there are different ways of providing consistency. This can be done by way of process - eg a carefully worked out set of resolution rules, a carefully worked out set of content-introduction rules (such as ecologically sound random encounter tables) - or by way of GM decision-making as things go along. The process approach can be consistent with gamist play, for the reasons you give - I say "can be", not "will be" because the processes may be so convoluted (imagine an interlocking system of yearly, monthly, daily and turn-by-turn event/encounter charts) that they are not in practice solvable. The GM decision-making approach tends not to be suitable for gamist play, again for the reasons you give - especially if some of the consistency that is maintained applies directly to the PCs and hence to the players' action declarations (eg "No one has ever broken in here in 100 years, therefore your solution that you've just come up with must have already been tried and failed, therefore I'm now retrofitting on an in-fiction reason why it fails" - I think someone upthread mentioned more-or-less this exact example).
And here we go . . .
a GDS Simulationist wouldn't hesitate to patch a hole if it didn't seem like a logical flaw in the problem so much as just something he hadn't thought about. That'd have been pretty bad form for a pure Gamist. If a simulationist of the stripe back then decided that any active opponents involved would have thought of it even if he didn't, he wouldn't even blink about addressing it--and a lot of the people playing with that view wouldn't think anything of it, because to them not doing so would have violated the setting integrity.
This is directly relevant to
@Manbearcat's question, just upthread, about how GD
S relates to GN
S.
The "Right to Dream" essay identifies multiple varieties of simulationist play. The two most interesting are purist-for-system, which - as I noted upthread - puts
system first; and high concept, which - as I also noted upthread - puts colour and fiction (character, setting and/or situation) first, and system last.
This distinction captures different attitudes towards the role of the GM in ensuring consistency in the fiction - in the "simulation". In high concept play, this is par for the course. And of course in some approaches that sort of GM role extends all the way to what many RPGers would regard as railroading. I think there is, therefore, an inevitably high degree of tension between high concept approaches and gamist priorities. This is borne out by the fact that terms like "munchkin", "powergamer", "optimiser" (used pejoratively) and the like are all part of the lexcion of high concept RPGing, that gained prominence in what, also upthread, I called the "high concept convergence" of the 1980s/90s.
Purist for system, on the other hand, aspires to have GM intervention minimised, as a special case of having
participant intervention minimised. If it has to happen, it is in the "corrective" spirit that
@kenada described upthread. Because this requires players being on-board with such correction, it is going to butt heads with really serious gamist priorities. But I know from experience it can be consistent with players who like to use their clever manipulation of the system to "win", but can recognise when a result is not the proper outgrowth of system but rather a result of system malfunction or mis-design. (I can report, from experience, that this comes up
a lot in Rolemaster play when the players are hardcore wargamers - which many in my group were - and which is being played using purist-for-system rather than high concept priorities, which was the case for my group.)
The "Right to Dream" essay makes this observation about the demandingness of purist-for-system aspirations:
In this sort of design, there's no possible excuse for any imperfections, including scale-derived breakdowns of the fundamental point/probability relationships. The system must be cleanly and at the service of the element(s) being emphasized, in strictly in-game-world terms. A good one is elegant, consistent, applicable to anything that happens in play, and clear about its outcomes. It also has to have points of contact at any scale for any conceivable thing. It cannot contain patch-rules to correct for inconsistencies; consistency is the essence of quality.
As I see it, Purist for System design is a tall, tall order. It's arguably the hardest design spec in all of role-playing.
And here are some remarks about how that design aspiration interacts with gamist priorities:
Another common problem is rules-bloat, which usually creeps into Simulationist game text as a form of anti-Gamist defense. I suggest that adding more layers to character creation is a poor idea, as it only introduces more potential points of broken Currency. I suggest instead that the most effective "defense" is to avoid ratios in one's layering, as in Godlike. More generally, beyond a certain point, anti-Gamist defensive rules design has a negative effect: given an increased number rules and punctilios, players simply punt in terms of understanding the system, and the GM has to "be" the entire game. This is exceptionally difficult in games like Rolemaster or GURPS (perhaps less so in Dread or Call of Cthulhu). Therefore the effort - to preserve the integrity of the Simulationist experience - often backfires as play gets harder and more full of speed-bumps rather than easier.
Rules-bloat can also result from the design and writing process itself. Cogitating about in-game causes can transform itself, at the keyboard, into a sort of Exploration of its own, which results in very elaborate rules-sets for situational modifiers, encumbrance, movement, technology, prices of things, none of which is related to actual play of the game with actual people. During the writing process, "what if" meets "but also" and breeds tons of situational rules modifiers. When this effect hits Currency, you get tons of layering in the form of prerequisites and nuances of described competency (e.g. Awful vs. Really Bad vs. Mediocre). The result is often what I like to call Paying to Suck, which is to say that character creation includes paying many points merely for the character to be bad or barely-adequate at things.
My recommendation is to know and value the virtues of Simulationist play, specifically refined toward the goals of a particular subset (as listed or make up your own), and to drive toward them with gusto. Don't spin your wheels defending your design against some other form of play.
I think this is consistent with what I've written above, and with my experience in how gamist and simulationist priorities need to be reconciled among the participants for purist-for-system play to work.
And for me - and to circle back to
@Manbearcat's question - it shows that the difference between GDS and GNS isn't necessarily where their boundaries fall, but rather the sort of analysis they put forward. I don't see anything in the GDS account that allows me to explain how gamist and simulationist priorities interact, and can perhaps be reconciled, except ad hoc intuitions. Whereas the "Right to Dream" essay, by setting out to analyse actual processes of play, the role of participants, the importance (or not) of mechanical systems, etc, actually provides the analytical tools for understanding why practically all gamists will bump into problems with high concept approaches; while some - those who can ameliorate their hardcore instincts and grasp what is going in purist-for-system aspirations - can enjoy a system like RM and even cooperate in the ongoing patch-work that play will inevitably reveal it to need; while the hardcore will break any feasible purist-for-system design!
