The Map is Not the Territory

And the Pizza is not the Sauce or Cheese.

Wikipedia tells us that the map-territory relationship is “the relationship between an object and a representation of that object, as in the relation between a geographical territory and a map of it.” Lewis Carroll, in his book Sylvie and Bruno Concluded, provides us with an amusing illustration of the map-territory relationship:

"What a useful thing a pocket-map is!" I remarked.

"That's another thing we've learned from your Nation," said Mein Herr, "map-making. But we've carried it much further than you. What do you consider the largest map that would be really useful?"

"About six inches to the mile."

"Only six inches!" exclaimed Mein Herr. "We very soon got to six yards to the mile. Then we tried a hundred yards to the mile. And then came the grandest idea of all ! We actually made a map of the country, on the scale of a mile to the mile!"

"Have you used it much?" I enquired.

"It has never been spread out, yet," said Mein Herr: "the farmers objected: they said it would cover the whole country, and shut out the sunlight ! So we now use the country itself, as its own map, and I assure you it does nearly as well."

From the point of simulationism, the map-territory relationship seems to pose a dilemma. No map can be as detailed as the territory without being the territory. No model can be correct without being what it is modeling. No game can fully simulate reality without being reality.

The map-territory dilemma isn’t usually referenced directly in our hobby’s great flame wars, but it is implicit in the criticism that gets directed at most simulationist games. Those criticisms often go something like this:

“Your game Ascendant is totally flawed because it models the damage of an attack based on the square root of kinetic energy without modeling hydrostatic shock, projectile tumbling, shot placement, wound entry and exit, and all the other factors that actually determine the harm suffered from a hit.”

Breaking it down logically, the argument goes something like this:

1. Ascendant is a model of X that incorporates Y but not Z.

2. A model of X that does not incorporate Z is totally flawed.

3. Therefore Ascendant is totally flawed.

Premise #1 is certainly true, but premise #2 is almost certainly not true. As British statistician E.P. Box remarked, “all models are wrong, but some are useful.” That is, accepting at the outset that no simulation is actually fully simulative, we can still create simulations that are useful for our purposes.

And what are those purposes? As I said in my prior article, the pleasure of a simulationist game arises (non-exclusively) from the noetic appreciation of the game’s verisimilitude. Noetic apprehension of verisimilitude is the inverse of willing suspension of disbelief. When we engage in the willing suspension of disbelief, we put aside what we know to be true in order to better appreciate something fictional. When we engage in noetic apprehension of verisimilitude, we use what we know to be true in order to better appreciate something fictional.

The Diminishing Return of Noetic Appreciation

Let’s imagine we are designing an RPG intended for noetic appreciation exclusive of all other types of enjoyment. We are, like Professor Konijnendijk watching Alexander, simply ignoring everything else. Considering only that factor, we would seek to have the structure of the rules (the map) isomorphically correlate to the structure of the reality being simulated (the territory) to the extent that noetic apprehension of verisimilitude is maximized.

Does that mean that we should simulate everything? No, because — like every other form of human utility — there are diminishing marginal returns to noetic enjoyment. Partly this is simply due to the nature of hedonic adaptation. Partly this is because the human mind is constrained. Most people’s working memories can only hold 5 to 7 bits of information at once, which in turn limits what they can care about in any given process. Most people’s knowledge of reality is highly incomplete, and with that comes an incomplete ability to appreciate models of reality. Thus, the “return on investment in simulation” looks something like this:

Of course, this graph doesn’t actually…model… the situation with great accuracy, because even hardcore fans of simulationism will have great variance in S-curves. Some might find that the fulcrum between useful complexity and pointless complexity comes sooner, others might find it comes later; some might have a steep slope, others a shallow slope. And that’s ok. Not every game needs to appeal to every gamer.

In acknowledging the diminishing return of simulationism, I do not mean to single it out as peculiarly flawed. What I have said above about the diminishing return on noetic appreciation is also true of every other type of appreciation. Consider:

• Novelists strive to “show” rather than “tell” how things occur, but they do not “show” every detail at every moment for every character. To do so would be to overwhelm the reader’s memory and mind. There is a diminishing return on investment in “showing”.

• Horror movie directors strive to scare the audience watching their film, but they do not attempt to scare the audience at every moment of every scene. Because of hedonic adaption, even the most terrifying conditions become humdrum after a while. Only the absence of fear for a few moments, a respite, makes it possible for the terror to be renewed. There is a diminishing return on investment in scaring.

• Gamblers of a certain mindset enjoy gambling for high stakes. A game of Poker with $50 at stake is less pleasurable than a game of Poker with $5,000 at stake. But what about your life being at stake? What about the fate of the entire planet being at stake? Even Las Vegas whales experience diminishing returns from their gambling hedonism — if they did not, Russian Roulette would be far more popular.

All types of pleasure have diminishing marginal returns, including noetic pleasure.

The Non-Exclusive Nature of Noetic Appreciation

Earlier we imagined we were designing an RPG intended for noetic appreciation exclusive of all other types of enjoyment. But to do that would be to take a foolish, Forge-based view that a game must only ever be either Gamist, Narrativist, or Simulationist. I do not subscribe to the Forge’s GNS Theory in general, but no place is at as wrong as it is wrong here.

