Thoughts on rpg players and readers

[jlh]

I am finding that my current trend is to not post for a while and then go nuts with the spam. I feel that since these things even out, I am not going to worry about it.

I had read some of the replies to Julie's poll for rpg players about what they wanted to tell their fans, and then sistermagpie's response to that, and while I certainly understood both posts they made me very sad. It seems that the players are resentful of the fans and wish they would have a less squeeful and shippy response and the fans are annoyed with the players and wish they would grow up and it's all sort of a mess.

And then I started reading the Q&A happening on nraged right now. I must admit, as a former NA player, I was hopeful but skeptical about the entire enterprise. But I've been very happily surprised at the number of interesting questions that even the smaller characters like Arthur and Molly are receiving. And it proved, for me, something I had always secretly hoped.

Any given fan community cannot contain the entirety of response to a given rpg. There are plenty of casual fans or readers who do not care to comment in a fan community, just as we all know there are plenty of readers of fanfic who do not review—or, in an even better parallel, there are plenty of truly passionate fans of the HP books that aren't in the fandom in any way. It seems to me a great mistake on the part of the players to presume that the prevailing opinion in a fan community is the "way fans think"; it is in fact only the way that a certain group of fans have decided to post. We all know how intimidating it can be to have an opposing point of view within a community, and if you're a fan of thatwasthen, let's say, but you don't like siriuslythebest for whatever reason, I doubt you will spend much time on twits. It's fun to squee over something shippy, and it's natural to have a debate over a point that has remained unclear in the game. It is just as natural not to be quite so overtly excited over friendships, or not to have a long discussion over something that is very clear. We all have times when we want to blow off steam about what the fans have said, but it is perhaps best to do this privately, on our player email lists or ooc journals or what have you.

As for the fans, I think that while it would be nice that all rpg players were perfectly mature and perfectly self-composed, emotionally engaged in their game enough to make the game good, but not so much that they are hurt even for a second by criticism, secure enough in their work that they not only don't care if someone criticizes them but they also don't care if they are ignored, this is clearly absolutely impossible. As a player, I know my limits, which is why I almost never read the fan communities unless someone points out a very specific entry or comment. Fans shouldn't be surprised that there is a person at the other end of that character, a person no more or less mature than anyone else. Of course they will sometimes be dismayed by things that you say, but that doesn't mean that you didn't have a right to say them. Having rights doesn't mean that there are no consequences to the exercise of those rights.

Of course, both of these thoughts are looking for people to be responsible, courteous adults, a behaviour I find not only sadly lacking around here, but unfortunately almost despised. Ah well.

Comments

[bookshop.livejournal.com]

I think that what ataniell93 said here (http://www.livejournal.com/users/sistermagpie/59492.html?thread=1231972#t1231972) on SM's journal pretty much sums up what I feel is the ideal player-to-fan dynamic: namely, that the fans have the right to express whatever they feel about the RPG and its characters, etc, and that the players remain in an autonomous realm where they simply do not allow those comments to affect them and the way they play.

That is, of course, a lot more easily said than done: but it is honestly how I feel RPGs should work. I've seen many fan-creator dynamics that brewed resentment because the creator tried to tell the fans how they should act: JKR, for instance--or Kevin Spacey in my last fandom. I don't think any fandom "creator" I've ever run into has been so good about giving fans their personal space and the leeway to do/feel/think/express whatever they liked regarding his characters as Joss Whedon: but Joss also never allowed fan sentiment to get in the way of his vision for the series. I have openly admired the way he handles/handled his fans many times, and ideally, that's the way I think that every RPG player should approach their RPG's fan following. It's one reason I was very, I guess I want to say proud of you, when you chose to avoid comments on Nraged that you knew would upset you: because in doing that you were not only validating your own feelings but giving NA's fans the space they needed to express their own. That's such a tough thing to do, but I really, really feel like it's so necessary.

The following metaphor may be clumsy and simplistic, but I'm rather heavily committed to it.

