Ludic Agent

A Ludic Agent is an independent decision-maker taking part in a Ludic Process. It chooses between possibilities, out of states of its own - perception, intention, impulse. The term comprises all participants in a ludic event: those playing, referees, coaches, substitutes, spectators, animals, the Ludic Robot and all other participants.

The defining criterion is the capacity to decide, not its actual exercise. A silent spectator is an agent because they could decide otherwise - and because their behaviour can be addressed by Ludic Regulation. Game theory likewise understands the player as a decision-maker.

Voluntariness is not constitutive of agent status. A professional player, a student in the simulation game of a compulsory seminar and a child on the playground are equally Ludic Agents. The question of why someone takes part does not belong to the basic definition of the agent.

Ludic Agents are human agents, animal agents or a Ludic Robot. Human agents have needs, motivations, emotions and reflexivity. Animal agents have instincts, the capacity to learn and impulses of their own; they do not grasp the play framing reflexively but are, through their behaviour, full participants in the process. The Ludic Robot is a built Ludic Agent - chess computer, game-playing robot, co-playing neural network; its decision behaviour is specified or trained.

Ludic Agents may possess Ludic Sovereignty - the authority to decide about the specifications themselves: changing rules, setting oneself an objective. It forms a spectrum from no to full sovereignty and is not required for agent status: the capacity to decide concerns decisions within the process, sovereignty concerns decisions about the specifications.

No distinction is drawn between the human being and their role as a Ludic Agent: the concept of the human agent already includes their autonomy.

In everyday language

• “player” (the term is broader): Whoever takes part in a match and plays.

Place and design access

Place on the axis: AGENT - the inner end of the reference axis AGENT – PROCESS – CORPUS – FORM. The agent acts at the innermost point, in its action space, and at the same time comes from outside: what it is, it brings with it.

Design access: addressable - agents are addressable, not controllable; what can be regulated is their action space - what they can do in play, not what they want or feel. Designers address agents and regulate what they can and may do in the process; what they want, what they feel and how they decide, designers do not determine. They create conditions under which certain experiences become more likely, but cannot guarantee or compel experience. Whoever does not want to play, does not play.

	human and animal Ludic Agents	Ludic Robot
Design access	addressable, not controllable; what can be regulated is the action space	likewise for all who do not build it; for those who build it, designable (specified) or targetable (trained)
Ludic Regulation	is applied	is implemented
Behaviour	emergent, unpredictable	specified or trained, potentially emergent
Designers’ task	create conditions under which experience becomes likely	develop and test the decision logic - where they build it themselves

Relations on the axis:

• At least one Ludic Agent makes the happening a Ludic Process - explicitly or by a social convention. Human agents frame; animals and the Ludic Robot are included.
• The Ludic Process presupposes agents taking part in it and determines their action space at every state. Agent and process presuppose each other.
• The Ludic Corpus addresses the agent and regulates its action space; conversely, the agent specifies in the corpus, as far as its Ludic Sovereignty reaches.
• The Ludic Operation couples it to the Ludic Form - in the human agent via its Capacitas. It reads what happens according to a Ludic Frame - a cultural schema the corpus calls up.

Further relations: The agent performs Ludic Actions and Activities and contributes to the Fabula. A Ludic Entity can represent it - the avatar. The Ludic Social Structure organises the agents in relation to one another; the Ludic Regulation addresses them. Ludic Sovereignty presupposes an agent. The Ludic Robot is its special form.

Delimitations

Delimitation from Ludic Entity

Against the Ludic Entity. The capacity to decide draws the line. The exoskeleton and the racing car do not decide - whoever sits in them is a human agent steering an Entity. The polo pony decides for itself - in polo, rider and horse are two agents of different type. Likewise with what is built: the scripted figure, whose place only the rules create, is an Entity; the chess computer in Black’s seat is a Ludic Robot. The place decides, not the technology. A hybrid agent is therefore not posited.

Delimitation from Ludic Agent Situation

Against the Ludic Agent Situation. Wind, floodlights and crowd noise influence the course but do not decide. They belong to the situation in which the agents play.

