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    46 Author 	Topic: GNS and "Congruency"  (Read 2443 times)

    47 

    48 *Walt Freitag

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    59 *GNS and "Congruency"

    60 <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=1733.msg16477#msg16477>*

    61 « * on:* March 30, 2002, 08:42:29 AM »

    62 	

    63 

    64 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

    65 GNS and "Congruency"

    66 

    67 This idea was inspired by all the recent GNS discussion using examples

    68 of individual game decisions that are ambiguous in terms of revealing

    69 the GNS decision-making preferences of the participants who made them.

    70 Instead of regarding this common situation as merely an inconvenience

    71 for GNS analysis, I believe it could be a phenomenon useful to focus

    72 some attention on in its own right.

    73 

    74 Quote from: Mike Holmes

    75 Just as a point of clarification (which may, ironically, confuse the

    76 issue some), quite often the same decision can be made for different

    77 reasons. I know I point this out all the time, but it is important here.

    78 It is one of the reasons that it is hard to determine the nature of a

    79 decision by observation. Quite often through coincidence the same

    80 decision could have been motivated by more than one of the three

    81 motives. Not always, sometimes it's very obvious. But quite often.

    82 

    83 

    84 Such observations in recent threads have been particularly helpful in

    85 developing this concept, which I?ve chosen to term *congruency.*

    86 

    87 Definition and Usage:

    88 

    89 A *congruent* decision is a decision made by a participant (GM or

    90 player) during play that cannot, on the basis of the visible behavior

    91 resulting from the decision, be categorized as belonging to a specific

    92 mode of decision-making enumerated by the underlying model. In the

    93 context of the GNS model there are exactly four possible congruencies,

    94 representing the four combinations of two or more modes for which a

    95 decision may be ambiguous.

    96 

    97 This definition refers only to visible behavior, not underlying motive

    98 or any other unknowable quality. Thus, such questions as whether or not

    99 every individual decision "really is" purely G, N, or S in nature, or

   100 whether it can be "43% this, 57% that," are irrelevant for purposes of

   101 discussing congruency.

   102 

   103 To specify a particular congruency, we could say that a decision is

   104 "congruent with respect to" or simply "congruent with" any two (or all

   105 three) modes. For shorthand we might use (and I will use) e.g. "S-N

   106 congruent" for "congruent with respect to Simulationism and

   107 Narrativism." Congruency is reflexive; there is no distinction between

   108 e.g. "G-S congruency" and "S-G congruency." However, for a further

   109 shorthand, when speaking in the context of discussion of one of the

   110 three modes, it should be OK to say that a decision is e.g. "S

   111 congruent" meaning congruent between the mode specified (in this case,

   112 S) and the mode under discussion.

   113 

   114 Keep in mind, however, that even when speaking of congruency between two

   115 specific modes, the third mode cannot be completely disregarded. For

   116 example, a decision that is unambiguously Gamist is *not* S-N congruent.

   117 To be S-N congruent, the decision has to be either unambiguously /not/

   118 Gamist, or ambiguous with respect to Gamism (in which case it could be

   119 G-S-N congruent, which also counts as S-N congruent).

   120 

   121 A congruent decision, by definition, does not influence the long-term

   122 judgment of whether the participant?s overall pattern of decision-making

   123 falls into one or the other of the modes with which the decision is

   124 congruent.

   125 

   126 By analogy with the GNS modes themselves, we could also describe a

   127 system or practice as congruent (or more specifically, as e.g. G-S

   128 congruent) as a verbal shorthand meaning that that system or practice

   129 promotes or rewards decision-making by participants that is congruent in

   130 the way specified. This purely definitional and is not meant to assume

   131 that such systems or practices exist.

   132 

   133 Incongruency

   134 

   135 The opposite of congruency can only be termed incongruency, which sounds

   136 like a bad thing but, in and of itself, isn?t. An incongruent decision

   137 is nothing more or less than a decision whose visible expression

   138 provides evidence that the decision-maker?s pattern of decisions

   139 conforms to a specific one of the three GNS modes. (It doesn?t have to

   140 be conclusive evidence. If a player were to make a series of incongruent

   141 decisions, some clearly simulationist and others clearly narrativist, we

   142 might be unable to characterize his overall pattern of decision-making,

   143 but each individual decision would provide some evidence in favor of one

   144 or the other possibility.)

   145 

   146 In practice, incongruent decisions appear usually to be ones where an

   147 observer can tell that there were other options open to the player

   148 which, if chosen, would have advanced different GNS goals than the

   149 choice the player actually made. Thus, what makes a decision incongruent

   150 (or congruent) is not just the decision itself, but also the

   151 circumstances (especially, other choices that were available) under

   152 which the decision is made. For that reason, it?s acceptable and

   153 understandable to describe a decision situation in which the decision

   154 has not yet been made as congruent or incongruent, as long as it?s

   155 understood that this is a loose usage that really means "likely to

   156 result in a congruent/incongruent decision."

   157 

   158 Congruency versus Coherency

   159 

   160 Congruency and coherency are not the same thing, though they are

   161 related. Definitionally they exist on different levels: coherency is an

   162 emergent quality that applies to an entire system, group, or large unit

   163 of actual game play, while congruency applies to individual decisions.

