D&D General D&D's Evolution: Rulings, Rules, and "System Matters"

[MichaelSomething]

But no, I don't think that D&D requires vetting for GMs -- this would be an odd thing to take from my point. Rather, I was pointing out another large difference between the conceptual space that holds Free Kriegsspiel and the one that holds D&D. There's actually very few things you can take from the former to the latter because they directly or even indirectly map.

If people want D&D to be more like Free Kriegsspiel/more based on DM rulings, then they should be willing to make adjustments to the game/culture in order to do so.

I wonder if @Snarf Zagyg would go through a vetting process if would allow them to run more based on rulings/have their players trust them more...

 

[hawkeyefan]

Sometimes I see advocates of more crunchy editions/games remind people that dnd grew out of tactical wargames. While true, it's also interesting that such wargames have a long history of those who wanted more extensive and codified rulesets and those who reacted against that and wanted more gm arbitration to make the game go fastser.

Right, there were opposing views even then. And ultimately, the neutral umpire was brought in.

The differences that I think really matter when compared to an RPG:

• the umpire is a subject matter expert whose knowledge is a fitting substitute for the rules
• the umpire is neutral in that there are two opposing participants and he is not affiliated with either
• the umpire is neutral in that the scenario is not one that he has designed

There are others, but I feel like those are the big ones.

Sneaky of you, to steal my main point with a simple statement of it while I write the opening chapter of a thesis.

Primplicated!

Parallel thinking is all. No thievery.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

If people want D&D to be more like Free Kriegsspiel/more based on DM rulings, then they should be willing to make adjustments to the game/culture in order to do so.

….so, you do understand that discussion of something isn’t the same as advocacy, right?

I think that the FKR movement (and the Arnesonian antecedents) are fascinating. shrug

 

[pemerton]

I don't think it's pretending constraints don't exist, as it is seeing what would happen if you start with the minimum viable ruleset and build up from there

<snip>

Among them:

*The idea is that a human being is better able to adjudicate a complex situation than an abstract ruleset. And they can do it faster.

* FKR prioritizes invisible rulebooks over visible rulebooks.

* FKR is a High-Trust play style. It's only going to work if you trust that the DM is fair, knowledgeable, and is going to make clear, consistent rulings.

And as I mentioned in that thread, in practice I think this style of play works best not just with high trust of the DM, but when the gameplay involves a degree of collaboration and conversation, the kind advocated for in storygames. The difference I think is that storygames are skeptical that that style of high trust play is possible without specific mechanics that constrain the gm and empower players. But both story games and fkr are skeptical that complicated, extensive rulesets (e.g. pathfinder, prussian wargames) can enable emergent play and/or be truly managed without becoming a headache for most people.

I mostly agree with what @Ovinomancer has posted in reply to this.

A few additional thoughts:

* The most abstract ruleset I know is Cthulhu Dark, and I don't think that a human can be quicker than that. The idea that applying abstract rulesets to complex situations takes time rests on a premise that the abstract ruleset looks more like the 3E D&D grappling rules than (say) the rules for Cthulhu Dark or HeroQueset revised or Cortex+ Heroic.

* To follow on from the above, the complexity of rulesets seems like a distinct concern in any event - BW has very crunchy rules (comparable at least to RuneQuest in complexity) and Marvel Heroic RP is not crunch-free (though much simpler than BW), but neither is oriented towards the same sort of play experience as AD&D (either edition) or Pathfinder. There are reasons for BW rules being crunchy, and replacing them with referee adjudication in the free kriegsspiel style would not satisfy those reasons.

* "High-trust" is a red herring. In BW I need to trust that the GM will be able to come up with worthwhile scenes and worthwhile consequence narration. Otherwise the game will just drag or even suck. In Apocalype World I need to trust that the GM is able to come up with signs of pending badness that are compelling (in general) and engaging (for me in the play of my PC). The idea that non-free kriegsspielers don't trust their referees is something I see asserted quite often but regard as low-level slander.

* "Consistent rulings" is also a red herring, for a different reason: it builds in an assumption that the main thing that should matter to resolution is sensible estimations of the outcomes of the causal processes involved in the action being taken by the character. Now obviously this is important for wargaming in the nineteenth century Prussian Army, which is meant to be teaching officers how to be better military decision-makers. But why does it matter for RPGing? Why should it be the same difficulty for my PC to move a one-ton weight in the gym and for my PC to move the one-ton block off my loved one? Why should the likelihood of meeting sentries be the same when we're sneaking into the compound as when we're fleeing from it with our stolen goodies (in a heist story the likelihood should be greater at the start; in an action story it should be greater at the end)? Etc. Building consistent rulings in as a premise is already taking a view about what RPGing is (namely, a type of wargaming) which hasn't been true universally since the mid-70s and probably isn't true of a majority of contemporary RPG play.

