Different philosophies concerning Rules Heavy and Rule Light RPGs.

[Thomas Shey]

The bit that I've bolded is pretty striking to me. Is that a thing?

There are games where part of character generation involves defining character traits about personality that are expected to be followed either directly or indirectly (depending on whether there's a reward for doing so, usually in the form of metacurrancy), often because having them is considered disadvantageous (because it potentially forces the character to do things under some circumstances that are unattractive from a basic gamist consideration). Ideally, the player has a good enough grasp on what these traits mean that there's no need for the GM to intervene, but since they're load-bearing (i.e. they give or gave a player extra resources) if they don't seem to be doing so he's expected to do that.

 

[Thomas Shey]

This is where I tend to agree with @Bill Zebub upthread: people should play games they want to play, with other people who want to play them.

And I'll just repeat that the hobby is full of people who find playing with less-than-perfect matches of other players and styles is what they're going to end up doing if they're playing at all, and they'd still rather play than not play. I don't think it does discussion much use to act like such situations don't exist and are not uncommon.

 

[Thomas Shey]

it’s a subcultural variable in gaming. I’ve run groups where a player got lambasted for not pointing out the negative rules in a timely manor, and others where even the mention of rules in player favor was a “SHUT THE «BLEEP» UP!!!” toxic reaction from the players.

As someone upthread mentioned, its unfortunately common to hit people that only want it one way--the rules are to be argued for and followed if it helps a player, but never if it hurts them. While I can understand that, I have to say I find it pretty offputting and doesn't improve my opinion of people who hold that position.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Most GM fudging is that level of obvious, with a lot of players not calling them on it. It often is subtle only in the fudging GM’s delusional thinking.

I've rarely seen it that blatant; it usually involves massaging numbers, either from hidden die rolls or changing result effecting number on the fly.

 

[aramis erak]

I've rarely seen it that blatant; it usually involves massaging numbers, either from hidden die rolls or changing result effecting number on the fly.

It's pretty obvious when GMs are massaging the to hit rates. If players didn't feel the overreaction to calling them on it would break the group... And then, there are a lot of players who notice and simply don't care.

 

[Thomas Shey]

It's pretty obvious when GMs are massaging the to hit rates. If players didn't feel the overreaction to calling them on it would break the group... And then, there are a lot of players who notice and simply don't care.

I'm not sure; with at least big linear die rolls like D20's and D100's, it can take a while to realize the numbers seem odd (just because the swing is so extreme), and the most subtle versions (only doing it when a particular roll is critical) requires people to think in the right ways that I'm unsold most people will.

More consistent use of this does, of course, provide a better ability to spot the pattern.

 

[pemerton]

Not so much in D&D (outside of Paladin falling) but in White Wolf derived systems there's often a judgement - Virtue rolls to take a certain action in Exalted, Humanity damage in Vampire and so on. Implicit in this is the DM judging your character shouldn't do that based on backstory or stats.

On one level, you can even expand this to (mundane, at least, for everyone to agree on) fear effects.

I didn't think that @hawkeyefan was talking about personality/behaviour mechanics like (say) Pendragon virtues or Steel in Burning Wheel or whatever. Which was confirmed by his reply.

Speaking just for myself, I wouldn't describe something like a GM in Burning Wheel calling for a Steel test, or a GM in (Pelgrane) Dying Earth calling for a roll to resist temptation, as the GM deciding that a player is not playing their PC properly or that the PC shouldn't do such-and-such a thing.

 

[pemerton]

There are games where part of character generation involves defining character traits about personality that are expected to be followed either directly or indirectly (depending on whether there's a reward for doing so, usually in the form of metacurrancy), often because having them is considered disadvantageous (because it potentially forces the character to do things under some circumstances that are unattractive from a basic gamist consideration). Ideally, the player has a good enough grasp on what these traits mean that there's no need for the GM to intervene, but since they're load-bearing (i.e. they give or gave a player extra resources) if they don't seem to be doing so he's expected to do that.

Sure. I think it was pretty obvious from @hawkeyefan's post, though, that he wasn't talking about disadvantages in HERO or GURPS.

 

[pemerton]

I too Faolyn to be talking about soft moves made by the GM in the course of the "conversation", in a context in which (i) no player-side move has been triggered, and (ii) no golden opportunity has been handed to the GM to bring things home with a hard move.

I was under the impression one of the differences between soft moves and hard was that was legitimate; have I erred there?

There's a syntax issue with your post that means I'm having trouble working out what you're asking.

I can restate the relevant principles, but that may not answer your question, in which case by all means re-ask it.

In AW (and DW, which follows AW very closely in the following respects), the general rule for when the GM makes a move is that the table looks to the GM to see what happens next. Because there is a principle that players decide what their PCs do and think, and that the GM decides what other people do, and what the "external world" is like, the players are apt to look to the GM after describing what it is that their PCs do.

When the GM makes a move, that should be a soft move - ie something which generate "rising action" (announce a thread, provide an opportunity, etc) - unless the players have provided a golden opportunity to bring home an established point of tension/challenge/threat (this is the "golden opportunity"), in which case the GM can make as hard and direct a move as they like.

The GM's role in relation to players' rolls for player-side moves can really be seen as falling within the above principles: when a player succeeds, and looks to the GM, the GM makes a move in accordance with the rules for player-side move in question; if the player fails (6 or down) then that is a golden opportunity for the GM to bring things home with as hard and direct a move as they like.

It's not impossible, but should be atypical, for a player to succeed on a player-side move and the GM to make a hard move. For instance, suppose all the fiction up to now, in an AW game, has established that some character has no desires - perhaps they have achieved some sort of almost-mystical union with the psychic maelstrom - and then a player succeeds vs them on Read a Person and asks How could I get them to love me?, the GM can answer with a hard move: There's no way you can do that.

This would be an instance of the GM following the principle of disclaiming decision-making by always saying what their prep demands.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I didn't think that @hawkeyefan was talking about personality/behaviour mechanics like (say) Pendragon virtues or Steel in Burning Wheel or whatever. Which was confirmed by his reply.

Speaking just for myself, I wouldn't describe something like a GM in Burning Wheel calling for a Steel test, or a GM in (Pelgrane) Dying Earth calling for a roll to resist temptation, as the GM deciding that a player is not playing their PC properly or that the PC shouldn't do such-and-such a thing.

I don't see how you could call it anything else. Its just inserting a mechanic for whether you can force that behavior or not; after all, in the second case its the GM deciding the character may not resist temptation no matter what the player wants.