Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Bill Zebub" data-source="post: 8605509" data-attributes="member: 7031982">I have a different take on that.&nbsp; It seems to me that they start with a desired narrative and then make the game rules/mechanics conform to it.&nbsp; I've seen this in the debates about NPC's &quot;using&quot; social skills on PCs, and about player knowledge.&nbsp; Their interpretation was along the lines of &quot;this is what would happen&quot; or &quot;this is what the character would do&quot; and so the goal then becomes how to interpret/bend/ignore the rules to make sure the correct thing happens, because otherwise it would &quot;break immersion&quot;. In my opinion this gets it backwards.&nbsp; My approach is to start with what happened according to player actions and rules, and then ask what narrative supports that.&nbsp; If the player declares an action I find surprising, I want to know why.&nbsp; Not to catch them &quot;cheating&quot; but because it's interesting.&nbsp; In fact I honestly don't care if the player is really just trying to gain advantage and they're simply making up a rationale after the fact in order to justify the choice: that improvisation is likely to be creative and add more color to the evolving narrative.So it's the same thing here.&nbsp; Yes: it does sound like you should be able to catch the Baron off guard.&nbsp; But the dice said otherwise, so what happened?&nbsp; What went wrong?&nbsp; The disconnect between the narrative that &quot;makes sense&quot; and the narrative that actually unfolds is an opportunity to improvise something new and surprising.&nbsp; To quote the Dungeon World motto: play to find out what happens.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Bill Zebub, post: 8605509, member: 7031982"] I have a different take on that. It seems to me that they start with a desired narrative and then make the game rules/mechanics conform to it. I've seen this in the debates about NPC's "using" social skills on PCs, and about player knowledge. Their interpretation was along the lines of "this is what [I]would[/I] happen" or "this is what the character [I]would[/I] do" and so the goal then becomes how to interpret/bend/ignore the rules to make sure the correct thing happens, because otherwise it would "break immersion". In my opinion this gets it backwards. My approach is to start with what happened according to player actions and rules, and then ask what narrative supports that. If the player declares an action I find surprising, I want to know why. Not to catch them "cheating" but because it's interesting. In fact I honestly don't care if the player is really just trying to gain advantage and they're simply making up a rationale after the fact in order to justify the choice: that improvisation is likely to be creative and add more color to the evolving narrative. So it's the same thing here. Yes: it does sound like you should be able to catch the Baron off guard. But the dice said otherwise, so what happened? What went wrong? The disconnect between the narrative that "makes sense" and the narrative that actually unfolds is an opportunity to improvise something new and surprising. To quote the Dungeon World motto: [I]play to find out what happens[/I]. [/QUOTE]

Verification