Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
The
VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX
is coming! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Failing Forward
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6822682" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>I think it's not a coincidence that D&D has its origins in dungeon play - where being blind and incompetent is verisimilitudinouos - and in army leadership play, where the original (wargaming) players used their prior knowledge of wargaming practices to fill in the environment.</p><p></p><p>Luke Crane has an intriguing comment that I think bears on this at least obliquely, in <a href="https://plus.google.com/+lukecrane/posts/Q8qRhCw7az5" target="_blank">his blog about running Moldvay Basic</a>:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">I'm nervous about the transition to the wilderness style of adventure, since the beautiful economy of Moldvay's basic rules are rapidly undermined by the poorly implemented ideas of the Expert set.</p><p></p><p>He doesn't elaborate, but extrapolation is possible from some of the things he says in praise of Moldvay, such as:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">This slim red volume emerged before us as a brilliant piece of game design that not only changed our world with it's own bright light, but looking from the vantage of 1981, I can see that this game changed THE world. This world of dark dungeons and savage encounters slowly crept out into ours, from hobby shops to basements, to computer labs and movie screens.</p><p></p><p>I'm inclined to link this back to my own comments, upthread, on <em>survival</em> as the measure of success, and on the players as little more than the <em>id</em> of play (if that): the notion of the RPG as showing us the "life" of the character, yet that life being so shallow, and characterised by such little emotional or even basic cognitive engagement with the world in which the character lives, produces a bizarre experience in which the GM's view of that world and that life becomes almost everything.</p><p></p><p>REH's Conan stories are meant to be an inspiration for D&D. But if one looks at the mechanics of the Expert set, or the similar mechanics of 1st ed AD&D, the play experience will almost never replicate anything like Conan. There is no device for the player recollecting facts as Conan does; for deliberately or by coincidence encountering past friends and enemies, as Conan does; for foreshadowing a character's destiny, as happens in the Conan stories; etc.</p><p></p><p>Another way of thinking about "fail forward", then, is that it is a way of avoiding this phenomenon in which the whole world is reduced to "dark dungeons and savage encounters" but without even the pacing and rational economy of the dungeon environment.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 6822682, member: 42582"] I think it's not a coincidence that D&D has its origins in dungeon play - where being blind and incompetent is verisimilitudinouos - and in army leadership play, where the original (wargaming) players used their prior knowledge of wargaming practices to fill in the environment. Luke Crane has an intriguing comment that I think bears on this at least obliquely, in [url=https://plus.google.com/+lukecrane/posts/Q8qRhCw7az5]his blog about running Moldvay Basic[/url]: [indent]I'm nervous about the transition to the wilderness style of adventure, since the beautiful economy of Moldvay's basic rules are rapidly undermined by the poorly implemented ideas of the Expert set.[/indent] He doesn't elaborate, but extrapolation is possible from some of the things he says in praise of Moldvay, such as: [indent]This slim red volume emerged before us as a brilliant piece of game design that not only changed our world with it's own bright light, but looking from the vantage of 1981, I can see that this game changed THE world. This world of dark dungeons and savage encounters slowly crept out into ours, from hobby shops to basements, to computer labs and movie screens.[/indent] I'm inclined to link this back to my own comments, upthread, on [I]survival[/I] as the measure of success, and on the players as little more than the [I]id[/I] of play (if that): the notion of the RPG as showing us the "life" of the character, yet that life being so shallow, and characterised by such little emotional or even basic cognitive engagement with the world in which the character lives, produces a bizarre experience in which the GM's view of that world and that life becomes almost everything. REH's Conan stories are meant to be an inspiration for D&D. But if one looks at the mechanics of the Expert set, or the similar mechanics of 1st ed AD&D, the play experience will almost never replicate anything like Conan. There is no device for the player recollecting facts as Conan does; for deliberately or by coincidence encountering past friends and enemies, as Conan does; for foreshadowing a character's destiny, as happens in the Conan stories; etc. Another way of thinking about "fail forward", then, is that it is a way of avoiding this phenomenon in which the whole world is reduced to "dark dungeons and savage encounters" but without even the pacing and rational economy of the dungeon environment. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Failing Forward
Top