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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Argyle King" data-source="post: 5814489" data-attributes="member: 58416">Yes and no; my apologies for being a little dense here, but I've often struggled with how the theory is presented.  It makes sense in that my initial impression was that the difference between Narrativism and Simulationism was one of macro scale versus micro scale; looking at the whole picture or looking at just one part; internal motivation versus external motivation.  Where it doesn't make sense is that I don't feel looking at one makes it impossible to see the other; likewise, I feel both are equally important.  I would say that perhaps where I'm sitting at the table changes which of the two I hold (slightly) closer though.  If I'm a player, I like getting into character and seeing things through the eyes of my character.  I like exploring the personality and motivations of that character.  Likewise, I enjoy observing the story and narrative the other players create with their characters.  If I'm the GM, I'm more concerned with the world as a whole -when looking at everything all at once- seems to make sense; that is something which some of the articles I've read say is a Simulationist trait.  I never stop seeing the other scale though; in games where the world itself (as a whole) doesn't make sense, I can have a lot of trouble putting myself into the perspective of the character and/or enjoying the narrative of my character and the other characters.  The inconsistency of the world has the potential to jar me out of it.  While I do enjoy D&D, this is one area where I sometimes find myself at odds with the current edition*.  When GMing, I suppose it's most accurate to say I'm two separate entities which I keep separated.  There is the GM who I view as the arbiter of the game, it's rules, and the (for a lack of better words) physics of the world.  That is a mostly out-of-game entity.  The other entity is whomever I happen to be when I'm playing the part of a NPC or thinking for a group of monsters; I don't control them using knowledge they would not have.  They act on what they do (or do not) know, their natures, motivations, and ambitions -just like I'd have my own character do if I were a player.  Occasionally I've even had people who were not involved in the game (sometimes even people who weren't even gamers) play the part of a NPC.  I did so because -as GM- part of my fun is not knowing what will happen.  I may have knowledge of things the players don't, but that does not mean there is a preset idea of how the moving pieces will interact.  On those occasions, it's been interesting to give somebody else's mind a chance to act upon the story.  It was fun to sit back and enjoy how the narrative and the story unfolded as an observer who had no knowledge of what would happen.*For what it's worth, I also currently feel the same when I look back at past 3rd Edition campaigns.  However, I didn't see it as much while playing in those campaigns because I barely knew anything beyond how D&D 3rd Edition handled playing a rpg.  Still, it would sometimes bug me that the level X king and his level X town guards would need the PCs of level X-5 to deal with some monsters.  If I thought about it too much, it made it difficult for me to enjoy the story.</blockquote>

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