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<blockquote data-quote="Umbran" data-source="post: 9468864" data-attributes="member: 177">I am not reading the six or so pages of responses yet.&nbsp; I want to get a few ideas of my own down first...Bah.&nbsp; The only &quot;proper&quot; way to play is the way that the entire group has a reasonable amount of fun doing it - for their own definitions of &quot;fun&quot;.&nbsp; Railroad is proper.&nbsp; Sandbox is proper.&nbsp; Indiscriminate hack and slash is proper.&nbsp; Heavy emotional plot is proper.&nbsp;&nbsp; It's all valid play.For myself, I've noted a pretty clear path of change over the earlier years of play, for me.I think of the main measure of what games are about by the &quot;war stories&quot; we tell among ourselves after the fact.&nbsp; When we say, &quot;Remember that time when...&quot; what are we talking about?For the vast majority of my 1e and 2e D&amp;D play, those war stories are about tactical moments - victories and defeats in fights, and the mechanics behind those moments.&nbsp; But for play in the same general era, but in different games - &quot;Faserip&quot; Marvel Super Heroes, Shadowrun, D6 Star Wars, World of Darkness - the war stories are pretty much all about story beats and emotional moments of play.And from the 3e era on, whatever game I'm playing, war stories are almost always always about the story and emotional beats.&nbsp; Sometimes those align with major tactical combat moments, but just as often they don't align.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Umbran, post: 9468864, member: 177"] I am not reading the six or so pages of responses yet. I want to get a few ideas of my own down first... Bah. The only "proper" way to play is the way that the entire group has a reasonable amount of fun doing it - for their own definitions of "fun". Railroad is proper. Sandbox is proper. Indiscriminate hack and slash is proper. Heavy emotional plot is proper. It's all valid play. For myself, I've noted a pretty clear path of change over the earlier years of play, for me. I think of the main measure of what games are about by the "war stories" we tell among ourselves after the fact. When we say, "Remember that time when..." what are we talking about? For the vast majority of my 1e and 2e D&D play, those war stories are about [I]tactical moments[/I] - victories and defeats in fights, and the mechanics behind those moments. But for play in the same general era, but in different games - "Faserip" Marvel Super Heroes, Shadowrun, D6 Star Wars, World of Darkness - the war stories are pretty much all about [I]story beats and emotional moments[/I] of play. And from the 3e era on, whatever game I'm playing, war stories are almost always always about the story and emotional beats. Sometimes those align with major tactical combat moments, but just as often they don't align. [/QUOTE]

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