A New Perspective on Simulationism, Realism, Verisimilitude, etc.

[howandwhy99]

SNIP

He says it himself - saying "I swing my sword" is not roleplay. I'm not making that up, these are his words.

You are absolutely right in your response to ByronD about the repairman actually doing his job by trying to repair the woman's phone. This is exactly how we roleplay most of our lives, from the second we gain consciousness in the morning, to the second before we fall asleep. (some of us gain consciousness later than others in the morning... zzz..)

And just like in describing the fixing of the phone in Example C., saying "I use the multimeter to check for an electronic signal" means only this is his intention. It is not acted out. The performance of this attempt is not roleplayed. What is being roleplayed is his role: repairperson. And that success in that role requires fulfilling certain elements. Checking for a signal before looking for other problems on a phone is certainly applicable. But is the act itself acted out? Of course not. Is the role being accurately described? I'd say so. But, as in all description-based roleplay, their will always be an abstraction of the role one is not performing.

This is why I said some folks don't consider description adequate qualifications for playing a role. But certainly not everyone.

 

[Galloglaich]

@Galloglaich:

I'm a little skeptical of the claim that that historical martial arts based systems are inherently easier for new players to get into than more fantastical or magic based systems. Presumably most of the "girlfriends, buddies from work, poker night friends etc." that you're trying to reach will have very little pre-existing knowledge about historical martial arts, so making a system based on that won't necessarily mean that they can transfer their knowledge easier.

But you are missing the point, the players don't need to know anything about historical martial arts, only the game designer does. This makes the game more intuitive and logical.

More specifically, my assertion is that the weapons and armor of Medieval Europe, Japan, China etc. make a lot more sense in the context of how they were actually used. If you, as a game designer, look at their actual physical properties (i.e. mail armor stops cuts) and work from there, they all actually make sense in how they different systems interract (if mail armor stops cuts, suddenly there is a role and a reason for a military pick, for example) resolving many common game designers dilemma such as what to do with such weapons in most systems.

My position is that this is also more intuitive for ordinary people who come to an RPG with an expectation of how things work in real life. You don't have to be a martial artisti, a military engineer or a physicist to guess that a spear or a staff has a greater reach than a dagger. If my friend Michelle has a wizard character and buys a staff in the expectation she can fend off enemies with it, she will be disappointed in most RPGs where weapons play no role in defense, wheras a system designed on a realistic basis would match her quite reasonable expectations.

Similarly if she pushed the villain out the window of a 5 story building with her staff she would reasonably expect them to be dead or very seriously hurt.... and if she saw him running away barely scratched, not being a gamer she would assume there was some specific supernatural reason for it, i.e. he was a werewolf or a ghost or something. It is kind of hard to explain why there wouldn't be, unless you've been playing DnD for ten years...

And the examples you give don't eliminate the need for rules knowledge. For example, in the Codex Martialis, you could certainly represent the tactic of “I’m going to wait until he takes a swing at Bob and then try to nail him” as "I'm going to ready an action to attack as soon as he uses up all his MP dice attacking Bob, so that he won't be able to use active defense against my attack." And presumably the player could simply describe their action the first way, and you could translate that into game terms. But in order for players to know when that tactic would be effective so they can effectively use it, they would still have to understand readied actions, the martial pool, active defenses etc.

With the codex rules, you could actually describe such an action in completely role playing terms, i.e. "I'm going to wait until he takes a swing at Bob and then try to nail him". The DM rolls the villains attack against Bob, using up his MP. My friend Michelle literally has tactics in her hand (her dice), she can decide how much and when to attack, defend, move etc. She really doesn't need to know the rules, she doesn't have to know about all different kinds of actions, when she can and cannot move, etc.. The MP is intuitive, she has it in her hand. Active Defense is intuitive, again, in her hand. She doesn't have to know either word (in fact, most people playing in my current campaign don't know almost any of the rules... they just know basically what their characters are capable of)

By way of comparison, I really can't imagine how a normal person deescribing normal intuitive fighting ideas they might have gotten from an action movie into the (to me at least) counter-intuitive combat concepts of a game like 4E.

