The Continuing Battle Between Creativity and Conformity in Our Society: Observations and Links

(This is in part an answer to Endymion's post in Up on a Tree Stump #4™ (below) and my continued commentary upon the matter.)

RPG Examples abound--and I  limited the contrasting part of my essay to 3E+.  It is also true that a new consumer market was created with the advent of computerized gaming; just as a new consumer market was created with the advent of RPG; and with the spread of Sc-Fi/Fantasy, with a big boost from JRR Tolkien's trilogy to help with the latter.

The coincidence is that all three of these markets just about occurred at once or very close in time to each other.  Fantasy-Fiction>RPG>Computerized versioning of both.  This has lead to different understandings of "what" out of these three are cross-adaptable markets and how to wean these "whats" into existing or merging ones.  But that is matter for another essay I am currently outlining.

What Endymion said...  >...wonder if the reason players today are perhaps reluctant to indulge in free play of the sort you recall is because the presence of technology itself has contributed to a regimented life that discourages initiative< ... is true.  Of course we have the challenge of built in competition at one of its highest levels in the history of American education and business, and so technology is being manipulated to cut avenues for it, time is being squashed due to societal demands, and children are being routed towards goal-driven futures at an extremely fast pace as everyone seems to a lesser of greater extent to be keeping up with the JONES.  Starting with the introductory link in the Boyd/Spolin post I am further summarizing the already known antithesis of play and creativity.  Also note that this embodies in part an over emphasis on competition (now, IMO, a cultural syndrome) as was negatively commented upon by Neva Boyd almost a century ago:

'At the time, public recreation programs in the main stressed formal sports, calisthenics, and competitive activity, which Neva Boyd found to be constricting and sterile.  She believed that the essence of such activity should be social development rather than mere physical exercise.  Consequently in her play programs she stressed the use of games and activities in which the leader and participants engaged both psychologically and physically, which resulted in improved social relationships.  She believed such activities should be valued for their intrinsic good, not for external rewards.  Applying this to her teaching, she noted:

                "The greed for power, the hatred and dishonesty which have become associated with competitive games are not an inherent part of them but have found their why in them through a false sense of values [emphasis mine].  Prizes separate people, pit them against each other, discourage the less able and set the more able apart."

    Miss Boyd believed in goodness and that the love of goodness must be cultivated.  “Social living,” she said, “cannot be maintained on the basis of destructive ideologies – domination, hate, prejudice, greed and dishonesty.  A society cannot hold together without a good way of life for all….Virtues are dynamic products and cannot be taken over fully developed without being continuously developed.'”

The aforementioned, when coupled with many other salient facts as I've previously noted, notes challenges within our society to the very notion that play is important to begin with.  That is why I posted Boyd's theory, then, in posting order, that codified theory in practice as contrasted between two historical versions of D&D, and then Brown's applications which incorporate free-form play in practice in the realm of design.  Within the comparisons derived from OD&D and Brown's POV, we see both stressing open exchange models as paramount and as the very route to abstract expansion, and all of this taking place within a constantly readapting and self-regenerative system.   What we as RP(game) designers are in essence creating are combinations of rules which when transferred from the imaginative play ground of thought to a pencil and paper game, or to other real-time environments, that must be codified to a certain extant to be understood in a base form.  This is what Brown asserts as the "Serious Side."  Beyond that designers run the risk of over-structuring and thus turning the sword back upon the original intent of keeping exploratory paths open in their RPGs.  OD&D/AD&D also asserts this in keeping the rulings open to DMs, in encouraging player/DM inputs and in open and free-form play and creation.

Non-abstract thinking players often see this free form style as hocus pocus.  "I cannot see where the result is derived from." Thus a DM is sometimes viewed as fallible or even unreliable in such games where the reliance is upon absolute rules structure.  Contrast this give-and-take to a playground game where a group of children are playing and adapting as they in turn input to the ongoing real-time design and you may find that there is what I call a missing link somewhere in the transiting stages of growth from child>young-adult>adult.  Also note these links, 1,  2,  3.  We see a growing reliance on the rational mind as compared to the abstract and a diametric shift away from what is wrongly considered "chaotic play" as we grow older and adapt to the rigidity of societal forms; and this leads us back as to why, and which in part we have already noted and answered.  Tim Brown asserts that finite and free-form wholes are not mutually exclusive parts.  He correctly notes them as interdependent due to their use when needed.  Thus when we strip all structure from an RPG we are back to parlor games or the playground.  If we add too much structure we are at the finite board/miniatures game.  OD&D/AD&D creatively bridge finite and free-form concepts, and actually on many levels given the medium, merges them, which is quite a creative achievement if one thinks about it.

