The Hollows and Hobgoblins Blog

Tag: Adeptplay

  • Roleplaying Basics, Part One: What Is It, Really?

    Hi everyone! I thought I’d spend the next few posts exploring the fundamentals of roleplaying games (RPGs). Not because I claim any special expertise, but simply because I enjoy thinking and talking about them. I’m also hoping this sparks a conversation, inviting you to share your own thoughts and perspectives.

    Part of my motivation is personal: I’m working to articulate my understanding in my own words, moving away from the specific jargon of a group I was previously involved with (AdeptPlay). This series is part of that process.

    What Roleplaying Isn’t: Storytelling

    First, let’s tackle what in my opinion is a common misconception. Despite what many books and articles suggest, roleplaying is not storytelling, at least not in the conventional sense. I believe framing it that way is misleading.

    Think about traditional storytelling: the storyteller typically arrives with a fully formed narrative – beginning, middle, end, plot points, the works. They then recount this pre-existing story to the audience.

    Roleplaying doesn’t work like that. While a story certainly emerges from a roleplaying session after it’s over, the act of playing isn’t about reciting or playing to a pre-written script.

    Crucially, the quality of the story that emerges after the session often has little correlation with how much fun the participants had during the session. You can have an incredible, engaging time playing, yet the resulting story, viewed objectively, might lack classic story structure or polish. Conversely, you might endure a dull or frustrating session where your contributions felt ignored, but the sequence of events, when looked back upon, coincidentally forms a structurally “good” story.

    Because the process isn’t storytelling, and because the quality of the resulting narrative doesn’t necessarily reflect the quality of the play experience, I find using “storytelling” as the primary lens for understanding RPGs to be unhelpful, even misleading.

    So, What Is Roleplaying? (Focusing on Game-mastered Games)

    Okay, if it’s not storytelling, what is happening during a roleplaying game?

    There’s a vast spectrum of RPGs. One major distinction is between games with a designated Game Master (GM) and those without (often called GM-less games). For this post, I’ll focus on games with a GM, simply because they are very common, though GM-less games are a fascinating topic for another time. (Note: It’s difficult to make sweeping generalizations about GM-less games due to their huge variety.)

    At its core, a GM’d roleplaying session is a conversation. Participants talk about what’s happening within a shared setting.

    For example, in a Star Trek Adventures game, the setting is the familiar sci-fi universe of the Federation, Klingons, Cardassians, Romulans, etc. Concepts like starships, phasers, transporters, and tractor beams are part of the assumed background shared by everyone playing.

    Most participants are Players, each typically controlling one or more specific characters within that setting. One participant is the Game Master (GM).

    Players assume the roles of their characters, describing their actions, words, and sometimes thoughts. They might also ask the GM questions to clarify the situation or environment (“What else do I see in this room?”).

    The Game Master has the power and responsibility to describe the setting, determine how the environment and its inhabitants react to the player characters (PCs), and portray all the other characters in the world, known as Non-Player Characters (NPCs). From a player’s perspective, NPCs are part of the setting managed by the GM.

    The Flow of Play

    The way play proceeds is, the GM presents a context, the players describe how their characters react, and the GM describes the outcome or the world’s response. The conversation flows back and forth between one or more players talking, the GM responding, and the players responding in turn.

    At certain points, most RPGs introduce an element of chance. Players, and sometimes the GM, might roll dice or use another randomizer (like drawing cards). The outcome of this randomization influences what happens next in the shared setting. Did the character succeed at their risky action? Did something unexpected occur? The result is incorporated into the ongoing conversation.

    This cycle—conversation, action, occasional randomization and determination of the outcome, followed by more conversation—repeats until the session reaches an endpoint. This might be due to external factors (like running out of scheduled time) or internal narrative developments (reaching a satisfying conclusion, achieving a goal or failing to). Occasionally, a session might end because players decide they aren’t enjoying the game anymore, which can happen for a myriad of reasons.

    Essential Elements of Gamemastered Roleplaying

    If that describes the process, what are the core components that make it work? Based on the flow described above (and please comment if you think I’ve missed something crucial!), here are what I see as the essential elements:

    Shared Setting: The group agrees to play within a specific fictional world (Middle-earth, the Star Trek universe, World War II, a post-apocalyptic wasteland, etc.) with common background assumptions about how that world works.

    Agreed-Upon Rules (The Game System): The group uses a specific set of rules (Dungeons & Dragons, Star Trek Adventures, Alien RPG, Call of Cthulhu, Apocalypse World, or one of the countless others). This system defines:

    • The distinct powers and responsibilities of the GM and the Players.
    • How characters are created and what they can do.
    • How and when randomization (dice, cards, etc.) is used to resolve uncertainty.
    • The ways characters and the setting can change.
    • Essentially, the game system dictates who gets to say what, when, and with what effect within the flow of play.