Readied actions, Combat actions etc. don't exist in the codex, incidentally, they are replaced by the Martial Pool. But I'm not basing my comments exclusively on the Codex, it could be any system based on a realistic historical / physics model, at any level of abstraction you wanted.

Codex isn't a perfect system and it's not the only realistic one ever made, For example The Riddle of Steel is a realistic system which is more complex, Burning Wheel is a (to me) realistic system which is much more abstract. I think for that matter Cthulhu Dark Ages and Warhammer FRPG are pretty realistic compared to a lot of RPGs I've seen, in spite of being quite simple.

This is not in any way a criticism of the Codex Martialis itself - I bought the PDF and read it, and it definitely seems to bring a whole new dimension to combat. My only real criticism of the Codex Martialis is that a lot of the rules seem not to be very clearly explained. I posted a post in the "FAQ" thread on the discussion boards on codexmartialis.com listing some of the things that I thought should be clarified.

Glad you like it Alex. I hopefully just answered your main question on there. I know the Codex is pretty dense, for now the boards serve to help provide support for understanding the new paradigm, though the best way to learn once you have the book is to play. We are going to be releasing a new expanded "2.0" version with a lot more 'fluff' and special rules for integrating into a 3.X campaign etc., but that is still a few weeks away yet. For now as you probably noticed there is a lot of support material, downloadable PDF's etc. on the Codex boards.

G.

 

[Hussar]

Just teasing out one line here.

Um.. what does this mean? How are Boffer LARPs not LARPs? Most LARPers I know anyways do not play those games to roleplay, but rather to pretend to be a fictional character.

I'm confused as to the difference between roleplay and pretending to be a fictional character. In the RPG context (and I'm not talking about roleplay as a pedagogical tool), isn't taking on the persona of a fictional character the entire point of role playing games? Or, even if you are trying to play a real person, either yourself or a known figure of some sort, don't most RPG's place you in a fictional situation? It's a pretty rare RPG that would have me playing myself posting stuff on En World.

One other question. You bring up the term Roleplay Simulation multiple times. Are you contending that this term and the term roleplay that we use when describing RPG's has the same meaning? That "Roleplay Simulation" is the only form of roleplay that can exist?

Because, then we're right back at Halo being a better Roleplay Simulation than any pen and paper game. After all there is a direct correlation between my actions and the actions in that world. There is nearly zero abstraction, other than user interface.

The other issue I'm having here is that your definition of roleplay includes nothing about freedom or creativity. A firedrill may be a Roleplay Simulation, but, it is not roleplay as the RPG world defines the word. And it sure isn't much fun either. Again, I'm very confused why you insist on defining the word so narrowly and only allow one possible definition for the term roleplay.

See, to me, a roleplaying game (not simulation, game) is any game where the primary function of the game is for you to create some form of persona that interacts in some way in a world that operates in a commonly agreed upon fashion within that group. And, yup, that's a pretty broad definition of role playing game. But, to me, I can't think why I would want to exclude games from the definition.

What do we gain by excluding games like Dogs in the Vineyard and GURPS from the umbrella of Role Playing Game? What benefit is there?

 

[Ariosto]

I've observed a curious thing about rules: having them can be a strong temptation to use them. There's a big "complexity budget" if one's standard is WotC-D&D (or Rolemaster or GURPS or etc.) ... but a much smaller one if the basis of comparison is (e.g.) TSR-D&D.

Rules-light games can easily go to a high level of abstraction that resolves fights (or other activities) very quickly. They can also easily get down to the level of detail typical of Amber Diceless -- or settle at any point in between, case by case.

That calls for a degree of confidence and trust in rulings for which I know many people find rules a comforting substitute. I have heard several times how that is a solution to "problems" with the older, looser games (which does not match my experience). I also know at first hand that manipulating game mechanisms can in itself be entertaining.

However, I have encountered those views only among a subset of "gamers" long accustomed to a more rules-bound mode. Only they seem to be at sea without numbers to crunch. People in general tend to take more naturally to describing imagined situations and actions in the same terms as real ones.

 

[Ariosto]

Howandwhy99 perhaps places too much stock in the application of the old term "role-playing" to these games -- showing just such confusion as was raised as an objection to the usage when it was first bruited. By 1977, though, the "fantasy role-playing" label was being spread so widely among newcomers to the hobby that there was no turning back.