   164 Nonetheless, in the application of theory, the concept of

   165 coherency/incoherency "reaches down" into the realm of individual game

   166 mechanisms or practices, while the concept of congruency/incongruency

   167 "reaches up" into patterns of decision-making and the in-game situations

   168 in which they occur. It?s likely they?re going to meet and coexist

   169 somewhere in the middle.

   170 

   171 Examples of poor play resulting from an incoherent system, and examples

   172 of excellent play in a coherent system, all seem to begin with a player

   173 making an incongruent decision. In the former case, the decision

   174 conflicts with the goals of other participants, representing

   175 dysfunction. In the latter case, all the participants have compatible

   176 goals so there is no dysfunction. In fact, the others generally take

   177 pleasure in the fact that the decision-maker made a choice that advances

   178 everyone?s goals even though other choices were available.

   179 

   180 A useful concept?

   181 

   182 If congruency is outside the control of system designers or game

   183 participants, then it is a useless concept.

   184 

   185 If congruency cannot be altered independently of coherency, then it is

   186 functionally equivalent to coherency and therefore useless as a separate

   187 concept.

   188 

   189 I believe that neither of these is the case. I believe that certain

   190 techniques and design considerations bear directly upon congruency, and

   191 that they are useful in two ways:

   192 

   193 1. To attenuate the dysfunction caused by an incoherent system or a

   194 group of participants with incoherent goals, by reducing the occurrence

   195 of incongruency during play.

   196 

   197 2. To adjust the level of metagame or other forms of self-conscious

   198 decision-making in coherent play, in either direction, by controlling

   199 the occurrence of incongruency during play.

   200 

   201 I further hypothesize that various forms (and especially, the most

   202 successfully functional forms) of vanilla play, abashed play, and drift

   203 will prove to be characterized by rules and practices promoting congruency.

   204 

   205 The interesting questions, I believe, are whether there are other

   206 techniques to be discovered, or if the known techniques can be applied

   207 in new ways such as embodying them in system designs.

   208 

   209 Example 1: OOC knowledge and G-S congruency

   210 

   211 A GM running a fantasy game plays out an encounter with vampires. A

   212 player-character recognizes the obvious vampiric demeanor of the

   213 vampires, and immediately acts upon the strategy of fleeing until

   214 sunrise, then finding the vampires? coffins and staking them. The GM is

   215 displeased because he believes that the player-characters, being from

   216 outside the European-style portion of the world in which the vampires

   217 exist, should not be able to recognize the vampires for what they are,

   218 let alone already know the best way to destroy them.

   219 

   220 Clearly there are GNS coherency problems at work here. Why does the GM

   221 not want the player-character to act on OOC knowledge? Because he

   222 believes that the goal of play is to create verisimilitude, and besides,

   223 the vampires were supposed to be difficult opponents that would hook the

   224 players into exploration of a really cool storyline. Why does the player

   225 want to act on OOC knowledge? Because the game system rewards him for

   226 dispatching enemies in the most effective possible way with the least risk.

   227 

   228 But even though the specific problem stems from lack of coherency, it

   229 could be solved on the level of congruency. If the vampires in the

   230 encounter have to be straight out of Hollywood, then the GM can easily

   231 make sure the player-characters are aware of the same vampire legends

   232 the players know. (He would also allow for that knowledge when designing

   233 the difficulty of the encounter.) Then, the player?s decision to try to

   234 stake the vampires would be a completely G-S congruent one. Or, if the

   235 GM doesn?t want the characters to know anything about the enemy, then he

   236 should invent a new creature with different habits and weaknesses than a

   237 standard vampire. The players will try their best to figure out how to

   238 survive and destroy the enemy, just as their characters would do in that

   239 situation, so again, their decisions will be G-S congruent.

   240 

   241 Note that neither of these solutions, for better or worse, affects the

   242 underlying GNS issue. The GM still has Simulationist expectations, and

   243 the player is still chasing those Gamist rewards. But the specific

   244 instance of dysfunction that was making the participants unhappy has

   245 been averted.

   246 

   247 This is only one example of dozens if not hundreds of known practices

   248 and system rules that appear to bear directly on G-S congruency. Many of

   249 these, as in the example, take the form of "don?t-do" constraints,

   250 suggesting that congruency does come at a cost in design freedom. A GM

   251 who wants G-S congruency, and wants Hollywood vampires, and wants the

   252 player-characters to not already know how to kill said vampires, is just

   253 SOL.

   254 

   255 S-N congruency

   256 

   257 As Mike Holmes pointed out in the same post the quote above was taken

   258 from, a player acting entirely on narrativist motivations would still

   259 make decisions compatible with "what the character would do" much of the

   260 time, because a good story has to be plausible. In other words many

   261 non-Gamist decisions are S-N congruent.

   262 

   263 What we should be interested in are the exceptions. When does S-N

   264 incongruency arise?

   265 

   266 - When a participant makes a decision that is consistent with

   267 verisimilitude but detracts from the story (deprotagonization).

   268 - When a participant makes a decision that is consistent with the

   269 creation of Story or exploration of Premise, but detracts from

   270 verisimilitude in some way. It might do so by being inconsistent with

   271 the character, or by invoking an explicitly metagame mechanism.

