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Message: <blockquote data-quote="innerdude" data-source="post: 5910563" data-attributes="member: 85870">When I'm talking about coherence in reference to Fantasy Craft, it's the idea that the designers seemed to recognize that the core d20 system is typically best at producing a gameplay style that emphasizes concrete, mechanical player options, and the interaction between those player options at the table. The power of rolling a single d20 for checks is its simplicity--there's a single die to roll, and a single number added to that roll to deduce the result. Yet when mechanical resolution is made this simple, it sort of unconsciously promotes this idea that since mechanical resolution for a d20 game is "simple," that anything that could be resolved mechanically should be resolved mechanically. "Coherence" isn't about adaptability; it's about the rules themselves either implicitly or explicitly supporting a certain play "style" as optimal for the best experience. And I strongly disagree with the assertion that there isn't a baseline style of play for existing D&D editions. Every RPG assumes a certain "baseline" style of play that the Rules-as-Written should ideally produce. Whether any particular group follows that baseline is another question entirely, but that doesn't mean that assumed baseline style--the one that optimally supports its gameplay tenets--doesn't exist. Now, can individual groups tailor rules and assumptions to produce unique, and subjectively better experiences for them? Absolutely. But designers have to have some idea in mind about how particular rules generally work and flow when they create them. "Good" design, to me, is at least partially encompassed by the concept that a "good" rule produces its "intended" effect.</blockquote>

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