D&D was not designed as a tool for "encounter groups" or the like. The use of some similar techniques no more makes it that kind of role-playing than the use of books makes it a literary enterprise, or other elements make it properly "improvisational radio theatre" (for all that it has been so called).

 

[Galloglaich]

I've observed a curious thing about rules: having them can be a strong temptation to use them. There's a big "complexity budget" if one's standard is WotC-D&D (or Rolemaster or GURPS or etc.) ... but a much smaller one if the basis of comparison is (e.g.) TSR-D&D.

Rules-light games can easily go to a high level of abstraction that resolves fights (or other activities) very quickly. They can also easily get down to the level of detail typical of Amber Diceless -- or settle at any point in between, case by case.

That calls for a degree of confidence and trust in rulings for which I know many people find rules a comforting substitute. I have heard several times how that is a solution to "problems" with the older, looser games (which does not match my experience). I also know at first hand that manipulating game mechanisms can in itself be entertaining.

However, I have encountered those views only among a subset of "gamers" long accustomed to a more rules-bound mode. Only they seem to be at sea without numbers to crunch. People in general tend to take more naturally to describing imagined situations and actions in the same terms as real ones.

I think the sharp difference between the kind of gameplay "people in general" take to relativley easily vs. the kind of 'numbers crunching' (and I don't think it's just numbers) that some hardcore gamers prefer is due to the sharp disconnect between the game design and basic logic. If the mechanics match the expectations of "people in general" on an intuitive level, in it's rythem, if you will, then the game has a natural feel whatever level of abstraction it's at, complex or very simple... and getting deep into it won't require entering such a strange world of weird math and bizarre rationalizations working around inconsistencies.

For some gamers, the very wierdness or disconnect of a badly designed game system can be what they find comforting about it, I think because it becomes "their world". Much the way some people grow very fond of the idosyncracies of say, old Star Treke episodes. I call this the "Klingoninzation" of the game. Taken in context I don't see anything wrong with this, (these can be a fun niche game) but it has literally become the mainstream of gaming, and you shouldn't need to understand Klingon to play IMO. Because frankly I think 'their world' is pretty limited and does seem to alienate a lot of "people in general" as well as some hard core gamers (like myself) who would like to play a game which had a little more natural and intuitive feel to it, with more of an open ended link with History or Mythology. The older versions of the game while largely broken systems, were open enough that you could still play that way, now it's gotten much harder.

To me "real" mythological elements like say Norse Trolls or Native American Wendigo are far more deeply interesting than Teiflings or Dragonlance type Dragonborn.

Although I give credit where it's due to the DnD designers (Gygax?) for making up Drow which have become a pretty well fleshed-out and interesting modern mythological monster (if largely based on the Norse Svartalf) maybe they can make up a new grown up version of these new ideas. That can always be done. But it's bloody hard to pull off even halfway well, most of what I see coming out of say Anime etc. really isn't "grown up" fare.

G.

 

[howandwhy99]

I'm confused as to the difference between roleplay and pretending to be a fictional character. In the RPG context (and I'm not talking about roleplay as a pedagogical tool), isn't taking on the persona of a fictional character the entire point of role playing games? Or, even if you are trying to play a real person, either yourself or a known figure of some sort, don't most RPG's place you in a fictional situation? It's a pretty rare RPG that would have me playing myself posting stuff on En World.

The point is to win the game for most players. But every person is going to have their own reasons for playing an RPG. Attempting to give one point to it is to set a subjective standard. As I said before, any pretended roleplaying involves character play and fictional situations. Improvised theatre cannot be nonfictional.

One other question. You bring up the term Roleplay Simulation multiple times. Are you contending that this term and the term roleplay that we use when describing RPG's has the same meaning? That "Roleplay Simulation" is the only form of roleplay that can exist?

For most players, I would say yes this is the definition they mean. If it were otherwise, we wouldn't have tens of millions of computer RPGers confusing computer simulation games for roleplaying. That it is the only one used in our hobby and in the wider world isn't true. I believe I have been open about there being two definitions of roleplaying and that currently both are being used without much clarity in order to describe two only somewhat similar activities in our hobby.

