Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
A GMing telling the players about the gameworld is not like real life
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7573415" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>[MENTION=5142]Aldarc[/MENTION], [MENTION=29398]Lanefan[/MENTION] - I've got a lot of actual play reports on these boards, so they would give a pretty good idea of what I have in mind by drama/excitement/thematic choice.</p><p></p><p>Over the past 6 to 12 months the two campaigns I've played the most have been Prince Valiant and Classic Traveller.</p><p></p><p>In Prince Valiant the drama is often social as much as physical adventure - whom to befriend, whom to snub, whom to woo.</p><p></p><p>In Traveller the drama can be social/political, but more often is sci-fi adventure/thriller. In <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?657595-I-really-enjoyed-today-s-Classic-Traveller-session" target="_blank">Sunday's session</a>, the players (as their PCs) had to make choices that include: (i) how to deal with arms smugglers they encountered in orbit, while engaging in their own undercover activity; (ii) whether to break into an installation they were spying on; (iii) what to do when pursued after deciding not to enter the installation (that pursuit was a direct consequence of the decision they made at (i)); (iv) how to handle being interrogated, once they surrendered; (v) in one case, whether or not to "go kinetic" and try to escape from captivity by overpowering a guard; (vi) having chosen to go kinetic, and having stolen a suit of battle dress, how to deal with the enemies in the base and the consequences of blowing some of them up with a plasma gun.</p><p></p><p>Some of the choices - especially at (iv) - reflected social and political allegiances, but at a fairly supericial level. It's not a thematically deep game in that sense.</p><p></p><p>What makes me contrast it with a game about <em>going to the library</em> or <em>starting a trade</em> or <em>trying to ingratiate oneself with nobles</em> is that, at more-or-less every moment of play, the players <em>have</em> to make a choice whose consequences - while not entirely forseeable - will clearly matter to how the fiction unfolds, both for their PCs and for the setting that the PCs are embedded in. (Eg the choices have implications for what the players anticipate to be a pending Imperial assault of at least some parts of the world they are currently on.)</p><p></p><p>And the converse of that is that there's basically no moment in play where the principle focus of activity is the players learning more from the GM about the contents or parameters of the setting. The few times when that happened (eg in clarifying some of the details concerning equipment; or in clarifying some points of geography) it was ancillary and in service of the real action.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 7573415, member: 42582"] [MENTION=5142]Aldarc[/MENTION], [MENTION=29398]Lanefan[/MENTION] - I've got a lot of actual play reports on these boards, so they would give a pretty good idea of what I have in mind by drama/excitement/thematic choice. Over the past 6 to 12 months the two campaigns I've played the most have been Prince Valiant and Classic Traveller. In Prince Valiant the drama is often social as much as physical adventure - whom to befriend, whom to snub, whom to woo. In Traveller the drama can be social/political, but more often is sci-fi adventure/thriller. In [url=http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?657595-I-really-enjoyed-today-s-Classic-Traveller-session]Sunday's session[/url], the players (as their PCs) had to make choices that include: (i) how to deal with arms smugglers they encountered in orbit, while engaging in their own undercover activity; (ii) whether to break into an installation they were spying on; (iii) what to do when pursued after deciding not to enter the installation (that pursuit was a direct consequence of the decision they made at (i)); (iv) how to handle being interrogated, once they surrendered; (v) in one case, whether or not to "go kinetic" and try to escape from captivity by overpowering a guard; (vi) having chosen to go kinetic, and having stolen a suit of battle dress, how to deal with the enemies in the base and the consequences of blowing some of them up with a plasma gun. Some of the choices - especially at (iv) - reflected social and political allegiances, but at a fairly supericial level. It's not a thematically deep game in that sense. What makes me contrast it with a game about [I]going to the library[/I] or [I]starting a trade[/I] or [I]trying to ingratiate oneself with nobles[/I] is that, at more-or-less every moment of play, the players [I]have[/I] to make a choice whose consequences - while not entirely forseeable - will clearly matter to how the fiction unfolds, both for their PCs and for the setting that the PCs are embedded in. (Eg the choices have implications for what the players anticipate to be a pending Imperial assault of at least some parts of the world they are currently on.) And the converse of that is that there's basically no moment in play where the principle focus of activity is the players learning more from the GM about the contents or parameters of the setting. The few times when that happened (eg in clarifying some of the details concerning equipment; or in clarifying some points of geography) it was ancillary and in service of the real action. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
A GMing telling the players about the gameworld is not like real life
Top