    GM Preparation: For most GM’d games, the GM does some preparation beforehand. The extent varies wildly by game system and GM style, but it generally involves creating or selecting fictional elements to drive the action and create conflict. This often includes:

    • Defining specific locations within the setting.
    • Creating NPCs with their own goals and motivations.
    • Establishing what’s at stake or what risks the player characters might face or care about.
    • For instance, if the GM knows the players want to reach a treasure cave on a mountain, they might prep the journey. This could involve creating a forest path, populating it with conflicting NPCs (like a lost baby dragon, goblins wanting to capture it, and its worried mother searching frantically), creating a dynamic context with choices for the players to navigate.

    Scene Framing: Someone (usually, but not always the GM) needs to kick off the action by describing the initial context: where the PCs are, what time it is, and what’s immediately happening. Examples: “You’re walking through the forest under a bright sun when a small dragon crashes through the trees into a clearing ahead.” or “You’re aboard your freighter, the Beowolf, en route to Hypatia Station when you pick up a distress signal.”

    Player Character Embodiment: Players respond to the framed scene by describing what their characters do, think, or say, guided by their character’s established goals, personality, and motivations.

    Active Listening and Building: Participants listen to each other. When a player describes their character’s action, it’s generally accepted as having happened in the shared world unless the rules or the GM intervenes (often by saying something like, “Okay, let’s see if you succeed at that,” and calling for a dice roll). Other players and the GM then react and build upon that contribution.

    GM Adjudication and Setting Response: The GM uses the rules and their prepared material (or improvisation) to describe how the world and NPCs react to the players’ actions. If a player character threatens a goblin, the GM portrays the goblin’s response based on what they know about its nature. If the outcome is uncertain (Just how intimidating was the threat? How tough is the goblin?), the GM might call for a dice roll based on the game’s rules. Similarly, if a character tries to scale a slippery wall, the GM might determine the difficulty and ask for a roll to see if they manage it.

    Player Response and Iteration: Players react to the outcomes and the GM’s descriptions, deciding on their characters’ next actions, continuing the cycle.

    Change and Consequence: As play progresses, the shared imagined world is dynamic. NPCs might change their goals, allegiances, abilities, or leave or die. Player characters can also change – gaining new abilities and powers, gaining or losing resources, changing their motivations, facing injuries and setbacks including death. Locations, organizations, and the overall setting will evolve based on the actions taken.

    Play continues cyclically and iteratively until a natural endpoint is reached for the session.

    Wrapping Up (For Now)
    So, that’s my initial take on describing what basic GM’d roleplaying is, focusing on the process rather than trying to define it by the story it might produce after the fact. I haven’t touched on what makes it good or effective yet – just the mechanics of what happens at the table.

    Over to You!
    What’s your perspective? Did I miss anything crucial in this description? Is there anything you think I’m off the mark on? I’d genuinely love to hear your thoughts in the comments!

  • A Brief Note on Leaving AdeptPlay

    This post will be of little to no interest to anyone who doesn’t know me personally, or who hasn’t interacted with me on Adeptplay or the related Discord server. I’m writing it mainly as an explanation to those friends I’ve made on those venues about why I’ll no longer be participating there. Everyone else should probably keep scrolling.

    So the AdeptPlay website is Ron Edwards’ project. I respect him because he did have a lot of interesting things to say on the subject of roleplaying, and through dialogue with him and other members of the site I did learn a lot, which helped to improve my gameplay and overall enjoyment of roleplaying.

    In the end, though, I had to leave the group behind. Here’s why.

    I found Ron’s writing very difficult to understand in general, not just on the website but in his published games as well. Part of that is my fault, at least initially – I brought assumptions based on earlier play to his writing, and misinterpreted his work because of that; that’s on me, and not the author’s fault.

    But the other 50% of the problem really was (and is) his writing. Once I eventually understood what he was trying to say, it made sense, but was very difficult to get out of the texts alone.

    It seemed like some of the time he spent a lot of effort talking about non-essential things, while giving short shrift to the most critical elements. The text of the game Trollbabe (a great game I have enjoyed, once I understood how to play it) is a good example.

    My theory is, this is at least partly because when he writes (this is also true of his spoken presentations as well) he tends to assume a certain specific framework of premises that no one else does. They might seem obvious to him, or he doesn’t think he needs to mention them because he has talked about them a lot before. Either way, in general this framework of assumptions was not obvious to me or most of the people he was talking to.

    The same was true even with his responses to questions, which were often vague, somewhat weird, and difficult to follow. I speak as someone with two Master’s degrees who’s used to reading technical and often obscure material.

    Now when I took the time to unpack exactly what he had in mind, usually he had something useful and interesting to say at the end of it, but this unpacking involved asking a lot of follow-up questions to figure out just what he meant. That’s fine. We all assume certain things when we try to communicate, or conversation would be impossible. Sometimes there are misunderstandings and we have to ask questions to clear things up. That’s just being human. So far, so good.

