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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ourph" data-source="post: 2398858" data-attributes="member: 20239">This is why I think that rules-lite vs. rules-heavy almost always makes significantly less impact on how safe or comfortable the players feel than how good the social contract and group interpersonal communication skills are.  In any game that follows the standard RPG model, there are going to be significant instances where the referee/GM/DM/CK/whatever has to make decisions that significantly impact the game world and, as a result, the PCs (there are a few games where all players share the powers of the GM, which have their own issues).  For players to feel some comfort level, the GM has to either 1) share a fairly similar outlook on how the game world works with the players, meaning his decisions mesh pretty closely with what they expect; or 2) consistently and actively engage in communication with the players - letting them know how he sees things and listening to their ideas about how they perceive the game world working.While I'm sure that having a pre-packaged Assessment of Reality provided in the rules makes it easier for some groups to reach consensus, I still maintain that those groups (if the necessity arose) could probably do the exact same thing on their own, without the benefit of a pre-packaged AOR - and that groups who seem unable to establish a shared AOR with a game that comes without a pre-packaged one would generally run into the same problem even if they were playing a game that provided one for them.  IME, if the communication between players and GM is good, a shared AOR usually just happens.  If communication is bad, no matter how many aids the rules provide to help the group toward that goal, a shared AOR is very difficult to achieve.</blockquote>

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