A computer game (and thus the contrasting perspective of DM<>Computer as DM, or even by extenuation, RULES as DM) is not often if ever seen as fallible in that regard (even though these are programmed by humans, and thus the overall view is false to assume so, as such fallibility when it exists will not come in the output stage (results from pressing a button or keys, etc) but is still present in the initial data and programming stages, all of which I touch upon in another upcoming essay, "Illusory Ground.").  These are accepted for what they are as they can be no more than what their data allows for.  Thus games which emulate them are what they are and provide a comfortable feeling of sameness and security of understanding.  Computer gaming is in fact similar to shopping methodology:  you can take time, you can PAUSE, you can retrace your steps (SAVE GAME) and you can start over in case of disaster (I LEFT MY WALLET AT HOME), not to mention the inevitable LIST of goodies sought.  During breaks from the computer game, players can plan to overcome its more often static environment which has not changed during that interval (or very little depending on what has been programmed into it, or what has been reduced in the meantime as in online games). Players can numerically figure it all out while retracing their steps many times before then to derive what is for the most part the one correct answer, or even a series of one correct answers.  This in turn corresponds to what is prevalent in our educational systems today (and which is noted in the above links, 1,2,3) and which is stifling creative thinking at that level. Finding correspondences to the above example in OD&D's design and play is difficult, as a DM has the ability to recreate situations on the fly and at a pace far out distancing and out creating what is possible for data dependent computers.  All that must prevail is the willingness on the DM's part to do so and a perceived need to continue working on their creative ranges.

This may have also contributed to an interesting cultural/psychological nuance:  that when consumers of these many computer games find ones that are distasteful they express their distaste more often in terms relating to the named game itself and not often to the company, or to the person(s) who programmed these.  "Ork3 sucks." But when we have a pencil and paper game, or even a board game to a lesser or greater degree, the finger is inevitably pointed at the designer, especially in our niche industry.  What should be important to track at all levels--quality of design and who(m) is manipulating it for consumption--at some point becomes obscured as its dissemination reaches mass market proportions.  I have not found this so in fiction, illustration/art nor with movies, and in these cases there are readily apparent reasons as to why this is not so.  The relevancy of such may lie in the fact that people disposed to mass intake have less demand for satisfactory return on all levels and this too may be a contributory reason for lack of creative need as many people are used to accepting the good alongside the bad and mediocre.  In retrospect, I have always found the American expression, "It wasn't that bad," to be a result of this thinking process; and of course in return to those saying such I always respond:  "I'm sorry..."

Up on A Tree Stump #4: The Value of D&D's Early Creativity, Improvisation and Play

Up on a Tree Stump™

(or) All I Know about D&D™ I Learned From Life

The Value of D&D's Early Creativity, Improvisation and Play

©2010.  Robert J. Kuntz

{An edited first draft extracted from my combined essays}
…
There was an acute difference in game-rules being used in David Arneson's First Fantasy Campaign and in our corresponding Lake Geneva Campaign under the leadership of EGG and myself and their participants. As has been historically noted, each "Campaign" had different rules, those at first initiated by David and his players, then as revised and rewritten by EGG as we play tested the D&D game in its soon to be published form.

Though there is a distinction of how the adjudications evolved in each game group, there is a thread of similarity in both which ties them tightly together:  they both relied on improvisational and creative play.

As there were no rules, but only notes and whatever existed in the minds-eye of each creator (or DM), spontaneous play WAS the course served.

