Why do RPGs have rules?

[pemerton]

Having rules sort of sets a baseline in the world that everyone can agree on and gives a rough idea on how those characters' reality works.

Rather than putting it in terms of "how those characters' reality works", I'd put it in terms of who is allowed to say what in respect of what happens next in the shared fiction.

 

[pemerton]

I'm not sure I agree that assigning authority isn't an important part of design.

In the first of the Vincent Baker blogs I linked to, he says this (in my OP its elided by the ". . ."):

What has to happen before the group agrees that [the fiction changes in a particular way]?

1. Sometimes, not much at all. The right participant said it, at an appropriate moment, and everybody else just incorporates it smoothly into their imaginary picture of the situation. . . . This is how it usually is for participants with high ownership of whatever they're talking about: GMs describing the weather or the noncombat actions of NPCs, players saying what their characters are wearing or thinking.​

I think the idea of "ownership" of bits of the fiction is useful, but limited in is application. What is striking about the weather, the noncombat actions of NPCs, what a PC is wearing or thinking, is that - typically - these are not moments of conflict.

But once we get into conflict - the rain is so strong it washes you character away and over the cliff or my thoughts are so potent that my friends pick up on them and know to come and rescue me or whatever it might be - then I'm not sure that allocation of authority is enough.

Authority - at least in its most basic - is "content neutral", in the sense that others are supposed to accept it regardless of what the authority says. So if the GM says that a NPC is hopping around on one leg, it might be silly or even bizarre but the players generally will accept that the fiction does indeed include that. We see the same thing happening when players have their PCs wear garish or outrageous clothing - it might lower the tone, but generally the player's say-so is sufficient.

For participants to accept the unwelcome, though, my feeling is that content-neutral authority may often not be enough. There need to be features of the mechanics that "warm the participants up" to accept the unwelcome.

RPGs that lean heavily on authority - and I think typical approaches to D&D are examples of this - seem to me to be particularly prone to clashes between participants about the unwelcome, because their procedures of play make it easy for not enough warming up to have taken place. ("Rocks fall, everyone dies" is obviously a caricature, but it's pointing to a real risk of leaning heavily on authority as the main method of easing negotiation about the content of the fiction.)

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I agree with the PbtA point.

As for the stuff about "not being how sure" etc; that's an example of using mechanics to ease negotiation. Instead of the GM having to posit something, which the players can then dispute ("We would have noticed if the door was super thick, if our ears were waxy, etc"), the process of establishing the shared fiction is done via an agreed randomiser.

Linking the two paras above together: the question of what the success chance should be becomes much more about pacing than about "realism".

Well, yeah, and with Dungeon World at least, you get this sort of change from low to high level where you get a lot of 9 or less rolls at low level, but the consequences are generally going to be somewhat less consequential. Not less from the standpoint of the character maybe, but overall, you run into lower level dangers, early front dangers, etc. that you can handle. High level PCs OTOH get a lot more 10+ if the players are fairly clever, and then when things DO go pear shaped, its "oh, doomsday arrived!" lol.

 

[Clint_L]

I think it is important to remember that every player has their own reasons for playing, and all of their reasons are equally valid, even if they don't make sense to us. I am reminded of this regularly because I'm the teacher sponsor for our D&D Club, and I see a huge variety of approaches to the game.

For a lot of players, the rules seem to be a huge part of the fun. I have students who enjoy arguing D&D RAW endlessly, and some who really enjoy just reading the books and making characters. There is a fascination with learning the rules and finding different combinations of them that I don't think is offered by games that I might consider more elegant in terms of pure design. Incidentally, though it is called D&D Club, they do play other RPGs, but overwhelmingly D&D-style games. Progression, levelling, and planning ahead for two to customize their characters within the rules (e.g. optimizing) are demonstrably enticing to most of the students.

So I think it is fair to say that for a lot of people, the rules are, in themselves, a significant attraction to this sort of game. I don't know DW, but if it is similar in design to Monsterhearts, it doesn't really offer that same attraction. In combat, specifically, more codified rules create logic puzzles that, again, are clearly rewarding for a great many players. I personally find the combat in D&D-style games tedious, but that's just me.

