Why DO Other Games Sell Less?

[prosfilaes]

Here's one example: The basic paradigm behind virtually all combat systems is based on attacking and defending against strikes. The only exceptions are games that don't deal with combat in enough reolution to have a distinct system for combat at all. This comes straight from D&D.

Or, alternately, it comes from sword-combat. Grappling doesn't figure much in a lot of movie/heroic combat. It brings to mind the great fight scene in "They Live!", but I don't see many games simulating genres where grappling would be the common form of fights.

there has *never* been an RPG that does it the other way around.

Really? What about the wrestling RPGs that came out once upon a time? How did they do combat?

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Here's one example: The basic paradigm behind virtually all combat systems is based on attacking and defending against strikes. The only exceptions are games that don't deal with combat in enough reolution to have a distinct system for combat at all. This comes straight from D&D. In mythology and in common-sense observations of violence, grappling is at least as central, if not more so (animals grapple; they don't "claw/claw/bite" like they have three knives). But in almost *every* combat system with a significant amount of inbuilt detail, grappling is a set of exceptions grafted on to a striking paradigm and there has *never* been an RPG that does it the other way around. Even gamist "indie" systems like The Burning Wheel and The Riddle of Steel never challenge this basic assumption.

I think you are largely correct, but not necessarily precisely correct.

D&D is a derivative from a certain style of wargame. Wargames have many commonalities, even if they also have significant differences. If you are going to include martial conflict in your RPG, you will need to be shockingly original to not include variants on wargame paradigms. But that does not necessarily mean you are copying D&D directly.

Claw-claw-bite is the logical result of a (phoney) kind of fine granularity. The alternative is to roll everything into a single kind of combat ability factor or go even coarser to a CRT. This middle road is pretty much what Shadowrun did IIRC.

 

[sullivan]

Here's one example: The basic paradigm behind virtually all combat systems is based on attacking and defending against strikes. The only exceptions are games that don't deal with combat in enough reolution to have a distinct system for combat at all. This comes straight from D&D. In mythology and in common-sense observations of violence, grappling is at least as central, if not more so (animals grapple; they don't "claw/claw/bite" like they have three knives). But in almost *every* combat system with a significant amount of inbuilt detail, grappling is a set of exceptions grafted on to a striking paradigm and there has *never* been an RPG that does it the other way around. Even gamist "indie" systems like The Burning Wheel and The Riddle of Steel never challenge this basic assumption.

Huh? Both of those system use a fundementally different combat paradigm than the "my turn, then your turn" that D&D uses. They even use a different paradigm from each other. They also drop to the next granularity level below D&D and, I know at least in Burning Wheel, the "grappling" is part of the deal. Lock, Throw Opponent, Tackle, etc. are on equal footing with Strike, Feint and so on. It goes so far as you can Lock someone into total submission while still wielding your weapon, if you are using one. Another very different thing is choosing combat actions before you know the exact state in which you'll be attempting them.

Riddle of Steel I'm not as sure about since I've never played it myself. But from descriptions I've gotten it appears to drop perhaps even further in granularity and certainly in detail. The people that I personally know that played it also do real steel martial arts (not SCA) and they find it likely the closest to a medieval/sword combat simulation they've found in a game. Of course grappling isn't going to be that popular when most people have weapons. Because showing up empty handed at a sword fight is decidedly bad. Far worse than RPGs typically make it out to be.

Curiously the same guy that made Burning Wheel is releasing Burning Empires at GenCon this year. It is a sci-fi type game, and it's combat in primarily based around shooting at other people/vehicles/spacecraft. It includes modern combat principles such as pushing opponents around with supressive fire and so on. You can still try punch someone or cut them down with a sword or drive over them with a tank, but that is handled more as an exception. Because bringing a knife to a gunfight is bad.


Regarding the first part of your post, you are sounding surprisingly close to Ron's counterpart. All you really had to do is answer my question "Or people that wrote the games at one point or another played D&D?" with "Yes."

 

[Davmeister84]

One of the reasons I prefer D&D over WoD (new or old) is that the basic premise of the game (faux magical fantasy) allows for much greater stretches of the ordinary without breaking suspension of disbelief.

Want to shoot a rider off a griffin 200 feet in the air? No problem!
Want to break down the castle door and cleave through hordes of underlings to the archenemy? Check!
Want to pelt the BBEG with a horde of fireballs while your party members whack on him with mighty weapons? Got it!

WoD was always too much, IMO, "let's just play relatively normal people with a few cool quirks tossed in here and there". As well, those systems themselves had too many things thrown in there that are too fundamentally tied to the basic working of the system (Banality, morality, etc...). Tossing them is difficult and requires a massive reworking.

D&D is full of mechanical systems that I hate, but can rework and/or toss with ease. WoD is full of flavor systems with mechanical hits that make it much more difficult to remove.

 

[eyebeams]

Huh? Both of those system use a fundementally different combat paradigm than the "my turn, then your turn" that D&D uses.

Not so much. When it comes down to it, scripting ain't much different from strike ranks/intiative phases, which were part of AD&D's segment rules.

