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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6599459" data-attributes="member: 42582">I assume that's meant to be a joke? Given that the die roll happens in the real world, not in the gameworld, and is no more nor less a game device than the rule that says "you can't use this power more than once without a short rest".That sounds like a sensible opinion, and I think I share it.A key word is "expectations". That word refers to mental states (beliefs, hopes, etc). It use is very consistent with my characterisation of "dissociated" mechanics as being about psychological experiences that certain players have playing certain games, rather than inherent feature of mechanics. For instance, if someone's expectations changed (which happens from time to time, at least for some people) then whether or not a mechanic "so overrides the possibilities of the fiction that that participant feels discord" might change. Hence, a mechanic which used to be "dissociated" for that person might cease to be so.As I said, this has to be narrated. The mechanics don't tell us. Much as they don't tell us why the thief fell.As for retries, lots of RPGs limit retries. For instance, in AD&D a character who misses on an attack can't retry until the next round (putting higher level fighters and monks to one side), which is a minute later. Why not? Because the game rules say so: one attack roll per round. But what is the ingame explanation? None is offered: in his DMG, Gygax simply says that we deem it to be the case that no one gets more than one decent opportunity per minute of sparring. Similarly, 4e deems it to be the case that the fighter, in your example, can't get his dander up more than once without resting for five minutes.The design logic in both cases is the same: it is a rationing of moves intended to facilitate game play. In both cases the mechanics provide the same degree of answer, namely, none. Neither is a case of ascertaining fictional possibilities by reference to the in-fiction circumstances. Rather, we have to narrate the in-fiction circumstances (such as the chance to get in a good shot coming up only once a minute) in a way that accords with the dictates of the mechanics.3E boosts the attack rate to one decent opportunity per 6 rather than 60 seconds, but the same basic issue still arises: the action economy is a metagame artefact, and no ingame explanation is offered. Why does moving stop a high-level 3E fighter making a full attack - no matter how many attacks in that full attack, and no matter the distance moved (beyond 5') relative to total movement allowance? Again, the mechanics offer no answer to this question. Again, this is a case of the in-fiction circumstances having to accommodate the dictates of the mechanics. Contrast, say, Rolemaster's mechanics, which handle this issue very differently: in-fiction circumstances such as movement rates absolutely affect the relationship between how far someone can travel in a round, and how many attacks that person can get off and at what sort of penalty. Or contrast DungeonWorld's mechanics, in which there is no action economy and whether or not a player is allowed to declare a particular action for his/her PC is determined entirely by the GM's adjudication of the fictional positioning (so it is like traditional D&D non-combat resolution, even in combat).I guess there is a numerically significant group of RPGers who don't find their expectations upended by the rationing of actions and turn-taking in combat resolution, although that is a subordination of fiction to mechanics, but do find their expectations upended by the rationing of technique deployment. My gut feeling is that that group very much overlaps with the group of people whose expectations as to how combat should be resolved, in an RPG, have been shaped by playing D&D, and especially 2nd ed AD&D and onwards (which is where individual turn taking in combat really becomes a default aspect of the game).That seems to me to say as much about their expectations, though, as it does about the mechanics they do and don't like.</blockquote>

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