   272 

   273 Note that opting not to make use of an available Narrativist-oriented

   274 metagame mechanism is not proof that a simulationist decision was made,

   275 as long as the option chosen instead was also consistent with the goal

   276 of creating story, so such a decision is not usually S-N incongruent.

   277 However, use of a metagame mechanism is almost always S-N incongruent.

   278 

   279 This immediately suggests that a dichotomy of taste could arise, between

   280 those who prefer the self-conscious decision making of Narrativist

   281 metagame mechanisms and those who prefer to create story within the

   282 constraints of S-N congruency. I believe this dichotomy is already known

   283 in practice as the distinction between vanilla and explicit Narrativism.

   284 While there is a continuum between them, the distribution of preferences

   285 along that continuum appears to be bimodal, and taking the concept of

   286 congruency into account explains why. This also explains why so many

   287 examples of vanilla Narrativism are difficult to distinguish from

   288 Simulationism. Quite simply, the practitioners want it that way.

   289 

   290 Besides metagame mechanics, other elements that could increase or

   291 decrease the prevalence of S-N congruity in a game include character

   292 design (traditional heroes will face fewer potentially S-N incongruent

   293 decisions than anti-heroes or more complex characters), choice of

   294 Premise, and the degree of realism in a setting. Attempts to portray

   295 settings that "simulate the world of movies instead of the real world"

   296 can be characterized as attempts to foster S-N congruency (though how

   297 successfully they accomplish it is unclear).

   298 

   299 Example 2: S-N congruency and Illusionism

   300 

   301 A now-wiser but still self-confident neonate Vampire leads her

   302 companions into the betrayer?s lair for the inevitable confrontation

   303 that both sides hope will be final. Oops, the enemy just make a

   304 spectacular success roll with the Possession discipline. Looks like our

   305 vengeful vampess is going to be working for the opposition for the rest

   306 of the scene. How deprotagonizing, especially since the major Premise

   307 happens to be about the nature of loyalty.

   308 

   309 The GM faces a decision that clearly has potential to be S-N

   310 incongruent: apply the effects of the roll, or fudge the roll to reduce

   311 the enemy?s success to an intermediate result that will play into the

   312 Premise rather than override it. If he chooses to let the roll stand,

   313 it?s clearly an S-N incongruent Simulationist decision. If he lies about

   314 the results of the roll, it?s clearly an S-N incongruent Narrativist

   315 decision. Or is it? Let?s look again at the definition of congruency:

   316 "?the /visible/ behavior resulting from..." An omniscient observer can

   317 clearly see the decision?s incongruency, as can the GM himself. But the

   318 GM isn?t telling, and there are no omniscient observers on the scene. As

   319 far as the players are concerned, no incongruency has occurred. Since

   320 congruency is based on visible behavior, there is no difference between

   321 the effective illusion of congruency and congruency itself.

   322 

   323 Thus, I believe, the concept of congruency gives us a framework for

   324 understanding illusionism in a straightforward way that is free of

   325 speculation about motivation. Other forms of illusionism appear to be

   326 similarly associated with other applications of congruency.

   327 

   328 G-N congruency?

   329 

   330 I think this occurs, but perhaps only in limited circumstances, such as,

   331 for example, when the Premise is about risk or fortune or fate. It?s

   332 certainly possible to create excellent Story with deep Premise about a

   333 group of people who go out and hunt a big powerful monster to take its

   334 treasure (ask the hundreds of Herman Melville buffs who live in my

   335 town), and under such circumstances, at least, the possibility of

   336 promoting G-N congruency appears promising. The actual techniques would

   337 probably be similar to those of S-G congruency (including illusionism)

   338 in many cases, with more severe constraints.

   339 

   340 It also appears that competitive storytelling games can be G-N

   341 congruent, through an entirely different approach.

   342 

   343 As for G-N-S congruency, it would have to incorporate G-N congruency as

   344 a start. It is certainly possible for an individual decision to be G-N-S

   345 congruent. But as for attempting to maintain such congruency

   346 consistently in a real game, my suspicion is that it?s theoretically

   347 possible, but the necessary constraints would be so severe that it would

   348 rarely be worth it.

   349 

   350 ----------

   351 

   352 That?s as far as I?ve got. I believe congruency could be a useful

   353 concept, not because it says very much that?s new, but because it gives

   354 us new language to use in applying the GNS model to real-world issues of

   355 coherency, drift, and taste. This could also help in the understanding

   356 and acceptance of the GNS model, because it addresses in a

   357 GNS-consistent way many of those in-between cases and tricky examples

   358 that people keep offering up as challenges to the validity of GNS.

   359 

   360 One more note: even as I?ve been writing this, others have been adding

   361 posts that are getting at the same idea. Just a few minutes ago

   362 Mytholder posted:

   363 

   364 Quote

   365 I'm well aware decisions are key here. I know a dramatist can make Sim

   366 decisions. I just don't think the majority of a players' decisions are

   367 "significant" in terms of GNS. It really doesn't matter if I chose to

   368 eat in that inn to ensure I don't suffer from fatigue-related

   369 penalities, or because it's a logical thing to do in terms of the

   370 simulation, or because I'm deliberately providing a plot opening for the

   371 GM. All three play styles are fully compatible with the action. It's

   372 only when the play styles are IN CONFLICT that GNS comes into it.

