GNS theory

The GNS Theory, as originally developed by Ron Edwards, is a relatively amorphous body of work attempting to create a theory of how role-playing games work. Primarily, GNS Theory holds that participants in role-playing games reinforce each other's behaviour towards ends which can be divided into three categories: Gamist, Narrativist and Simulationist.

Strictly, GNS theory is concerned with players' social interactions, but it has been extrapolated to direct game design, both in and outside the world of RPGs. A game can be classified according to how strongly it encourages or facilitates players reinforcing behaviours matching each category. Game designers find it useful because it can be used to explain why players play certain games.

Ron Edwards later discarded GNS Theory in favor of The Big Model, which includes the GNS categories as different kinds of creative agenda.

GNS: Gamist, Narrativist, Simulationist

Gamism: Prove Yourself

Gamist refers to decisions based on satisfying clear predefined goal conditions in the face of adversity- in other words, on the desire to win. As RE mentions in Gamism, Step on Up:

• I might as well get this over with now: the phrase "Role-playing games are not about winning" is the most widespread example of synecdoche in the hobby. Potential Gamist responses, and I think appropriately, include: "Eat me," (-upon winning) "I win," and "C'mon, let's play without these morons."

These decisions are most common in games which pit characters against successively tougher challenges and opponents, and may not spend much time dwelling on why the characters are facing them in the first place. Gamist RPG design tends to place a strong emphasis on parity in character-effectiveness: that is, the idea that all player-characters should be (at least when properly built or optimised over time,) equally strong and capable of dealing with adversity. Combat is frequently heavily emphasised, as is a diversity in options for short-term problem-solving (i.e, long lists of highly specific spells or combat techniques.) Randomisation (i.e, 'Fortune' methods,) exist primarily to provide a gamble and allow players to risk more for higher stakes (for instance, attempting a more effective hit in combat requires a penalty on the dice roll), rather than modelling strict probability.

Examples include, Magic: The Gathering, Chess, and most computer games.

Narrativism: Say Something

Narrativism is perhaps best illustrated by a quote from the Forge Glossary on the subject:

• The Impossible Thing Before Breakfast- "The GM is the author of the story and the players direct the actions of the protagonists." Widely repeated across many role-playing texts. Neither clause in the sentence is possible in the presence of the other.

Narrativist play revolves around prompting the players- through their characters' active and judgemental decisions on the emotional questions presented- for large-scale input to the story. This prioritises story-creation as the foremost product of play, in the sense that no predefined plotline exists, is supposed to exist, or *ought* to exist, prior to the events and decisions of play. Such play revolves around moments of drama- in the sense that the characters must be placed in situations that oblige them to trade off between things of basic emotional importance to them. This makes the imposition of any fixed plotline impossible, because the more input the players' have to theme, the more ambivalent/dramatic such choices must be, the less predictable such choices become, and those choices must be the single most important factor in determining the ultimate outcome of events. In this fashion, the character develops and grows over time, and the story that develops provides a moral commentary on their choices.

Such decision-making should not be confused with purely tactical choices between differing means to a predetermined end, as often seen in Gamist problem-solving, nor with predictable stimulus-effect responses based on a fixed character-template, as often seen in Simulationist role-play.

As of 2006, many indie role-playing games are designed as Narrativist games, such as Dogs in the Vineyard or Sorcerer.

Simulationism: Be There

Simulationist refers to decisions based on what would be most realistic or plausible within the game's setting, or to a game where the rules try to simulate the way that things work in that world, or at least the way that they could be thought of working.

To resolve combat, a simulationist approach might be to see if the character hits, then if the victim can parry, then how much 'damage' the weapon does, then determine what part of the victim is hit, then how much damage the armour in that location stops, then see how much harm the remaining damage does. The benefit of this method is that it is simple for the players to interpret the results and understand what must have happened. The drawback is that the process of obtaining the results can take a long time to perform, and may still not produce plausible results if it is inaccurate and/or incomplete. Often, simulationist games have numerous additional layers, often optional, that can be used to further increase the complexity of combat or other activities. These optional layers can include things like targeted attacks or the use of special techniques like martial arts, whose complexities can even require an entire optional sourcebook, as in the case of GURPS.

However, the agenda is not necessarily bound to complex game mechanics. GURPS, which is very complex thanks to its many optional rules, is classified by Ron Edwards as a simulationist role-playing system, but Call of Cthulhu, which is lighter, can also be considered a Simulationist game with a strong focus on Narration.

Furthermore, an effect-based or statistical view can produce a Simulationist game that is more realistic, faster, and easier to run.

