Framing Devices and Role Playing

[KoL]

Hi. I read this part of the forum quite a lot but rarely, if ever post my opinion on anything, or start discussions.

However, I came upon a question while planning a RP with a few friends and that brought me a doubt that could be a good debate issue.

Simply put, what are your opinions/tips/view on the usage of framing devices for a role play? For those who may not be aware, I refer to things such as story that is game inside of game, or the RP being a story/song/poem being told by a narrator to an interlocutor of whatever nature. Things like this, where the player characters are unaware that they are inside of a story, but there's a higher level existence within the narrative that knows better.

How would you pull one of these settings, or wouldn't you?

[Maxwell]

I don't think I would. I rarely feel that framing devices add much to stories in general, and I don't see how they would add anything to a role playing game.

The closest thing I've ever experienced was many, many years ago, where most of the players portrayed fantasy adventurers, while a few of the others played gods taking an interest in their adventures and interfering with them.

[BrokenPromise]

I think by framing devices, you're simply saying the story is told by a character who never appears in the story. Versus normal third person, where the story is told by a body-less entity.

Some examples:

3rd Person:

"the world was in peril."

"Jack picked up a coin. He wondered how it got there."

what you want:

"our world was in peril."

"Jack picked up a coin. How do you suppose it got there?"

I thought this approach was called "4th narrative" but i can't find any evidence on google.

I think the main problem with framed stories for RPs is that it usually requires a group of people to share the same character (the narrator) which can cause drama. You could split up the narrators, but then why not just have everyone write in first person if you wanted to flavor the posts with some personality?

I suppose it's a matter of taste. You could do it, but would the pay off be worth it?

[Shoryu Magami]

Depending on what you mean by 'framing devices' (they can imply a few different things, each which would be handled differently in role-play), @KoL, my response to this could actually be different.

If you're referring to having an 'off-screen' character (a.k.a. 'fourth person' as @BrokenPromise called it) telling the narrative the entire time then you've already gotten the answer I'd give you -- it can work in specific types of storytelling, but becomes a problem when multiple role-players need to play it at the same time to keep consistency, unless all the writers in question have good collaboration anyway.

However, if you're talking about the 'framing devices' being something that appears occasionally - that isn't a constant narrator - then it could probably work depending on how your preferences swing. I believe this is likely a very subjective matter, as most forms of writing and reading are. I arguably use devices like this myself in my own project.