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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8316377" data-attributes="member: 82106">At the risk of recapitulating what is probably already answered, this is a reasonably good question:So, the question IMHO here in terms of flexibility is which of these processes can be best adapted to other types of situations and play? I mean, I'm assuming games A and B both focus on some sort of genre and tone that is related to this example, reading the room and leveraging that information in terms advancing the agenda of the game (whatever that is). In other words, the question is "If I change the genre/tone/agenda, in which type of system will I have to make the most adjustments, or achieve the least satisfactory results?" I think we would most likely need to develop more detail about the systems in question to answer that. I will make a few assumptions here, as few as possible, to see what I can come up with (I haven't predetermined an answer to the question here, lets find out):System A sounds like a 'traditional model RPG' in which the rules govern resolution of application of character elements to fiction. The GM describes the fiction, players declare actions of some sort, and that gets mapped onto skills or something similar which simulate the varying degree of competency and talent of each character. System B sounds, well, pretty much like PbtA, but it might also fit other games, depending.So, now imagine that we want to have a 'gunfight'. That is, neither system A nor B explicitly provides a mechanism for this, but we've taken ourselves to a new genre, lets call it 'old west gun fighting' and we are wanting to handle this situation. Now, regardless of agenda, whatever this mechanism is it will have to A) leverage our existing resolution scheme (IE skills or moves according to your description)B) produce some sort of fictionally appropriate results (IE someone outshoots somebody else, possibly with variations like outdrawing, hitting/missing, shot in the back, etc.).C) mesh with our agenda such that it leverages the things we care about in terms of both agenda and principles and processes, or else build new ones.Now, 'traditional' RPGs don't tend to be very explicit about C. Usually a game simply advertises its target genre and then perhaps its material and mechanics produce some variation of that (or perhaps even something wildly different in a few cases...). Agenda is TYPICALLY in those cases unstated or embedded within it. So, for example, classic D&D embeds its agenda in 'XP for GP' pretty much, and its deeper agenda in the architecture of leveling, which requires you to gain XP to 'unlock' much of the potential content, combined with the various exploration/encounter/terrain/architecture type rules. So, what would be an agenda for System A 'Shoot 'em Up'? We just don't know exactly, but let me just leave this question until after we talk about System B for a minute.As for points A and B, System A probably 'works' here, to some degree. That is, some 'skill-like' resolution scheme can include something like 'gunfighting' as a skill and resolve attacks. Where it may fall short is in B, but we can reasonably engineer something that embodies basically "It hurts to get shot." Depending on tone (gritty, pathetic, heroic, etc.) you might vary things like exactly how much damage you can take, its immediate effects, healing, etc. Obviously if you are building on a system which already has these rules, you can 'just use them' assuming they produce the correct tone. Otherwise you will need to hack those too.System B is a more 'indie' kind of system. So our process is going to be 'fiction first' in focus, typically. That means fiction will govern mechanics, much like DW reads the fiction of a fight and has the GM translate it into moves based on how the players describe the PCs These games also don't typically map resolution mechanics so much to 'physical parameters'. That is, System B might potentially not even focus on things like 'firing a gun' so much as maybe 'Can I Control My Fear'? or maybe its an exploration of the cultural impact of violence in society, etc. Moves might be pretty abstract, or they might be quite detailed. There isn't a really specific requirement here that we can generalize without really building a game. A seems simple, B seems straightforward once we know about C, but C is deep.Getting back to agenda in System A, it is hard to see how you will approach something like an agenda of 'Explore the Effects of Violence on Society' or something like that. You COULD make a much more granular system, like instead of modeling gunfire, you could model the effects of various tactics, terrain, and other factors to reduce the results to a much more abstract level. You might even create an agenda like "Arrest and Convict Bad Guys" (that might leverage the mechanics of the original game's social skills). Traditional model games generally are limited to focusing on 'action agendas' which are mostly described as 'Do X'. That's because they work on an action basis. Once you go beyond that, you start to need more narratively focused process/mechanics. Of course, you MIGHT be able to add some of those to System A, but the core process is going to limit you to things you can do in a 'GM presents the material, players call out actions' loop where each action is a specific 'apply skill X to perform action A on target B' kind of a thing. In a game like DW you do clearly state actions, but the process is more just pushing you to "what must the GM describe next?" vs "Did the bullet hit the guy I fired at?" and that is a more generalizable kind of process IMHO. I think one of the reasons that traditional games SEEM very flexible is simply that RPGs have avoided addressing things that model doesn't do well.</blockquote>

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