 

[Chaosmancer]

If WOTC has a certified GM accreditation program; would you apply for one? Would you be more likely to play in their games??

I'd certainly be interested in seeing it, even if I didn't end up applying.

 

[Chaosmancer]

You aren't very good at taking the hint, are you?

EDIT- removed and changed to this:

That's not how sentencing work. That's not what I was talking about This has nothing to do with "removing all precedent and judicial review and appeals from the legal system."

However, none of this matters to the instant issue since it was just an analogy. Moreover, this is not the Politics and Law blog- this is for RPGs. If you want to poorly explain the law, do it to someone else, please.

And this isn't a polish military history blog either, yet that is coming up in discussion.

Again, you seem to be advocating for a removal of all rules from DnD, to match a Free Kriegspiel set-up. I question the value of that, because I see value in the rules. I'm trying to show that your analogy showing a tension between an authority following rules and an authority unlimited by rules, when zoomed out to actual context, doesn't show a desire to remove all rules, like what you seem to be proposing. Which gets to the heart of the issue. Rules tend to exist for good reasons, reasons that we mostly agree with, and removing all rules is an extreme step, that usually results in rules being added back into the situation.

 

[Chaosmancer]

* "Consistent rulings" is also a red herring, for a different reason: it builds in an assumption that the main thing that should matter to resolution is sensible estimations of the outcomes of the causal processes involved in the action being taken by the character. Now obviously this is important for wargaming in the nineteenth century Prussian Army, which is meant to be teaching officers how to be better military decision-makers. But why does it matter for RPGing? Why should it be the same difficulty for my PC to move a one-ton weight in the gym and for my PC to move the one-ton block off my loved one? Why should the likelihood of meeting sentries be the same when we're sneaking into the compound as when we're fleeing from it with our stolen goodies (in a heist story the likelihood should be greater at the start; in an action story it should be greater at the end)? Etc. Building consistent rulings in as a premise is already taking a view about what RPGing is (namely, a type of wargaming) which hasn't been true universally since the mid-70s and probably isn't true of a majority of contemporary RPG play.

This is a really good point, and I think I saw @Lanefan give an excellent answer to it in another thread.

The reason why it can be good for the 1 ton weight to be the same difficulty to move in the gym and when crushing your loved one is consistency of the world. It is very difficult to know what is possible, if what is possible is always shifting with the scenario.

However, to call upon Elan from Order of the Stick, narrative conventions can also be something that we can rely on to be consistent. Of course you, the hero, can shove the 1 ton block off your lover during the dramatic final encounter, because that is what we expect from stories like this.

I think in the end, it comes down to priorities and a willingness to embrace a bit of silliness in tropes. If your priority is "things are what they are, and life isn't a story" then more consistent rules is a boon. If your priority is matching dramatic story beats where the hero does the epic impossible thing they will only do once, then more loose rules are a boon. Or if you want a tropey game.

 

[The-Magic-Sword]

So freeform forum roleplaying is pretty FKR, in fact we used etiquette in place of the referee and... it was fun but there's a reason I prefer crunchier systems now. By having a consistent rule set you create more game to play, and allows for a much more... Sophisticated? texture of play. So I disagree with the premise that concrete rules were primarily driven by financial incentive, I think that they discovered that greater codification had benefits in terms of the metagame, consistent rules are really important for sustaining some kinds of game play that would have been really interesting at the time, since we mostly devalue of it as a result of desensitization from video games.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Again, you seem to be advocating for a removal of all rules from DnD, to match a Free Kriegspiel set-up. ...doesn't show a desire to remove all rules, like what you seem to be proposing.

The OP:

This isn't meant as a slam on any particular approach, or even advocacy for any approach. But I am putting out the topic in case people find it interesting!

Two posts above this one:

….so, you do understand that discussion of something isn’t the same as advocacy, right?

How about in my reply to you earlier:

I think that if you drop your preconceptions about a desired outcome of this discussion- in other words, if you assume it is a discussion and not a debate...

So I will make this abundantly clear; there are three things that really annoy me:
1. People who continue to argue with me when I've repeatedly tried to tell them to stop.
2. People who cannot seem to understand that discussing something isn't advocacy for that thing.
3. Bards.

Since you refuse to get the hint, I will make this very clear: the only thing keeping you from the trifecta right now is a lyre.

Is that clear enough for you?

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

It’s an interesting concept. I don’t know if I’m familiar with any games that might be considered FKR or that identify as such. I’m curious to hear about them.

.

Try the link at the top of the OP.

you might also find this insteresting:

How I Run and Play an Ultralight Game

I take it for granted that I know how I run and have been running my games for a few years now according to the "free kriegsspiel/FKR" (henc...

d66kobolds.blogspot.com