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Message: <blockquote data-quote="The Firebird" data-source="post: 9777805" data-attributes="member: 7015803">I guess the first question is to define what we mean by simulationism. Sam Sorensen has <a href="https://headofthegoat.itch.io/new-simulationism" target="_blank">a recent take</a> that has prompted some commentary. For me, when I think of a world as 'simulationist' I'm looking for a large degree of separation between the GMs role as a referee and the GMs role as a worldbuilder. When they are sitting at home constructing the world, they have a lot of creativity to think about questions like "what conflicts would make for a fun story" or "how will I make sure this world generates interesting gameplay". But when they are refereeing, those questions should leave their mind; their only interest is in adjudicating the world appropriately. For this reason, I find it important to have fixed things the GM can rely on when adjudicating in play. This can either be previously established material (e.g., there is a doctor in this town) or previously established rules (e.g., there is a 50% a doctor is in the town). If the players ask "is there a doctor in town" and the GM has to make up a procedure, that is a "failure" point of the game/system. (I put "failure" in quotes because it really isn't a big deal and I don't want to come across as extreme). I think it's interesting that random generation techniques are very practical now but that hasn't led to a revival in interest in simulation. A lot of questions that need to be answered can be automated with an appropriate ruleset. (E.g., how many people live in this town? What is the distribution of professions? What is each family's income and what assets do they have? How much income does the lord make?) I've seen attempts to do this, like <a href="https://www.fantasytowngenerator.com/" target="_blank">fantasy town generator</a>. You can do something similar with <a href="https://worldographer.com/" target="_blank">worldographer</a>. However, the town maps are not very high quality, especially for printing. <a href="https://donjon.bin.sh/fantasy/demographics/" target="_blank">Donjon</a> gets demographics but no map. I feel like the issue is that none of the tools out there are quite good enough for what is a very hard problem. Can you simulate (1) at a fine level of detail but (2) present it to the user such that they can avoid most of that underlying detail? None of the generators I've seen have accomplished (2); it requires the GM to pick which NPCs are important and what the conflicts are before play.</blockquote>

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