So rules offer the possibility of mastery, and the more complex the rules, and game, the more complicated that becomes. This is not mastery in the sense of a video game, where you can learn the parameters and optimize perfectly, but a looser form of it. I'm not sure I quite understand it, but the rules themselves, in all their messiness, are demonstrably a huge attraction for a great many players.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

In the first of the Vincent Baker blogs I linked to, he says this (in my OP its elided by the ". . ."):

What has to happen before the group agrees that [the fiction changes in a particular way]?​

​

1. Sometimes, not much at all. The right participant said it, at an appropriate moment, and everybody else just incorporates it smoothly into their imaginary picture of the situation. . . . This is how it usually is for participants with high ownership of whatever they're talking about: GMs describing the weather or the noncombat actions of NPCs, players saying what their characters are wearing or thinking.​

I think the idea of "ownership" of bits of the fiction is useful, but limited in is application. What is striking about the weather, the noncombat actions of NPCs, what a PC is wearing or thinking, is that - typically - these are not moments of conflict.

But once we get into conflict - the rain is so strong it washes you character away and over the cliff or my thoughts are so potent that my friends pick up on them and know to come and rescue me or whatever it might be - then I'm not sure that allocation of authority is enough.

Authority - at least in its most basic - is "content neutral", in the sense that others are supposed to accept it regardless of what the authority says. So if the GM says that a NPC is hopping around on one leg, it might be silly or even bizarre but the players generally will accept that the fiction does indeed include that. We see the same thing happening when players have their PCs wear garish or outrageous clothing - it might lower the tone, but generally the player's say-so is sufficient.

For participants to accept the unwelcome, though, my feeling is that content-neutral authority may often not be enough. There need to be features of the mechanics that "warm the participants up" to accept the unwelcome.

RPGs that lean heavily on authority - and I think typical approaches to D&D are examples of this - seem to me to be particularly prone to clashes between participants about the unwelcome, because their procedures of play make it easy for not enough warming up to have taken place. ("Rocks fall, everyone dies" is obviously a caricature, but it's pointing to a real risk of leaning heavily on authority as the main method of easing negotiation about the content of the fiction.)

Exactly what I am saying when I talk about the mechanics letting the GM 'hide behind the dice'. I mean, that's a bit of a facile way of putting it, but its MUCH easier for a GM to say "Oh, gosh, the orc hit you with a 17! Ouch, 7 damage, looks like you're dead Jill" than to convince the players that a group of orcs with a similar level of combat prowess to themselves are bound to extract a casualty or two, and then pick Jill to fill that role! I would call this a "negotiating fiction" as well as a "way to announce the unwelcome". Certainly unwelcome content is not neutral!

I think Dungeon World MAY be less prone to these clashes, but the old "hard move, the orc deals damage to you!" thing can be pretty rough. It just needs to be preceded by at least one, probably a couple, of low rolls and the accompanying 'unwelcome news' moves by the GM that do the warming up. Still, B/X or 1e GENERALLY eases you in a bit, you get encounter distance, random monster check, surprise, and initiative, plus whatever the PCs precautions were. That could all amount to a big nuthin' but usually you at least had to roll bad once or twice before you die. As usual, DW's principles generally make it likely you did get 'warmed up' though.

 

[MGibster]

So why do RPGs have rules?

I'm almost positive I read the introduction to an RPG from many years ago that uses the very same example of children playing an imagination game. Except they wrote that the rules provide you with a guideline on how to handle who got shot instead of arguing about whether or not the person got shot.

I suppose we should start with the fact that role playing games as we know them grew out of table top war gaming. And if you're unfamliar with table top war gaming, they often have a copious amount of rules. Sometimes they're very complicated. And I'll have to echo what's already been said, it's a role playing game, and games have rules. Even the kids who play imagination games have an unwritten set of rules they're following. Imagine trying to play chess and suddenly your opponent decides the queen can move like a knight or all his pawns can move like the queen.

 

[Clint_L]

Here's a related puzzle to explore: why do so many folks love making D&D characters? Not coming up with backstory, wants&needs, flaws, etc., but in the sense of rolling or assigning the stats, picking the skills, purchasing/collecting equipment, managing spells, treasure, all the rest of it. The majority of my kids at school tinker endlessly at their character sheets, make lists of coveted items, spells, and so on.

What is it about that facet of the rules that is so compelling? I know I used to do it, too, though these days I mostly just care about the first stuff I mentioned, the story. But I remember pouring over the books, back in the AD&D days, and looking for every angle of character progression.

