable object hit by this spell ignites if it isn’t being worn or carried. This spell’s damage increases by 1d10 when you reach 5th level (2d10), 11th level (3d10), and 17th level (4d10).

There’s no story-rule or world-rule being expressed here. It is purely a point of gameplay expedience. I can enjoy a good tactics boardgame but as I found with ICON, I never really want it within my RPG.

A Case Study: Adapting Earthsea

So what do I want? Let’s take as our first case study an attempt to create a Wizard of Earthsea RPG. We can discard immediately any notion of a systematized wargame, which would be anathema to LeGuin’s work. Instead I have two approaches in mind.

One is to use the game to codify the movement of the characters through the arc of an Earthsea book. We could make a passable attempt that looks something like:

• All characters start with an internal conflict, probably represented as two warring forces or impulses within them
• Early in the game, we are confronted with some challenge or situation that represents a violation of the natural balance
• The game mechanics guide us along as the characters grapple with their place in the world and their self-conception
• In the game’s climax, the characters regain their balance and come to understand an important lesson, often one about non-interference or self-acceptance

Our characters will have journeys much like Ged’s self-acceptance in Wizard of Earthsea or Tenar’s escape in Tombs of Atuan. We won’t be bogged down in unnecessary detail, and the story we tell will have the appropriate structure.

The second would be an attempt to transcribe the rules that govern Earthsea and let the events unfold as they may. We know something of dragons, naming, and the consequences of magic from A Wizard of Earthsea. We know something of the “Nameless Ones” and old powers of Earthsea from The Tombs of Atuan. So on and so forth, we can then play characters in this world and let the narrative emerge post-hoc. Maybe the rules systematize magic, and the relations between powerful wizards, and the social structure underlying wizardly life. Then our wizards will come to do things like take advantage of the women’s work that they rely on, or unbalance the world in a doomed quest for power, or get into perilous magical duels.

These two hypothetical games do both sort of exist: Archipelago by Matthijs Holter and The Seven Part Pact by Jay Dragon. The former takes a “deck of narrative prompts and narrative metacurrency” approach; the latter is a series of complex interlocking board games and an associated magic system. I am sure there are many people whose ideal Earthsea game is the former, but I find myself mostly uninterested in playing it. The latter I have played but once, in a very early playtest, and playing again is my RPG white whale.

‘Fictional Logic’

If we’re going to play a game with a traditional structure, what I want the rules to run on is fictional logic. I don’t want to hear about how much damage the third-level spell “summon lightning bolt” is, and I don’t want “demi-god daughter of Jupiter” to give me a +2 on rolls relating to my lightning powers. I wanna have rules that model lightning powers, and then let me throw lightning at people!

Give me something like Boasts from Wolves Upon the Coast or License Levels from Lancer rather than XP for failing rolls or whatever. Boasts give you a world where a very bro-y, masculine behavior (essentially the Viking equivalent of “YOLO”) is the key to unlocking great combat strength. That’s got really interesting implications on play! Hell, you can give XP for killing monsters as long as you really sit with that one. Why does killing increase your power? Who counts as a monster?

(TODO: does this section need to be expanded)

Is this simulationism?

No?? Uh. Maybe?

Look. GNS^[2] is a fundamentally wrongheaded model for understanding games. It stands in a long tradition of attempting to resolve the contradictory ingredients of D&D (wargaming and science-fiction fandom)^[3] by schematizing out the contrasting ingredients. None of these schemas work very well. I think I’ll rely on Vincent Baker here to say that The Forge was primarily concerned with exploring ‘narrativism’, and “gamist” and “simulationist” are things that Forge games were not.

So what is simulationism? I don’t know, whatever you want it to be. Maybe the only time I’ve ever seen anyone claim the label is The New Simulationism.

Is this blog post simulationism? Is it The New Simulationism, even? Ugh, I don’t know. Some of that stuff sounds good to me but frankly it seems exhausting.

(TODO: does this section need to be cut)