Good thoughts, I've run into some of the issues you describe recently in Brigadine's "Brigstein." What to call a player-controlled Braunstein actor? CC is a good word to have for grouping them with patrons and PCs.
The Imposed vs Organic split is likewise interesting to me, a fruitful ground for gameplay incentives to shape action and impose coherent tone of the campaign. Traveller (and random lifepath chargen in general) seem to do a particularly good job of keeping even Canonicals highly Organic from the start. Reserve XP and monthly upkeep mechanics fill a similar role, pushing characters to spend lavishly. It'd be interesting to run a scatter plot of games with rough estimations of the scope of their theming (i.e. the breadth of potential Organic outcomes) and their mechanical incentivization of said theming, though putting numbers to it would be tricky.
It's certainly noteworthy that many more recent D&D type games trim away the procedures that make NCCs workable. Storygames are actually an intriguing high point in that regard, while the methods differ they seem to much more often have actual procedures - probably because they can't inherit the unwritten body of procedures used for D&D style gaming.
These ideas, unfortunately, represent only a first attempt to seriously grapple with what characters in a rich gameworld can accomplish and what roles they fulfill in service of the gameworld, the game, and the instantiation of that game at the table (the campaign).
I have no doubt we will crystallize a more functional language surrounding TTRPG play over time. I am definitely looking forward to a more immediate clarity when discussing character and player interactions and roles in the future. These kinds of questions eat up a lot of time and discussion.
I am kind of waiting for someone to object with "but your terms don't let me distinguish between a PC and a Braunstein patron." My instinct says that, with a really good language and a really good TTRPG, we won't need or want to do so.
I agree. I actually think there's a greater difference between a patron proper and a Braunstein patron than there is between a Braunstein patron and a PC. The transition from being purely an actor in the world to being a co-creator of said world is a big one. I'm not sure how much that line gets blurred in various games people are running, but certainly it's a very different experience on the player's end.
Good thoughts, I've run into some of the issues you describe recently in Brigadine's "Brigstein." What to call a player-controlled Braunstein actor? CC is a good word to have for grouping them with patrons and PCs.
The Imposed vs Organic split is likewise interesting to me, a fruitful ground for gameplay incentives to shape action and impose coherent tone of the campaign. Traveller (and random lifepath chargen in general) seem to do a particularly good job of keeping even Canonicals highly Organic from the start. Reserve XP and monthly upkeep mechanics fill a similar role, pushing characters to spend lavishly. It'd be interesting to run a scatter plot of games with rough estimations of the scope of their theming (i.e. the breadth of potential Organic outcomes) and their mechanical incentivization of said theming, though putting numbers to it would be tricky.
It's certainly noteworthy that many more recent D&D type games trim away the procedures that make NCCs workable. Storygames are actually an intriguing high point in that regard, while the methods differ they seem to much more often have actual procedures - probably because they can't inherit the unwritten body of procedures used for D&D style gaming.
These ideas, unfortunately, represent only a first attempt to seriously grapple with what characters in a rich gameworld can accomplish and what roles they fulfill in service of the gameworld, the game, and the instantiation of that game at the table (the campaign).
I have no doubt we will crystallize a more functional language surrounding TTRPG play over time. I am definitely looking forward to a more immediate clarity when discussing character and player interactions and roles in the future. These kinds of questions eat up a lot of time and discussion.
I am kind of waiting for someone to object with "but your terms don't let me distinguish between a PC and a Braunstein patron." My instinct says that, with a really good language and a really good TTRPG, we won't need or want to do so.
I agree. I actually think there's a greater difference between a patron proper and a Braunstein patron than there is between a Braunstein patron and a PC. The transition from being purely an actor in the world to being a co-creator of said world is a big one. I'm not sure how much that line gets blurred in various games people are running, but certainly it's a very different experience on the player's end.