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Is Pathfinder 2 Paizo's 4E?
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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7631861" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>It seems to me that "win condition" here is turning into something like <em>happy with the outcome</em>. Whereas in a scenario like ToH or Ghost Tower of Inverness or The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan or White Plume Mountain or Castle Amber (to fasten on some classics of the genre) when we talk about <em>win conditions</em> we're certainy not talking about (say) <em>being happy with how we reconciled two feuding members of the Amber family</em>.</p><p></p><p>When I used the scenario <a href="https://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?654732-Prince-Valiant-actual-play" target="_blank">The Crimson Bull</a> the players enjoyed it. The one who converted the wise woman by his display of the power of St Sigobert was happy with that outcome; and the knight who was ready to kill all the pagans was happy enough to have convered them instead! But had things unfolded differently, including (say) a different end for the wise woman, they probably would have been happy with that also. (As Ron Edwards rightly notes in his descriptions of it, Prince Valiant isn't a particularly demanding or traumatic game to play: it's not going to push the player far out of his/her romantic fantasy comfort zone.)</p><p></p><p>Look at the account <a href="https://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?355600-Session-report-(Apect-of)-Vecna-defeated-demon-bargained-with" target="_blank">here</a> of the Demon of the Red Grove (a loose adapation to epic tier 4e of a Robin Laws Hero Wars scenario) for something similar. In that scenario the PCs tried to bind the demon rather than outright defeating it. But the players were happy with how it turned out, even though they didn't get everything they wanted.</p><p></p><p>Neither scenario had any win condition beyond its evolution in the course of play as the players declared actions for their PCs and those were resolved and the situation re-framed in response. The only way to "lose" in scenarios of this sort is for the whole thing to collapse into poor pacing and no resolution (which my most recent Prince Valiant session flirted with - I had doubt about the scneario, Jeff Grub's The Mare's Lamp, going in, and those doubts were amply justified). The contrast with ToH and its friend is incredibly marked: those have no pacing at all, let alone as a primary consideration, and have no danger of not yielding a resolution (in the sense that either the dungeon's beaten or it's not, with the extreme version of the latter being TPK).</p><p></p><p>It's close to a chalk-and-cheese comparison.</p><p></p><p>I didn't mean a different system, I meant a different ethose of play. The post-DL ethos is applicable to a variety of systems - not only D&D but (say) Rolemaster, RQ, I would suggest HERO and GURPS - anything where the PC gen provides fairly vivid pictures of the character's capabilities and role in the story, where the resolution system leaves slippage between literal outcome of the resolution process and significant development in the shared fiction (what is sometimes called task as opposed to conflict resolution) and where the GM might be allowed or even encouraged to ignore a die roll from time to time in the interests of "the story".</p><p></p><p>I'm not going to accept the proposition that a skilled GM can make a prepared story feel like narrativist play until I hear an account of how someone used those post-DL techniques in the context of a system like BW or a PbtA system and pulled it off. To me it just seems obvious that it can't be done. In a system like Cortex+ Heroic, for instance, the notion of ignoring or fudging a die roll or an outcome in the interests of the story doesn't have any purchase unless the GM just outright cheats or ignores the rules - which the players will notice, thus refuting (in that particular case) the conjecture that the illusionism you're positing is being successfully achieved.</p><p></p><p>I'm not going to try and explain why it would similarly break down in the BW or PbtA case, as that would require a bit more detail. (But am happy to elaborate upon request.) Needless to say I think it would. And hence that the illusionism you conjecture as a possibiity is really not possible.</p><p></p><p>I may have missed, or misread, the double negative in "the GNS labels /not/ supposed to be exclusionary us-v-them categoriesWin conditions have to be in advance?" - now that you've signalled your intended reading I can't remember which I did.</p><p></p><p>What I mean is that GNS laebs are not supposed to be <em>us vs them</em> categories - a person can sit down and enjoy a sim game, and then a gamist game; and even in play there can be shifts in GNS orientation from episode to episode (but not moment to moment).'</p><p></p><p>But that doesn't mean that everyone has done every one of them, or enjoys them. I can tell you now that I tend to suck at gamist play both as player and GM, and (as a result? am I sore loser? others would have to judge!) don't care for it that much, even though I can enjoy the <em>ide of</em> it.</p><p></p><p>My experience on these boards is that the number of ENworld posters who have seriously engaged in narrativist play is fairly modest. I don't know if you're in that category or not. At the risk of being too honest, you come across as being an experienced RPGer whose seen quite a bit of variety over the years; but the way you (at least seem to) relate to "roll vs role" and edition wars, and the claims you make about the place of a GM and what a skilled GM can pull off; makes it seem to me as if you've seen a lot of simulationist play (ranging a wide spectrum from CoC-ish full immersion to HEROs-esque system-oriented simulationism to the classic post-DL adventure path) and probably a fair bit of gamist play (eg classic tournament-style "beat the dungeon" play) and probably a fair bit of gamist players trying to "wreck"/break the simulationist experience, and therefore needing the GM to rein them in.</p><p></p><p>But I don't recall you ever posting about play from the narrativist point of view, nor talking about some typical systems that might support it like (say) DitV or PbtA or even narrativist-oriented Fate play.