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Except that hit points don't represent damage. Things and people that are damaged are weaker and less capable. Hit points represent your ability to ignore physical consequences.

If it's not fun it's not a good game. And I you've put your finger on an issue with simulationism - all we have is guesses backed by some research.

First Rolemaster is second in my sim game list (behind, of course, GURPS) and is definitely underappreciated. But the problem it has in terms of complexity is that due to the required tables for the combat you can not master Rolemaster to the point you can run without looking things up in the...

OK. If this is only RP settings I'm citing WFRP as being better thematically than almost any Sci-Fi RPG I can think of with the possible exception of its space-fantasy spinoff.

Then you're reading the wrong fantasy. The Discworld, Earthsea, and the Curse of Chalion series all say hi.

For me to actually matter the setting element must either (a) be something there that we can interact with and can adapt to what we say or do or (b) be something I have a significant belief will be burned to the ground without there being a reset button. Which is why I don't give a damn about...

Except it literally isn't something to track. It's a one-and-done thing. All you are tracking is the physical position of the model in the map. It's a one-and-done rather than something you have to track. There is no ongoing effect that actually needs tracking - all that there is is that the NPC...

Lighter games track what they value and not what they don't. And tend to be focused round valuing a few things. So yes, most lighter games don't use battlemaps. Or encumbrance. Or skills. Or ... But I can think of games that do all these. I've got Major Property Damage! on my work bench - a...

I have a question: if you are purely into rules light why worry about a thread about Draw Steel and PF2e? But forced movement isn't really "extra things to track". You're already playing in an environment so there's nothing added to the fiction. If you're helping visualise by means of a sketch...

To me the big difference between forced movement and inflicting conditions is that when you inflict conditions you're interacting with the mechanics with something that you can do every fight; when you use forced movement and get a bonus from it you're interacting with the setting. And...

Or the DM to ask the player how it works.

And given the existence of off the top of my head (a) Stargate, (b) Warhammer Tomb Kings, and (c) Necrons it seems pretty common and popular to want a mix of Ancient Egyptians and either androids or stone golems.

Night City is on a very different scale to Golarion. One's a city with determined slang and an observable hierarchy. The other is a "kitchen sink universe" with literally dozens of countries, each one with a hat including "having been The Terror of the French Revolution for literal decades". I...

Partially disagree. Players care about worldbuilding lore as long as they are allowed to do it rather than having it be something that is imposed on them mostly in the form of restrictions and things they are not allowed to do. Let the players build their own cultures and they will be invested...

Paizo just puts all its settings into Golarion and calls it a day. Goofy comic relief characters can be entirely integrated into a setting as my current Daggerheart campaign is demonstrating. It does however take a willingness for the GM to not be precious about their setting - which is at...

I'm saying that this is missing the problem entirely. Just as you can write modules to be written or write them to be played unless you tightly integrate the setting with the rules all pre-written settings are optimised to be read rather than played. But games need them because no one is going...

I'd argue that once you've got D&D's highly specific magic system (even more specific pre-4e) and D&D's class and level structure you aren't that flexible. And that D&D was a bad fit for both Planescape and Dark Sun because of this.

Exandria has always used the Dawn War cosmology right from the very earliest days of Critical Role (although there are some interlopers sometimes). I think from memory the Raven Queen predates 4e by technicalities but she was popularised through the Nentir Vale which used the Dawn War pantheon.

And this gets me into the distinction between settings meant to be read vs settings meant to be played. I think the only game without a setting that has a chance to get big is Daggerheart because it's settings that spark the imagination - but find that too much setting material has a negative...