 

[niklinna]

Here's a related puzzle to explore: why do so many folks love making D&D characters? Not coming up with backstory, wants&needs, flaws, etc., but in the sense of rolling or assigning the stats, picking the skills, purchasing/collecting equipment, managing spells, treasure, all the rest of it. The majority of my kids at school tinker endlessly at their character sheets, make lists of coveted items, spells, and so on.

What is it about that facet of the rules that is so compelling? I know I used to do it, too, though these days I mostly just care about the first stuff I mentioned, the story. But I remember pouring over the books, back in the AD&D days, and looking for every angle of character progression.

It's a mystery to me! I don't even play D&D any more, but I look at new official & homebrew classes all the time. I think there's some nostalgia driving that, and the idea I could make up a character that would be fun to play with the right group...if only I had the right group.

I'd be better of spending the time looking for a group! But that's a fraught endeavor any more, it seems. Although I did stumble on some good people to RPG with here on enworld...just not D&D! (I mean, some of then are actively running or playing D&D, but their groups are full.)

 

[kenada]

(1) In classic dungeon-crawling and puzzle-solving D&D, some of the rules do have the function of easing negotiation - eg rules about likelihoods of finding secret door, and rules about surprise and encounter distance, and some elements of the avoidance and evasion rules. But some of the rules really seem like they're largely disconnected from "shared imagination" except that, at the end of the rule process, they spit out an answer to "what happens next" - I'm thinking about the combat rules in particular here, which involve playing a mini-wargame to answer the question "what happens when the PCs fight the monsters". And the idea of "unwelcome" outcomes doesn't really seem applicable.

I want to posit that protecting the competitive integrity of the game as a corollary of Baker’s stance. If conflict is determined through negotiation (or even unilaterally), then competitive play is not possible. From a gamist perspective, these unwanted outcomes must be possible and wanted for all participants (players and GM). If the players cannot eek out an edge or risk defeat, then their play is performative more than competitive. It must be possible to effect an “anticlimatic” battle or “solve” an adventure too quickly (but also to lose utterly or even just partially). Relying on social convention also comes with another constraint: the perception of fair play. The rules in that case work as a blame-shifting mechanism: the GM didn’t decide to have rocks fall; the rules indicate that something really bad should happen, and rocks falling is how that was manifested.

Given the above, the function of elaborate combat procedures does seem to be as an extended “find out if there is an unwelcome outcome” process. It’s like clocks (in BitD) or skill challenges (in 4e) where multiple rolls and actions are used to determine the outcome rather than just a simple check. Where an issue arises is when groups don’t want an unwelcome outcome (TPK, surrender, being forced to flee, etc), so the process is manipulated or run with weaker inputs to avoid those outcomes. That can be true for both combat and extended tests (clocks, skill challenges, etc). If the referee provides only easy or straight-forward challenges on purpose, you can follow the rules as written while avoiding the spirit (of rules being a way to create the unwelcome and unwanted). It should be no surprise that Baker has a solution: explicate the agenda and principles for running the game as rules to follow.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I think it is important to remember that every player has their own reasons for playing, and all of their reasons are equally valid, even if they don't make sense to us. I am reminded of this regularly because I'm the teacher sponsor for our D&D Club, and I see a huge variety of approaches to the game.

For a lot of players, the rules seem to be a huge part of the fun. I have students who enjoy arguing D&D RAW endlessly, and some who really enjoy just reading the books and making characters. There is a fascination with learning the rules and finding different combinations of them that I don't think is offered by games that I might consider more elegant in terms of pure design. Incidentally, though it is called D&D Club, they do play other RPGs, but overwhelmingly D&D-style games. Progression, levelling, and planning ahead for two to customize their characters within the rules (e.g. optimizing) are demonstrably enticing to most of the students.

So I think it is fair to say that for a lot of people, the rules are, in themselves, a significant attraction to this sort of game. I don't know DW, but if it is similar in design to Monsterhearts, it doesn't really offer that same attraction. In combat, specifically, more codified rules create logic puzzles that, again, are clearly rewarding for a great many players. I personally find the combat in D&D-style games tedious, but that's just me.

So rules offer the possibility of mastery, and the more complex the rules, and game, the more complicated that becomes. This is not mastery in the sense of a video game, where you can learn the parameters and optimize perfectly, but a looser form of it. I'm not sure I quite understand it, but the rules themselves, in all their messiness, are demonstrably a huge attraction for a great many players.

Yeah, I agree, rules mastery is a very real thing. I think it's a bit different from skilled play, but they often overlap.