Whether you’re scrolling through Reddit and blog posts or watching a YouTube video from your favorite personalities, you’ll notice that, time and time again, they emphasize two words over and over again when it comes to Tabletop Roleplaying Games (TRPGs): Player Agency. For many newcomers to this game genre, player agency is a whole new concept that rarely receives any explanation. This post seeks to remedy that issue!
What is agency, and why is it so vital for TRPGs? In this entry, we’re going to explore those questions and hopefully come out the other side as better Players and Game Masters (GM). Without further ado, let’s dive in!
What is Agency?
In the shortest terms, agency is “the capacity to act or exert power” (Dictionary.com). Character agency is always present; it’s the series of actions and reactions that keeps a story moving. When a character attempts to persuade a stern-looking bouncer for entry into a building, or draws their weapons when the conversation goes topside, that character has agency. Whether you’re a player or GM, your game is going to be dead in the water if you are ever having character agency problems.
Player agency, then, is your ability to act or exert power on the game. It’s when you choose between having your character try to persuade or intimidate the bouncer into letting your character enter the building, or when you choose to pull your weapon or run when the bouncer replies with force. A lack of player agency typically includes moments of mind control and dream sequences (in which you cannot act or your actions are made by someone else), or when any action a character takes leads to the same result (I’m looking at you, Telltale Games). If it’s so straightforward, why is this topic brought up all the time?
The problem here is our definition of player agency only tells half the story. Player agency, as it relates to TRPGs, should be defined as, “a player’s capacity to act or exert power on the narrative in meaningful ways.” As you can see, it’s these six words that add a great deal of ambiguity to the subject.
Why is Player Agency Important to TRPGs?
Ahhh, here comes the part of this post where I try to avoid treading ground covered by the aforementioned posts and videos. If engaging mechanics are the bread of an enjoyable TRPG experience, player agency is the butter. Just as we have the free will to act of our own accord and explore the consequences of those actions in real life, agency allows us to reflect that free will in the game space. It transforms the guided narratives of video games, books, and board games into fully collaborative, and deeply personal, storytelling experiences.
As underlined in our new definition, player agency must be meaningful. In this instance, meaningful means the outcome is a reaction that incorporates the player’s choice into the narrative. Using our example from before, let’s say you attempted to persuade the bouncer by mentioning his boss, Skinny Charlie, is looking for you. Instead of simply “they deny you entry,” the bouncer knows Skinny Charlie is a nickname reserved for those closets to the boss. The bouncer lets you in but warns the rest of the staff that you’re imposters. Now, the characters are in for a nasty ambush of their own design. What if you had passed the check? Using the Skinny Charlie nickname not only gets you into the building but also grants you an immediate audience with the target. You can see how the outcome is so much more rewarding than “they let you inside” or “they deny you entry and draw their weapons.”
For GMs, this means planning the story (or following written modules) in broad strokes. It’s less about knowing every action the NPCs take and more about understanding what motivates these characters and how they’ll react to the the PCs’ actions. It’s about holding nothing sacred to the story: villains may get killed in the first encounter, cries for help may go unanswered, and that shopkeeper you created 20 seconds ago may become the players’ most beloved and pivotal character in the game. And that has to be okay. You have to trust that the story will continue in new, exciting ways.
Conclusion
As you engage with the TRPG scene more, I hope this brief explanation of player agency equips you with enough of an understanding to contribute your experiences and rationale to the conversations. At your own table, let it help you understand what you want from the game, as both a GM and a player, and whether or not that is being accomplished.
Until next time,
Matthew Wulf
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