Why the hate for complexity?

I would love a game that more accurately modeled medieval combat and weapons, and made combat full of mechanical options and choices...but every system like that I've tried was a chore to run and bogged down at the table. So I went back to an OD&D philosophy and system and things are fine.

I do agree that there is a strain of "complex = badwrongfun" which has been pervasive over the last few years. I wish it were easier for folks to accept that different people like different things, but I guess that's the nature of things.

Celebrim said:

In the 80's, design in RPGs was wide open and we barely had language to talk about the issues of design. There was a lot of good design and a lot of bad design, but one very common complaint about D&D is that the design was bad because it wasn't 'realistic', and there was a general sense in much of the community that many if not all of the problems tables encountered in a game was do to a lack of 'realism'. Various systems of Traveller and GURPS might also be worth looking at, and a trip into the world of GULLIVER (a modification of GURPS) would also be worthwhile. This led to a fetishization of realism as a goal of game design, which can be seen in extremely complex games of the period - HERO, and Rolemaster might be a very good examples, though the pain points in that complexity come up at different points. Since the goal of RPGs started out as basically 'Simulation of the World', the attributes of a system which were considered very admirable in a system were that it would be universal (able to simulate everything) and realistic (able to produce a simulation that produced intuitive or 'correct' results).

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@Celebrim sums it up pretty well here, with the key idea being, why the need for complexity? What does the complexity actually positively accomplish either at or away from the game table?

Ostensibly the goal early on for creating more complex games was realism. The thought was that in order to more accurately "simulate" real-world processes and phenomena, you had to create rules systems that operated at a highly granular level.

The problem with doing this is that implementing that complexity at the table---making skill checks, running details combat scenarios---became so cumbersome that many players ended up rejecting the resulting play experience.

If "realism" really was the end-all, be-all to a quality RPG experience, then Rolemaster, GURPS, HERO, Runequest, etc., would have long ago gotten a much larger footprint into the TRPG "cultural identity," but they haven't.

What little experience I have with these types of systems is with GURPS, but I was always struck by the irony of the attitude many of the players had when I was in that particular group. They had this attitude that GURPS was the "One True Way," that anyone who didn't immediately recognize and embrace the awesomeness that was GURPS was essentially a moron. "It's so much more realistic," "You can literally do anything with it," "I don't get why ANYONE would still play D&D when GURPS is around; D&D is inferior in every way."

But after a few brief turns of popularity, 33 years after its release in 1986, GURPS is barely a niche player at this point. D&D, Pathfinder, Fate, Savage Worlds, Fantasy Flight Star Wars / Genesys are all objectively more popular and widely played based on sales numbers and play statistics on things like Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds. I'd even argue that the combined OSR and Powered by the Apocalypse games are vastly more popular.

And why is that? Because for other than a microscopic fraction of the TRPG player base, the complexity of GURPS does not ultimately serve the purposes of play for participants.

So the question again is, why are you adding complexity? It's already been shown through decades of real-world experience that "complexity for the sake of realism" is a dead-end goal. So why else would you add complexity?

Are you wanting to just give players more options to muck about with away from the table? Because it's no denying that this was a huge draw for D&D 3.x / Pathfinder. But that again only plays into the needs of a small subset of gamers.

Are you, as @Celebrim noted, adding complexity because it makes a good marketing strategy? Because this was clearly the case with GURPS as well, where they literally have a supplement for every conceivable genre and historical period. And that's fine, but again, SOMEONE has to balance all that complexity against the costs for putting it to use in play.


(*Edit* As [MENTION=4937]Celebrim[/MENTION] mentions too, historically there was a strident section of RPG players at the time who firmly believed that adherence to realism as the ultimate goal would create dramatically better play experiences across the board. The reasoning being, most disagreements at the game table between players and GMs were around "how realistic" stuff should be, and that if GMs could just grasp "realism" better, that games would automatically improve in play. And we continue to see this impulse manifest itself, even now.)

I think at the core, the need for complexity is "Some players are nuts and bolts type people, others aren't". One True Wayism isn't limited to complexity as goal games, as evidenced by presenting an open game and immediately being asked "Is it d20 system?". 20 years ago, I was a One True Wayer for D&D.

innerdude said:

So the question again is, why are you adding complexity? It's already been shown through decades of real-world experience that "complexity for the sake of realism" is a dead-end goal. So why else would you add complexity?

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Because I enjoy it.

Are you wanting to just give players more options to muck about with away from the table?

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Absolutely! System mastery is its own fun for some. Tinkering is an enjoyable activity for many.

Because it's no denying that this was a huge draw for D&D 3.x / Pathfinder. But that again only plays into the needs of a small subset of gamers.

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Well, I only need to worry about a small subset of gamers. Me and my friends!

(Or if I'm designing, as a small press publisher I don't need to sell millions of copies to make a living).

I think a big reason why my group didn't grouse when I moved the system from more complex games ultimately Swords and Wizardry is that they don't mess with the game stuff outside game night for the most part, so the build tweaking loss wasn't a huge deal. Since 2k we went from 3.0>3.5>CC>1e+CC mashup>5e>S&W. And with 5e, well I was having to rework too much of it to make it even remotely challenging for my table that I said, screw this. Otherwise I'd probably still run it. I would just house rule the heck out of it, but why bother when S&W is doing what I want?

I have maybe two-and-a-half hours in which to play, every other week, with a group of up to seven players at a time.

We can get a heck of a lot more done in that time with a rules-light system than we can with something more complex.

