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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6730704" data-attributes="member: 42582">For me this is another non sequitur moment.What makes you think that I am talking about collaboratively inventing a story? I have never said that that is what I do when I play D&D. You are projecting that onto me. Read [MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION]'s posts to see the sort of play that is what I aim for (though as I said upthread I think my game is probably flabbier than [MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION]'s).And of course I believe there is such a think as Gygaxian "skilled play" - the quotes are used because it is a term of art, and the skill involved is rather distinct (and doesn't exhaust the sorts of skills that a player might bring to RPGing). Though personally I'm not very good at it as a GM or player. (I lack the patience.)But none of this has any bearing on whether the goal of play is for the players to reconstruct, by extrapolation from their play experiences, the GM's random tables. As I have said, and as other posters in this thread have agreed, that has never been a goal of mainstream D&D play. Gygax nowhere talks about it in his DMG. Look at his comments on NPC random tables, for instance (p 100):It is often highly desirable, if not absolutely necessary, to have well developed non-player characters (NPCs). In order to easily develop these personae, the tables below are offered for consideration. Note that the various facts and traits are given in a sequence which allows the character to develop itself - with judicial help from the DM. Thus, Alignment, Appearance, Possessions, and then General Tendencies are given. The first three will, of necessity, modify the fourth, and the latter will similarly greatly modify the other traits. The personae of special NPCs should be selected . . . . Other NPCs can be developed randomly, or by a combination of random and considered selection.Notice that, just as with dungeon design, Gygax expects the GM to use a mix of random selection and choice - with random selection mostly being for ease of generation for unimportant NPCs.I'm not sure what you think "special NPCs" means, by the way, but it is pretty clear to me that it means NPCs that are important to the backstory of the dungeon, in the sort of fashion that Roger Musson talks about.You've been playing D&D since 1985, yes? In that case, I've been playing for 3 years more than you (1982). I think I have a pretty good idea of whether or not I want to play D&D, or any other role playing game.Sometime I use maps. Sometimes not. My players occasionally draw maps, but not very often. In my Burning Wheel campaign, for instance, I just lay out my GH maps on the table and we all look at them, to work out where the players are, and where they might want to go to. This may not be the sort of game you want to play, but it is a game in the sense of an amusement or pastime. It involves dice, and character sheets, and pretty intricate action resolution mechanics.I have not been "convinced that narratives are what I want by narrative absolutists"! That's absurd. I started playing D&D because I enjoyed fantasy tropes, and fanatasy stories, and wanted to play a game that would allow me to partake of them. (Just as the foreword to Moldvay Basic promises.) Oriental Adventures - a D&D book published in the mid-80s - really showed me the way to get what I wanted. (Which was not the "skilled play" of Gygax or Moldvay.)And I am not perpetuating any myth that stories are games. For a start, games are activities that take place in the real world whereas stories are tellings or retellings of imagined events. But some games generate stories. Sometimes as a byproduct, sometimes by design. I prefer the latter. Which isn't the same thing as "collaboratively inventing stories". Luke Crane has designed a game which will, by design, generate stories without the need for collaborative invention. (He's a clever guy, though he built on the designs of others.)</blockquote>

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