Different philosophies concerning Rules Heavy and Rule Light RPGs.

[soviet]

A GM can always fudge. It's just the nature of the fudging differs in different games.

How does a GM fudge in Apocalypse World?

Rules light systems with player defined powers and abilities it takes the mode of lots of arguing for "Does my tag apply?" or "I think my tag should apply because...".

I wrote and published an RPG based entirely around player defined abilities and ran 4 campaigns. Play didn't resemble this at all. The vast majority of the time it was obvious whether something applied or didn't. The few times something was in question, it was resolved in seconds by a GM decision or asking the rest of the group for a reaction. We didn't ever have any arguments or protracted discussions.

 

[Umbran]

Rules light systems with player defined powers and abilities it takes the mode of lots of arguing for "Does my tag apply?" or "I think my tag should apply because...".

Yes, I've seen it - but only among folks who come from rules-heavy contexts and are trying to play those tags as if they are trying to optimize play in a rules-heavy ruleset.

So, if you are looking at a Fate character sheet, and asking yourself, "How do a squeeze an extra +2 out of these Aspects?" then that question comes up a lot, as you are thinking mechanical goals first, character reality afterwards.

When you look at a Fate character sheet and ask yourself, "What would this character do in this situation?" then you pick actions that are natural for the character, and that sort of question doesn't come up much.

 

[Celebrim]

Yes, I've seen it - but only among folks who come from rules-heavy contexts and are trying to play those tags as if they are trying to optimize play in a rules-heavy ruleset.

I direct you to Ryan Macklin's play in the video I linked to earlier.

So, if you are looking at a Fate character sheet, and asking yourself, "How do a squeeze an extra +2 out of these Aspects?" then that question comes up a lot, as you are thinking mechanical goals first, character reality afterwards.

The reality of most characters is that they want to succeed. There is always someone at the table with a least in part aesthetics driven by Fantasy and a desire to win big, but then also everyone at the table wants spotlight and shining moments of awesome and they will pick up on the methods a player is using to get that spotlight.

When you look at a Fate character sheet and ask yourself, "What would this character do in this situation?" then you pick actions that are natural for the character, and that sort of question doesn't come up much.

This is the converse of "Just don't play with bad GMs." While true, it isn't very relevant to the real world where no one is perfect at playing and no group is filled with perfect players.

 

[Celebrim]

How does a GM fudge in Apocalypse World?

Every roll that isn't 10+

I wrote and published an RPG based entirely around player defined abilities and ran 4 campaigns. Play didn't resemble this at all. The vast majority of the time it was obvious whether something applied or didn't. The few times something was in question, it was resolved in seconds by a GM decision or asking the rest of the group for a reaction. We didn't ever have any arguments or protracted discussions.

99% of the time this is true when I game with friends as well. I do have that one guy who will occasionally metagame and rules lawyer when he's stressed about the security of his character ("Am I going to die?") or when he hasn't had a recent big impressive success on something he's tried, but for the most part we don't have arguments or protracted discussions. On the other hand, were I to port that player into a game around Aspects, I would expect that virtually every proposition would involve table arguments.

I learned a lot by running games for strangers as well.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I direct you to Ryan Macklin's play in the video I linked to earlier.

Examples of this sort exist for all games. People will not always immediately grasp how a game is meant to be played. They may struggle to get to a point where that’s clear. They may never reach that point.

I don’t think a video showing a first time player trying to play a game in a way that conflicts with the game’s intended approach really supports your argument much.

The reality of most characters is that they want to succeed. There is always someone at the table with a least in part aesthetics driven by Fantasy and a desire to win big, but then also everyone at the table wants spotlight and shining moments of awesome and they will pick up on the methods a player is using to get that spotlight.

I’m not entirely sure what you’re trying to say here… but if I follow it correctly, what’s to stop players (not characters) from recognizing that big moments and spotlight (assuming these are the kind of universal goals you claim) come from playing your character faithfully and without a mind to unearned advantages or even success?