   373 

   374 

   375 Congruency gives us a more rigorous definition of "significant in terms

   376 of GNS," and also finds a way to apply GNS to the remaining "ground" (in

   377 the figure-vs.-ground sense) of decision, by specifying which modes

   378 those decisions are congruent with.

   379 

   380 - Walt

   381 	Logged

   382 

   383 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   384 Wandering in the diasporosphere

   385 

   386 *Laurel <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;u=216>*

   387 Member

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   396 <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=1733.msg16529#msg16529>

   397 *GNS and "Congruency"

   398 <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=1733.msg16529#msg16529>*

   399 « *Reply #1 on:* April 01, 2002, 09:11:25 AM »

   400 	

   401 

   402 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   403 While the idea of adding more jargon to an already jargon-heavy body of

   404 communication personally fills me with dismay, I can't argue with your

   405 logic Walt and I agree that this would be useful to do in this instance.

   406   What you are posting makes sense to me.  

   407 

   408 Laurel

   409 	Logged

   410 

   411 *Ron Edwards

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   413 Global Moderator

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   424 *GNS and "Congruency"

   425 <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=1733.msg17506#msg17506>*

   426 « *Reply #2 on:* April 10, 2002, 08:19:14 AM »

   427 	

   428 

   429 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   430 Hi Walt,

   431 

   432 I finally, finally managed to get to this thread. I think you've posted

   433 something well worth attention. I'll begin by saying that in all

   434 practical, observational points, I agree in full.

   435 

   436 The real question, as you know, is as you stated: /If congruency cannot

   437 be altered independently of coherency, then it is functionally

   438 equivalent to coherency and therefore useless as a separate concept./

   439 

   440 My own take on the matter is that I have been, all along, thinking of

   441 Coherence in such a way that it includes your concept of Congruency.

   442 It's still pretty hard for me to separate them, for a couple of reasons.

   443 

   444 1) I have tried to stress that compatibility of goals, in practice, is

   445 the defining feature of Coherence. The fact that goals are most

   446 compatible when they are similar-to-identical, as well as the fact that

   447 I tend to prefer such play situations personally, are not relevant; any

   448 compatible mix of different goals ("convergence?") is Coherent too.

   449 

   450 2) I tend to include the entire spectrum from "atomic" GNS decision, to

   451 "molecular" GNS activity (observable), to "substance" GNS profile (very

   452 observable), all the way to "group" or "object" GNS profile when I

   453 discuss these things. Or more accurately, I tend to encourage discussion

   454 at the upper end and let the lower/finer end take care of itself. (I'm

   455 working on some material to clarify this issue, to myself as well as to

   456 anyone who's interested. I'll be posting that when it's done.)

   457 

   458 Now the real question is whether my own ease of combining techniques

   459 with outcomes in #1, as well as my inclination to discuss mainly the

   460 upper-end (observable, functional) of the spectrum in #2, have been

   461 causing problems in discussion. If so, then Congruency as a concept

   462 would be the perfect solution.

   463 

   464 What I need to nail down is, if we use Congruency as you've defined it,

   465 what need is there for Coherence, as a term? I'm kind of chewing it

   466 over, personally, not goin' one way or another. Can you clarify that for

   467 me, or provide more examples of how the two terms might interrelate in

   468 practice?

   469 

   470 Best,

   471 Ron

   472 	Logged

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   485 *GNS and "Congruency"

   486 <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=1733.msg17510#msg17510>*

   487 « *Reply #3 on:* April 10, 2002, 08:40:55 AM »

   488 	

   489 

   490 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   491 Quote from: Ron Edwards

   492 

   493 2) I tend to include the entire spectrum from "atomic" GNS decision, to

   494 "molecular" GNS activity (observable), to "substance" GNS profile (very

   495 observable), all the way to "group" or "object" GNS profile when I

   496 discuss these things. Or more accurately, I tend to encourage discussion

   497 at the upper end and let the lower/finer end take care of itself. (I'm

   498 working on some material to clarify this issue, to myself as well as to

   499 anyone who's interested. I'll be posting that when it's done.)

   500 

   501 Now the real question is whether my own ease of combining techniques

   502 with outcomes in #1, as well as my inclination to discuss mainly the

   503 upper-end (observable, functional) of the spectrum in #2, have been

   504 causing problems in discussion. If so, then Congruency as a concept

   505 would be the perfect solution.

   506 

   507 

   508 Speaking for myself I think, you've hit on the source of the problem I

   509 had for a long time.  You understood that GNS was formulated on the

   510 atomic level, and could freely translate the concepts up to the

   511 "molecular" and "subtance level".  But for me (and I suspect based on my

   512 own observations, many of us) I didn't see the translation going on and

   513 thought that GNS was formulated at the "substance" level...which in turn

   514 led me skim over and pay less attention to those times when you brought

   515 up "decisions".

   516 

   517 Mytholder and I had a very extended thread which basically boiled down

   518 what Walt skillfully summarized as Congruency.  If we'd had the

   519 vocabulary of Congruency at the time of the thread as it relates to GNS,

   520 we probably could have spent less time circling each other, and more

   521 time moveing the thread forward.