They even use a different paradigm from each other. They also drop to the next granularity level below D&D and, I know at least in Burning Wheel, the "grappling" is part of the deal. Lock, Throw Opponent, Tackle, etc. are on equal footing with Strike, Feint and so on. It goes so far as you can Lock someone into total submission while still wielding your weapon, if you are using one. Another very different thing is choosing combat actions before you know the exact state in which you'll be attempting them.

Not especially. All of them have additional bells and whistles compared to Strike (like Power vs. Power for Lock), whic the combat mechanics clearly set as the core form of attack. Strike is the maneuver that conforms to the fundamental combat mechanics; the others you mention contain the same exceptionalities, bels and whistles that most games do.

Riddle of Steel I'm not as sure about since I've never played it myself. But from descriptions I've gotten it appears to drop perhaps even further in granularity and certainly in detail. The people that I personally know that played it also do real steel martial arts (not SCA) and they find it likely the closest to a medieval/sword combat simulation they've found in a game. Of course grappling isn't going to be that popular when most people have weapons. Because showing up empty handed at a sword fight is decidedly bad. Far worse than RPGs typically make it out to be.

The interesting thing there is that grappling is a part of the core skillset of ARMA and reconstructed European martial arts. AEMMA's curriculum starts with grappling and it;s derived from a verifiable historical tradition, making the principles of grappling more fundamental to period combat.

Curiously the same guy that made Burning Wheel is releasing Burning Empires at GenCon this year. It is a sci-fi type game, and it's combat in primarily based around shooting at other people/vehicles/spacecraft. It includes modern combat principles such as pushing opponents around with supressive fire and so on. You can still try punch someone or cut them down with a sword or drive over them with a tank, but that is handled more as an exception. Because bringing a knife to a gunfight is bad.

It should be interesting. I like The Burning Wheel. In fact, the only major problems it seems to have seem to be mostly derived from revision after contact with the Forge . . .

Regarding the first part of your post, you are sounding surprisingly close to Ron's counterpart. All you really had to do is answer my question "Or people that wrote the games at one point or another played D&D?" with "Yes." [/QUOTE]

Not necessarily. D&D is back there in the chain, but someone doesn't need to absorb its values through D&D. They just need to play a game that inherits those values.

 

[eyebeams]

I think you are largely correct, but not necessarily precisely correct.

D&D is a derivative from a certain style of wargame. Wargames have many commonalities, even if they also have significant differences. If you are going to include martial conflict in your RPG, you will need to be shockingly original to not include variants on wargame paradigms. But that does not necessarily mean you are copying D&D directly.

Claw-claw-bite is the logical result of a (phoney) kind of fine granularity. The alternative is to roll everything into a single kind of combat ability factor or go even coarser to a CRT. This middle road is pretty much what Shadowrun did IIRC.

I don't think that even D&D needed to interpret the wargame paradigm in that fashion. When applied to units, weapons and armour are general measures of lethality and toughness. Wargaming is really concerned with the results of those mass engagements, not the process of individual combat.

I think striking is also a *handy* central metaphor. I just wonder what it would be like if there was a different one . . .

 

[eyebeams]

Or, alternately, it comes from sword-combat. Grappling doesn't figure much in a lot of movie/heroic combat. It brings to mind the great fight scene in "They Live!", but I don't see many games simulating genres where grappling would be the common form of fights.

Grappling is very common in virtually all staged fighting outside of wuxia and chanbara. It's also a favoured form of individual combat in the Bible and Beowulf.

Really? What about the wrestling RPGs that came out once upon a time? How did they do combat?

Know Your Role's basc mechanic is based on boosting damage as if a particular move *is* a strike; the descriptor is just that. There's no particular concern for position, base and submission opportunities. I can't speak for Kayfabe or other games. But then again, saying "What about wrestling RPGs?" does not partuculatly diminish my point, if only a game about a specialized form of combat can even change the basic assumption

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I'm not sure that D&D was "first". ...

As has been pointed out by others, it isn't that D&D invented roleplaying "the concept" (which was identified in psychological texts decades before), its that it was the first RPG that invented roleplaying "the commercial product."

Until you have a product on the shelves, all you have is a nebulously defined potential market.

D&D was the product that defined the ACTUAL market by being first to enter it.

 

[prosfilaes]

Grappling is very common in virtually all staged fighting outside of wuxia and chanbara. It's also a favoured form of individual combat in the Bible and Beowulf.

Walking over to the wall of DVDs behind me, I don't recall grappling in the Lord of the Rings, Indian Jones, the Matrix, or Star Wars. Fictional fighting in American culture doesn't seem to head towards heavy grappling, so it's natural that American RPGs wouldn't do so either.

saying "What about wrestling RPGs?" does not partuculatly diminish my point, if only a game about a specialized form of combat can even change the basic assumption

It certainly negates that argument that no RPG has done so, and one would expect innovation on a subject to come in a genre that needs the innovation.

 

[Greg K]

And lets not forget that unlike most rpgs, you can find DND in major book chains ( in many bookstores,DND is the only game on the shelf). As FLGS close down in many areas, major book chains are the place where many potential new gamers will come across rpgs. If DND is all that a new gamer finds on the shelf that is what they are going to buy.