I envision every person as being enclosed in a big round bubble. This bubble contains their personal space; where, from within that space, they can send whatever opinions and feelings they need to release out into the open air. None of those feelings can puncture someone else's bubble to affect or hurt them, unless the other person punctures their own bubble themselves and allows those feelings to come inside their personal space and affect them.

Does that make any sense at all? Fans/Players = 2 separate bubbles--and, you're right, the burden is on every individual to know when his/her bubble needs to be broken.

I don't pierce my bubble anymore for the things I used to.

[ladylisse.livejournal.com]

One of my pet peeves (there can be straight guys. really.) is sort of a universal RPG vent, directed at players and fans alike. Actually, all of my pet peeves can be directed at both, and occasionally at myself.

I don't understand the antagonism many people have toward the fan communities. Maybe it's because I always played minor parts, but I didn't expect to be noticed and was always pleasantly surprised and rather flattered when someone bothered to comment on something I wrote. My feeling is that if you don't like the fan comms, don't read them -- and if you do, there you go.

Uh. And this is a long-winded way of saying WORD. And wheeeinternet'sback, but mostly WORD.

[jlh.livejournal.com]

Well, I understand your metaphor, but I think that its perfection is unrealistic. I think it puts a lot of the burden on the person, which is a problem I keep having in the community in general: "If your feelings are hurt, that's your problem; I'm just 'telling the truth'." It allows people to not have to take responsibility for the things that they say, when a community can only sustain itself through mutual courtesy. It's the wish to be able to say as many hateful things as you want and then say that if someone is upset it is their fault, when of course how could they not be upset? Of course I think that a person has to do what they can not to let silly things or things they can't control get to them, but that doesn't mean that one has the right to say whatever one wishes without consequences. Understanding the consequences is part of behaving like a responsible adult.

But more specifically to RPGs, I think that I was more reacting to this (http://www.livejournal.com/users/sistermagpie/59492.html?thread=1230180#t1230180) from villeinage, where they say they want the players to "grow up." I thought, well, that's really easy for you to say. It is understandably disheartening to work very hard on something, whatever it is, and hear that your work is literally for nothing; that your character could be surgically removed from the game and absolutely no one would care.

But I think it's difficult even for me to hear you say it's one reason I was very, I guess I want to say proud of you, when you chose to avoid comments on Nraged that you knew would upset you because while I see what you are saying it also sounds sort of patronizing, as though if I were the Perfect Player I could read the entire fan community and literally not care, and the fact that I really couldn't do that—and actually, it wasn't the negative comments about my character (except in one specific instance where there was a very popular misreading that frustrated everyone involved) but the lack of interest in general—was my failing as a person, that I was weak in some way.

Because yes, the player want the fans to behave in a certain way, but I think the fans want the players to behave in a certain way as well. There was always a sense on nraged that the fans wanted the players to come in, interact with them, perhaps even give them information, but "be an adult" about whatever was said. I couldn't do both, which is why I avoided nraged. But I think to expect people to is expecting a lot.

I think it's a lot easier for Joss Whedon to interact in this way because his "payment" comes in other ways: ratings, money, industry praise (though not enough). He also doesn't know his fans, not really. But we are all in the same community with these fans, and we don't really have another sense of what is going on, so getting that distance (and, I would say, enough of a sense of power to say, "whatever" with the fans) is much more difficult.

But the much, much, much larger point is that the fan communities not only aren't everyone watching the rpg, but aren't even representative of everyone watching, and even moreso, don't talk about everything they like about the rpg. So reading the Q&A on nraged now is a very, very pleasant surprise.

[bookshop.livejournal.com]

It allows people to not have to take responsibility for the things that they say, when a community can only sustain itself through mutual courtesy.

This is very true; and really with the "bubble" my whole point is that it allows for a dual responsibility, from the person who is choosing what opinions to air, and the person who is choosing how to receive them. You can't have that kind of courtesy at all if there isn't a basic level of respect for and awareness of how what you're saying/doing is affecting someone else--especially because as you said this is a close-knit community where we don't always get to choose our level of distance from one another.

