The Id DM Interviews Monte Cook

Morrus · Jun 15, 2012

The Id DM has interviewed Monte Cook (one of the l ead designers of D&D 3E, and until recently - until he left for reasons mysterious and unknown and thus inviting of speculation - of D&D Next, on the RPG industry, his thoughts on rules systems, and his evolotion as a game designer. Read it here.

Mark CMG · Jun 15, 2012

Interesting interview of Monte Cook on The Id DM Michael's blog -

Ego Check: Monte Cook, Game Designer & Author | The Id DM

Stormonu · Jun 15, 2012

It's interesting that system mastery keeps coming up.

I think there is some benefit to system mastery, but I don't think Monte is explaining it very well.

I see it at its best in games like chess. "Out of the box", everyone has the same number of pieces, the pieces are fixed, and yet each piece has own ability. The big difference often comes in the experience of the players. Long-time players have developed strategies and know how to use the board pieces to great effect. They know that losing a pawn is a minor problem compared to the loss of a queen.

It's not a case of "pawns suck, queens rule" and you need to change the game rules so that all the pieces are pawns (or mid-range rooks/bishops) - or god forbid, every piece is a queen*. So long as a player is playing with all the pieces, the game's fine as it is. And you should be able to play Archon or Nightmare chess without other people giving you the evil eye.

* Also, when comparing to D&D, it's better if each class represents a mix of all the pieces, not one specific piece; look at the entire side, instead of one single figure on that side (i.e., fighter ≠ pawn, wizard ≠ queen, but perhaps in certain edition's fighter = 16 pawns, wizard = 16 queens). The chess anology works best if each player is playing either white or black, not pawn, rook, knight, bishop or queen as their only piece. You start doing the latter, and the whole game falls apart.

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TL; DR - some system mastery is okay, so long as it's about using what you have and not screwing with what you have.

mcmillan · Jun 15, 2012

It's an interesting read, though I want to point out it's not Matt James' blog

Mark CMG · Jun 15, 2012

mcmillan said:
It's an interesting read, though I want to point out it's not Matt James' blog

Thank you. My bad. He pointed it out on FB and I thought it was his blog. I'll fix that.

Richards · Jun 16, 2012

Stormonu said:
And you should be able to play Archon or Nightmare chess without other people giving you the evil eye.

Not really relevant to the topic at hand, but Knightmare Chess is awesome!

Johnathan

Andor · Jun 16, 2012

It is an interesting read. And really, it makes me wonder all the more why Monte left WotC becuase what he says his goals have evolved into seems to align precisely with what 5e is supposed to be all about.

One thing that caught my eye though was his emphasis on intuative rules. Personally I want a game to give me evocative rules. I want the rules to help conjure the world of the game into my head. I want to read and be inspired.

Griego · Jun 16, 2012

Wow, so minimizing system mastery produces a game where "there’s no chance that you can lose"? Sounds like a bit of a straw man, to me.

Alphastream · Jun 16, 2012

Andor said:
It is an interesting read. And really, it makes me wonder all the more why Monte left WotC becuase what he says his goals have evolved into seems to align precisely with what 5e is supposed to be all about.

From both that and the Mike Mearls AMA, it sounds as if it was what they said it was - more about work styles and agreements than subject matter or personality differences.

Doug McCrae · Jun 16, 2012

I suppose that rust monsters and bookworms count as punishing, as whether they affect a character or not depends upon that character's class.

Regarding system mastery, studying rules in depth is an activity that many rpg-ers enjoy for its own sake. They just like rules. Rewards of system mastery can come in different forms such as being recognised as a rules guru by one's peers, or having a more powerful player character and thus more authority over the game than the other players.

A system master may not necessarily use his knowledge to create a more powerful character - I've often restrained myself playing Champions, regarding many possibilities allowed by the rules as either illegitimate, going too far, not being in genre, or otherwise unfun.

One method I've seen employed to stop varying levels of system mastery leading to PC power imbalance is for one participant - either the GM, or the group's 'rules guru' - to create all the PCs, or at least their mechanical elements.