   522 

   523 Quote

   524 

   525 What I need to nail down is, if we use Congruency as you've defined it,

   526 what need is there for Coherence, as a term? I'm kind of chewing it

   527 over, personally, not goin' one way or another. Can you clarify that for

   528 me, or provide more examples of how the two terms might interrelate in

   529 practice?

   530 

   531 

   532 

   533 The way I see it from Walt's description is that they operate at

   534 different scales.

   535 

   536 Congruence, as he's defined it, is strictly an atomic level phenomenon.

   537  It allows us to identify Incongruent decisions that can be identified

   538 as occupying a GNS decision from the congruent decisions that could be

   539 more than one position and which can't be determined.  This is what

   540 Mytholder was calling "significant" and we were representing as blanks

   541 in the decision maps we were drawing (the blanks being congruent and the

   542 non blanks being incongruent...of course, in Walts model we'd need to

   543 use something other than blanks to represent the 4 different types of

   544 congruency).

   545 

   546 Coherency on the other hand looks at the pattern of incongruent

   547 decisions over the period of the game.  If the pattern of Incongruent

   548 decisions is dominantly one position, N----N----N--N, for instance, then

   549 the game is N Coherent.  If the pattern of Incongruent decisions is a

   550 mix of GNS positions, N---G----N----S---S---S---G, for instance, then

   551 the game is Incoherent.

   552 

   553 Whether an Incoherent game is dysfunctional or a functional hybrid would

   554 need to be determined using other tools.

   555 

   556 Needless to say, I'm a BIG fan of this method of analysing GNS.  Walt

   557 managed to summarize alot of concepts I was batting around with

   558 Mytholder very succinctly.

   559 	Logged

   560 

   561 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   562 Ralph Mazza

   563 Universalis:  The Game of Unlimited Stories

   564 <http://www.ramshead.indie-rpgs.com>

   565 

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   578 *GNS and "Congruency"

   579 <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=1733.msg17523#msg17523>*

   580 « *Reply #4 on:* April 10, 2002, 10:10:50 AM »

   581 	

   582 

   583 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   584 Hey, wait.

   585 

   586 Isn't coherency at the game-text level, I mean at the V:tM or Sorcerer

   587 or Smurfs: the Smurfing level, and doesn't it mean that all the game's

   588 rules plus its hype work together well to drive the game?

   589 

   590 Like an N-coherent game is one where you can make consistently N

   591 decisions without having to compromise with the rules, right?  The game

   592 supports you in your consistently N decision-making.

   593 

   594 If so, congruency and coherency aren't that closely related at all.  I

   595 think congruency is more related to (but opposite to) 'perviness,' as in

   596 "I'm a pervy Narrativist."  

   597 

   598 A highly congruent N-S game is one that supports decisions that might be

   599 N, might be S.  Sorcerer, I'd say as an example, and having never played

   600 it, is more congruent than The World, the Flesh, and the Devil, because

   601 it's damn hard to make a (game-rule significant) decision in the WF&D

   602 that /isn't/ Narrativist.  Sorcerer on the other hand has all kinds of

   603 support for Sim decisions, like stats with numbers and things.  Yes you

   604 can/must/will use them to drive a story, but any given Lore roll (again

   605 just talking out my butt) might be Sim instead, hard to say.  I fail my

   606 Lore roll -- is what happens because it makes for a good story, or

   607 because it's consistent with the world-sim?  Who knows?  Hence: congruent.

   608 

   609 ('Pervy' is kind of the opposite of 'vanilla,' right?  Which would make

   610 'highly congruent' and 'vanilla' into cousins, which sounds right to me.)

   611 

   612 -Vincent

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   627 *GNS and "Congruency"

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   629 « *Reply #5 on:* April 10, 2002, 10:40:43 AM »

   630 	

   631 

   632 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   633 Sorry about this, but here's what I mean.

   634 

   635 A coherent, incongruent ('pervy') game like the WF&D looks like this:

   636 

   637 N--N-NNNN-N--N-NN-N-

   638 

   639 A coherent, congruent ('vanilla'?) game like Sorcerer (I speculate)

   640 looks like this:

   641 

   642 N----N--N---N---N----N

   643 

   644 An incoherent, congruent game looks like this:

   645 

   646 ------N--S-GG---N----

   647 

   648 And an incoherent, incongruent game looks like this:

   649 

   650 G-NNS--GGS-SN--G-NNS

   651 

   652 Where - is a decision that an observer can't tell by looking at it alone

   653 whether it's S, G, or N.

   654 

   655 Oh and which, rereading it, is almost exactly what you said, Valamir.

   656 

   657 -Vincent

   658 	Logged

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   660 *Ron Edwards

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   673 *GNS and "Congruency"

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   675 « *Reply #6 on:* April 10, 2002, 12:01:15 PM »

   676 	

   677 

   678 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   679 Hi Vincent,

   680 

   681 Coherence, like nearly all the terms in the essay except for

   682 system-tools, refers to play. Just like "Gamist RPG" refers to "game

   683 whose rules facilitate Gamist play," "coherent RPG design" refers to

   684 "game whose rules facilitate coherent play."