The (role)-play tests evolved to reform the rules as published, and to this day folks may still believe that this was necessarily the form we adhered to during these play tests. To that I will say:  yes and no.  Partial rules were always being implemented and added as the play tests discovered a new set of challenges and areas as yet uncovered, and this lead to a furtherance of the rules as written by EGG to cover these circumstances, until, one might say that he, sitting back, finally said:  "This is enough, this is the core of what we’ve experienced and what is needed for gamers to experience what we just played."

So, what we experienced during the play tests was the growing act of Being and Doing.  The play test was a promotion of ideas that had various forms given to it by the acts themselves that varied inside our group conception of interchange.  This of course continued to free us as the actors and designers within the play; and this, more importantly, allowed for a constant progression of creative and playful nuances to occur.

Let me pose a simplified example of what occurred many times in that manner. Imagine wanting to climb a wall and there are no rules for it, as there were none for accomplishing this in-game task then.  Let’s take a look at how we may have handled that circumstance then during the course of play (the following is a recreation only):

R:  1) "I want to climb the wall."  NOTE:  The need is established here but not the instrument (the rule is not yet understood, and that is in turn understood on the surface by the player, as their PC has no such ability but assumes that he may be able to accomplish the feat notwithstanding).  This may have been couched similarly: 2) "Can I climb the wall?"  Both instances beg the DM's adjudication.  The DM is the arbiter of this event as dictated by the inputs forthcoming in interchange...

G:  1) "How do you accomplish that?” NOTE: or 2) "Yes, you can try." This is the first input field.  This establishes "yes" it is possible, but not HOW, as we have not as yet deduced that from the inputs.

R:  1) “Well, I look for jutting spots on the escarpment to cling to as I climb and I shed my armor. I climb slowly and use the hammer to lodge spikes into the wall to create perches.  I proceed cautiously.  Before ascending I tie the rope about the armor and attach its free end securely about my waist.”

G:  “Okay.  What's your Dexterity?”

R:  “12.”

G:  NOTE:  This is where the DM makes adjustments (+1/-1 to the inputs).  As the escarpment has been described as 80' high and straight up with some protrusions, we now have a base for ascertaining an on the fly ruling.  Here the DM decides to use 2 six-sided dice to ascertain the difficulty range, though in different circumstances in the LG Campaign this choice was easily substituted for different types and numbers of dice to expand or contract the numerical ranges.

+0 for dex
-1 for length of climb (would have been higher if the PC had not noted that they were proceeding slowly and cautiously)
+0 for armor being shed.  This may have been an extremely high minus if it had not been shed

Thus a +1 input on 2 six-sided dice.

G:  “The base is 7 and you need an 8 or better on 2 six-sided dice.”

R:  Rolls:  “9.”

G:  “You make it to the top of the cliff, but your armor is still below, which I imagine you pull up.”

R:  “Yes.”

G:  “That takes a minute--there you go.  Well done.  Give yourself 100 experience points for good planning.”


Note that this probability sequence, once used and re-used, became second nature with us.  In this instancing exchanges occur quickly and deductions become normal in respect to inputs.  This progresses matters for which there are no steadfast rules, or in turn belays the use of books and their referencing, expediting in all cases the action of the event and the participation of the players (both DM and PC) on a primary level.  This creative improvising can be tracked from these first occurrences during play to their printed forms in the DMG’s many tables, but in my opinion, the latter provides an incomplete idea of how we in the LGC conducted such matters and to which EGG never totally adhered.

…The New D&D:  The Lessening of the Play Experience

The built in safety net in the newest RPGs only exemplifies what is already known in that regard: Even if the rigidity of form is adopted, as in numerical expressions and tables and endless charts for myriad events or perceived game driven engagements, even if the players "feel" that there is fair and equitable treatment being proposed, in the end, the DM, however rigid and defined the system may be, can always call upon the fantastic if he or she is unfair or unyielding or selfish, breaking all barriers of pretense with but one summoned monster from the ether which demolishes said party of PCs anyway.  Players may scream in the end about equality of CR levels or what not, but done is done.  In retrospect OD&D assumed a standard of fairness of adjudication as its core principle in DMing the game.  Thus I find that this sacrifice of play in the new D&D—and supposedly in answer to player demand or a perceived design need--has never held water with me; and it appears beneath the surface as a red herring implemented to justify new rules favoring a finite structure that in turn explode PC-dominant positions within the game.

