The nature of "realism" in the game world

So, I was going to post this on another thread, or maybe my blog, but I decided it'd work better here. It is, in essence, my view on "realism" in Role-playing games. feel free to argue/agree/expand upon.

***

There is a certain notion among many gamers that "realism" must be reflected in the game world. When an event happens in the game world, some player will point out "That's not realistic!". Taken to an extreme, you start getting some weird extensions of the game - Invisible Characters cannot see, because light is no longer able to reflect off their eyes, or a character with 100 hit points gets hit by a katana for 8 damage and dies, because "katana are very sharp weapons, and would kill a man if it hit".

This, of course, is a topic that has been discussed at length on every RPG-centred thread board time and time again, and it's not really something I care to discuss here.

Instead, I'm wondering - how is reality reflected in a game system? And to that, I say - every game system reflects their own view of reality. A game that encourages swashbuckling should have rules that encourage swashbuckling, and promote a reality similar to that in a swashbuckling movie. A post-apocalyptic RPG should probably have very gritty rules, but it could add things that are very unrealistic (radiation that causes mutations, for example) to enhance it's own reality.

In essence, the goal of any game is not to promote reality, but instead a vision of reality - much like films. I mention films because this drive for "realism" is just as present in that art form - how many times have fans argued against something in a film because it just wasn't "realistic"? While the obvious fantasies - Indiana Jones, Star Wars, and the like - can be ignored, this "realism" charge is trumped against even many dramas. How realistic, some critics will bring up, are some of the scenes in Saving Private Ryan? Or The Thin Red Line?

Also much like films, the goal of RPG design is not just to promote one form of reality, but to make that vision consistent. If your swashbuckling game is fairly loose and fluid in most of the rules, and then it has some really strange rules involving drinking dirty water (which goes against 99% of the source material) because, historically, people drank fermented beverages to avoid water-bourne illnesses, the rules have actually broken away from their assumed reality and consistency, in the hopes of capturing the "realism" of the period.

Now, I've been thinking about "reality" in games for a while, and I've come to the conclusion that if you want a "realistic" game, avoid rules-heavy systems. This may seem to be counterintuitive, but I'll do my best to explain my position.

In a rules-heavy game (I would define Shadowrun as a rules-heavy game, as well as most incarnations of 3.5E; 4e I think is heading in that direction, as well... but this is a different topic entirely, and if someone wants to bring it up, feel free to do so in a different thread), there are rules for many different aspects of character behaviour - there are usually rules for running, taking damage, healing, vision, exploration, interpersonal communications, and so on. Many of these rules are there to promote the game's vision of reality, but many of them are there to cover things not pertaining to the game's "reality" - in 3.5E, for example, I'd point at the aging rules as a prime suspect.

The problem is, once you start tryign to reflect "Reality" with a rules system, strange artefacts begin to develop. IN 3.5E, for example, your wisdom increases as you gets older, which could be argued a realistic development. However, because perception is based off wisdom, your character's vision and hearing actually improve as you get older, which is decidedly "Unrealistic". Similarly, the 3.5E rules have all sorts of rules for things like Grappling and Disarming, which could lead to some fairly unrealistic (and against the implied reality of the game) situations where PCs would become grapple-fiends.

In other words, rules-heavy games must, by nature, encourage some choices over others. And sometimes, these choices go against both "reality" and "game reality" (i.e., the rules by which the game world lives by). A clever player can exploit these rules to tweak the system to suit his needs.

In contrast, a rules-light system can better reflect "Reality" (both true reality and in-game reality), simply because the absence of tight rules mean the GM is required to describe things more to fill the void. Rather than consulting game rules, many times the GM is required to make a judgement call in response to a player action, based on what he thinks is realistic (whether it is real-world realistic or game-world realistic is an important choice for the GM). Because this is a human element adjudicating player actions, the presence of rules-artefacts will arise less frequently.

Wik said:

In contrast, a rules-light system can better reflect "Reality" (both true reality and in-game reality), simply because the absence of tight rules mean the GM is required to describe things more to fill the void. Rather than consulting game rules, many times the GM is required to make a judgement call in response to a player action, based on what he thinks is realistic (whether it is real-world realistic or game-world realistic is an important choice for the GM). Because this is a human element adjudicating player actions, the presence of rules-artefacts will arise less frequently.