    The problem was, Ron started to see my attempts to get an understanding of what he was saying as challenging or hostile attacks against him. So my asking questions with the intent of gaining understanding were perceived as somehow aggressive and unkind.

    Now I know what my intent was. But it’s important in general to objectively assess whether your actions competently convey your intent, and to correct yourself if not.

    So I reviewed what I wrote on the entirety of the website carefully, and except for my very last comment on the site, neither the tone nor the content of anything I wrote could be reasonably construed as aggressive or challenging in a hostile way towards Ron.

    I have tried to see things from Ron’s point of view. Most people who didn’t understand Ron were content to stay silent, for one reason or another, so I did ask more questions than average, which might have given the impression of being aggressive. The normal adult thing to do in that case, if Ron thought that, would be to have a dialogue to clarify intent, but this is not something he tried: he basically gaslighted me and just asserted that I was being hostile, with no discussion. However, objectively speaking, there was nothing in the content of what I wrote on the site that was hostile; my questions were what they putatively appeared to be: I asked many questions because I was really interested in comprehending what he was saying and what his position was. I had no evil, hidden intent or nefarious motives.

    In the end, Ron insisted on interpreting my questions as my attacking him, and there was nothing I could do to disabuse him of this notion. In our last interaction he concluded he was not able to help me and no longer wanted to answer any of my questions, or accept any of my money in future. Any reasonable person who examines the totality of our interactions on the site would be very hard-pressed to find any evidence for these conclusions. Frankly, I find his behavior here childish and silly. But such is life, no one has to interact with anyone they don’t want to on the internet.

    Edwards didn’t ban me from the Adeptplay site, although I guess he might do so now (it doesn’t matter, as I’ll never post on it again, or read it again). I’m choosing to leave it voluntarily. In general the site, and the Discord server, became stressful places to take part in. His treatment of me wasn’t unique (and actually better than what he did to many others); he would often become upset at someone for an innocuous comment, or ban someone immediately for an imagined transgression. It became very difficult to predict what would set Ron off. So every time I would write something, I had to wonder whether it was somehow the wrong thing and would get me banned. And this is coming from me, someone who (as Ron knows) actively promoted and encouraged others to check out his work.

    Upon leaving the Discord, I immediately felt a sense of relief and relaxation. It surprises me to realize the amount of stress of “not wanting to upset Ron” I was unconsciously carrying around with me. I feel considerably happier already.

    I wish everyone else participating at Adeptplay well, in their gaming and other creative endeavors. Hopefully they will be able to safely tiptoe around that venue without somehow offending Ron. For me though, Ron’s volatility, combined with his paranoid tendency to think I was attacking him, made it too uncomfortable a place to be. My time is better spent in other activities than in vainly trying to persuade someone that I’m not an evil bastard out to get them.

    I look forward to continuing to discuss games with anyone interested, on this blog or in other venues. No person is an island, and we need to keep talking to and working with each other to achieve worthwhile things.

    Edit: So as I was discussing this situation with a friend, he raised the following thoughts: 

    “I hate to say it, but it sounds like you were taken in by a narcissist. The behavior you describe sounds typical, including the explosions over minor comments or criticisms, or in your case just asking questions. Was everything in this group you were in about how his theories are unique and better than anything else out there? Was he like a guru whose wisdom could not be questioned? 

    “It sounds a bit like a cult, to be honest. Let me guess: was there a unique vocabulary, or special code words that no outsider would understand? Special ‘wisdom’ that was only available to those inside the group? Would they laugh and demean others outside it, considering themselves superior? Initial friendliness to recruit, followed by strict rules afterward? There you go – us vs. them mentality, authoritarian leadership, emotional abuse, etc.

    “Sometimes narcissistic cult leaders will make vague, cryptic statements to make themselves look profound, but when you dig into it there isn’t much there. That’s why they can get upset over innocent questions – they don’t want to be understood, at least not fully, because it would show they’re a fraud, or just not that special. And also they just don’t want to put in the work – they’d rather sit back and be worshipped for their profundity.

    “And forget about trying to dialogue with someone like that – everything will always come back to you being the problem and your being deficient in some way. They will never apologize. Be thankful you got out when you did.”

    This hit me like a splash of cold water in the face; I’ve had issues with narcissists before, but I simply hadn’t considered this could be what was going on. Whether my friend’s assessment is entirely accurate I don’t know, but clearly I’ll have to think deeply about this for some time. 

    Edit 2: Interestingly, shortly after I got that feedback, my sister (who knew nothing about the situation or anyone involved) contacted me to say she had a dream where I was taken in by a pig, that pretended to be nice and would be a valued member on the farm, but then killed and ate me when my back was turned. I am taking this as confirmation that my friend was correct.

    What a world…