Different philosophies concerning Rules Heavy and Rule Light RPGs.

[PrunellaUK]

I find this is not true for a variety of reasons.

Rules light and rules heavy are not synonyms for rules complete. A rules light game can be more rules complete than a rules heavy game in that for example it maps all player propositions to some small set of defined moves that they can perform. Players can be as creative as they like in describing and narrating their moves, but at the end of the day they are all just moves and mechanically all that narration has little or no meaning at all. This means that all but the most expressive narration driven groups will in the long run default to just stating the move that they intend because what they state doesn't matter anyway. Combat almost always devolves down to stating a series of moves and performing the mechanic, and this is true even of rules light systems that aren't rules complete (like BECMI).

Rules light systems give GMs very few levers to pull to adjudicate a player proposition. The more rules I have and the more things that the rules account for and can interact with, the more I can translate creative propositions into mechanically distinct and meaningful acts with real outcomes rather than just the color of outcomes.

One thing that might be the case is that in a rules light game the limits of your character as a playing piece are often much less coherently defined. In a rules light game, because literally everything is on fiat, it's easier to be generous with character propositions into areas that the rules are silent on because the rules don't say the character sucks at whatever they are trying to do.

This does not compute for me. Outcomes for a light system aren't any less real than outcomes for a crunchy system. This appears to be an assertion that more detail and process is somehow more concrete than less. It's assigning a qualitative value to crunch. Or, to inject the title of a VERY old British sitcom: "Never mind the quality, feel the width."

 

[PrunellaUK]

I'll just add that in the wargaming circles I belonged to, the whole 'complexity = quality' argument was litigated intensively for decades, right back to the era when flame wars were fought in issues of 1980s Xeroxed fanzines. It's interesting that a lot of the veterans of those bustups - all grey-hairs like myself - now lean away from heavier games towards far lighter ones. Just saying.

 

[dragoner]

I remember those discussions: beer and pretzel vs simulation.

 

[Kichwas]

So in summation, crunching systems better define what you can with a clearly defined rules set. While a lighter system is more up to GM fiat which fans of crunchy game really don't like. At least that is how I perceive it.

What do you think?

That's probably about right and roughly sums up why I dislike rules light and prefer crunchier more defined systems.

You've given a fairly honest evaluation of the side of the table that is not yours, which is a good thing to see.

I've played both rules light and rules heavy systems and for me, I lean to the crunchier side of the table, up to a point. That point is probably just before you reach the Hero System - which is a system so heavily defined that gameplay can really slow down. That said the last time I saw Hero was 20 years ago. Maybe it would work inside a VTT with good automation.

When it came to more rules light systems, as a GM I didn't trust myself to be able to remember what I'd done the last time a given issue had popped up. And while for some people that's a freeing experience, for me it was a stress point.

 

[PrunellaUK]

I remember those discussions: beer and pretzel vs simulation.

Yes. And yet 'simulation' was too often defined in terms of complexity, and process. Ignoring that the simpler games often boiled away the excess and fat to get to get us a rich and tasty sauce.

I still remember the shock of playing Ben Knight's 1991 Jutland game in Command magazine, or the same designer's Victory at Midway, to see how simpler games often had more nuance and clarity than the complex ones, and did a far better job of mapping game decisions to historical ones.

 

[dragoner]

Yes. And yet 'simulation' was too often defined in terms of complexity, and process. Ignoring that the simpler games often boiled away the excess and fat to get to get us a rich and tasty sauce.

I still remember the shock of playing Ben Knight's 1991 Jutland game in Command magazine, or the same designer's Victory at Midway, to see how simpler games often had more nuance and clarity than the complex ones, and did a far better job of mapping game decisions to historical ones.

I was a fan of both, from microgames in plastic bags, to huge setups in squad leader. The key element is time and space; more complex the more time and space it needed. Similar to RPG's, it takes longer to make a 3 page character, than one that fits on a index card, each promotes a different style of gaming.

 

[overgeeked]

Yes. And yet 'simulation' was too often defined in terms of complexity, and process. Ignoring that the simpler games often boiled away the excess and fat to get to get us a rich and tasty sauce.

Exactly. It’s a mistake to think you can’t have simulation without heaps of codified rules. Each of us is walking around with a lifetime of experience with the real world. (Well, nowadays there’s fewer and fewer people engaging with reality, but that’s another thread for another forum.) We can just as easily draw from that as anyone else. That it’s preemptively written down doesn’t make it somehow a better answer.

What’s more the notion of needing consistency is wildly overblown. You almost never encounter exactly the same circumstances twice. If those differences in circumstance make a difference in the fiction, they should make a difference in the mechanics. “But last time it was a 3 to climb a wall, why is it a 4 this time?” Because these are different circumstances than those. People ignore that reality and say it’s a capricious referee instead.

If you (general you, not the poster I’m quoting), refuse to trust the referee, that’s fine. Just say so. But again, no amount of rules can protect you from a bad referee.

 

[dragoner]

Exactly. It’s a mistake to think you can’t have simulation without heaps of codified rules. Each of us is walking around with a lifetime of experience with the real world. (Well, nowadays there’s fewer and fewer people engaging with reality, but that’s another thread for another forum.) We can just as easily draw from that as anyone else. That it’s preemptively written down doesn’t make it somehow a better answer.

What’s more the notion of needing consistency is wildly overblown. You almost never encounter exactly the same circumstances twice. If those differences in circumstance make a difference in the fiction, they should make a difference in the mechanics. “But last time it was a 3 to climb a wall, why is it a 4 this time?” Because these are different circumstances than those. People ignore that reality and say it’s a capricious referee instead.

If you (general you, not the poster I’m quoting), refuse to trust the referee, that’s fine. Just say so. But again, no amount of rules can protect you from a bad referee.

The rich tasty sauce was also good game design, I played a lot of wargames that weren't so good, both simple and complex. This is also something that applies to RPG's.

 

[overgeeked]

The rich tasty sauce was also good game design, I played a lot of wargames that weren't so good, both simple and complex. This is also something that applies to RPG's.

I generally find more focused RPGs to be better designed than the sprawling games that try to somehow do everything. It’s that focus that lets designers cut away the cruft and streamline. Even if that focus is “this RPG is unapologetically a story emulator not a physics simulator” it will tend to produce better results.

 

[dragoner]

I generally find more focused RPGs to be better designed than the sprawling games that try to somehow do everything. It’s that focus that lets designers cut away the cruft and streamline. Even if that focus is “this RPG is unapologetically a story emulator not a physics simulator” it will tend to produce better results.

Yes, and some are more like one and done. Which is fine if that is what someone is looking for. I often find myself in a silent majority of liking games. If something interests me I'll dig more into it, where like in the new PHB I made a Rogue, they are cool, though looking at casters, that is fairly involved, over my interests of making one. I could still play the rogue and be happy though. Running a game is a different story. Some sort of rules mastery is required usually for GM'ing.