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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6289527" data-attributes="member: 42582">On the first paragraph: I assume that the gameworld conforms to the particpants' expectations for it, generally reached through shared genre expectations as communicated via the game rules. In 4e, for instance, an epic PC may be a demigod, and so expectations as to what is achievable for an epic PC, in terms of magic or endurance or other feats of might, are to be framed by reference to shared genre expectations around demigods. There is also a discussion of &quot;tiers of adventure&quot; in the PHB that helps set those genre expectations.On the second paragraph: in my 4e game, there are two ways you work out what your character is experiencing. Some of it is via participant narration (most often the GM, at my table): for instance I might describe the effects of an NPC's successful attack. The second way, though, is more important: your PC is experiencing the same emotions as you are experiencing in the play of your PC. So if you are feeling anxious, as if you are boxed into a corner with no way to extract yourself and not much left in the way of reserves, than that's how your PC is feeling (the flip side of this: healing inspires the player, restoring hope, as much as it does the PC). It is a mark of good rules, for me, that they engender this sort of correlation between players' and characters' emotional states. And direct mechanical causation removes the need for mechanical simulation!</blockquote>

[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 6289527, member: 42582"] On the first paragraph: I assume that the gameworld conforms to the particpants' expectations for it, generally reached through shared genre expectations as communicated via the game rules. In 4e, for instance, an epic PC may be a demigod, and so expectations as to what is achievable for an epic PC, in terms of magic or endurance or other feats of might, are to be framed by reference to shared genre expectations around demigods. There is also a discussion of "tiers of adventure" in the PHB that helps set those genre expectations. On the second paragraph: in my 4e game, there are two ways you work out what your character is experiencing. Some of it is via participant narration (most often the GM, at my table): for instance I might describe the effects of an NPC's successful attack. The second way, though, is more important: your PC is experiencing the same emotions as you are experiencing in the play of your PC. So if you are feeling anxious, as if you are boxed into a corner with no way to extract yourself and not much left in the way of reserves, than that's how your PC is feeling (the flip side of this: healing inspires the player, restoring hope, as much as it does the PC). It is a mark of good rules, for me, that they engender this sort of correlation between players' and characters' emotional states. And direct mechanical causation removes the need for mechanical simulation! [/QUOTE]

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