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Message: <blockquote data-quote="~Johnny~" data-source="post: 1585567" data-attributes="member: 16493">While I think the term "cinematic" is overdone, it's also descriptive. It means you're going to try to keep things moving, you're going to elide time between "scenes," you're going to come up with ways to keep things visually interesting, you'll use some cinematic cliches like chase scenes, et cetera.And no, I don't think that RPGs automatically do this. I think a lot of people approach RPGs in a "novelistic" way. Which isn't necessarily bad, but it's different. My favorite RPG experiences have been in the Star Wars RPG, and that's because I have a GM who does an awesome job of focusing on "scenes" instead of plots.As for action points or Force points or whatever, I don't think they have to be a way of telling players to go all Legolas on someone. When my wookiee Jedi Wrrlichuk was trapped in a sinking city and stuck in a totally uneven match-up against Asajj Ventress, I didn't have him doing any flips or kung-fu moves. I just had him roaring his Wookiee roar and pushing with renewed vigor against her twin lightsabers. That was his Force Point. When I DM and Eberron campaign, Action Points won't be a way to "break the rules," they'll just have a bit more effect (and a cooler description) than a standard action.I think making a game "cinematic" is as easy as asking yourself how to make each encounter more memorable. There are lots of things that movies do to make people care about what's going on. Make relationships tighter: the little girl the PCs have to save is a character's daughter. Make scenes into set-pieces: give your environments more dynamic qualities. Set time limits: take the dungeon you're about to run and show that it's about to collapse.It's not the only way to do things, but it can be fun. It's defintely worth a try!(Silly Cinematic RPG Variant: I once played in a game where the DM "cast" recognizable actors in all the roles. He printed out a bunch of celebrities' pictures from IMDB.com and showed them to us whenever we met someone new. He even did little impersonations of these actors "playing" the NPCs. It was really odd, and not something I'd ever do on an ongoing basis, but it was a tremendous amount of fun.)</blockquote>

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