Let's Talk About Metacurrency

[Crimson Longinus]

I have spoken above about how I'm not comfortable with luck mechanics, so I'm certainly not ignorant of them. And I'm aware that meta- rules of one kind or another have always been a thing. I try to avoid them when practical, particularly in actual play at the table (on either side of the screen). I have been very clear on this many times. How does this not make sense to you, whether or not you agree?

How can you not be fine with luck points, but be fine with mundanes using force points? They are basically the same thing.

 

[Micah Sweet]

How can you not be fine with luck points, but be fine with mundanes using force points? They are basically the same thing.

They are the same thing mechanically. Luck doesn't have an in-setting explanation. The Force does, explicitly.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

They are the same thing mechanically. Luck doesn't have an in-setting explanation. The Force does, explicitly.

I’d assume that in a fantasy world things like luck and fate can be real forces as well, especially if we have mechanics that represent them.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I’d assume that in a fantasy world things like luck and fate can be real forces as well, especially if we have mechanics that represent them.

They can be, if they are stated as being so. Generally they aren't, and I see no need to make such a statement myself. I feel the dice and modifiers to the roll handle the randomness of success when attempting something just fine, and don't particularly care for effects that modify the result after the roll, like many luck mechanics do.

 

[Maxperson]

I have spoken above about how I'm not comfortable with luck mechanics, so I'm certainly not ignorant of them. And I'm aware that meta- rules of one kind or another have always been a thing. I try to avoid them when practical, particularly in actual play at the table (on either side of the screen). I have been very clear on this many times. How does this not make sense to you, whether or not you agree?

What doesn't make sense is your idea that prepare makes what the DM does not meta.

Almost everything the DM does is meta. Prepping in advance prevents quantum like the cook being both in the kitchen and not on the kitchen until the die is rolled. However, the DM placing her in the kitchen during prep is still a meta decision. The DM making a chart with the odds of her being in a particular room and then rolling is a meta decision.

Outside of roleplaying the PC interactions with the established world and NPCs, virtually everything the DM does is meta.

You can dislike luck mechanics and other meta-currencies, but you can't avoid other types of meta in your game.

 

[Micah Sweet]

What doesn't make sense is your idea that prepare makes what the DM does not meta.

Almost everything the DM does is meta. Prepping in advance prevents quantum like the cook being both in the kitchen and not on the kitchen until the die is rolled. However, the DM placing her in the kitchen during prep is still a meta decision. The DM making a chart with the odds of her being in a particular room and then rolling is a meta decision.

Outside of roleplaying the PC interactions with the established world and NPCs, virtually everything the DM does is meta.

You can dislike luck mechanics and other meta-currencies, but you can't avoid other types of meta in your game.

Since everything I place during prep is done in accordance with my judgement on what makes sense to be there in the setting as a high priority, I don't really see it as meta. You are welcome to disagree. In any case, luck mechanics and other meta-currencies are a different beast, and that's what this thread is about, not whether or not GM prep counts as "meta".

 

[mamba]

They are the same thing mechanically. Luck doesn't have an in-setting explanation. The Force does, explicitly.

luck = a god interfered has pretty much the same in setting explanation. Heck, even you actually legitimately getting lucky is not that far behind ‘the Force’ as an explanation, esp when there is nothing measurable (in game) attached to the Force

 

[Micah Sweet]

luck = a god interfered has pretty much the same in setting explanation. Heck, even you actually legitimately getting lucky is not that far behind ‘the Force’ as an explanation, esp when there is nothing measurable (in game) attached to the Force

Except in Star Wars games there clearly is something measurable about the Force. It's used for a bunch of things, and the description of it works just fine for it's unconscious use by non Force-sensitives.

 

[soviet]

Earthdawn has an in-fiction explanation for every D&Dism it embraces. It's glorious.

I have first edition on (an official) CD-ROM!

 

[Thomas Shey]

Earthdawn has an in-fiction explanation for every D&Dism it embraces. It's glorious.

Yeah, its pretty much "Let's look at all the D&D tropes and say "Okay, all these things have to at least some degree an in-world explanation and aren't just naked fictional and mechanical tropes. So what would do that?"

Of course the price is you can't tell yourself its a low-key fantasy world anymore. It blatantly isn't.