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<blockquote data-quote="Bochi" data-source="post: 6400656" data-attributes="member: 6781792">Wick's assumption that a role-playing game is primarily about story-telling is dubious. One could easily get up a counter-argument that a story-telling game is not a role-playing game. One of the features of RPG's that old schoolers in particular bang on about is that the story emerged out of the play, rather than driving the play: the sandbox imposes an environment, and the story is what the characters did in it.D&amp;D has strong wargame simulation roots but very rapidly it becomes a simulation of being a thief, mage, adventurer, hero, elf etc. Celebrim's rule &quot;Thou shalt not be good at everything&quot; is written all over early games from D&amp;D to Traveller and Runequest: even things like alignment systems are ways of restricting activity while encouraging role-play: you have to find a reason not to do the optimal thing that is character based (again, it's not about story-telling but about role-playing regardless of the story you might want to tell). And if 1e/2e is being singled out for being not-RPG, I am not sure what the rules in 1e penalizing players who act out of role, or the xp system in 2e for rewarding actions taken in role (casters score for casting, fighters score for fighting, thieves score for thieving) are doing if they are not there to enforce a degree of role-playing.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Bochi, post: 6400656, member: 6781792"] Wick's assumption that a role-playing game is primarily about story-telling is dubious. One could easily get up a counter-argument that a story-telling game is not a role-playing game. One of the features of RPG's that old schoolers in particular bang on about is that the story emerged out of the play, rather than driving the play: the sandbox imposes an environment, and the story is what the characters did in it. D&D has strong wargame simulation roots but very rapidly it becomes a simulation of being a thief, mage, adventurer, hero, elf etc. Celebrim's rule "Thou shalt not be good at everything" is written all over early games from D&D to Traveller and Runequest: even things like alignment systems are ways of restricting activity while encouraging role-play: you have to find a reason not to do the optimal thing that is character based (again, it's not about story-telling but about role-playing regardless of the story you might want to tell). And if 1e/2e is being singled out for being not-RPG, I am not sure what the rules in 1e penalizing players who act out of role, or the xp system in 2e for rewarding actions taken in role (casters score for casting, fighters score for fighting, thieves score for thieving) are doing if they are not there to enforce a degree of role-playing. [/QUOTE]

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