Delimitation from Ludic Regulation

Against chance. The die influences the course but does not decide: chance is specified in the Ludic Regulation. Game theory assigns chance moves to “Nature”, not to a player.

Examples

• Chess: two players. If someone plays against a chess computer, a Ludic Robot sits in Black’s seat. The audience of a tournament consists of agents who must remain silent.
• Werewolf: the players and the game master, who schedules and runs the match but does not play - they frame and regulate.
• Polo: riders and horses, two agents of different type in the same process.
• Association football: 22 players, plus referees, coaches, substitutes and spectators; only some of them have an action space on the pitch.
• Sandbox game: players with far-reaching Ludic Sovereignty who set their own goals.

Explanation

Who takes part in a game? Not only those at the board or on the pitch. At a chess tournament it is the two players, but also the arbiter and the audience, who must stay silent. In Werewolf it includes the game master, who does not play but runs the match. In polo the horse is a Ludic Agent, and whoever plays against a chess computer faces a Ludic Robot. All of them take part in deciding, all are addressed by rules, all belong to the game.

Whether someone plays voluntarily or is paid for it, whether they act themselves or cheer from the stands: this changes nothing about their status as a Ludic Agent, only how they take part in the Ludic Process. You can hear how different that can be: in tennis the audience falls silent during the rally, in football it sings and whistles for ninety minutes. The difference is designed - the rules specify what spectators may do.

Some agents can change the game’s specifications themselves: the child who invents new rules; the player who builds worlds in a sandbox; the game master who adapts rules on the spot. How far this Ludic Sovereignty reaches is itself a design decision. As designers we can shape the game - we do not control the people and animals who play it. Therein lie the creative challenge of game design and its responsibility.

Constituting features

Participation in the Ludic Process: The agent is involved in an ongoing Ludic Process - they are within the framing “this is play”. At least one human agent makes the happening a Ludic Process, explicitly or by a social convention. Animal agents and the Ludic Robot do not frame; they are included in the framing.

Capacity to decide: The agent can choose between possibilities within the process - in its action space, which the process determines at every state. What matters is the capacity, not the actual exercise: whoever stays silent or sits on the bench also decides.

Being regulated: Ludic Regulation addresses the agent and regulates its action space - even where regulation is minimal. Spectators in football may not enter the pitch; spectators in tennis must be silent during the serve. The kind of regulation is a design decision that directly affects the experience of all involved.

Differentiation axes

The following three dimensions are not a grid of types: a Ludic Agent can combine several dimensions at once and hold each of them to a different degree. A player-coach occupies activity and shaping; a Game Master occupies regulation and shaping together with Ludic Sovereignty.

Dimension 1: Participation

Activity: Does the agent have an action space defined by Ludic Regulation, perform Ludic Actions and Activities and interact directly with Entities? The degree ranges from full (those playing on the pitch) through latent (substitutes: an action space not yet opened) to none (spectators without a formalised action space).

Regulation: Does the agent monitor, interpret and execute the Ludic Regulation? Fully present in referees, partly in players keeping score in a card game.

Shaping: Does the agent influence the process through decisions outside the immediate play? Fully present in coaches, partly in spectators whose cheering co-determines the course contextually.

The degrees are designable: design decisions can lift spectators from no activity to limited activity (audience voting) and vice versa.

Dimension 2: Agent type

Human agent: reflexive about the framing; addressable, not controllable; what can be regulated is its action space Animal agent: non-reflexive; trainable, partly unpredictable Ludic Robot: built; decision behaviour specified or trained; occupies a participant’s place; designable or targetable for those who build it, addressable for everyone else

The Ludic Agent is the type-neutral basic term. The three Human Agent dimensions - Capacitas, Habitus, Motivation - are the human-specific elaboration of what an agent brings along. Ludic Agent Situation and Ludic Sovereignty are type-neutral. Ludic Fabula, Ludic Experience, Ludic Ductus and Ludic Effectus arise in the process and are borne by the agent (AGENT–PROCESS).

Dimension 3: Ludic Sovereignty

no sovereignty (fixed rule set), limited sovereignty (content, not rules), regulated sovereignty (rules by meta-rules), full sovereignty (anything changeable at any time). Its extent is framed by the meta-regulation and can be individual or shared.