Imaculata
Hero
Quite cromulent, but isn't "combat-as-X" always going to be inadequate for that? You want to capture stuff beyond combat in your term.
Possibly. Which is why I was trying to find different terminology that covers more than just combat.
See, I don't actually think THIS is strictly accurate either. I've known 4e DMs who do exactly this--because they trust the 4e system to deliver a fun fight even when they do it. (It's part of how the best 4e game I've ever been in had 2 deaths before 4th level, and a near-miss before 5th.)
I have never played 4e, so I really can't comment on that.
I would absolutely do this to my own players--whether in 4e or DW or if, in some fit of pique, I ran 1e or something like that, in that too. An example of my own:
-snip-
Love the example!
Yet I would absolutely say I run a "combat as adventure" game, not "combat as war." I just make the victories and defeats, the rewards and losses, something that primarily happens on the "what stuff matters to the NPCs? What stuff do they love or hate?" level, rather than the "your ticket for getting onto the ride (aka their PCs themselves)" level.
I don't think it's an either/or situation, or black and white. The way I see it, it's a sliding scale. You can run a combat-as-adventure game that has elements of strategy in it. But you can also run a strategic campaign that has elements of adventure in it.
Even my current campaign isn't constant war and strategizing. While the actual battles can get quite tactical and detailed, in between those big battles there is plenty of run of the mill dungeon delving and adventuring.
It is up to the DM how much of those ingredients to include. I try to keep my games tactical, to make it different from default D&D, without getting so specific that it becomes a full on simulation or tabletop war game.