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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Balesir" data-source="post: 5790286" data-attributes="member: 27160">Maybe - in which case, as I said before, we need someone to come and tell us what is the "essence of simulationism"? What I see at this point are two cases:1) A group gather to create a joint story and use mechanics and game procedures (whether written in the rule book or not) to prioritise player input to that story from all players (including the GM, if there is one).2) One person comes up with a situation and plotted "story arc" (by which I mean a set of intentions of the (NPC) protagonists and maybe an expected storyline if things aren't changed) and the players experience it in the alter egos of their characters, possibly pushing buttons and twisting dials in the fiction to see how that alters the 'story'/situation.These seem to be fundamentally different; to "lump them together" as "Dramatism" seems to miss a critical distinction.On the other hand, we have:1) One person comes up with a situation and plotted "story arc" (by which I mean a set of intentions of the (NPC) protagonists and maybe an expected storyline if things aren't changed) and the players experience it in the alter egos of their characters, possibly pushing buttons and twisting dials in the fiction to see how that alters the 'story'/situation.2) One person creates a game world setting, with NPCs and societies and such like and the players explore that setting using their alter ego 'characters', pushing buttons and twisting dials in that game world to see what effect that has in the game setting.3) One person sets up a game world setting, with NPCs and so on to interact with, and the player(s) use that world setting as a foil to their character, which they try to "get into the head of" and identify with to the maximum degree, experiencing the game world from that character's point of view.These three seem to me to have far more in common than the first two, even though they are clearly quite different themselves.Why? Sure, there is a clear, prima facie difference, but from the point of view of games that are very specifically about "other worlds", why should the one we somewhat thoughtlessly refer to as "real" hold any special position or significance?[MENTION=463]S'mon[/MENTION] claimed that Simulationism was treated as an inferior agenda in the post three below yours.The drive to categorise people sits heavy with you, apparently. If all you are going to try and do is pigeonhole me as a strawman I'm not gonna play."Threefold Dramatism" is a kludged amalgam already, as I pointed out above. GNS Simulationism can pretty much be described as "exploration" in all its forms - if you have examples that don't fit (these "parts of Threefold Simulationism that were 'orphaned', perhaps?) please explain them.Exactly what is "explored" is certainly freeform and variable, but does classifying the elements of what is explored either (a) change the basic agenda of "exploration" or (b) consitute a useful exercise, as opposed to artificially limiting what we think of as "viable exploration targets"? I don't think so.Simulation is tied into exploration: if someone is exploring an imagined world, someone else has to "simulate" that imaginary world for them. As Hârn creator Robin Crossby put it "GMs build castles in the sky, and players live in them".No, it would be unrelated to GNS (as it always was - possibly Edwards' greatest mistake was the conflation of terminology) and still kludging together two fundamentally different forms of play:1) One in which the GM makes in-fiction choices and resolutions in order to make "interesting" dramatic situations for the players to explore, and2) One in which the group looks for mechanics and procedures that allow all of them collectively to fabricate a story without any preconceived situation or premise.And in reply 11 he makes it clear that this is discussion to try to uncover theories from a mess of opinions. Two points:1) Agreeing that GNS is a useful set of classifications for thinking about RPGs and RPG systems is not the same as agreeing with whatever Ron edwards has ever said, and2) If we start getting possessive and defensive about terms we identify with, or start searching through what other people have ever said to classify them as "bad people", useful discussion soon flies out the window.I think we're skirting close to that last one already.Leaving aside that I think a (non-railroaded) 'Buffy' game could easily pursue a Narrativist agenda, could you explain what a non-railroaded, non-Narrativist game of 'Buffy' could look like?As an aside, an exploratory game does not have to be "railroaded"; you can change things as you explore them - a fact dramatically demonstrated by European explorers since the 1200's or so. That doesn't stop what you are doing being exploration.Aside 2: railroads can, in my view, be useful in some situations (and by no means only in "Sim" ones). A game addressing a specific Gamist agenda concerned with encounters only (D&D 4E could - but need not - be played in this way) can use a "railroad" story to tie together and add context/goals to the encounters, for example. By no means to everyone's taste (not to mine, to be honest), but nevertheless a valid use for the "technique".</blockquote>

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