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Does "rules light" lead to more arguments?
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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 6212388" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>Maybe. My biggest problem with more dice rolls is that they can create a 'hurry up and wait problem', where the dramatic tension is lost in the process resolution. I don't necessarily agree that well designed process resolution short changes you on interesting drama, it's just as a practical matter it may take too long to resolve.</p><p></p><p>But in a sense, even a rules light game is process simulation. I mean, if we wanted to we could just use 1 fortune roll for the whole campaign, "Do you win? Yes/No." It's the process simulation that makes you care for the story. Otherwise you might as well just write a book.</p><p></p><p>An example of recent intense process resolution leading to high cinema occurred in my last session.</p><p></p><p>The players were staking out a possible bad guy. For reasons of their own, the bad guys were staking out the same place, and sent a higher level mook to figure out why the lower level mook hadn't checked in.</p><p></p><p>Long story short, the mook and one of the PC's ended up on a roof top chase across the city. But that's not the interesting part, because that really didn't even require a die roll- both the PC and the NPC were too skilled to be threatened by the obstacles they were facing at the moment. Down in the street, the champion decided to spur his mount to a gallop to get ahead of the chase. In response, I rolled a half-dozen urban random encounters to indicate the crowd in the street to see if there were any obstacles to this plan. The results that struck my eye were Funeral, and Teamsters (3). I narrated this as a traffic jam between a Funeral Procession and three manure haulers with ox drawn wagons (as well as various other pedestrians). The results there were of minor hilarity, but unbeknownst to me or anything I could have planned, they were about to cascade. </p><p></p><p>Back on the roof a little while latter, the NPC realized he was getting cut off and couldn't shake pursuit. What could this guy do to possibly shake the guy behind him? He was running out of options. Then, I looked down off the side of the building through the eyes of the NPC - and I saw something soft to land in. So through heavy process simulation, the NPC successfully jumps off the side of the building 40' into the manure cart below, taking (skilled as he is in such things) minor damage. </p><p></p><p>But then my player proposes something I hadn't expected. Not only is he going to attempt the same jump, but he's going to try to land on the guy. Again, heavy process simulation with a fairly high risk of failure ensues, but he succeeds (also taking minor damage BUT inflicting a random amount of damage on the target. </p><p></p><p>Except that the random amount inflicted neared maximum damage, instantly killing the target. None of this was planned or intentional, nor could I have planned it. But it had players jumping up and down and whooping like they'd just watch a game winning TD in overtime at a sporting event - which in a sense they had, because like the TD, none of this was planned or anticipatable.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 6212388, member: 4937"] Maybe. My biggest problem with more dice rolls is that they can create a 'hurry up and wait problem', where the dramatic tension is lost in the process resolution. I don't necessarily agree that well designed process resolution short changes you on interesting drama, it's just as a practical matter it may take too long to resolve. But in a sense, even a rules light game is process simulation. I mean, if we wanted to we could just use 1 fortune roll for the whole campaign, "Do you win? Yes/No." It's the process simulation that makes you care for the story. Otherwise you might as well just write a book. An example of recent intense process resolution leading to high cinema occurred in my last session. The players were staking out a possible bad guy. For reasons of their own, the bad guys were staking out the same place, and sent a higher level mook to figure out why the lower level mook hadn't checked in. Long story short, the mook and one of the PC's ended up on a roof top chase across the city. But that's not the interesting part, because that really didn't even require a die roll- both the PC and the NPC were too skilled to be threatened by the obstacles they were facing at the moment. Down in the street, the champion decided to spur his mount to a gallop to get ahead of the chase. In response, I rolled a half-dozen urban random encounters to indicate the crowd in the street to see if there were any obstacles to this plan. The results that struck my eye were Funeral, and Teamsters (3). I narrated this as a traffic jam between a Funeral Procession and three manure haulers with ox drawn wagons (as well as various other pedestrians). The results there were of minor hilarity, but unbeknownst to me or anything I could have planned, they were about to cascade. Back on the roof a little while latter, the NPC realized he was getting cut off and couldn't shake pursuit. What could this guy do to possibly shake the guy behind him? He was running out of options. Then, I looked down off the side of the building through the eyes of the NPC - and I saw something soft to land in. So through heavy process simulation, the NPC successfully jumps off the side of the building 40' into the manure cart below, taking (skilled as he is in such things) minor damage. But then my player proposes something I hadn't expected. Not only is he going to attempt the same jump, but he's going to try to land on the guy. Again, heavy process simulation with a fairly high risk of failure ensues, but he succeeds (also taking minor damage BUT inflicting a random amount of damage on the target. Except that the random amount inflicted neared maximum damage, instantly killing the target. None of this was planned or intentional, nor could I have planned it. But it had players jumping up and down and whooping like they'd just watch a game winning TD in overtime at a sporting event - which in a sense they had, because like the TD, none of this was planned or anticipatable. [/QUOTE]
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