   685 

   686 From the essay: /By "coherence," I mean the degree to which a group of

   687 people can hit upon and sustain a shared Premise ... - and by

   688 definition, continue to enjoy the social role-playing activity

   689 consistently./

   690 

   691 It so happens that I claim, in practice, that GNS-focused game designs

   692 are more reliably coherent, but that's not a definition.

   693 

   694 So if I'm not mistaken, coherence exists as an end-product - the point

   695 is whether Congruency exists as a means to it that can be identified in

   696 some useful way or level, or whether it's a grab-bag,

   697 possibly-unnecessary synonym for "play which facilitates Coherence."

   698 

   699 I agree that techniques for that kind of play, which successfully

   700 resolve potential incompatibilities among (a) within-mode differences (N

   701 vs. N'), or (b) among-mode differences (G vs. N vs. S), deserve a lot of

   702 attention. But do they deserve any name but Coherence-preserving or

   703 Coherence-creating techniques? Considering that that's what they

   704 actually do?

   705 

   706 Just to be clear, I'm not trying to scrub out Walt's suggestion

   707 regarding the term Congruence. I want to dissect out the topic with

   708 great care, because it's important.

   709 

   710 The most important thing, of course, is what it seems we all agree on:

   711 that the level of GNS application between one person's decision and

   712 successful group play does need to be brought more into the light, both

   713 in the essay and during discussions.

   714 

   715 Best,

   716 Ron

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   731 *GNS and "Congruency"

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   733 « *Reply #7 on:* April 10, 2002, 12:21:54 PM »

   734 	

   735 

   736 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   737 Um, I'm having problems with the terms selected. Congruent means

   738 something like "Similar to" or parallel. Having some qualities in

   739 common. While Incongruent means the opposite. Having dissimilarities.

   740 

   741 So did I misread the definitions above, or are these terms being used in

   742 a really odd fashion? This seems totally counterintuitive to me.

   743 

   744 Wouldn't it be congruent = behavior that adheres to one GNS style, and

   745 Incongruent = behavior that does not adhere to a single style?

   746 

   747 If this is the case then I can see using congruency to say something

   748 like "the players' deisions being congruent with Gamism led to a

   749 coherently Gamist experience." In this case indicating the atomic level

   750 discussion of behavior as it relates to an entire game experience (a

   751 "molecular" level event). As Ralph and others have intimated it might be

   752 used.

   753 

   754 Or am I just confused?

   755 

   756 Mike

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   774 *GNS and "Congruency"

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   776 « *Reply #8 on:* April 10, 2002, 12:22:15 PM »

   777 	

   778 

   779 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   780 At this point I'm seeing them as 2 completely seperate ideas trying to

   781 define 2 seperate (but related) concepts.

   782 

   783 Whether an individual decision is Congruent or Incongruent does not tell

   784 you whether the resulting game with be Coherent or Incoherent, therefor

   785 I don't think we can see Congruency as being "Coherent Preserving" or not.

   786 

   787 That said, I think the very definition of Coherency needs to be

   788 tightened up.  For instance in the part of your essay you quote above

   789 you say "By 'coherence,' I mean the degree to which a group of people

   790 can hit upon and sustain a shared Premise ... - and by definition,

   791 continue to enjoy the social role-playing activity consistently"

   792 

   793 There are two weakness with this definition I see.

   794 

   795 First, the last part very strongly implies that a game needs to be

   796 coherent in order for players to enjoy the activity consistently.  This

   797 is at odds with the comments you made in another thread of mine

   798 regarding Coherency, where you acknowledge the potential for Functional

   799 Hybrids.  

   800 

   801 Second, I have difficulty with tieing the concept of Coherency back to

   802 Premise.  One reason is that there are several different types of

   803 Premise discussed in the essay (a seperate pet peeve of mine), but there

   804 is no indication of which form of premise leads to Coherency.  Another

   805 is that in practice, Coherency has been used to refer to a game which

   806 targets a specific GNS position consistently.  Thus, I fail to see the

   807 purpose of tieing Coherency back to Premise at all, when what it appears

   808 to be is an aspect of GNS positions.

   809 

   810 Note:  I'm not saying the definition of Coherency needs to be scrapped

   811 or changed.  Just that it could use a good bit of clarifying.  It is

   812 difficult to evaluate whether "Congruence" is really the same thing as

   813 "Coherent" when I can't fully understand what is meant by "Coherent".

   814 	Logged

   815 

   816 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   817 Ralph Mazza

   818 Universalis:  The Game of Unlimited Stories

   819 <http://www.ramshead.indie-rpgs.com>

   820 

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   833 *GNS and "Congruency"

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   835 « *Reply #9 on:* April 10, 2002, 12:27:17 PM »

   836 	

   837 

   838 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   839 Ron,  

   840 

   841 Huh.

   842 

   843 So I've been thinking too narrowly about coherence, then.  You're saying

   844 that this:

   845 

   846 NSS--NNN-S--NSSN---S

   847 

   848 Might well be a coherent NS game, not necessarily an incoherent game

   849 with N and S in conflict.

   850 

   851 Yes?

   852 

   853 -Vincent

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   867 *GNS and "Congruency"

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   869 « *Reply #10 on:* April 10, 2002, 12:38:08 PM »

   870 	

   871 

   872 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   873 Mike,

   874 

   875 Walt is using the term in the technically correct manner which seems odd

   876 on first blush.  

