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"Gamism," The Forge, and the Elephant in the Room
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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5796203" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>I would say not oblivious, but certainly not designing games for them!</p><p></p><p>Well, everyone wants the system to deliver genre/world-appropriate outcomes. The difference is how this achieved, mechanically.</p><p></p><p>Overgeneralising slightly:</p><p></p><p>*simulationist play emphasises a correlation between mechanics and ingame causation - the "to hit" roll correlates to my weapon swing, the damage roll correlates to wear and how hard I hit, etc.</p><p></p><p>*narrativist and gamist play can more easily separate mechanics and ingame causation (going metagame, like you said) - and this opens the door to a different sort of mechanic, which sets parameters on outcomes, but leaves the details of how it comes about in the gameworld to be narrated by the players and GM.</p><p></p><p><a href="http://www.indie-rpgs.com/_articles/narr_essay.html" target="_blank">Here</a> are <a href="http://www.indie-rpgs.com/articles/21/" target="_blank">some passages</a> from Edwards that draws the contrast:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Narrativism now appeared to be a mirror image or twin sibling of Gamism, counter to older impressions shared by me and anyone else who ever wrote about role-playing that Gamism was the odd man out. . .</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Gamist and Narrativist play often share the following things: </p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">*Common use of player Author Stance (Pawn or non-Pawn) to set up the arena for conflict. This isn't an issue of whether Author (or any) Stance is employed at all, but rather when and for what. </p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">*Fortune-in-the-middle during resolution, to whatever degree - the point is that Exploration as such can be deferred, rather than established at every point during play in a linear fashion. </p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">*More generally, Exploration overall is negotiated in a casual fashion through ongoing dialogue, using system for input (which may be constraining), rather than explicitly delivered by system per se. </p><p></p><p>I see all that as elaborating your point about the metagame levers.</p><p></p><p>Skill challenge mechanics,in 4e, are an example of this sort of non-simulationist mechanic (except when used just as complex skill checks). And I know of two games that use that style of mechanic exclusively: HeroWars/Quest, and Maelstrom Storytelling. In those games, coherence, consistency and genre-appropriateness in the mechanics are delivered entirely by participant narration - the mechanics, though, set the parameters on what sorts of outcomes can be narrated.</p><p></p><p>Why do you say this? For example, how can anyone use wit and knowledge to "beat" the Tomb of Horrors if they drop the pretending part?</p><p></p><p>Well, this is controversial too.</p><p></p><p>I mean, a big driver of The Forge movement and GNS (maybe the most important driver) is to design RPGs that will reliably deliver story, (i) <em>without</em> the balance of power issues that come from Rule 0 "storytelling" - which tends to produce either dysfunction, or else player exploration of the GM's story if the players acquiesce, and (ii) without undermining player advocacy for their PCs and degenerating into insipid conch-passing.</p><p></p><p>As it happens, this is a non-trivial design challenge. Rule 0 is certainly not up to the task.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 5796203, member: 42582"] I would say not oblivious, but certainly not designing games for them! Well, everyone wants the system to deliver genre/world-appropriate outcomes. The difference is how this achieved, mechanically. Overgeneralising slightly: *simulationist play emphasises a correlation between mechanics and ingame causation - the "to hit" roll correlates to my weapon swing, the damage roll correlates to wear and how hard I hit, etc. *narrativist and gamist play can more easily separate mechanics and ingame causation (going metagame, like you said) - and this opens the door to a different sort of mechanic, which sets parameters on outcomes, but leaves the details of how it comes about in the gameworld to be narrated by the players and GM. [url=http://www.indie-rpgs.com/_articles/narr_essay.html]Here[/url] are [url=http://www.indie-rpgs.com/articles/21/]some passages[/url] from Edwards that draws the contrast: [indent]Narrativism now appeared to be a mirror image or twin sibling of Gamism, counter to older impressions shared by me and anyone else who ever wrote about role-playing that Gamism was the odd man out. . . Gamist and Narrativist play often share the following things: *Common use of player Author Stance (Pawn or non-Pawn) to set up the arena for conflict. This isn't an issue of whether Author (or any) Stance is employed at all, but rather when and for what. *Fortune-in-the-middle during resolution, to whatever degree - the point is that Exploration as such can be deferred, rather than established at every point during play in a linear fashion. *More generally, Exploration overall is negotiated in a casual fashion through ongoing dialogue, using system for input (which may be constraining), rather than explicitly delivered by system per se. [/indent] I see all that as elaborating your point about the metagame levers. Skill challenge mechanics,in 4e, are an example of this sort of non-simulationist mechanic (except when used just as complex skill checks). And I know of two games that use that style of mechanic exclusively: HeroWars/Quest, and Maelstrom Storytelling. In those games, coherence, consistency and genre-appropriateness in the mechanics are delivered entirely by participant narration - the mechanics, though, set the parameters on what sorts of outcomes can be narrated. Why do you say this? For example, how can anyone use wit and knowledge to "beat" the Tomb of Horrors if they drop the pretending part? Well, this is controversial too. I mean, a big driver of The Forge movement and GNS (maybe the most important driver) is to design RPGs that will reliably deliver story, (i) [I]without[/I] the balance of power issues that come from Rule 0 "storytelling" - which tends to produce either dysfunction, or else player exploration of the GM's story if the players acquiesce, and (ii) without undermining player advocacy for their PCs and degenerating into insipid conch-passing. As it happens, this is a non-trivial design challenge. Rule 0 is certainly not up to the task. [/QUOTE]
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