thread: 2006-10-02 : Conflict resolution sans stakes
On 2006-10-03, Sydney Freedberg wrote:
To drag back off the tangents about character death and deprotagonization and other well-beaten dead horses:
Vincent: You roll dice ...to find out which movie you're playing
YES!
I'd go further, because you get to make decisions about your dice rolls: decisions about what you're going to risk, about when, and, once those dice have rolled and the fortune is in the middle, about whether you're going to accept the consequences or risk something else to undo them. If those are real, non-obvious decisions—dilemmas, which as I've said elsewhere are the sine qua non of both Gamist and Narrativist play - then most of your energy in play is going to be about those decisions. And those decisions, and how your fellow players react to them, are what really tells you who your character really is—not any static "character concept" you came up with before play began.
I think this idea terrifies a lot of people, who prefer the character concept they came up with to be involate and simply want the play around the table to confirm that character. Which is actually a fine, socially sound, artistically legitimate way to play. I specifically think it's a major sub-category of "the Right to Dream" (aka "simulationism," ugly word though that is): Let's all share our imaginations and validate each other.
A smaller group of people aren't so frightened but are afraid of "deprotagonization," because they confuse "you're not allowed to play your character as you've envisioned him or her" with "you're allowed allow to play your character." But in fact, you are making decisions for your character, you do have options: It's just that none of options is "you are pretty much the person you thought you were before you were tested in this fire."
So I'd say:
You roll dice to find out which character you are really playing.
Or even, since the character's not real:
You play to find out who you are.