Because, then we're right back at Halo being a better Roleplay Simulation than any pen and paper game. After all there is a direct correlation between my actions and the actions in that world. There is nearly zero abstraction, other than user interface.

Undoubtedly Halo is a good game, but because it uses a computer generated avatar it is a kind of puppet show rather than roleplay. No actions are acted out by the player. As most sociologists will routinely point out, the line between roleplay and simulation is thin.

The other issue I'm having here is that your definition of roleplay includes nothing about freedom or creativity. A firedrill may be a Roleplay Simulation, but, it is not roleplay as the RPG world defines the word. And it sure isn't much fun either. Again, I'm very confused why you insist on defining the word so narrowly and only allow one possible definition for the term roleplay.

Wow. I've played tons of RPGs and the freedom to create tactics and strategies specific to the role has been vast. Far more than in any simulation game. Creativity is positively required in RPGs. Not to mention imagination. I think you may be falsely equating pretending to be another person as the only way a person can be creative in an RPG.

As for roleplay simulation not being "fun", that's one of the most insulting memes to have come from the Forge in order to belittle game play and game designs that do not use its' philosophy. I mean really, the Big Model has a lock on how roleplaying is "fun"? I know some folks are even trying to prove "Indie" games are "more fun" than other RPGs using scientific testing. As if "fun" could be scientifically quantified and verified. This whole endeavor by the Forge, a website with a self-professed agenda, is credible only when we ignore certain grossly self-serving generalizations like this one. Roleplaying games have been fun for over 35 years. Please don't buy into the hype.

And I am not choosing to define the term Roleplaying narrowly. I am using the game designer definition used for decades up until what were commonly called Theatre Games in our hobby gained some popularity. That those games could only be termed RPGs is because of the discovery by a few designers about fifteen to twenty years ago regarding an alternative definition of roleplaying. I completely agree with you that roleplaying needs to differentiate between its' two definitions and show how broad a term it is, even in our own hobby. But my single definition usage is mainly to keep clear what I am saying. Of course it also helps to demonstrate the the singular definition used throughout Big Model and other Forge-based theory. This is a shame as those theories typically claim to account for all kinds of RPG, when they tend to only find fault with a good 95% of them. By changing the definition of roleplayin, purposefully or accidentally, they fail to take into account the excellence in design of the first thirty-five years of roleplaying games.

See, to me, a roleplaying game (not simulation, game) is any game where the primary function of the game is for you to create some form of persona that interacts in some way in a world that operates in a commonly agreed upon fashion within that group. And, yup, that's a pretty broad definition of role playing game. But, to me, I can't think why I would want to exclude games from the definition.

The problem here is you are excluding most every RPG in our hobby. That's a definition of Storygames, not RPGs. Both may require acting out a role, but one game is about character portrayal and the other is about roleplaying as their "primary function". Have you honestly ever felt your portrayal of a character's personality was rewarded in an RPG? That's not by accident. That is a trait of Storygames.

What do we gain by excluding games like Dogs in the Vineyard and GURPS from the umbrella of Role Playing Game? What benefit is there?

What benefit do we get from people saying RPGs have had horrible designs for over thirty years? None, when it isn't the truth. The two games you mentioned are badly designed roleplaying games according to the definition of RPGs for the past 35 years. Dogs in the Vineyard is a fine storygame, which also happens to fulfill a secondary definition of rolelpaying and game. I think you misunderstand me, if you believe I am the one claiming certain games should be excluded.

What have said is simulation games are not roleplaying games. That neither theatre roleplay nor roleplay simulation definitions qualify them as such. But I also said I don't feel too strongly about their designation as such. I like those games too. Especially because they are easier to manipulate into roleplaying games then storygames could ever be.

 

[howandwhy99]

Howandwhy99 perhaps places too much stock in the application of the old term "role-playing" to these games -- showing just such confusion as was raised as an objection to the usage when it was first bruited. By 1977, though, the "fantasy role-playing" label was being spread so widely among newcomers to the hobby that there was no turning back.

To the best of my knowledge, RPGs were called Fantasy Role-Playing to differentiate them from real world roleplaying.