In turn, this new RPG “safety net” creates and sustains a totally manufactured and assumptive way of imagining a player and thus their regulated environment, making sure that they are not over-wounded (disfavored) in the game.  This of course does not present a realistic portrayal of any event driven fiction (role) and its backlash is the need driven participation of the player to succeed time and time again.  When faced with challenges or loss, they can point back at “balance or fairness,” the very things that have in fact been worked out of the game play due to structuring it in this manner. In essence, the apparent reason for this conceptual deletion of value-driven accomplishment is due to marketing and grooming of the play environment to keep players, like in computer games, happy as larks with their perceived rewards and gains.

Now let's take a look at a different way of viewing this from the other end of the telescope.

Immersive play furthers creative thought.  When a player substitutes intuition and creativity for game mechanics only, they are not immersing themselves in a growing experience through which they become better decision makers or strategists.  This very lack summons a ground of clay that makes any stance for learning or achieving beyond a redundant and non-immersive pattern impossible. Such participants instead comfortably root to where and when they will choose to implement powers and repeatable set in stone strategies.  They may reach for dice with the knowledge that they have achieved a numerically advantageous position as they have before them all of the inputs in print to arrive at that calculation, so they are assured in most respects of a positive outcome.  This is like opening a door.  It takes little thought or planning.  It's like eating a bowl of noodles.  Some may dangle, but the fork can rearrange them.  It is in a word boring; but the consequences for those who limit play under such a premise is more than just boring, it's frightening.

If we attempted to construct a specific mechanic for each or any one of our real world actions and/or specify or attach relative times and other values for doing so based upon a multitude of raw and variable inputs, we would soon need a computer to arrive at such extrapolated deductions and also a wave of corresponding experience to make fair assessments in arriving at the derived principles.  That is not possible as we are not the sum of human knowledge and worldly existence, so we must seek comparative improvisation to reach expansiveness in play rather than seeking models with built in limits that bar such creative extrapolation.

The further one closes off their mind to experience, the less they participate and in turn the less value they derive from such experiences.  Only value-added achievements spur growth.  EGG used to welcome players at conventions to test their metal in Greyhawk Castle, especially those who claimed to have higher-leveled and well-appointed PCs. These types who were never challenged to produce efforts equal to gains in their DM's campaign soon found, much to their consternation, that their flimsy "strategies" were nullified in a DM's game where real thinking was involved.  This close-mindedness often, and unfortunately, always goes back to the DM, for it is he or she who sets the examples and difficulties for their players.

A closed, or oftentimes, routed mindset, allows very little expansion for abstract thinking.  The more one sides with a finite approach as opposed to an open-ended play environment the more one will become reliant upon a structure that codifies itself within a box.  This is fine with many game designs as all reach superimposed limits at some point, but when applied as a model on top of an RPG which in its conceptual range is based upon playing out broadly expanding fictional situations and forms, it is anathema and is in contradiction to the inherent honesty of design relating to the matter overall and on sundry understood levels.

Within an open model as OD&D presents, players and DMs can choose what they need and ignore or discard the rest. They may even change what they need from within the selections and even come back to those they did not think worthy at first to re-examine them.  There is always a creative flow at work within the mutable parts. Attempt to do that with closed models and their static forms are always broken if not challenged as their entire event and statistical stream must be re-imagined and re-codified.  Once an RPG loses a model of play oriented expansiveness it, in my estimation, becomes at best “role assumption,” as the PLAY in the most inclusive and creative use of the term is no longer considered important to its titular description.

Thus each game/rules form dictates the mode, the mode dictates the expression, and this as a combined cycle dictates the outcome. Within these there may be variances, such as what to add to any given sequence, but if these particles as a whole are on the front end designed in to perpetuate the ending cycle, then outcomes are assured no matter the available sources for input (re:  as in a computer program). This is true with all devised systems.  OD&D’s system was there to implement and to improvise as one experienced it. This remains its absolute strength to this day.