The proliferation of rules-light games are a godsend for tables like mine. We wouldn't be able to play RPGs otherwise. They might not always have the longevity that a more complex RPG can bring to the table, but not every table needs that style of play anymore. 8-12 sessions can be a good length for a campaign.

innerdude said:

[MENTION=4937]Celebrim[/MENTION] sums it up pretty well here, with the key idea being, why the need for complexity? What does the complexity actually positively accomplish either at or away from the game table?

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That's an extraordinarily deep and useful question, and my way of answering it depends on me discussing what I think an RPG is, and what I think makes a good and successful RPG. My answers are radically different than the conventional ones The Forge offers, so bear with me.

So to begin with, I believe an RPG is a game of structured make believe story-telling that is composed of a collection of mini-games which simulate aspects of the genera of the story that is being told. An RPG is successful, if the different mini-games satisfy one or more of the potential aesthetics of play of the participants in a compelling way.

That may require some breakdown to fully get at what I'm saying, but from that definition we can I think immediately espy the utility of complexity. First, complexity is useful because more minigames means more different aesthetics of play that can be potentially satisfied by a game over the course of play, and the more different genera elements or conflicts we can resolve in a compelling way. Secondly, complexity is useful because it can add depth to those minigames, making them more compelling in terms of the opportunities the player will have for decision making, the emersion that the player will experience in the minigame, and the way that the minigame will act to both prompt and aid the imaginations of the participants. That is to say, by providing more structure and more details within a particular minigame, the more likely it is that the minigame can satisfy multiple aesthetics of play simultaneously.

Now I want to contrast this with two specific claims made by 'The Forge'. The first is that all correctly designed games only can satisfy at most one aesthetic of play (of which The Forge identified only three). And the second is that a system should be tightly designed as a single coherent game to satisfy that one aesthetic of play. These two claims lead one to think that the best possible RPG is one that is very simple and has a single unified system running through out it. But by contrast I'm suggesting that the best possible RPG is one that has disparate, non-unified but interacting subsystems that each work to accomplish different goals of play by the different participants in the game.

My idea here is that by catering to diverse experiences, not only are you attracting more different participants to the game, but you are preventing the participants from easily tiring of the ones perspective on play that a more tightly designed system would provide for. To go back to my earlier food analogy, a good rules light game might be something like 'Cane's Chicken Fingers', which offers a very limited menu selection of simply prepared convenient food. The problem with this approach is that while it satisfies your urge for fried chicken, when you assemble a crowd of people not only are you likely to have people that are tired of fried chicken or who are glutten intolerant, but you probably will not find a group that will want to go out for chicken fingers every week. Whereas a diner with a more diverse menu, might reasonably offer something for everyone and sufficient menu diversity that you do not easily tire of the food. There might be that one guy that likes cheeseburgers and always orders the cheeseburgers, but as long as the other participants in the party can order something else, everyone is happy.

Derren said:

So I wonder where this hate for complexity comes from?

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"Hate" is a strong word. It suggests an emotional commitment that probably doesn't (or at least shouldn't) apply to a game mechanic.

Have people grown up, gotten jobs and dont have time/interest to learn rules anymore? Do they feel rules are constricting or that the granularity complex rules add like characters being differently competent in different skills instead of having one modifier for everything doesn't add anything to the game?

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It isn't about *learning* the rules. It is about *using* the rules. When I was a kid, my free time was bountiful, and my life experience limited. I would spend tons of time on just about anything. Weekends and summers were long stretches of freedom to do whatever I pleased, a lot of which was gaming sessions, 8 hour stretches, twice a weekend, and multiple days a week in the summer...

Today, that just can't happen. Free time is limited, and to have the most full life, one must prioritize for the greatest joys. So, I have to ask myself, is *USING* the rules at least in the running to be the most fun part of the game? Do I (and more importantly my players) get a kick and have fun in the act of working the mechanics? The act of counting up the fiddly bits, looking up details, is that a thing we smile when we do?

If not, then the rules need to get out of the way for the things that are in the running. With my main group, I have a three hour session every other week. I *do not have time* for things in there that are a drag.

Derren said:

So I wonder where this hate for complexity comes from? Was it always there? Have people grown up, gotten jobs and dont have time/interest to learn rules anymore? Do they feel rules are constricting or that the granularity complex rules add like characters being differently competent in different skills instead of having one modifier for everything doesn't add anything to the game?

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Speaking for myself - I teach a lot of novices how to play. And I play with a lot of casual gamers. So in my role as an RPG evangelist to complete noobs and people who won't remember the rules from week to week, having rules systems that are "just complex enough" is important. Too much complexity they get overwhelmed and it becomes "not fun". Too rules-lite and there isn't enough of a game for them to hang onto. As more companies are kind of thinking about bringing new players into the market - rather than just cannibalizing existing players to come play their game - I think they're keeping issues like that more at the fore than they might have a decade or so ago.

Another angle is that a lot of folks are coming into the game via actual play pod/vid casts. And in general the shows that have more narrative and less rules talk are more engaging for the audience. So there's been more exposure for games that play well for audiences, and that's driving the conversation in ways that it never would have been driven previously when the idea of people actually tuning in to watch a bunch of nerds sit around a table and play D&D would have been the punchline to a joke and not something that happens on a daily basis. (I still can't quite believe that it happens, tbh.)

And also - I think that it's hard to sell people on a new complex game these days. Because there are existing games out there that they're already playing, and learning a new complex rules set is more of a time cost than learning to play a lighter game. It's a big ask.