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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 4019291" data-attributes="member: 42582">I thought my claim's truth was relevant too. That's why I made it.Btw, I have never asserted that the GM will be primarily a combat adjudicator. I expressly denied this upthread - the claim is facile. What I did do is agree with Reynard that 4e appears to have certain goals to do with the role of the GM in the game (the relevant comparison class being especially AD&D).I agree with Reynard that prediction is more important for player than GM control.  D&D has always assumed that a GM will jury rig things as s/he goes along to cope with failed predictions, whereas the players have never had any such power (eg if the PCs are losing a fight, the game does not give them the power to suddenly bring an ally into play, whereas if NPCs are losing a fight the GM has always had the power to bring an ally into play). So an increase in predictability changes the GM's toolbox, but does not increase the GM's power, whereas it does increase the players' power.Well, "could" is a necessary condition of "does", and conversely "could not" entails "does not", so what you think I'm discussing is hardly irrelevant.But I must admit I am now having trouble working out what you think would count as evidence that the rules of D&D are changing anything at all. Given the two passages quoted above, your argument seems to be "Because the GM can do whatever s/he wishes in terms of the introduction of game elements, mechanically defined however s/he wishes, s/he is not constrained." I point to comments from the designers (in W&M, on message board threads) that suggest that the system expcets the GM to do something different (and something different from what has been done in previous editions) and you reiterate that the GM can make up whatever game elements s/he wishes.Well, nothing is physically stopping the GM sitting at the table and saying "Rocks fall, everybody dies". But I don't really see what that shows about the mechanics or gameplay of D&D.There is no passage in the HeroQuest Narrators Guide (that I can remember, at least) that states that the GM may not introduce whatever game elements s/he wishes - I think it's just taken for granted that the GM will run the game as the rulebooks indicate. But would you deny that HeroQuest gives players more narrative control than 2nd ed AD&D?This is false of AD&D 1st ed. Nothing in the PHB or DMG for that game establishes safe havens, let alone establishes conditions under which only the players have the power to trigger adversity. In fact appendix C of the DMG includes random encounters for cities, which can include powerful undead and fiends.The closest thing to a safe haven in that game is the iron-spiked room, which reduces the frequency of wandering monsters. But that is not perfectly safe, and is under the GM's narrative control.What, then, do you think is the point of the remarks in W&M p20, sidebar therein?  Having read things that have given me that opinion, I'm sharing it. I'm not the only person to believe it - Reynard, Apoptosis, Hussar (in his gamism thread) are all saying similar things. Chris Sims comments on the healing thread also run in the same direction.The only barrow I have to push is this: the 4e debate seems to me to include to much focus on trivial things like Gnomes and Brass Dragons, and too little focus on the actual design direction of the game.Well, you seem to view the entire scope of the game through what is, to me, one of its most trivial aspects, namely, from what list of game elements is the GM entitled to choose? As I've already said, 4e (like earlier editions) does not constrain the GM in this respect (subject to certain caveats I've noted in earlier threads, and the mechanics of these elements being constrained in certain ways,  perhaps moreso than in AD&D). The separation of NPC and monster build rules from PC build rules are obviously necessary and conceptually trivial (though mechanically challenging to implement).  I was debating the same issue in relation to RM and HARP, which like 3E suffer from overly simulationist NPC design rules, on the ICE boards well before 4e was announced.But my argument rests on other aspects of the system than those of game-element-introduction.I also don't see why you think that my analysis does not offer "perfectly fine design explanations". The success of player-oriented splatbooks, opening up new feat and PrC choices for players, suggests to me that players are looking for more control in an RPG than D&D has traditionally given them. The success of 3E compared to 2nd - a game that allows players to resolve PC action through a sophisticated set of mechanics, rather than rely on GM adjudication - suggests the same thing. Why wouldn't the 4e designers continue the trend? I think they have, and will succeed in producing a version of D&D that finally leaves the wargaming legacy, and the legacy of abusive GMing that (as an unintended consequence) grew out of it, behind.</blockquote>

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