   877 

   878 If a decision can be used to support both a G position and an S position

   879 than the decision is Congruent between G and S.  Thus a decision which

   880 only supports a single position in not congruent with any other decision

   881 and is therefor considered incongruent.

   882 	Logged

   883 

   884 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   885 Ralph Mazza

   886 Universalis:  The Game of Unlimited Stories

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   900 *It's an O-blood Kinda Thing.

   901 <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=1733.msg17550#msg17550>*

   902 « *Reply #11 on:* April 10, 2002, 12:49:13 PM »

   903 	

   904 

   905 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   906 What I am hearing so far makes it sound like 'congruent' decisions (I

   907 agree with Mike, the term is counter-intuitive) are decisions /at the

   908 atomic level/ that cannot be determined to be Particles G, N, or S and

   909 function as any of them.  (Perhaps a GNS uncertainty principle at work?)

   910 

   911 The reason Ron seems to be having trouble settling them in terms of

   912 coherence is because he's looking for a relationship (much like the many

   913 people who try to connect Director Stance to Narrativism).  There isn't any.

   914 

   915 What we seem to be talking about here is what O-type blood is once it's

   916 in the blood stream.  You infuse O-type into a person with AB blood and

   917 what do you get?  A living person with AB blood.  The same goes for all

   918 the GNS modes and hybrids.  An O-type decision (one that /is/ congruent)

   919 disappears when you consider the overall flow of the game.  It's the AB

   920 blood cells that tell you what blood-type a person has, no matter how

   921 much O-type blood has been infused.  (Note; the patient is dying if they

   922 have too many /different/ blood-types mixing in their veins - that is

   923 incoherency - the amount of O-type blood makes no difference.)

   924 

   925 So basically O-particles work as any of the types as needed and they are

   926 not considered in the search for coherency.  If a molecule has

   927 O-particles and G-particles, then it is a G-molecule; the same goes for

   928 S-particles and N-particles.  This continues to carry forward all the

   929 way up to the 'substance level.'  If a substance is made primarily of

   930 G-molecules, no matter how many O-particles it has, it's the G-element

   931 fully coherently.

   932 

   933 The only reason I see this as an asset is that it allows us to say, "Oh

   934 that's an O-type decision, we cannot determine GNS-state from that" - a

   935 mechanism to agree to disagree more readily and move on.  A patch if you

   936 will to the 'crunchiness' of the GNS.

   937 

   938 Fang Langford

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   941 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

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   947 

   948 *Walt Freitag

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   959 *GNS and "Congruency"

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   961 « *Reply #12 on:* April 10, 2002, 02:05:22 PM »

   962 	

   963 

   964 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   965 A few quick points:

   966 

   967 1. I will hereinafter try to stick to "congruence" and "coherence"

   968 instead of the alternatives ending with y.

   969 

   970 2. The thread with Mytholder that Valamir refers to was what gave me the

   971 idea to pursue congruence as a concept. I found that discussion very

   972 interesting despite (and in part, because of) the communications

   973 difficulty it revealed.

   974 

   975 3. /This is what... we were representing as blanks in the decision maps

   976 we were drawing (the blanks being congruent and the non blanks being

   977 incongruent...of course, in Walts model we'd need to use something other

   978 than blanks to represent the 4 different types of congruency)./

   979 

   980 Probably not necessary in most real-world cases. Any type of congruence

   981 means you cannot characterize the decision specifically as G, N, or S;

   982 the only difference between the types is whether one of the three

   983 possibilities (and if so which one) is ruled out.

   984 

   985 Now, to the main issue, which Ron has not surprisingly homed in on. It's

   986 irrelevant that coherence is defined differently from congruence if in

   987 practice they amount to the same thing. So, do they?

   988 

   989 Quote from: Ron Edwards

   990 I have tried to stress that compatibility of goals, in practice, is the

   991 defining feature of Coherence. The fact that goals are most compatible

   992 when they are similar-to-identical, as well as the fact that I tend to

   993 prefer such play situations personally, are not relevant; any compatible

   994 mix of different goals ("convergence?") is Coherent too.

   995 

   996 

   997 "compatibility of goals, in practice"... but where's the emphasis? Does

   998 this mean compatibility of goals with each other in the context of a

   999 particular practice, or does it mean compatibility of the goals with the

  1000 practice itself? I always read it as the latter. (It's almost but not

  1001 quite the same thing... one single goal must always be compatible with

  1002 itself, but could be incompatible with the practice.)

  1003 

  1004 If it's the latter, the congruence has no direct definitional

  1005 relationship to coherence, but a logical connection can be made that

  1006 congruence implies coherence. If it's the former, then congruence is by

  1007 definition one form of coherence. In either case, though, congruence is

  1008 far from synonymous with coherence itself.

  1009 

  1010 From what I've seen, advice stemming from GNS theory usually emphasizes

  1011 achieving coherence in ways other than promoting congruence (e.g., pick

  1012 a single goal and focus on it).