Potential frictions between modes

Many common role-playing techniques can enhance the enjoyment of a particular GNS mode at the expense of others, but the fundamental incompatibilities between each are actually very high-level.

Gamist-Narrativist friction

• Moments of drama (in the emotional sense,) make clear goal conditions (i.e, a well-defined challenge in the Gamist sense) impossible. Their very purpose is to focus on a conflict between two or more of a given character's values. 'Winning' is impossible under such circumstances, because there is no clear goal. Conversely, if a character is presented only with well-defined goal conditions during the entire 'story', this implies a lack of emotional ambivalence during decision-making which denies the possibility of input to theme.

Simulationist-Narrativist friction

• Theme, by its nature, is a series of aesthetically pleasing but statistically unlikely coincidences. In order to reliably revisit the same emotional topic or human questions, in-world probability must be frequently distorted to present conflicts that visit those topics or questions.
• Moments of drama (in the emotional sense) cannot, in the strictest sense, be consistently role-played. Their very purpose is to focus on a conflict between two or more of a given character's values, in which they are obliged to choose one over the other. In other words, to focus on a point where the character's internal consistency breaks down.

Gamist-Simulationist friction

• Perfect 'Balance'- in the sense of parity in character-effectiveness, or a level playing field- is rarely compatible with the full complexities of a self-consistent imagined world. That is, Life is Unfair. For example, realistic swordfighting leads to a high-rate of wound-related mortality, while an unbiased presentation of Tolkien's Middle-Earth would make elves far more powerful than orcs or halflings. Resolving such imbalances requires either a manifestly artificial 'world', or metagame constructs such as hit points, level adjustments, etc. that distort a Simulationist aesthetic.

Other terms

The GNS theory incorporates Jonathan Tweet's three forms of task resolution that determine the outcome of an event. Edwards said that an RPG should use a task resolution system or combination of systems that is most appropriate for game's GNS perspective. The three task resolution forms are:

• Drama, the participants decide the results, the requirements of the plot being the determining factor (e.g., Houses of the Blooded )
• Fortune, chance decides the results (e.g., by using dice)
• Karma, a fixed value decides the results (e.g., by comparing stats - e.g. Nobilis )

Edwards has said that the main reason he changed the Threefold Model's Drama type to Narrativism for GNS was to avoid confusion with Drama as a task resolution system.

The GNS Theory identifies five elements of role-playing that all players recognize:

• Character, a fictional person
• Color, details that provide atmosphere
• Setting, location (in space and time)
• Situation, the dilemma
• System, determines how in-game events unfold

It also explains four Stances the player can have in making decisions for their character:

• Actor, decides based on what their character would know
• Author, decides based on what they as a player want for their character and then retroactively explains why their character made that decision
• Director, makes decisions that affect the environment rather than the character (usually represented by a game master in an RPG)
• Pawn, decides based on what they as a player want for their character without bothering to explain why their character would make that decision

History

The theory developed out of the Threefold Model that defined Drama, Simulation, and Game as three paradigms of role-playing. The concept first appeared in the rec.games.frp.advocacy newsgroup, and the name "Threefold Model" was coined in a post made by Mary Kuhner in 1997 which outlined the principles of the theory.

In his article "System Does Matter", Edwards said that all participants in RPGs hold one of three mutually exclusive perspectives or aims. He wrote that enjoyable RPGs focus on only one of these perspectives and that it is a common mistake in RPG design to try to satisfy all three types. It is for this reason that the article could be seen as a warning against generic role-playing game systems made by larger developers.

Ron Edwards has since further refined his understanding of RPGs, discarding GNS Theory in favor of The Big Model, which redefines and recontextualizes problematic aspects of GNS.

On December 2, 2005, Edwards closed the forums on The Forge regarding GNS theory, explaining that the forums supporting the GNS theoretical framework had outlived their usefulness..

Critiques

Introduction of GNS has met with marked opposition from elements of the gaming community. Some feel that RPGs are inherently frivolous and reject out of hand that they can be subjected to artistic criticism at all, and disparage any attempt to do so as pseudo-intellectualism. Direct critics of the theory have argued that it doesn't really explain anything regarding player behavior and only serves to shoehorn game design down limited paths. Many casual players react negatively to the idea, complaining that it forces them into false dilemmas and draws artificial, wordy distinctions between elements that can, in practice, combine well with one another and mutually reinforce.

See also: The Big Model

External links

• "GNS and Other Matters of Role-playing Theory" by Ron Edwards
• "A Look at Gamist-Narrativist-Simulationist Theory" by Nathan Jennings