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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ariosto" data-source="post: 4750506" data-attributes="member: 80487">It's interesting that both Runestar and MichaelSomething equated "role-playing" with narration.Runestar is right that what should affect a character's chances of survival is not "how elaborately or vividly you describe how your character might have reacted to the dragon's breath weapon."What should matter is the reaction itself. Putting on a ring of fire resistance, diving for cover, and so on might be more helpful than standing in place. Running away might mean less time in the cone of fire -- as might running closer to the dragon!The choice of how one's character behaves (not of the consequences) is the key element of role-playing.MichaelSomething's example suggests that the choice of a "tactical option" in the form of a 4E Encounter Exploit (Fighter Attack 7) is something other than role-playing.I agree in that the game mechanism itself is thoroughly divorced from any choice meaningful to the character; it is a purely abstract board-game element. The "color text" in the PHB may suggest the "color narration" in the example -- but that has nothing to do with how the power actually operates!That's taking the dismissive view of concrete matters as mere "fluff" to the extreme that has become par for the course.If the character's vocalization were in fact a cause of effects, and those effects were based on actually relevant factors, then it would be not just "color" but role-playing.Reducing the concept of role-playing to insignificant narration applied after the fact to the results of abstract game manipulations misses the point of what made Dungeons & Dragons a notably new kind of game. One can (and some people do) tell a story in just such a way about the adventures of the Clothes Iron and the Top Hat in Atlantic City, or about a game of Gin Rummy.</blockquote>

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