Click to expand...

It could also reasonably be argued that rules-light vs. rules-heavy comes down to the difference between human-created rules largely already in place and human-created rules that must more often be invented on the fly. In both cases, the human element is inescapable, of course. But when using rules-light systems, GMing is in one fundamental sense a more demanding and complicated role (and therefore more prone to error).

Which is a bit of a sidetrack I suppose, so sorry about that.

As for realism, suspension of disbelief and immersion in character and in the setting is what I look for / aim for / try for / demand.

Aus_Snow said:

It could also reasonably be argued that rules-light vs. rules-heavy comes down to the difference between human-created rules largely already in place and human-created rules that must more often be invented on the fly. In both cases, the human element is inescapable, of course. But when using rules-light systems, GMing is in one fundamental sense a more demanding and complicated role (and therefore more prone to error).

Which is a bit of a sidetrack I suppose, so sorry about that.

As for realism, suspension of disbelief and immersion in character and in the setting is what I look for / aim for / try for / demand.

Click to expand...

Not really much of a sidetrack, and I appreciate the viewpoint. While you can easily say that rules-heavy actually favours inexperienced GMs, and I can totally understand that, I do believe that if a gamer really wanted a "Realistic" game (whether it is true realism, or a "Real within the game" realism), you are better off with a rules-light approach.

I guess that's my main point, but I'm up late, and I had the idea in my head, and I wanted to get it down all fancy-like. So, my real points are these:

1) Realism is hard to get in a game system.
2) If you want realism, you're better off with a rules-light system.
3) Rules-heavy systems often come up with some weird rule artefacts that contribute to "unrealistic" play.

I think realism is much more important when it comes to actions of NPCs than when it comes to physics/rules. It's one thing to handwave invisibility as "it works and you can see while invisible", it's another if the existence of invisibility has no impact or is not reflected in the game world.

Shadowrun is, at least partially, pretty realistic not because of the mechanics, but because the world (with some exceptions) tries to have some internal consistency. Invisibility exists, is known, and the world adapted to it. There are magical guards, and technological means to counter it.

Contrast this with some settings where despite the known existence of Fly and Invisibility, people who are likely to be the target of such a combo behave as if there were no such things. That's not realistic.

A game world should have an explanation why applications of spells and powers most gamers will come up with in 5 minutes are not done.

I agree, in gerenal, with the OP. Thus, I will give only a few additions.

I think there are three different types of realism that may be present in RPG:
1. Real-world realism ("how it works in reality"). Obviously cannot be applied to things that directly violate laws of our world (magic, for example).
2. Setting consistency ("how this fictional world works"). This is type of realism demands economy and society structure to take the existence of magic into account.
3. Style consistency ("which themes are present in this kind of stories and which are not"). This is why Star Wars ships and bases have bottomless pits, why D&D villains build dungeons etc. This type of realism is violated by "dirty water" rules in a swashbuckling system in OP's example.

As for rules-heavy and rules-light systems, the most important aspect, IMO, is players' perception of character creation and in-game actions. When using rules-light systems, most people take setting and style into account when deciding who they want to play and what they want to do. In rules-heavy, there is quite a strong tendency to think "whatever the rules allow is OK in game" - and this is the reason why rule artifacts break realism. It is possible to play in the same way as in rules-light game, but even very good players get caught in this "think by rules" trap.

Although I tend to prefer rules-lightness, what really matters is the relationship with the rules.

Someone with little game and/or life experience may find it much handier to have more rules than to make more rulings. As you've pointed out, naive application of rules can often produce results at odds with verisimilitude (which may or may not be identical with a more objective "realism").

Indeed, in an RPG, the very knowledge of game mechanics is a step away from "first person" verisimilitude. What does Valthor the Mighty know of hit points?

From a "third person" perspective, game probabilities might be a very accurate model of a given situation -- or at least be impressive enough in their number-crunching and pedantry to assist players' suspension of disbelief.

(Complex mechanics can also simply be fun for some gamers. That is quite another subject, along with the tendency to ascribe more "fairness" to more detailed and rigid rules.)

