Tony Vargas
Legend
...another good reason to play a game now and then.In life the stakes aren't typically clearly defined....
The voice is less at issue than the message. And, if I seem strident about this, it's because it's not just your too-narrow, exclusionary definition and it's not just in this context. The Forgites do the same thing, multiplied by their copious lexicon, and it happens way to much in RL politics.LOL. I apologize for the caps. It was 2am and I went too far in trying to emphasize. I don't think so. I think that in order to not sound one true way you have included things under the roleplaying umbrella that aren't actually roleplaying.
It's fine to stipulate a definition for purposes of discussion, but if anyone was going to advance such a definition, it should have been the OP, and clearly limited to the question being put forward. Even then, it might not go over so well, or could be chosen to assume or force a conclusion, exclude valid alternatives, etc...
I'd certainly be trying harder to avoid hits, which'd impact roleplaying a brave vs cautious vs foolhardy character.I disagree. Just as a cute off the cuff mental example. Suppose that D&D had a mechanic where everytime your character took a hit you had to do 5 jumping jacks. Are you seriously arguing that doing 5 jumping jacks upon taking a hit is inseparable from roleplaying?
The idea is just to be a bit open-minded.Sure. The opposite to that is that a non-one-true-wayist defines and judges non-narrowly. Anything which confirms to anyones way is true role playing ...
Not what I'm arguing. (Though, also not exactly wrong: sure, a functional mechanic should deliver it's intended experience more consistently and over a wider range of users than would freestyle RPing from the same assumptions.) Rather my point is that, because you prettymuch can RP (broad definition) anything, including, hypothetically, delivering any given RP experience (just w/ or w/o specific system artifacts), trying to compare or analyze systems on the basis of what experiences they can't deliver is fraught, and will invite push-back and descent into subjectivity, rather than thoughtful engagement.Yet, you argue in other posts that freestyln has no benefits to roleplaying, that a system of some kind will always be preferable to that.
And, that's just an observation - of this thread and others like it, really.
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