Constraints

I've written about contraints before, but they're worth reviewing.  Constraints are arbitrary limitations created to make an activity more difficult that it would be ordinarily.  As an example, I like to use golf as an example.

If golf is described as getting the ball in your hand into the hole three hundred yards distant, the obvious solution is to walk three hundred yards and put the ball in the hole.  However, anyone can do this, so we invent constraints.  We say you have to put the ball on the ground at your feet and then use a stick to hit it into the hole.  Sticks evolve for this process, producing odd shapes that are, nonetheless, practical.  We make a constraint that the ball needs to be a certain size.  Golf is originally played along a grassy beach with pools of sand, so we make constraints about how the ball is hit in "sand traps."  The ball gets trapped, so we make constraints to describe under what circumstances it can be untrapped.  Thereafter, as elements of the game are invented, constraints are also invented.  Since golf is substantially a game between equals, the equals agree to observe a certain set of "official" constraints by unilateral agreement.  "Clubs" are formed that encourage members to adhere to these agreements.

Contraints form the game's functional design, e.g. the way the game is meant to be played.  The game's behaviour is the way it's actually played.  The constraints say you can't kick your ball out of the rough.  Observation shows that if you kick your ball out of the rough when no one is looking, and its new location can be reasonably explained, then it's okay to kick your ball.  Those who follow the constraints call the practice, "integrity."  But it must be noted that those who kick their ball also identify themselves as having "integrity."  The difference is that the second group is lying.  Usually, the second group believes that no one can tell.  The second group is almost always wrong.  Everyone knows.

Role-players are often snobs about their game being compared with "sports" (if that's what golf is) — but games theory makes no such distinction.  In fact, games theory makes no distinction between games and war, or games and business, or really anything human beings do where constraints are involved.  Civilisation is built on constraint.  You and I sit in a restaurant and we agree to observe the social constraint that we will not stab each other with steak knives.  Yes, of course it's illegal; but more than that, we probably agree that stabbing each other with knives for any reason ought to be illegal.  Not everyone feels that way, obviously.  Quite a lot of people, both in and out of prison, feel differently.  But we'll go out on a limb and say that YOU don't feel differently.

That constraint began as our pre-human ancestors began to gather in clans, some 60 million years ago (sorry, Mr. Bible, you didn't invent "don't kill people" — nice try though).  Turn against a member of the clan in this way and the clan will kill you, or ostracize you, which is a way of having nature do the killing.  This was policy when we were still animals, when we weren't even lemurs yet ... we can watch lemurs carry out this policy today just as their ancestors did back then.

Society is made up of thousands of these constraints, which together allow us to live together in relative peace.  We ask our human folk not to steal, not to sleep with our spouse, not to cheat at games, not to fling snot during meals, not to poop on the street and so on — all with the express understanding that we all have to live together and it's nice when the place is kept clean and civil ... thus, "civilisation."  As more and more people decide it's okay to kick the ball out of the civil rough, metaphorically speaking, these agreements start to break down, followed by what we call a "decline" of civilisation.  Historically speaking, this is a good thing to avoid.  But we don't need to follow down that road further.

In most table-top games, there is a turn-feature that makes it practical for individuals to maintain the constraints put in place, through policing adjacent humans.  Golf is a difficult game to police, because the human-per-square-foot ratio is scant.  Chess, by comparison, is much easier.  All the pieces are on the game board.  None are kept in uncertainly defined piles, like in Monopoly, or in easily manipulatable, overturned thin cards, like with Poker.  Still, if someone wants to cheat at a game, there's a reasonable expectation that someone else will see the cheating and call it out.  Preferably without guns, but there you go, another argument for civilisation.

As games grow more complex, particularly as they increase the number of players, it becomes necessary to designate observers apart from the players to ensure the constraints are respected.  With respect to war and business, and politics also, even though we employ hundreds of thousands of observers, the task is still impossible.  We employ millions of observers, and give them actual policing authority, and still they don't manage the problem.

Baseball, a much less complicated game, can be played without an umpire.  When it became official, however, because there was money in it, the game started with one umpire.  This number has increased since.  This is how it goes when players won't respect constraints AND when it's desirable to establish standards for wins, losses and a host of statistics, which enables someone to compare a player from a recent era with an ancient one.  Not that I think this really works, but it's very important to baseball fans to believe it works, and so every effort is made to ensure that it does, as close as human observation allows.

The true innovation in D&D, the first role-playing game, is the invention of "dungeon master" — a participant who both sets the game in motion AND ensures the constraints of the game are observed.  This is sort of like the pitcher throwing the ball and then teleporting to stand behind the catcher, to call the ball — and assuring the call is accurate by the revolutionary idea that the DM has nothing to gain by calling the ball wrong.  This is meant to put a constraint upon the DM, asserting that the DM must be impartial.  Unlike a baseball umpire, the players can, if they feel the DM lacks integrity — that is, the DM keeps kicking the ball out of the rough — remove the DM from play, ostracize the DM and establish a new DM.

Theoretically.

Unfortunately, the teleportation trick is so difficult to master, so impossibly complicated to learn, and so inconvenient a learning curve for those willing to try, that DMs are often empowered to kick balls wherever they goddamn please, in full view of the players, who must accept the total lack of integrity because if they want to play, they cannot access another DM.  So, in fact, while the function of the DM is crystal clear, the behaviour of the DM is a bloody disaster.

Most of the time.

Therefore, the solution for how to ensure the longevity of D&D, or any other role-playing game, is perfectly clear:

1)  Encourage every participant around your gaming table to attempt DMing, even if this means initially simplifying the game to the level of 1974's Chain Mail.

2)  Give them sufficient practice to get better.

3)  Instead of using computers to simulate DMs, so that users can play, create simulations of players, so that users can DM.

Do these three things and D&D will never die.