Like when I was trying to ask everyone not to write NA fanfic; it may be just because it was me or something about the way I was asking, but I was surprised at how many people refused to accept "because it's hurting their feelings" as valid reasoning. It may be that the ever-present wank factor has made it easier for us to mock each other's feelings than respect them, because I certainly don't think that was a completely invalid way to feel--and asking each other to "grow up" is also a convenient way of sidestepping responsibility for how you're hurting somebody else.

as though if I were the Perfect Player I could read the entire fan community and literally not care,

I'm sorry I sounded patronizing. It's not that I think that was the ideal way to handle the situation; an ideal situation, to me, would have involved somehow making the fans aware of how their comments were being taken and getting them to be a little more conscious of the player's feelings; which, unless we had some sort of grand NA summit meeting, would have been impossible anyway.

What I really admired you for in that situation specifically was that you reacted in a way that didn't lead to you resenting the fans for their feelings and opinions--and this was when I was still struggling as the Nraged mod and that issue was a huge one for me. It wasn't that I thought you should have been able to not react to anything, but rather that you didn't react in ways that fueled your own hurt feelings or resentment--and maybe that is simply the basis of responding to things in a mature way.

People on the outside of the game really just could not know what it was like as a player; and above all my biggest and really only regret regarding NA is that I tried to keep both roles the whole time--I tried to be both a player and a fan, and it just didn't work because the players' experience is so radically different from the fans.' Even if you're a player in one rpg and a fan of another I would say your experience is very different from one game to the next just because you're in a different role each time.

I hope that if there's anything people learn from the NA/Nraged dynamic it's that despite the tensions a basic love for the game fueled all our interactions with each other; and I think that's always bridged the divide between the two experiences, even though we've had some stumbling blocks along the way--I think you can really see that right now with the Q&A. I'm glad it's been going so well, and glad it's been refreshing for you.

[jlh.livejournal.com]

The funny thing is, remember back when the word was (and this might never have changed) that NA was cliquey? I never really understood that but I think where we're landing here is that yes, RPGs are cliquey and in fact have to be in order to survive and be good. That you have to have among the players an esprit de corps, a we're-all-in-this-together feeling. It is this that allows you to just play for each other, to shrug off external criticism, etc. It also allows you to accept the criticism of people within the game, as you all have the same goal.

Which gets us to ataniell93's comment. Personally I agree with her as both a player and a fan; if someone I was a fan of changed because of something I'd said I think I'd be vaguely horrified. But I think there are plenty of those within our fandom who feel that RPGs are no different than fic, and that their "constructive criticism" should be taken to heart by the members of the game and changes made. And I'd say, no, which I think you are saying as well.

And this shifts the dynamic from a we-are-all-writers-together that fanfic is generally about, especially when your friends are mostly writer-readers and not solely readers, to an I-am-the-player-and-you-are-the-fan dynamic. It's the difference between Holly or Cassie asking me what I think of something they've written, and their asking their entire LJ audience. Once again, NA was first, but that really upends the structure of things, doesn't it?

[adjudicated.livejournal.com]

A very quick drive-by comment to let you know that I really did enjoy reading this post, and I know I have a response, which is forthcoming. Today was just nuts, and right now I'm feeling too sleepy to adequately formulate multiple original sentences.

I hadn't seen sistermagpie's post, and I wish I had . . . alas and woe. Both sides of the issue have the wheels churning in my head.

In a nutshell: more later.

[bookshop.livejournal.com]

It is this that allows you to just play for each other, to shrug off external criticism, etc. It also allows you to accept the criticism of people within the game

You know, I think that's sort of a microcosmic assessment of fandom friendships in general. Not only that but it's kind of an assessment of the basic mentality of "cliques" in general, without the negative connotations that word carries. No matter who you are, you're going to have experiences that give you a group of friends you trust and are close to, and I think that a kind of solidarity grows out of this feeling that only the people in your group really share and understand what you've been through.

With RPGs and even with fanfic writers, though, there is, in addition to the kind of mutual understanding vibe, the added peer-group thing: who is your peer and who isn't. RPG fans may be peers outside of that context, but within it, they really aren't. Which is again, I think, maybe a part of what you're saying: that peer relationships in RPGs supercede the fan-player dynamics and, at the same time, protect both groups.