Challenge the Players, Not the Characters' Stats

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I'm cool with that.

I think the term 'role-playing game' was coined as a way to describe a hobby that was evolving; the directions that evolution took the hobby may have taken it beyond the literal definition of the words that make up that term, but the hobby still falls under the umbrella of the term. If the dictionary has not kept up with the way that umbrella has expanded, it is the dictionary that has fallen behind.

-Hyp.

I agree with that. What might have been true has changed over the time. When the term was coined, nobody knew exactly where it would lead and what it could and would all encompass.

In other words, "Roleplaying Game" is larger then just "Roleplaying" and "Game". Another example might be a word like "Television". Taken apart, it might be just "remote view(ing)". But that description is insufficient. Using the internet to read EN World doesn't make it television, even though we are looking at something that is far away. it doesn't even become television if someone posts an image of his role-playing game table here. On the other hand, when we're taking of television, we also expect "teleaudio", despite noise/sound or speech not appearing in the word "television" at all.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Does Acrobat have word count?

Cheers!

I don't think so, but paper-captured Acrobat can be saved as Word.

RC

 

[Voadam]

Riddles? Players first, but if it's going to stop the game dead, resort to dice. Ditto puzzles, though I don't use puzzles very often.

And if the dice don't give the PCs success?

Dice and game mechanics based on a character's stats don't solve the problem in this case. They just give a second chance for the riddle or puzzle to be solved if the players don't succeed at the challenge.

If the problem is that failure stops the game dead then neither challenging the players nor challenging the characters is guaranteed to solve the problem of possible failure since both can fail.

The true solution is to not have failure stop the game dead.

The PCs don't solve the riddle revealing the safe passage through the rune covered floor in front of the treasure room? Then have the PCs go around another way, rig up a rope bridge to cross without touching the runes, gather abjurations to make it through unharmed when the runes go off, or take damage and curses etc. going through.

 

[Stalker0]

One thing I wish dnd had more of is the notion of "drama points"...similar to what is seen in the Buffy RPG.

Basically these are mechanics that let players "break" the rules in an organized way, such as having a key friend come in at the right time, the perfect clue just "happens" to fall into the player's lap, etc.

To me these are a good compromise between challenging the player and challenging the stats. A character with high stats might get more of these kinds of points, or might get more in a specific category, like "social" for high charisma. But its up to the player in how to use it. A "smart" character might get points that he can spend on solving puzzles, making it easier, but the player still has to solve the puzzle.

 

[Korgoth]

Apparently, 4E's using the Big Model definition, "evolved" or not, is leaving us out of the hobby. Oh well.

Which is perhaps the biggest success of Edwards and his cronies to date. My estimation is that they set out to destroy role playing games and replace them with something else that was called the same thing. They may very well have succeeded.

But I think that actual role playing games, the kind of games that Gygax and Arneson invented, have a place in the world. I don't think that the Forge will ever succeed in stamping them out completely. At least, not until the generation that grew up with role playing games dies off. Will "story games" last so long? I have my doubts.

The current ascendance of Forgeism would do the likes of Saul Alinsky proud, though. Change the categories with which people think and you can change their behavior without them even noticing. Now, as to whether Edward's model was intentionally subversive of mainstream role playing or that it just so colossally misunderstood it that it actually changed it is a matter of speculation, and I've already speculated on it (and given that D&D was singled out by Edwards for vilification is reasonable evidence).

 

[Hypersmurf]

Change the categories with which people think and you can change their behavior without them even noticing.

1E AD&D DMG, p9: "Of the two approaches to hobby games today, one is best defined as the realism simulation school and the other as the game school. AD&D is surely an adherent of the latter school. It does not stress any realism (in the author's opinion an absurd effort at best considering the topic!). It does little to attempt to simulate anything either."

It looks like the "G" and "S" styles of "hobby games" were established as categories as early as 1979... so are the categories with which people think really being changed?

-Hyp.

 

[Korgoth]

It looks like the "G" and "S" styles of "hobby games" were established as categories as early as 1979... so are the categories with which people think really being changed?
-Hyp.

Well, my point about Forgespeak is not that it uses new words, but that it uses old words in novel ways. Rewrites the dictionary, as it were.

