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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Mercurius" data-source="post: 6227572" data-attributes="member: 59082">OK, I see what you mean - you're talking about a greater degree of player choice - choosing resources - rather than character choice, as the player acting as the character within the world of the story itself.To me this is part of the "problem" with 4e - what you explain here, where a player is running their character like a game piece, rather than the player running their character like a character within a story.This isn't about right or wrong, but the tone of the game changes.Very interesting - and on a level of critical analysis of the game that I generally don't do. Very impressive, actually!I think my issue isn't with the "FitM" rules as they do allow for what could be called "heroic narrative possibilities". My issue is with the net result of 4e mechanics that separate the player into the operator of the character as game piece on a game board.I think what you are saying, in a way, is that 3e was a bit confused in that it was trying to be too realistic (simulative) in some respects (e.g. fighters), but not in others (e.g. spellcasters) - which created the infamous lopsided class power comparisons, which spellcasters far out-pacing non-spellcasters in double-digit levels.The other extreme, though, is fighters with "powers." I would have preferred if they were given something akin to maneuvers and combat styles, and think that Essentials was on the right track in this regard. In a more straightforward D&D game without powers and such, I can see incorporating some kind of luck or fate mechanic which non-spellcasters get because they don't consciously manipulate magical forces, and thus are "infused" with it subconsciously. So a fighter could spend "fate points" to empower an attack, sort of like an adrenaline rush, in modern vernacular - like when a mother lifts a car to save her child. This still involves a certain degree of player-character duality, but at least it gives players the opportunity to "power up" on occasion for a heroic deed.Again, this is will said. But again, my problem with 4e is that I found that players, at least in my game, would look at a bunch of cards and always decide their actions based upon those options written down in front of them, rather than what I experienced in older versions of the game where players would imagine themselves as the character and act accordingly. This opened the door to any number of possibilities, not just the printed out power cards.Now 4e does, of course, have page 42. And at one point I found myself house ruling to try to encourage players to think outside of the powers box. But the result was that they rarely did. Maybe other games are different - I'm sure some players took page 42 seriously and ran with it. But I've hard enough similar anecdotes to mine to think that the very design of 4e discourages that sort of imaginative creativity - not overtly, but certainly through implication.But that's never been the point of what I was talking about with regards to Excalibur, as I explained a couple times. I'm not talking about (nor opposed to) simulating Excalibur. I was talking only, or mainly, about the phrase "the secret that was lost," which I am relating to the experience of imaginative wonderment. The question - which I don't have a clear answer for, and am open to different views - is what role different rules and approaches have in relationship to imaginative generation. Among other things! I was riffing, improvising, not performing a pre-written symphony.So what is it, exactly, that gives you "the sort of immersie experience" you are looking for? Can you pin it down? You seem to imply that it is, in fact, dependent upon the resolution mechanics. But what exactly?</blockquote>

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