Do RPGs' Wargaming Aspects Overshadow RPing?

[Odhanan]

Here is a PITA response...

During combat, the miniatures aspect of the game has certainly distracted from the roleplay. Wizards measure exactly were on a grid to place a fireball, fighters precount squares to determine where they will land after the sping attack. It's all very "preplanned" in a wargame sense.

By this, I simply mean that some of the roleplay aspects of the game take a backseat to roleplay during the initial "combat calculation phase" that seems to take place before all combat rounds.

That's a question of player, really. Personally, I don't see any impact of preplanning actions versus roleplaying. If I want to play my character impulsively and have him charge in the melee, I will. If however the situation from my character's point of view requires some planning and precision, I will take decisions accordingly.

 

[Mycanid]

In general I would say no - but I must admit that I am with Piratecat in general terms of percentile preference. I prefer things like 75% rp and 25% combat when a player.

As a DM though, I much prefer the rp'ing aspect. I especially love whisking away the players into an imaginary world to where they feel as if it were almost real. I've been able to do it many a time, too, and the players I DM'd with seemed to enjoy it immensely. The DnD horror adventure with the "poor old joe" birds (anyone living in Alaska would know about these) still gives them shivers after 14 years, in fact ... of course the happy sort.

But, of course, rare is the pc (or the DM, for that matter) who can live by rp'ing alone.

 

[The_Gneech]

Here is a PITA response...

During combat, the miniatures aspect of the game has certainly distracted from the roleplay. Wizards measure exactly were on a grid to place a fireball, fighters precount squares to determine where they will land after the sping attack. It's all very "preplanned" in a wargame sense.

By this, I simply mean that some of the roleplay aspects of the game take a backseat to roleplay during the initial "combat calculation phase" that seems to take place before all combat rounds.

Thing is, in the heat of the moment, the characters don't need to measure squares -- the wizard knows where to put his fireball to hit the baddies and miss his friends the same way a baseball pitcher knows how to put the ball over the plate. But if there was a gameboard recreation of baseball, you would have to make skill checks to pitch and catch, move counters around to know if the shortstop could tag the guy running for third before he got there, or whatever. It wouldn't take away from the catcher's ability to talk smack to the batter!

-The Gneech

 

[Mark]

Thing is, in the heat of the moment, the characters don't need to measure squares -- the wizard knows where to put his fireball to hit the baddies and miss his friends (. . .)

I give the player a die or marker and give them six seconds to pick a square, whether they wish to count or not. In particularly dire circumstances, I distract them while they are doing this by talking to them about how busy the battlefield is and what is happening around them. It's very rare for someone to blow up their allies.

 

[francisca]

Not at my table.

We're not heavy-duty, beret and black turtleneck wearing roleplayers, but we've settled in on the right mix for our table.

YMMV.

 

[Agback]

Sometimes Yes, Sometimes No. It Depends On The Group And The Players, And To A Lesser Extent On The Game.

 

[William Ronald]

I have had many game sessions where there were no dice ever rollled. I think that individual groups can differ widely in this area, but that role playing has been a large part of the games that I have been in during the past 26 years.

 

[steenan]

It depends - both on individual players' style and on the system used. Some players think boardgame-tactically, crunching numbers, while others concentrate on narration and base their decisions on how the situation "looks and feels", not on game mechanics. Of course, these are not separate groups - rather a spectrum between the extremes.
No matter what their inherent style is, players are affected by the system played and the GMing style. The more numbers and dice rolls are asked for, the more maps and minis used - the more wargaming. On the other hand, dynamic, cinematic descriptions and intense NPC interactions cause even the very "wargamy" players to get into their characters.

 

[WizarDru]

Rise from your grave!

 

[Jasperak]

In my limited experience, any game that concerns itself primarily with combat options and cool abilities, and has combats that take more than thirty minutes to resolve limits roleplaying.

Any time you have to base your character concept around making choices between combat abilities, roleplaying will suffer. Games like OD&D, BXCMI, and maybe even AD&D1e before Dungeoneer's and Wilderness Survival Guides did not hamper roleplaying because how you roleplayed differentiated your character from another of the same class, not your different abilities; you didn't have any. Take for instance a 9th-level fighter in any of the above games. Mechanically speaking, the only differences between any of them would be gear and ability scores. You had no major choices to make (except weapon choice.) The exception being magic-users and clerics with spell choices. All of these characters were frameworks around which you would build a persona.

In third and fourth edition, characters are defined by what they can do in combat since that is where the focus of their abilities are. Granted there are skill resolution systems in both editions that cover out of combat actions, but there is no doubt in my mind where the focus of D&D has always tried to be (2nd edition being the odd-man-out.) I think the more decisions one has to make about choosing a character's combat abilities, the more likely one is to think of their character with respects to their combat ability.

I just wonder if "roleplaying" got its start from the early players getting tired of playing the same 9th-level fighter.