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<blockquote data-quote="Balesir" data-source="post: 5648908" data-attributes="member: 27160">If this is the impression you have then communication has indeed faltered.&nbsp; I am not talking about &quot;realism&quot; at all; I'll try to explain more clearly on this specific point.&nbsp; Oh, and I am going, generally, on Ron Edwards' and The Forge contributors' definitions of GNS, rather than a Wiki or ENWorld summary, useful though those summaries might be as introductions.&quot;Simulationist&quot; play reaches out to simulate something.&nbsp; That something must be consistent within itself for Sim play to really &quot;work&quot;.&nbsp; Some minor flaws are forgivable and, perhaps, inevitable but in general the &quot;world&quot; presented should &quot;make sense&quot; on its own terms.&nbsp; Toon, for example, does this admirably.&nbsp; D&amp;D, on the other hand, gets into choppy water pretty quickly without some willing and rigid adherence, by the players, to a number of meta &quot;rules&quot;.Take, for example, the threat of low level monsters.&nbsp; In D&amp;D we see these left to low level parties to deal with, or attacked with an army.&nbsp; But, if the inhabitants of this &quot;world&quot; are rational beings, and if the world really works as defined by the game rules, this is utterly barmy.&nbsp; Send in a single high-level character and the threat will be wiped out inside a day!A key focus - maybe even a requirement - of Sim play is for the players, through their characters, to explore the game setting.&nbsp; Not just to wander around it in character, but to explore how it works, to (attempt to) grok what &quot;makes it tick&quot;.&nbsp; To do so requires freedom in what their character does.&nbsp; RPGs have much vaunted this freedom almost since day 1, and yet it fails for a very high number of cases.&nbsp; Not only is play as a shopkeeper or town guard likely boring and unrewarding, but deciding, say, to attack the town dignitaries to seize the offered reward without the inconvenience of fighting the &quot;evil&quot; monsters leads to non-sensical situations really fast, IME.&nbsp; Your (mid-to-high level) characters attack the clerk offering the reward and set off to find and take the money.&nbsp; Next, either the town guard arrives (and gets slaughtered), of a &quot;town guard&quot; that is somehow as high a level as the PCs turns up, triggering a host of &quot;WTF&quot; questions.&nbsp; How did these guys get to be the level they are?&nbsp; Do monster infestations (that germinate levelled &quot;adventurers&quot;) pop up on a regular basis hereabouts?&nbsp; Why aren't these guys dealing with the threat as part of their job?&nbsp; How come there are any monsters left after (apparently) generations of multiple levelled &quot;adventurers&quot; being generated?Basically, if the &quot;physics&quot; of the world work as described by the rulebooks, the situations described in the D&amp;D published game worlds (even the 'default' settings) just don't hang together.&nbsp; They don't represent stable (or even metastable) situations - and yet they are frequently apparently meant to have existed for a fair while.We can handwave all this away and just live with the fact that the world is a backdrop, in a familiar idiom, for our play.&nbsp; But that isn't the crux of Simulationist play; it does not allow of any exploring or poking the setting to see how it works.&nbsp; It doesn't make for a solid sandbox in which to play.&nbsp; As a result, for Sim play, it works up to a point (as long as we deliberately ignore the parts of the world that don't stand up to scrutiny by a rational mind), but under stress it all falls apart (which is back to what I said above).&nbsp; It falls apart, not because it is different from the &quot;real world&quot;, but because, in the final analysis, it makes no sense on its own terms.&nbsp;Sure - but those tales are (almost by definition) not Simulationist vehicles.&nbsp; Neither do the worlds they are set in adhere to D&amp;D &quot;physics&quot;.&nbsp; At no point is it made clear that Conan reaches 12th level, for example.&nbsp; Trying to model his adventures with the assumption that he does reach 12th level, in fact, is probably impossible.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Balesir, post: 5648908, member: 27160"] If this is the impression you have then communication has indeed faltered. I am not talking about "realism" at all; I'll try to explain more clearly on this specific point. Oh, and I am going, generally, on Ron Edwards' and The Forge contributors' definitions of GNS, rather than a Wiki or ENWorld summary, useful though those summaries might be as introductions. "Simulationist" play reaches out to simulate [B]something[/B]. That something [I]must[/I] be consistent within itself for Sim play to really "work". Some minor flaws are forgivable and, perhaps, inevitable but in general the "world" presented should "make sense" on its own terms. Toon, for example, does this admirably. D&D, on the other hand, gets into choppy water pretty quickly without some willing and rigid adherence, by the players, to a number of meta "rules". Take, for example, the threat of low level monsters. In D&D we see these left to low level parties to deal with, or attacked with an army. But, if the inhabitants of this "world" are rational beings, and if the world really works as defined by the game rules, this is utterly barmy. Send in a single high-level character and the threat will be wiped out inside a day! A key focus - maybe even a requirement - of Sim play is for the players, through their characters, to explore the game setting. Not just to wander around it in character, but to explore how it works, to (attempt to) grok what "makes it tick". To do so requires freedom in what their character does. RPGs have much vaunted this freedom almost since day 1, and yet it fails for a very high number of cases. Not only is play as a shopkeeper or town guard likely boring and unrewarding, but deciding, say, to attack the town dignitaries to seize the offered reward without the inconvenience of fighting the "evil" monsters leads to non-sensical situations really fast, IME. Your (mid-to-high level) characters attack the clerk offering the reward and set off to find and take the money. Next, either the town guard arrives (and gets slaughtered), of a "town guard" that is somehow as high a level as the PCs turns up, triggering a host of "WTF" questions. How did these guys get to be the level they are? Do monster infestations (that germinate levelled "adventurers") pop up on a regular basis hereabouts? Why aren't these guys dealing with the threat as part of their job? How come there are any monsters left after (apparently) generations of multiple levelled "adventurers" being generated? Basically, if the "physics" of the world work as described by the rulebooks, the situations described in the D&D published game worlds (even the 'default' settings) just don't hang together. They don't represent stable (or even metastable) situations - and yet they are frequently apparently meant to have existed for a fair while. We can handwave all this away and just live with the fact that the world is a backdrop, in a familiar idiom, for our play. But that isn't the crux of Simulationist play; it does not allow of any exploring or poking the setting to see how it works. It doesn't make for a solid sandbox in which to play. As a result, for Sim play, it works up to a point (as long as we deliberately ignore the parts of the world that don't stand up to scrutiny by a rational mind), but under stress it all falls apart (which is back to what I said above). It falls apart, not because it is different from the "real world", but because, in the final analysis, it makes no sense on its own terms. Sure - but those tales are (almost by definition) not Simulationist vehicles. Neither do the worlds they are set in adhere to D&D "physics". At no point is it made clear that Conan reaches 12th level, for example. Trying to model his adventures with the assumption that he [I]does[/I] reach 12th level, in fact, is probably impossible. [/QUOTE]

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