D&D was not designed as a tool for "encounter groups" or the like. The use of some similar techniques no more makes it that kind of role-playing than the use of books makes it a literary enterprise, or other elements make it properly "improvisational radio theatre" (for all that it has been so called).

The number of drama therapists in the entire world in 1974 could be counted on two hands. Roleplaying came from military simulations. D&D is an acted out game of fantasy warfare.

I should also point out that cool pic over on the linked site. This displays nicely the general transition from roleplaying to other kinds of simulation:

 

[Aus_Snow]

No opinion of preference or argument for or against how RPGs should be defined can negate the existence of real world definitions.

Well then, check out wikipedia, here.

LARPGs, for example, *are* RPGs. It doesn't matter how many times, or in how many ways, you protest to the contrary. Your own theories are just that. 'Real world definitions', ironically, prove it so. Whether you like it or not, in fact.

And really, Rolemaster doesn't know what it is, or is doing or whatever, and both that RPG and GURPS don't provide support for roles? And therefore, I suppose, for roleplaying? Yeesh.

Have you actually played or GMed any RPG other than D&D? More than a little curious about that. Because what I'm reading sure looks a lot like ignorant bias and baseless or borrowed theorising.

 

[Hussar]

The problem here is you are excluding most every RPG in our hobby. That's a definition of Storygames, not RPGs. Both may require acting out a role, but one game is about character portrayal and the other is about roleplaying as their "primary function". Have you honestly ever felt your portrayal of a character's personality was rewarded in an RPG? That's not by accident. That is a trait of Storygames.

Umm, what?

Are you honestly going to tell me that the primary method of play of nearly every RPG out there is NOT to create a fictional character with which to interact with a setting? Even AD&D punished you for not playing in character with the training rules. The assumption of a fictional role is at the very heart of every role playing game.

Look at the introduction paragraph to pretty much every RPG out there. That's PRECISELY what it states.

In 1981, Tom Moldvay wrote in the introduction to Basic D&D:

In the D&D rules, individuals play the roles of characters in a fantasy world where magic is real and heroes venture out on dangerous quests in search of fame and fortune. Characters gain expereience by overcoming perils and recovering treasures. As characters gain experience, they grow in power and ability.

And on your point that players play to "win"

"Winning" and "losing", things important to most games, do not apply to D&D games. The DM and the players do not play against each other, even thoug hthe DM often plays the role of various monsters which threaten the player characters. ... A good D&D campaign is similar to the creation of a fantasy novel, written by the DM and the players.

Sounds a lot like what you are terming "theater gaming" to me. And this is long before Forgisms came on the scene.

/edit for further thought.

The problem I'm having here is that Simulationist Role Play serves a very different function, typically, than what gamers consider to be role playing. SRP is a pedagogical tool. The entire point of using it is to teach people how to act in a given situation. When you are in elementary school and you do a game of "going to the supermarket" and you have play money and plastic food to buy while another student acts out the role of the cashier, that's SRP.

But, and this is the big but for me, there is no such purpose to most RPG's. There's not teaching element required or even wanted in RPG's. Unless you're trying to Blackleaf D&D, most people are not playing D&D to learn how to cast spells. It would be pretty useless to come to D&D to learn how to sword fight or climb a mountain. There's no direct pedagogical function to RPG's. Yes, you do learn skills while playing RPG's - communication skills, math skills etc - by that's a byproduct of the activity, not a reason for playing.

In tabletop wargaming, OTOH, there is no role assumption. You are not, usually, pretending that you are George Washington trying to defeat the British. You are simply using your own knowledge of tactics and strategy to beat the other guy and change the course of history. Without role assumption though, most people would not call Dungeons and Dragons Miniatures a role playing game. Chainmail is a fantastic system for handling mass fantasy battles, but, it's pretty hard to call it any sort of a role playing game, because there is no assumption of any sort of role.

For the same reason, I wouldn't call Microsoft Flight Simulator an RPG. But, under your definition, it certainly is. I'm acting out the role of a pilot in a very realistic situation that is about as close to real as you can get while sitting on the ground. I can actually LEARN to fly an airplane playing this game. As far as Simulationist Roleplay goes, that's SRP on the head.