  1013 

  1014 Also, there is an "idealized" concept of coherence that may not be

  1015 implied in the original definition but is, I believe, often read into

  1016 it. Idealized coherence raises the bar from compatibility of goals with

  1017 each other and/or with the practice, to active promotion of the desired

  1018 goals by the practice. (Especially when one primary goal is identified,

  1019 compatibility /of/ goals no longer appears the issue; compatibility of

  1020 practices /with/ the goal becomes paramount, and that bar can easily be

  1021 raised to "promotion of" that goal.) For that idealized form of

  1022 coherence, coherence and congruence become completely disjoint at the

  1023 atomic level (an individual decision either promotes the main goal

  1024 specifically, or it is congruent, or it promotes a different goal and is

  1025 incoherent; it cannot be any two simultaneously). At higher levels this

  1026 translates into a linear trade-off between the prevalence of congruent

  1027 decisions versus coherent decisions, represented by the continuum

  1028 between vanilla and pervy.

  1029 

  1030 Phew, very abstract, all that. In actual practice I see the following

  1031 differences:

  1032 

  1033 - A group of players can be loosely described as coherent or incoherent

  1034 based on how similar their goals are, without taking into account their

  1035 practices. This may not be strictly proper, but it's done. Congruence

  1036 has no meaning in that context.

  1037 

  1038 - A game system can be characterized as coherent or incoherent, without

  1039 taking into account the players, based on whether it promotes a

  1040 compatible set of goals or not. My hypothesis is that a game system can

  1041 also be characterized as congruent or incongruent based on whether it

  1042 promotes congruence between different goals or not. A game might be

  1043 coherent by virtue of it clearly promoting a single GNS goal type, or it

  1044 might be coherent by virtue of promoting multiple cross-GNS goals but

  1045 also promoting congruency between those goals. Also, it might (in

  1046 theory) be coherent, despite promoting multiple cross-GNS goals, through

  1047 some other means, but I don't believe any such means are known.

  1048 

  1049 - A relatively small unit of game practice can be characterized as

  1050 promoting congruence or incongruence, before the fact, at a level where

  1051 the concept of coherence appears difficult to apply. Usually this comes

  1052 in the form of realizing that a certain practice unnecessarily promotes

  1053 incongruence. For example, a system might offer metagame rewards for a

  1054 character to behave in certain protagonistic ways without regard for

  1055 whether that behavior makes any sense for the character (unnecessary S-N

  1056 incongruence), or a setting might introduce a puzzle that is easy for

  1057 the players to solve but unreasonable for the characters to be able to

  1058 do so (unnecessary G-S incongruence). A game system rule promoting G-S

  1059 incongruence could be a definition of what a "loophole" is.

  1060 

  1061 - The concept of coherence appears to be most "at home" at the level of

  1062 evaluating a game system. The concept of congruence appears to be most

  1063 "at home" at the level of evaluating a specific rule, encounter, scene,

  1064 or other relatively small unit of play.

  1065 

  1066 - Specific gamemastering practices can often easily be described as

  1067 promoting congruence or incongruence. I haven't seen much discussion

  1068 here of effects of gamemastering practices on coherence or incoherence.

  1069 (That doesn't mean it's not a viable concept; it's the nature of this

  1070 forum to look at things from a system designer's point of view.)

  1071 

  1072 - Again, the main point: consistent congruence throughout a system might

  1073 imply coherence at least of a sort. Incongruence, even when pervasive,

  1074 does not imply incoherence. A gamist game might be filled with rules

  1075 loopholes and might despite (or because of) that be a good coherent

  1076 gamist game. A narrativist game might reward players for changing the

  1077 character's nature during play for purely noncausal reasons, and still

  1078 be a good coherent narrativist game.

  1079 

  1080 - However, I would suggest that a system that promotes goals from

  1081 different GNS modes, and does not promote congruence, must be incoherent.

  1082 

  1083 - Walt

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  1085 

  1086 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

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  1088 

  1089 *Walt Freitag

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  1098 	

  1099 <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=1733.msg17570#msg17570>

  1100 *GNS and "Congruency"

  1101 <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=1733.msg17570#msg17570>*

  1102 « *Reply #13 on:* April 10, 2002, 02:26:24 PM »

  1103 	

  1104 

  1105 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

  1106 Fang's blood-type analogy reminds me of a point I forgot to make: since

  1107 congruence applies to a particle, only a pervasive pattern of congruence

  1108 has any meaning at higher levels. So when I say something like

  1109 "congruence is by definition one form of coherence," I mean that

  1110 pervasive congruence throughout play, not some small number of

  1111 individual instances, would result in coherence.

  1112 

  1113 An open question is, how pervasive can congruence be? To borrow Fang's

  1114 analogy, do any "Type O" people exist, or does everyone inevitably have

  1115 enough "A", "B" etc. particles that they must fall into some other type?

  1116 If pervasive congruence is not a real phenomenon, then as Fang says the

  1117 applicability of the concept is very limited.

  1118 

  1119 I believe pervasive congruence is real and in fact fairly common, which

  1120 is why specific occurrences that introduce additional unnecessary

  1121 incongruence (such as a particular scene where OOC knowledge suddenly

  1122 becomes an issue) cause noticeable problems in play.

  1123 

  1124 - Walt

  1125 	Logged

  1126 

  1127 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

  1128 Wandering in the diasporosphere

  1129 

  1130 *Gordon C. Landis

  1131 <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;u=35>*

  1132 Member

  1133 

  1134 Posts: 1011

  1135