What Do You Think Of As "Modern TTRPG Mechanics"?

[pemerton]

the available 'moves' and their resolution to me still feel more restricted than in say D&D

I don't understand why. AW has a rule for resolving any declared action. It actually is broader, in that respect, than any version of D&D prior to 4e.

 

[pemerton]

The thing about hit points is that getting hit by something sharp or heavy moving fast is, in most ttrpg settings, the single most common event that in the real world would be likely to have long term consequences. Therefore how you take and recover from damage is one of the first two baseline things you need to get right for any sort of simulation. (The only thing as important is baseline success chance for doing things normal people can with little training).

Banging on about hit points in a supposedly real world simulationist game is like banging on about the engine power in what is meant to be a racing car. I don't care if it has an air dam and spoiler and pretty streamlining if it's using an engine out of a motorbike it's not going to be a good racing car.

Right. If I read someone's account of how they use exhaustion/stamina-type conditions for walking long distances, and implement twisted ankles for falling into a pit trap, and worry about hands being severed by a hidden blade in the ominous hand-sized opening trap - but no character in their game ever suffers a serious wound from sword-fighting or being bitten by a tiger, or twists their ankle while fleeing a monster or dodging the swing of a giant's club, or is winded by being struck in the torso by a mace - then I don't see it as very sim-y. I see it as a strange hybrid, where non-fight-y stuff can be physically demanding and debilitating, but fighting is oddly a-physical and low cost.

 

[dbolack]

We were doing that in Over the Edge in 1998, while waiting for Mind’s Eye Theatre sessions to start. Someone I knew claimed to have done it earlier in Theatrix, but their logs showed it was all just Lacanian BS, more or less Zizek avant la lettre.

Theatrix. Man. There's a name I had forgotten....

 

[Autumnal]

Theatrix. Man. There's a name I had forgotten....

“In the end”? Nothing ever ends, Adrian. Nothing ever ends.

 

[Micah Sweet]

The question is, by the time you've done all that, given it was about half the mechanics or more of OD&D, why even bother? Again, assuming its not all about network effect.

I fo it to make the game I want. Is there another reason?

 

[pemerton]

this thread is, I believe, not looking at all games, but only TTRPGs. So while I am happy to say that compared to wargames in the 70s, D&D was not simulation-focused, I cannot say the same when we compare it to all TTRPGs. Yes, it uses abstraction, genre trappings and has gamist approaches -- I might argue that "hit points" are the most "modern" mechanic, as it's a purely gamist mechanic with minimal connection to realism(*). But the vast majority of the rules are in service of simulation, such as the selection on p13 of vol1 (I picked a paragraph at random) which explains in detail how relatives can inherit character's wealth, if they pay a 10% tax, but that if the original character returns they can recover their possessions, also paying 10%, in which case the player character must revert to being an NPC and start with a loyalty penalty of 0 to -6 ...

It is hard to argue that rules like this are aimed at being fun, or making the game flow easily. They're an attempt at simulation.

() Actually, with some more thought, I really do think that

To me, the relatives rule looks like a rule intended to serve the purpose of getting a player whose PC dies back into the game. It reminds me a bit of the rule in Torchbearer that lets a player carry a (limited) amount of Fate and Persona from a dead character to a new character. The 10% tax looks like a sim lampshade hung over the imposition of a gameplay cost.

The bit that seems the most sim-y is the stuff about the relative, if "demoted" from PC back to NPC, holding a grudge and suffering a loyalty penalty. But even that seems like it serves a gameplay purpose - of discouraging overly frivolous bequests, and also being a (faint) precursor to enemies rules found in (say) Burning Wheel and Torchbearer.

So I guess I don't see that rule as an attempt at simulation. I see it as a rule for responding to a player loss, that has some costs and risks associated with it, with a sim lampshade hung over those costs and risks. (Just like we might explain the MU armour rule by retroactively deciding that metal armour interferes with the harnessing of magical energy.)

 

[mamba]

I don't understand why. AW has a rule for resolving any declared action. It actually is broader, in that respect, than any version of D&D prior to 4e.

I guess that is my point, AW is more prescriptive (a rule for resolving any declared action), D&D leaves more up to DM fiat

 

[Umbran]

I guess that is my point, AW is more prescriptive (a rule for resolving any declared action), D&D leaves more up to DM fiat

Um, mamba? No.

You see, the basic way to resolve an action that isn't a move IS GM FIAT!

When a player declares an action that isn't a move, the GM simply decides what happens, and changes the fiction in a small way to give the players something new to respond to. In AW lingo this is a GM's "soft move", but it is basically a fiat decision.

 

[mamba]

You see, the basic way to resolve an action that isn't a move IS GM FIAT!

I didn’t mean to say that there is zero fiat, only that there is less room for it

 

[Umbran]

I didn’t mean to say that there is zero fiat, only that there is less room for it

And I am telling you that is exactly wrong. There is more room for fiat in a move-based game, because resolving everything that is not a move is a GM fiat decision!