Why can’t a first time player of FATE sit down with veteran players and pick up on good practices that make a FATE game functional and enjoyable?

This is the converse of "Just don't play with bad GMs." While true, it isn't very relevant to the real world where no one is perfect at playing and no group is filled with perfect players.

No, of course not. But you’re pointing out how people can learn from watching what works for others… but you seem to assume that there is one group of preferred traits for all RPGs or that people will continue to mistake traits that are a poor fit for the game as a good fit.

Every roll that isn't 10+

This is an astonishingly bad take.

 

[pemerton]

On the fairness/bias issue - perhaps I'm misunderstanding what others mean by those terms, but to me I feel like there are a number of RPGs I GM which don't require me, as GM to, be unbiased at all, nor to be fair except in the basis sense of following the procedures set out in the rules.

I'm thinking of Burning Wheel, Torchbearer, Prince Valiant, 4e D&D and others.

 

[chuckdee]

Sure. But "cool" is a very subjective thing and what someone will consider cool varies from person to person. So "the rule of cool" very quickly makes the process of play about what discovering a) what the GM thinks is cool and catering to the GM's preference or b) doing the same thing with the dominate personality at the table if that dominate personality isn't the GM (Bob decides what is cool and everyone follows his lead).

It's not as if rulings should be what's driving the game in general imo. You follow the rules until they leave you at the edge and rule to get you back on track. I don't think of how the GM will rule when I try something. I just have a general feel of how they will rule when it happens.

It's true that some games leave themselves open to rulings more than others, but that's where compatible play styles come into play.

 

[chuckdee]

How does a GM fudge in Apocalypse World?

I think that apocalypse world and it's ilk were created to remove the ability for the GM to fudge, for good or ill. You use other levers that have nothing to do with the randomizer.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I find this is not true for a variety of reasons.

Rules light and rules heavy are not synonyms for rules complete. A rules light game can be more rules complete than a rules heavy game in that for example it maps all player propositions to some small set of defined moves that they can perform. Players can be as creative as they like in describing and narrating their moves, but at the end of the day they are all just moves and mechanically all that narration has little or no meaning at all. This means that all but the most expressive narration driven groups will in the long run default to just stating the move that they intend because what they state doesn't matter anyway. Combat almost always devolves down to stating a series of moves and performing the mechanic, and this is true even of rules light systems that aren't rules complete (like BECMI).

Rules light systems give GMs very few levers to pull to adjudicate a player proposition. The more rules I have and the more things that the rules account for and can interact with, the more I can translate creative propositions into mechanically distinct and meaningful acts with real outcomes rather than just the color of outcomes.

One thing that might be the case is that in a rules light game the limits of your character as a playing piece are often much less coherently defined. In a rules light game, because literally everything is on fiat, it's easier to be generous with character propositions into areas that the rules are silent on because the rules don't say the character sucks at whatever they are trying to do.

I think you are clearly omitting PbtA games here. They are both 'complete', and can be fairly light, but your description of play seems off. That is, fiction matters a whole lot, and although you may be using one of a repertoire of only half a dozen moves, the fiction can move in limitless ways. It WILL move in limitless ways! It has to.

 

[Nebuchadnezzar1972]

Agreed.

Some groups want rules for underwater knife fights, some groups just use narrative improvisation for underwater knife fights. It's about what's most fun for the group. Neither system is bad but what often happens is a group chooses the wrong system and problems emerge.

For me, the key thing is that once you improvise rules for underwater knife fights, those become the rules for underwater knife fights. And if you have an underwater knife fight in the future, it had better follow those rules or the players will rightly be upset that you’ve changed the game on them.

People like to say “rulings, not rules,” but the practical reality is “rulings equal rules.”

The exception here is narrative-based rules like QuestWorlds or HeroQuest that explicitly say the dice mechanics have nothing to do with the scenario and everything to do with the storytelling. Whether it’s hard to defeat the dragon has nothing to do with the dragon’s “stats” and instead whether the storyline says it’s the right time to defeat the dragon.