 

[howandwhy99]

It looks like the "G" and "S" styles of "hobby games" were established as categories as early as 1979... so are the categories with which people think really being changed?

-Hyp.

Hyp, check Edward's latest undesignated rewrite of his Sim article(s). Even he believes Gygax's D&D was a Sim game and his reference there was to what GNS terms might term "hyper"-simulated wargames.

 

[howandwhy99]

The current ascendance of Forgeism would do the likes of Saul Alinsky proud, though. Change the categories with which people think and you can change their behavior without them even noticing. Now, as to whether Edward's model was intentionally subversive of mainstream role playing or that it just so colossally misunderstood it that it actually changed it is a matter of speculation, and I've already speculated on it (and given that D&D was singled out by Edwards for vilification is reasonable evidence).

It isn't cool to assign intentions to people's words on the internet. It's hard to know the reasons behind their actions.

(though ironically, assigning intentions to your customers when you design "narrational resolution games" makes all the difference in the world)

I'm still convinced their qualification for "narrative authority resolution" or "NAR" rules is meaningless when it comes to design differences in any other game's ruleset. It's a scam to call any kind of rule design collaborative storytelling when used with "storytelling intent". It's the whole, "if I 'intend' to play baseball to tell a story or improvisationally act when playing, then they are "story" or "theatre" games" schtick. The real NAR design elements in those games' rulesets are world alteration rules "outside of role-play".

And I will say they do know it. Otherwise such ridiculous assertions wouldn't be made about game prep being "role-play". If you are "playing the role" of the game prepper in real life that means you are also engaged in the act of role-playing? But when you play the role of a baseball player, or doctor, or dentist in real life you aren't? By their definition, you have to allow this to be so. I mean really. When I use a Rand McNally map in my RPG session, how on earth does the cartographer become a role-playing participant in my game? I believe the GNS answer is: when you use NAR rules you are playing the role of a storyteller. It's the only functional way to include non-role-playing actions as role-play.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Which is perhaps the biggest success of Edwards and his cronies to date. My estimation is that they set out to destroy role playing games and replace them with something else that was called the same thing. They may very well have succeeded.

But I think that actual role playing games, the kind of games that Gygax and Arneson invented, have a place in the world. I don't think that the Forge will ever succeed in stamping them out completely. At least, not until the generation that grew up with role playing games dies off. Will "story games" last so long? I have my doubts.

The current ascendance of Forgeism would do the likes of Saul Alinsky proud, though. Change the categories with which people think and you can change their behavior without them even noticing. Now, as to whether Edward's model was intentionally subversive of mainstream role playing or that it just so colossally misunderstood it that it actually changed it is a matter of speculation, and I've already speculated on it (and given that D&D was singled out by Edwards for vilification is reasonable evidence).

To me this sounds more like a crazy conspiracy theory. "Edwards has manipulated us to change how we think about RPGs and what we do with them." He hasn't. He has only coined some terminology and a model to describe RPGs. Whether this model is actually good I can't say, though I see some merits and some flaws.
Those "narrative" elements we find in Indie games existed way before the Big Model and GNS entered the place. How long does Shadowrun use Karma (and did replacing the Karma Pool with Edge change anything)? What's Torg Drama Deck and Possibilities if not narrative tools to give the players the oppotunity to change the story told in the game?

Believing that it was Edwards or the Forge behind this changes is ... well, wrong. He just tried to find words and categorize what happened in the different game systems.

If you can't identify yourself with the games created today, it's not the Forgeismns fault. It's the fault of the market that prefers this stuff. If you're lucky, the markets taste will change again.

Well, my point about Forgespeak is not that it uses new words, but that it uses old words in novel ways. Rewrites the dictionary, as it were.

Well, I might agree with that one based on the discussions on Circvs Maximvs - and after reading the Forge glossary that made me wonder where they did find all this strange words and their meaning.

The biggest fault of the GNS is not that it tried to change our thinking, but it uses a confusing terminology and that its developer seems a little to full of himself (considering the claim that the Big Model is apparently "finished" - it's almost certainly not - no model of a real-world phenoma can ever be declared "finished"!)