Why the hate for complexity?

[MENTION=907]Staffan[/MENTION]'s post made me think about Rolemaster:

1. Declare attack/defence split.
2. Declare target.
3. Roll d100.
4. Add attack portion of the split declared at 1.
5. Subtract target defence.
6. Cross reference on chart to determine hits taken and crit delivered.
7. Roll crit.
8. Cross reference on chart to determine consequence of crit.
9. Determine total hits delivered (from 6 and 8).
10. Apply hits taken and other crit effects to target.

This can get to twelve steps if more than one crit table has to be consulted (which can happen with some RM attack forms).

pemerton said:

[MENTION=907]Staffan[/MENTION]'s post made me think about Rolemaster:

1. Declare attack/defence split.
2. Declare target.
3. Roll d100.
4. Add attack portion of the split declared at 1.
5. Subtract target defence.
6. Cross reference on chart to determine hits taken and crit delivered.
7. Roll crit.
8. Cross reference on chart to determine consequence of crit.
9. Determine total hits delivered (from 6 and 8).
10. Apply hits taken and other crit effects to target.

This can get to twelve steps if more than one crit table has to be consulted (which can happen with some RM attack forms).

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You're kinda creating micro steps out of single steps though. For D&D I could say:

1. Declare target.
2. Pick up a d20.
3. Look up the monster's armor class.
4. Roll the d20.
5. Add your attack bonus.
6. Compare the total to the monster's armor class.
7. Determine whether it was a critical hit.
8. Look up your damage roll.
9. Roll damage.
10. Double the dice rolls if it was a critical.
11. Compare damage to monster's resistances.
12. Halve damage if the monster is resistant.
13. Deduct damage from the monster's hit points.

I mean, yeah, I agree that Rolemaster is much more complex than D&D 5E, but you can also stretch out any process into as many steps as you want to.

Morrus said:

You're kinda creating micro steps out of single steps though.

<snip>

I mean, yeah, I agree that Rolemaster is much more complex than D&D 5E, but you can also stretch out any process into as many steps as you want to.

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I've played a lot of Rolemaster - regular (weekly or fortnightly) sessions from 1990 to 2008. I think my identification of the steps is pretty reasonable.

For 4e D&D - which I've also played quite a bit of - I would say:

1. Choose attack
2. Declare target
3. Roll d20
4. Add attack bonus
5. Comare result to target's defence
6. Roll damage
7. Apply damage and any other effect

That makes 4e less complex than RM, and to me that seems right. Choosing a power to use in 4e is comparable to declaring the RM OB/DB split - it sets your tactical orientation for the round; comparing to defence is comparable to subtracting deffence in RM (though mathematically easier); and rolling damage is comparable to rolling a crit.

But in 4e there are no table look-ups, which are a significant part of RM attack resolution; and there is no need to combine the first lot of hits with the hits from the crit, which is a real thing.

One thing that doesn’t come up much is that simulationism isn’t always complex.

Sword of Spirit said:

One thing that doesn’t come up much is that simulationism isn’t always complex.

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I would argue that part of what drives perceived complexity is how well the editing was done. Twilight:2013 is a great set of rules with not-good editing. Mythus was a set of rules hampered by purposely adding complexity in the language used and artificially upping the complexity (such as adding unnecessary granularity to each of the attributes) - Mythus Prime is actually an ok rules set.

pemerton said:

For 4e D&D - which I've also played quite a bit of - I would say:

1. Choose attack
2. Declare target
3. Roll d20
4. Add attack bonus
5. Comare result to target's defence
6. Roll damage
7. Apply damage and any other effect

That makes 4e less complex than RM, and to me that seems right

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Hmm. I've run 100s of sessions of both RM and 4E, and my impression is the reverse; For both examples I'll assume a "good" sport of hit -- one that causes a critical or triggers an effect


Rolemaster
0. Declare action (who you attack and how/what attack)
1. Declare attack/defence split.
2. Roll d100.
3. Apply modifiers (attack split, defense, situational)
4. Cross reference on chart to determine hits taken and crit delivered.
5. Roll crit.
6. Cross reference on chart to determine consequence of crit.
7. Apply total hits taken and other crit effects to target.