In summary one might break down the aspects of the D&D game in its initial stage, and then the D&D game in its current stage, thusly:

OD&D 1973 play test and forward: Play grows out of games and play-fiction.  War games>miniature games>parlor games>make believe>story-telling.  Rules mix with play but do not burden them.  Play becomes the focus, to the point where EGG discards major rules as published to concentrate on his home-brew style that we both adopted in the play test version. In bringing the game to consumers this aspect is stressed more than once as a fundamental theory as there is no way to "formally" adjudicate every instance of play as play is seen as forever open-ended. Through AD&D 2nd edition this finds purchase and is on many levels adopted, spurring creative implementation of home-brew rules even in the face of TSR's attempted rules codifications for IP reasons.

3rd Edition onward to present: The game goes through drastic changes producing a new rules structure and eliminating in-house rulings.  The play aspect is foreshortened, being replaced by skills and feats.  The creative aspect of playing and thinking is routed into a statistical mode of balance siding with the players.  The DM's use of rules improvisation is depleted as rules dependency becomes a reality due to overt, formal structuring.  We no longer have open-ended play but what is now a semblance of a computerized flow-chart implemented on the table.  Part miniatures game, part role-playing, but with no real extenuation of imaginative input as this is all deduced up front for the player and the DM.  We now have a formula-based RPG.  ADA has arrived.

Now....

I climb the wall.

Roll your dice...

I succeed.

OK, you're up.  And with your feat of quantum carrying, you did so with your armor on.

Don’t I get experience for negotiating that very deadly obstacle?  It says so here in the book.

Right.  Is 500 enough?...
…

…RJK (Somewhere near Betelgeuse)

The Lake Geneva Campaign: The Ongoing Aspect of PLAY

Here is a letter partial I recently sent to a fan who is transitioning from 3rd Edititon D&D to a more loose AD&D/OD&D play style.  This was recently touched upon at Gene Palmer's excellent blog as well, and my notes here appear as an afterthought.  The real idea as promulgated then was to keep "PLAY" open and moving and not tied to a constant mechanic.  By comparison, one may consider this style as the open mind set expressed and shared among a group of creative children who play together, changing and adapting as they continue interjecting into that endeavor.  Later, they will remember parts of that process and even reincorporate salient parts of those past, shared mechanics and principles, but they will always be seeking to expand upon these self-imposed limits as the search for creative expression continues.

"Hi Johnny,

Fast and loose was the typical game in LG.  The game rules were codified to cover as many circumstances that were common.  As this is a representation of a real world environment, everything cannot be so explained.  That would cover a list of rules which are endless or in turn would limit the same expression if creativity and a flowing probability range was not introduced.

It's all basically inputs which arrive at probabilities.  Plus/Minus until the final influence on the die/dice roll is arrived at.  This is accomplished through taking in what the circumstances are as opposed to what the players are attempting to do within these.  This is then introduced to a curve (Bell curve, for example of a 2 six-sided die roll), which is what EGG and I did in many circumstances where the rules could not define outcomes.  The game is open-ended and mutable.  Some things naturally were seen as doable.  Like hiding.  If you use the base as a thief, then just pare it down by 80% in unusual circumstances or apply other inputs.  Anyone can hide, it is just that thieves are more practiced in it and at instantly accomplishing it over a constant range of application.  In all cases it is specific to the circumstances and is not a general idea which is an abstract applied to a set rule of hiding. Each case will be judged for its variable nuances within the developing situation.

As far as weaponry and classes.  These were included to affect game balance, almost reverse engineered to strike balances between classes, as were the sliding HD system I created for classes in OD&D and thus can be used or ignored at will.  Explain them as you will.

The rules are guides.  The moment you realize this, the realms of possibilities expand as you as a creative implementor of them are outside of the box.  That is how they were designed to be, not set in stone and limited. Fantasy cannot exist within a box, it has no limits, thus it must continue to expand outward, up and away, reaching new levels of extrapolation.   The day this ceases to be so, you are no longer playing an open-ended game of fantasy, but a set-in-stone game with fantasy motifs and elements only, and that is not the game as we designed it back in 1973.

Best Regards.

Rob Kuntz"