thread: 2006-03-08 : Between-session Activity
On 2006-03-08, Neel wrote:
I guess I have to disagree with you, Vincent, for the first time in a few months. :)
Of course "that stuff" is play. A PBEM or wiki game is play, right? And a tabletop game is play, right? When you put the two together, both are still play. And when you specialize the type of play in each medium to what the medium supports better, both are still play.
Consider the example of a group that sets up a wiki, and then the players all add stuff to it doing all the world-buildy stuff that works better online than it does at the table due to persistence and hyperlinking, and then at the tabletop they use that stuff as the setting for their game. The between session stuff is real, actual, honest-to-god, worthwhile play.
The problem isn't that stuff that happens away from the table isn't real play—it's when the stuff that happens away from the gaming table is not collaborative. The GM carefully working out secrets the players will never see is engaging in play; he's just not collaborating or interacting with the other players. When that stuff degrades the quality of the cooperation, then it's harmful, and otherwise it's irrelevant to the group.
This makes JCL go "I agree"
Suppose you roll the dice, then interpret them. When you do it at the table, there's a very short feedback time. Same way with spending a point of a resource while at the table, or describing something in the fiction while at the table. No one would think of calling it Not Play Between-seesion activity is the same thing, just with a longer time before getting feedback from the other players. That makes it play. It just has a lot of pitfalls at-the-table play doesn't have.
This makes CS go "Me too"
