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Sure, but there are levels to our interest and empathy. I do not find it all that controversial to stipulate that those higher levels of interest and empathy in a given character would make it more difficult to rely on principles alone. Just like it's harder for me to eat cookies that are at the...

I don't think player versus non-player is the best distinction. I think actively seeking to shape/influence play is the right one. Like even if a Vampire Storyteller is not considered a player no one argue they are a neutral arbiter. Same for an Apocalypse World MC. They are actively putting...

As an addendum I do not think a freeform group where a player introduces something unwanted and unwelcome to another player (that they themselves do not find unwelcome in some way) is very functional. Because that would suggest that the player in question does not have a personal investment or...

In some forms of play I believe a GM, or another player, may introduce the unwelcome and unwanted via principles alone. This mostly works fine when comes to a GM as a neutral referee or a GM as a motivated storyteller because the things they want, and desire, are not in conflict with sustaining...

@clearstream Just letting you know that I have been busy but will get back to you. We're working on finishing the characters all get to know each other at a fancy party thread before we split off for preludes for each character's individual embrace.

Vampire, Monsterhearts, Blades in the Dark, Mouseguard, The Between, Changeling. That's just in the last year. Our Vampire, Changeling and Monsterhearts games didn't even have the concept of "the party". Just intersecting characters.

It's just not credible given what you are actually capable of as it bears out in play vis a vis the antagonists you face or even basic NPCs who lack proficiency in the things you are supposed to be good at. It is more credible in say Pathfinder Second Edition where basic goblins and kobolds are...

Outside of discrete subsystems like combat I often like to add success with complications into otherwise traditional games. In our group's Vampire hack 1-2 successes is success with complications, 3-4 is success with complications and 5+ is critical success. In Worlds Without Number I often use...

@clearstream If you wanted to honestly ponder and engage in a conversation about these things, I would hope that you would engage with Vincent's accounts of his Ars Magica game or ask questions about my own freeform experience. I would also hope you would offer up some relevant principles, way...

Vincent Baker's unwelcome is the thing none of us would choose but is still compelling. It's also conflict-sustaining. It's all about resolving some basic issues that tend to rear their head in freeform play - mainly that when we all like (or at least feel for) each other's characters there is a...

What's most important to me is that player characters are connected. I want them to have relevant relationships that they leverage and heighten the emotional stakes of situations. I want history, but like history that does not stay history. I want characters who can confidently move through...

At least from a D&D perspective one of the sorts of characters I often need to represent are characters who very skilled in one particular area but lack the broad capabilities of D&D adventures. Diplomats, physicians, scholars, ritualists, weaponsmiths, etc. Highly skilled, but also highly...

I think what matters is whether or not people are thoughtful and able collaborators. I think being open to new ideas is important, but so can adhering to a vision. My overall stance is that merely asking should never be taken as rude. Insisting sure. What I don't want to get to the point of is a...

When it comes to NPCs there is a phenomenal difference between a game having a consistent interface and the process by which we get to the stat block. As a longtime GM of games like Vampire, Legend of the Five Rings, various 2d20 games, et al most of the games I have run outside of 3e advocate...

I mean that for a setting to feel like a real lived place there needs to be some elements that come from novel creativity rather than just extrapolation. That's regardless of top down or bottom-up design. That exceptions to the norms should exist, especially when comes to the behavior of...

Despite the name of the thread the actual thesis seems more like top-down setting extrapolation is overrated. That's a sentiment I can personally get behind. I find that often settings designed from a top-down approach with very little of the sort of novel (as in usual) elements that Tolkein's...

So, to my mind there is a phenomenal amount of difference between these things: The game inevitably produces incoherent fiction to a degree I could not bear. You have lower standards for coherency so it is fine for you. The process of the game would not allow me to interface with the fiction of...

I mean if you can actually explain how than we can actually have a conversation. However, the way this usually goes is that people will claim that a game will support a playstyle they actively do not enjoy and have never tried to achieve with game C while paying no need to efforts people playing...

On GM Moves one common meme that I think leads people astray is that they are what a GM normally does. This comes from John Harper's response to the MC Playbook / GM section of Apocalypse World being just how you GM. That is mostly true from someone with Harper's background (deeply embedded in...

Generally, when game A is capable of providing experience X but not Y and Game B is capable of providing experience Y but not X we do not call either narrower than the other. We simply accept they both have something of value that might appeal to different parties or the same parties at...