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<blockquote data-quote="Lizard" data-source="post: 4026971" data-attributes="member: 1054">I was talking about the game losing whatever veneer of simulationism it had and charging whole-hog into gamism. I've never considered any version of D&amp;D to be narrativist or aspire to it, so I can't really reply to the rest of your post.I'm concerned about being forced to define everything as &quot;encounters&quot; in order to know when a player can use an ability, for example. If someone uses a minor spell to impress barmaid, does that mean this is an &quot;encounter&quot; with the barmaid? Does it mean that if the other PCs are at the same bar, an &quot;encounter&quot; has begun for them, as well, with their abilities recharged? Does the encounter end when the barmaid slaps the PC? When they leave the bar? When two of them stay in the bar and two others decide to go down to the docks and look for a mercenary to hire? Are the two who stayed behind still in the same encounter, and the other two now heading for a different one? Can you &quot;force&quot; an encounter to begin in order to gain mechanical effects? Can you artificially prolong an encounter for ditto?Different DMs will have different answers to all of these. The fact these issues don't seem to be a concern to the developers is what leads me to my &quot;chain of encounters&quot; conclusion. The game mechanics cannot function outside of &quot;encounters&quot;, so the PCs just walk from one to the next. To use an example I've used before, in a recent game, my PC was turned invisible and had to accomplish a task before it wore off. Failing to do so would lead to either a TPK or some serious political/social upheaval for our party. The spell was based on &quot;minutes&quot;, not &quot;an encounter&quot;, so there was a serious time limit. By most standards, the entire sequence would be &quot;an encounter&quot;, so, there would be no way for a spell which lasts for the duration of an encounter to wear off! Seems to me that it's someone else telling the story for you. To my mind, a game whose focus is not &quot;Play in this universe&quot; ought to have only enough fluff so that there's a bare baseline of commonality -- i.e, orcs are savage humanoids, not cuddly half-horses.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Lizard, post: 4026971, member: 1054"] I was talking about the game losing whatever veneer of simulationism it had and charging whole-hog into gamism. I've never considered any version of D&D to be narrativist or aspire to it, so I can't really reply to the rest of your post. I'm concerned about being forced to define everything as "encounters" in order to know when a player can use an ability, for example. If someone uses a minor spell to impress barmaid, does that mean this is an "encounter" with the barmaid? Does it mean that if the other PCs are at the same bar, an "encounter" has begun for them, as well, with their abilities recharged? Does the encounter end when the barmaid slaps the PC? When they leave the bar? When two of them stay in the bar and two others decide to go down to the docks and look for a mercenary to hire? Are the two who stayed behind still in the same encounter, and the other two now heading for a different one? Can you "force" an encounter to begin in order to gain mechanical effects? Can you artificially prolong an encounter for ditto? Different DMs will have different answers to all of these. The fact these issues don't seem to be a concern to the developers is what leads me to my "chain of encounters" conclusion. The game mechanics cannot function outside of "encounters", so the PCs just walk from one to the next. To use an example I've used before, in a recent game, my PC was turned invisible and had to accomplish a task before it wore off. Failing to do so would lead to either a TPK or some serious political/social upheaval for our party. The spell was based on "minutes", not "an encounter", so there was a serious time limit. By most standards, the entire sequence would be "an encounter", so, there would be no way for a spell which lasts for the duration of an encounter to wear off! Seems to me that it's someone else telling the story for you. To my mind, a game whose focus is not "Play in this universe" ought to have only enough fluff so that there's a bare baseline of commonality -- i.e, orcs are savage humanoids, not cuddly half-horses. [/QUOTE]

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