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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8525564" data-attributes="member: 82106">This is why I tried to draw the distinction between DRIVING and INFORMING. In 5e fiction largely INFORMS mechanics, it serves as the structure upon which basic motivations and decisions hang (IE will I enter into combat against X or will I try to recruit him as an ally). Once decisions are made, D&D (and 5e being typical) largely drive at least COMBAT decisions almost purely via the mechanics. Given 5e's loose and murky tiebacks from mechanics to fiction it can often be pretty hard to even KNOW what the fiction is, but you can still go ahead and execute the next mechanical action! When fiction DRIVES mechanics, the linkage is causal and strong. The fiction of iron hard scales CAUSED the fighter's attempt at Hack & Slash to be adjudged ineffective, meaning his player had to come up with a different option, which was again supplied purely by fiction. In AD&D, for example, it isn't at all clear how this kind of thing could happen. The player would have to assess, via knowledge of attack charts and such plus translating some fictional clue back into mechanics, that a melee attack was non-viable, and then either query the DM, or perhaps directly engage some special mechanics in the Monster Manual that grant a way to make an attack against the creature's unarmored mouth (certain monsters have these kinds of things). Certainly it is PRIMARILY driven by mechanics, the bad guy's AC value caused the attack to be impossible, and some special rule opened up an alternative. It is granted that there is an associated fiction. It is just questionable that it even needs to be referred to at the table! I think the other hang up is, nobody is ever positing that trad D&D doesn't have rightward arrows, it does! Every RPG has them, I think it is a definition of RPG. Still, AD&D, for example, is not necessarily 'fiction first'. The action is embedded IN a fiction, but in a lot of cases that fiction could be a pretty thin veneer! Your typical dungeon illustrates exactly that, the important constraints are the mechanics of exploration turns, effects of darkness, wandering monster check rules, and the formal dungeon map structure with associated typical features. Dungeons definitely depart into more fictional territory when they have idiosyncratic features, or if players attempt unconventional actions, but there's a very strongly mechanistic process in place that is somewhat loosely coupled to fiction (or you can view it as there is a lot of fiction, but it is of a structured and predetermined variety).Again, DW shows how fiction first/story games differ. The 'map' of a dungeon will have 'holes in it' (canonically), so it is just a loose description of what might be present, or partially describing some elements. Due to the lack of any sort of mechanistic "boxes to boxes" means to resolve ANYTHING in DW, that dungeon will be 'explored' by a process of the players describing their moves, and the GM describing outcomes, or even asking the players to supply fiction. The outcomes are arbitrated by checks, but all those do is tell us if the PCs are getting into more hot water or if they are progressing in a way that achieves their ends (or a mix of both). It is a very immediate kind of fiction where the rules are really secondary (many moves for instance don't trigger any dice, they are just fiction to fiction).</blockquote>

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