Charlaquin
Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
Why? I like that premise.I've bolded an unargued premise in your synthesis.
Abandon that premise, and then imagine what other possibilities there are.
Why? I like that premise.I've bolded an unargued premise in your synthesis.
Abandon that premise, and then imagine what other possibilities there are.
This looks like a stripped back version of 5e resolution. It doesn't make me think you would like Dungeon World.I can tell you what I’m envisioning is a system using Dungeon World’s core mechanic of rolling 2d6 + a modifier of up to +3 (which conveniently coincides with B/X’s relationship between ability scores and modifiers), with mixed success on a 6-9 and total success on a 10+, but tweaked to be used for “task resolution” rather than “consequence resolution.” I look at Dungeon World’s Act Under Pressure move and I see something very close to how I approach calling for checks in 5e. I can easily see massaging it into something like…
Ability Check
When you want to accomplish a goal, describe what you want to do and how you try to do it. The GM might describe a potential consequence for failure and ask you to roll…
• +Str if you use direct physical force
• +Dex if you use agility or fine manipulation
• +Con if you use resilience and fortitude
• +Int if you use memory or deductive reasoning
• +Wis if you use your senses of perception or intuition
• +Cha if you use charm and social grace
On a 7 or higher you accomplish what you were trying to do. If you get under a 10 you suffer the consequence the GM described.
The GM in Torchbearer has to make key decisions about pacing. In that way it resembles Burning Wheel.So, I read the primer on the Torchbearer Kickstarter. Sounds awesome, though I suppose that is the job of a primer. The one thing that gives me pause is the idea that it seems like on a fail the GM decides whether to let it succeed at the cost of a condition or impose a twist. Now, maybe there are clear principles laid out for when to do which, but without knowing what those principles are (if they do exist), that feels arbitrary in a way I wouldn’t really be bothered by as a player, but would feel uncomfortable deciding on as a GM. Maybe I’m stuck in D&D GM-as-referee mindset, but it feels too partial to me.
Just for the thought exercise, put it down, see how that changes things. You can pick it back up any time.Why? I like that premise.
I think that was the point! @Charlaquin is adopting something from Dungeon World that they do like and applying it to B/X.This looks like a stripped back version of 5e resolution. It doesn't make me think you would like Dungeon World.
Oh yeah, I barely got into it, but Torchbearer has many interlocking parts that go into decisions like this. It's like a Swiss watch!You apply a twist when failure would be fun! There's no straightforward 5e analogue to this. A twist generally requires a new obstacle to be overcome and so adds to the grind, which imposes a condition every 4 obstacles, so it's kind of a quarter of a condition in itself. Extra obstacles are good for improving skills and abilities, and allow pursuing Beliefs just as much as success + a condition would.
I'm not asking you to abandon the premise as a principle of your play! What I'm saying is that your synthesis rests on a premise which is not essential to RPGing, even to RPGing with a group of players; and I'm inviting you to abandon the premise, at least for a moment, in thought. If one does so, then other possibilities reveal themselves.Why? I like that premise.
You did. But your take on Dungeon World seems to involve stripping out all its narrativist components and inserting new ones. And you've posted that you really like the environment-exploration aspect of 5e D&D, to the extent that you would like to move beyond 5e D&D to the B/X style dungeon crawl but using your DW-inspired moves in place of the B/X resolution framework.I got pretty stoked about a game that was pitched on the premise of being in constant tension between gamist and narrativist concerns…
I get an impression of you enjoying vivid, engaging characters. Absolutely.Huh? Did I testify that? I seem to remember describing what I wanted as the use of performance measuring tools to lend weight to character development decisions, which were my ultimate goal.
I think the dirty-word simulationism was probably purist-for-system/process-simulation. Which 4e is the antithesis of!Sure, but this goes beyond that. If agendas are supposed to be about what your gaming priorities ultimately come down to, I’m pretty sure mine, in GNS terms are “exploration of character,” which I thought was similationist. Which is pretty wild, since I fought on the 4e side of the Edition Wars, so simulationism was a dirty word to me for quite some time.
Very well said.Second, I think that most RPG theory tends to try and discuss typologies, or to put it in more simple terms- most of it is trying to categorize either (a) types of players, or (b) types of games. I find that to be unhelpful, as most RPG games and players cannot easily be described in a single category, and there is a long history of these characterizations being used in unhelpful ways.
My BW-loving friend basically cannot stop himself from sacrificing character priorities to the goal of PC improvement. He is the one who chose to take the catacombs to try and save his brother from assassination, rather than go overground, because he wanted the Cataombs-wise test.It is very possible to integrate playing a game for sake of playing it with skill and guts with exploration of character and/or setting. It is also very possible to integrate the visceral character crucible with skilled play. There will be pain points, generally between players who value the play priorities differently.
Now imagine GMing vanilla narrativist Rolemaster without having yet worked out that all the advice on world building, world events, random encounters etc is inimical to what you're trying to do . . .However Story Now and Right To Dream are like oil and water because they require phenomenally different play structures.
I suppose that if you want to lump all those terms together, so that if one is used all of the others are intended, then you can get there. I prefer to not do that. A game can be incoherent and not dysfunctional, or incoherent and dysfunctional, and even coherent and dysfunctional (for completion, we also have coherent and not dysfunctional). He's specifically talking to the Vampire system, which very much is dysfunctional in that if you try to do what the game suggests you should be doing while using the system, it doesn't work at all. Vampire was a primary motivator for a lot of the Forge discussion, because it's clearly telling you what it's supposed to do but then actually doesn't do that.I understand the ideas “incoherence” is meant to communicate, and because of this am arguing incoherence is not a particularly apt term. In fact, it seems Edwards distinguished between “incoherent” and “hybrid” design:
Incoherent game design is distinguished from Hybrid design due to its confusing, disjointed, disorganized (i.e. “incoherent”) goals and presentation (though, he says he is “highly skeptical” that hybrid design is truly achievable). He writes this “unfortunately” applies to many games with which we are familiar, which are “dysfunctional.” In fact, “horribly dysfunctional.” This is a problem especially when it can’t drift from one agenda to another, and so becomes an “indigestible mix” of multiple agendas. This untenable situation can be seen in Vampire, where the incoherent design leads players to be “especially screwed.” Instead of just drifting their game to one agenda or another, the outcome is that in this incoherent game “including encouraging subcultural snobbery against other Simulationist play without being much removed from it.” In sum, he writes that “the prognosis for the enjoyment of such play is not favorable.”
So maybe “dysfunctional,” “indigestible,” “screwed,” and “unfavorable prognosis” also just technical terms within his theory describing a type of design or a state of play. But given everything Edwards writes above and more, I think its intended as a criticism and something to be avoided in design.
Which again, is fine. It’s sensible in its immediate context (you’ll hear no defense of vampire’s system from me) and introduces, though the agendas, a kind of focus that some designers and players have found helpful. But pretending that its not a criticism is bizarre, not only because it clearly is, but because the fact that it is a swipe at Vampire is what makes it an insightful point in the first place. Perhaps there was an idea that a theory needs to be abstract and neutral, devoid of historical context; certainly theory in other fields operates under this assumption. But I think you can admit that theory is motivated (the definitely not that aspect of it) and not only is it not a problem, but is helpful.