An experienced GM may regard heavier rules systems as simply more "tools" to use as appropriate. The degree to which they can be treated as optional without "breaking the system" or confounding players' expectations is critical.

Speaking of "critical," Rolemaster with all its Companions presents so many (often mutually exclusive) options that some selection is necessary to a playable game. Some other game systems may present a similar challenge.

Older versions of D&D presented a fairly rules-light core. Embellishments, whether from "official" supplements or "home brewed," were common. They were clearly, however, not required components. Over time, some additions (for example, variable damage by weapon type, and the Thief class) became widely regarded as intrinsic. Others remained clearly marked as "optional" -- and the basic principle that "the DM is the rules" was never entirely buried.

With 3E and 4E, more complex structures became essentially de rigeur. When mechanisms become mandatory, obviously there's less room for considerations of realism.

I think that a better question is to ask: "Are the game mechanics plausible within the genre conventions?" An over-the-top martial arts game has different assumptions than a gritty WWII campaign.

I do not consider D&D - in any incarnation - to be "realistic". Yet that doesn't detract me from enjoying the game, as it has its own conventions and style of play. As long as everyone at the table understands these conventions, everything should go smoothly.

If I do want to play a game that's doing a reasonably close approximation of "realism", I tend to pick GURPS. And happily, it does not rely on me having to make judgment calls as a GM (since such judgment calls are inevitably biased and might disagree with the players), since the authors of GURPS did their research on what is plausible and what isn't before writing the rules...

I mostly agree with the OP.

When using written rules or DM judgment, either way you're getting a human being's take on the rules.

The human being who wrote the written rule had certain advantages. He had a lot of time to think about what he wrote, he had time to research if he chose, he had time to compare to other gaming systems, he had a good vision of the overall design and theme of the game, and he had time to consider balance and repeatability. He also has two big disadvantages: he had to anticipate the problems that the rule was intended to resolve, and he had limited space to write down rules, both of which require a degree of generalization.

The DM making an off the cuff ruling has the inverse of all of those. He has no time to think, research, compare, consider balance, etc. He may not totally *get* the theme of the game yet. But he also knows exactly the nature of the problem faced by his players.

That's why, in my opinion, rules for social matters, crafts, professions held by players, and so forth should be as general as possible and allow for as much DM intervention as possible. These are things where it is hard to predict in advance the needs that will arrive at every game table and where its hard to come up with enough rules to cover the matter thoroughly in a limited space, but where its also easy to make off the cuff judgments.

In contrast, I prefer for combat rules to be written down in detail. For me, combat is a problem solving challenge. How do I, as a player, help my character use his abilities to the utmost to accomplish his goals? For that I need predictability and quality of detail and balance that are better obtained from someone writing rules in advance.

Wik said:

This, of course, is a topic that has been discussed at length on every RPG-centred thread board time and time again, and it's not really something I care to discuss here.

Click to expand...

I find myself skeptical of this.


Cheers,
Roger

Ariosto said:

When mechanisms become mandatory, obviously there's less room for considerations of realism. When (as in 4E) they are designed with thoroughgoing disregard for verisimilitude, trying to introduce it can be problematic indeed. "It's not Dungeons & Physics" is a pat response to any whiff of common sense, because One Rule to Ring Them All provides a blanket of security considered more important than fidelity even to the internal logic of fantasy.

Click to expand...

That's how I see it too.

But a rule-light system doesn't necessarily mean "the absence of tight rules" or just "filling the void".
Some rules get in the way of realism precisely because they're too broad and simplified. Take the OP's Wisdom example. A few ability scores covering several loosely related concepts (in this case perception and common sense) is rule-light compared to more detailed systems with lots of narrow abilities but creates more inconsistencies. The ageing rule isn't unrealistic because it's too detailed. It's unrealistic because it's too broad.

I think it's more a matter of priorities (the will to actually model something) and well thought-out rules than rule-light vs rule-heavy.
I prefer more streamlined systems but gurps is both more detailed and more realistic than dnd. And I won't go into what I think of 4e's "simplifications" and how they affect verisimilitude.

I also believe that the more judgment calls a dm has to make, the more inconsistencies will arise, no matter how experienced he is.