Noetic appreciation is not exclusive of other types of enjoyment. I can enjoy Alexander for the drama and spectacle, and for the verisimilitude. I can enjoy playing Ascendant and ACKS for the challenging gameplay or shared making of history, and for its accuracy in simulating comic-book physics or classical warfare.

Let us take for granted that there are at least three pleasures to be had from tabletop RPGs — the gamist, the dramatist or narrativist, and the simulationist pleasure. (There are probably others, but threefold models are popular so we’ll stick with three.) We’ve already explained that there are diminishing returns from all types of enjoyment. This raises an interesting question: Is the return of each type of enjoyment diminished by the other types of enjoyment or are they independent utility curves?

The question is less complex than it sounds. Imagine you are at one of those fancy Michelin-starred restaurants where they serve you multiple course of food but each course is a tiny portion of foie gras or boiled monkey brains or pork-fried legumes. If you get served one course, you’ll enjoy the meal. If you get served three courses, you’ll enjoy it even more. But by the time you get to sixty courses, you’ll be far too full to appreciate the later courses. It doesn’t really matter what the courses are; they are additive in filling you up, and hence the enjoyment diminishes as the sum of the courses.

Now imagine you are eating a pizza. A typical American pizza combines wheat crust, mozzarella cheese, margherita sauce, and one or more toppings to create a savory, tasty dish. The satisfaction of eating a pizza comes from the mix of the ingredients. There is a right amount of each, and they work in synergy.

If dramatism, gamism, and simulationism are like “courses in a meal,” then the enjoyment you can get from them is a zero-sum game. If you have too many “courses” of gamism, you won’t get to enjoy any courses of dramatism, and so on. If this were the case, the Forge would be right to focus on maximizing just one aspect of the game.

If dramatism, gamism, and simulationism are like “ingredients in a pizza,” then the enjoyment you can get from them is a positive-sum game. The best pizza experience comes from blending all the flavors to perfection. No amount of mozzarella cheese can substitute for pepperoni, because they are different ingredients. One can have too much pepperoni, but one cannot have too much crust because of an excess of pepperoni.

I propose that tabletop RPGs are like pizzas, with a mix of dramatist, gamist, and simulationist ingredients. People can, of course, disagree on what constitutes the right amount of each. Some might prefer Chicago style pizza with thicker crust, more sauce, and tons of toppings, others might prefer New York style pizza with thin crust and no toppings. Likewise, some people might prefer tabletop RPGs that emphasize different components of dramatism, gamism, and simulationism.

But the ingredients are not inherently in conflict — far from it! They are instead the very source of what makes pizza what it is, and what makes tabletop RPGs what they are.

Now, there are exceptionally eccentric consumers, the sort who’d go to a pizza shop and say “I want a cheese pizza, but hold the bread and sauce.” Such people do exist… But if you’re thinking about starting a pizza shop, you shouldn’t plan your business around them. Likewise, if you’re designing a tabletop RPG, you shouldn’t plan to ignore any aspect of the threefold enjoyments unless you want commercial failure. In other words, my advice is the opposite of the advice from the Forge.

Simulation is the Pizza Crust

I don’t want to give the impression that I put simulation as merely one of many ingredients that make up a good tabletop RPG. As I’ve said repeatedly I’m an avowed simulationist and I believe simulation is at the core of the tabletop RPG experience.

Let’s go back to pizza. You can make a pizza without cheese and it will still recognizably be a pizza. You can make a pizza without sauce and, again, it will still recognizably be a pizza. But you can’t make a pizza without a crust. The crust is the essence of what makes pizza pizza and not just dipping sauce. A good crust can serve as the foundation for any number of sauces, cheeses, and toppings, but no combination of sauces, cheeses, and toppings can be satisfying as a pizza qua pizza without a crust.

In terms of our pizza analogy, simulation is the crust. In RPGs, a well-designed simulation can serve as the foundation for exciting and enjoyable dramatist and gamist experiences, but the converse is not true. On this, we’ll have more to say in the future. For now…

Let’s Go to YouTube!

Over at the Arbiter of Worlds YouTube channel, I’ve posted the trailer to my current crowdfunding campaign, Ascendant: Platinum Edition. Ascendant was designed to be a physics-based simulation of a superhero universe with 1990s Image Comics aesthetics. I hope you’ll enjoy the trailer enough to back the Kickstarter.

But whether or not supers are your jam, be sure to subscribe to the channel, because I will soon be launching a weekly YouTube show focusing on gamemastering tabletop RPGs. As I’ve remarked in my book, most GM advice is simply terrible and following it simply destroys the ability to run a great campaign. I’ll aim to change that, and if even a dozen gaming groups get a better RPG campaign out of my efforts, that’ll be a win that’s worth it.

Do You Want to Know More?

Once you’ve finished joining the Discord and backing the new campaign, head over to the links below for ways to get involved in the newly declared Simulationist culture. If you’re a fan, be kind and spread the word!

• ACKS Patreon with a new article from our Axioms ezine every month

• Ascendant Patreon with a new character and story hook every month

• Autarch Facebook page with news and updates about our projects

• Autarch Twitter channel with brief comments and witty quirks

• Ascendant Comics Facebook page with sneak previews of the upcoming comics

• Ascendant Comics Instagram page with tons of art and cosplay

• Ascendant Comics Twitter channel with short messages and quirky wit

• ACKS Forums with discussion for the game

• Ascendant Forums with FAQ and Errata for the game

Thanks for reading Arbiter of Worlds!