D&D 4E
0. Declare action (who you attack and how/what power)
1. Roll d20.
2. Apply modifiers (attack bonus, situational) and compare to defense
3. Work out how many damage dice to roll based on d20 roll and other situational modifiers
4. Roll damage dice
5. Work out modifications to the damage based usually on situational modifiers
6. Apply hit/miss/effects for the power
7. Resolve reactions
8. Apply total hits taken and other effects to target


Not only are there more steps, but the details for the 4E ones are trickier (dare I say "more complex"?)
Looking at my current 4E character, here is a completely standard attack sequence:

0. "I attack the stone giant with OPENING MOVE"
1. Roll 19
2. +22 attack, +2 for combat advantage, +2 because the warlord gave me a bonus -- I hit
3a. Since I am using my longsword I will roll a base of 2d8 (referring to both power and weapon information)
3b. I have combat advantage, so I will add 3d8 sneak attack dice
3c. Critical? I did not roll a critical (refer to weapon, which only crits on a 20, unlike my jagged longsword) so no modifications there
4. Roll 5d8 for a total of 26 hits
5a. Standard modifier is +12 (different for each combination of power and weapon -- some attacks are dex based, others charisma)
5b. My goblin totem weapon applies, adding +3 to the damage
5c. As a multi classed fighter, choose whether I want to apply my once per encounter damage bonus
6. Apply the OPENING MOVE effect of a power bonus to my AC and reflex for one turn
7. Anything could happen now, if I'd used a ranged attack, typically the ranger might take an attack right now
8. Target only takes hits damage from this power.

My experience is that RM is significantly easier -- conditional stuff usually applies just to the the attack roll, not to damage calculations, not to extra effects, and so on. The lack of reactions is also huge.

This is not a knock on 4E -- I love playing it, but it is because I enjoy the complexity! It's a feature!

[MENTION=75787]GrahamWills[/MENTION], that's interesting - you're right that I left out reactions, although those can come up in RM too (Bladeturn being a popular one in our games). But I do find 4e quicker/less complex than RM.

I don't believe that being "rules light" necessarily translates into being less complex.

Sometimes loosely vague and ambiguous rules can complicate things in actual play.

On addition, I believe that some games have a reputation for being complex/easy which isn't entirely accurate. For example, it's an unpopular opinion, but I personally find certain editions of D&D to be far more complicated than GURPS. While the latter (arguably) has more rules, the application of those rules is relatively coherent and intuitive. For D&D, that's not always the case; in some editions, understanding how one part of the game works doesn't at all correlate into even having a rough idea of how something else works. The plethora of feats, different abilities, spells, and various other things is (imo) sometimes far more complicated than keeping track of active defenses.

Johnny3D3D said:

I don't believe that being "rules light" necessarily translates into being less complex.

Sometimes loosely vague and ambiguous rules can complicate things in actual play.

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I would say it depends very much on the details of the rules in question.

If rules light means a sub-system type game but with subsystems for only a few sorts of actions, yet the game contemplates activity encompassing other actions, then the issue you raise will arise. Likewise if the sub-systems and/or their scope are poorly defined.

Trying to use Moldvay Basic to play a game with the fictional scope of Dragonlance, for instance, won't be free of mechanical/adjudicative complexity. Using Prince Valiant to play that game, however, will be.

GrahamWills said:

My experience is that RM is significantly easier -- conditional stuff usually applies just to the the attack roll, not to damage calculations, not to extra effects, and so on. The lack of reactions is also huge.

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Which hits up a good point. There are several types of complexity which should not be simply mixed and compared with each other.

Some systems have a lot of one-time frontloaded complexity. Complex rules spread over several sub systems for example. But once you learn them, navigating them is easy and the game moves surprisingly fast for the amount of rules there are.
On the other side you have dynamic complexity. This kind of complexity might not look like much when reading or learning the rules, but for example once you are playing you are bombarded with so many temporary and situational modifiers so that even if you know all the rules you have to still stop and calculate all the stuff that applies in the current situation (or wing it when the outcome is obvious).