</p><p></p><p>Moving from an honest attempt at conveying a summary impression, to honest conjecture: given the sorts of play experiences and play context you describe, I wouldn't be surprised if you've played in groups/at tables where GM duties are rotated fairly regularly, and everyone takes turns playing through everyone else's dungeons and scenarios. And that <em>that</em> is how you've tended to do shared creativity, rather than via playing a game where collective story creation is done by everyone simultaneously (but not all by being GMs simultaneously - a system like DitV or PbtA has very clear GM/player role demarcations, and it's a recurrent irritation for me on these boards that many posters seem to equate narrativist play with shared authorship of the "spend a point to make such-and-such true in the fiction" variety, where as - as The Forge essays noted 15+ years ago - there's no particuar connection between those sorts of mechanics and narrativist play in the sense The Forge is intersted in).</p><p></p><p>If the attempt at a summary bio and conjecture are way off I apologise. I hope they don't cause offence - they're intended in honest good faith.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 7631861, member: 42582"] It seems to me that "win condition" here is turning into something like [i]happy with the outcome[/i]. Whereas in a scenario like ToH or Ghost Tower of Inverness or The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan or White Plume Mountain or Castle Amber (to fasten on some classics of the genre) when we talk about [i]win conditions[/i] we're certainy not talking about (say) [i]being happy with how we reconciled two feuding members of the Amber family[/i]. When I used the scenario [url=https://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?654732-Prince-Valiant-actual-play]The Crimson Bull[/url] the players enjoyed it. The one who converted the wise woman by his display of the power of St Sigobert was happy with that outcome; and the knight who was ready to kill all the pagans was happy enough to have convered them instead! But had things unfolded differently, including (say) a different end for the wise woman, they probably would have been happy with that also. (As Ron Edwards rightly notes in his descriptions of it, Prince Valiant isn't a particularly demanding or traumatic game to play: it's not going to push the player far out of his/her romantic fantasy comfort zone.) Look at the account [url=https://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?355600-Session-report-(Apect-of)-Vecna-defeated-demon-bargained-with]here[/url] of the Demon of the Red Grove (a loose adapation to epic tier 4e of a Robin Laws Hero Wars scenario) for something similar. In that scenario the PCs tried to bind the demon rather than outright defeating it. But the players were happy with how it turned out, even though they didn't get everything they wanted. Neither scenario had any win condition beyond its evolution in the course of play as the players declared actions for their PCs and those were resolved and the situation re-framed in response. The only way to "lose" in scenarios of this sort is for the whole thing to collapse into poor pacing and no resolution (which my most recent Prince Valiant session flirted with - I had doubt about the scneario, Jeff Grub's The Mare's Lamp, going in, and those doubts were amply justified). The contrast with ToH and its friend is incredibly marked: those have no pacing at all, let alone as a primary consideration, and have no danger of not yielding a resolution (in the sense that either the dungeon's beaten or it's not, with the extreme version of the latter being TPK). It's close to a chalk-and-cheese comparison. I didn't mean a different system, I meant a different ethose of play. The post-DL ethos is applicable to a variety of systems - not only D&D but (say) Rolemaster, RQ, I would suggest HERO and GURPS - anything where the PC gen provides fairly vivid pictures of the character's capabilities and role in the story, where the resolution system leaves slippage between literal outcome of the resolution process and significant development in the shared fiction (what is sometimes called task as opposed to conflict resolution) and where the GM might be allowed or even encouraged to ignore a die roll from time to time in the interests of "the story". I'm not going to accept the proposition that a skilled GM can make a prepared story feel like narrativist play until I hear an account of how someone used those post-DL techniques in the context of a system like BW or a PbtA system and pulled it off. To me it just seems obvious that it can't be done. In a system like Cortex+ Heroic, for instance, the notion of ignoring or fudging a die roll or an outcome in the interests of the story doesn't have any purchase unless the GM just outright cheats or ignores the rules - which the players will notice, thus refuting (in that particular case) the conjecture that the illusionism you're positing is being successfully achieved. I'm not going to try and explain why it would similarly break down in the BW or PbtA case, as that would require a bit more detail. (But am happy to elaborate upon request.) Needless to say I think it would. And hence that the illusionism you conjecture as a possibiity is really not possible. I may have missed, or misread, the double negative in "the GNS labels /not/ supposed to be exclusionary us-v-them categoriesWin conditions have to be in advance?" - now that you've signalled your intended reading I can't remember which I did. What I mean is that GNS laebs are not supposed to be [I]us vs them[/I] categories - a person can sit down and enjoy a sim game, and then a gamist game; and even in play there can be shifts in GNS orientation from episode to episode (but not moment to moment).' But that doesn't mean that everyone has done every one of them, or enjoys them. I can tell you now that I tend to suck at gamist play both as player and GM, and (as a result? am I sore loser? others would have to judge!) don't care for it that much, even though I can enjoy the [I]ide of[/I] it. My experience on these boards is that the number of ENworld posters who have seriously engaged in narrativist play is fairly modest. I don't know if you're in that category or not. At the risk of being too honest, you come across as being an experienced RPGer whose seen quite a bit of variety over the years; but the way you (at least seem to) relate to "roll vs role" and edition wars, and the claims you make about the place of a GM and what a skilled GM can pull off; makes it seem to me as if you've seen a lot of simulationist play (ranging a wide spectrum from CoC-ish full immersion to HEROs-esque system-oriented simulationism to the classic post-DL adventure path) and probably a fair bit of gamist play (eg classic tournament-style "beat the dungeon" play) and probably a fair bit of gamist players trying to "wreck"/break the simulationist experience, and therefore needing the GM to rein them in. But I don't recall you ever posting about play from the narrativist point of view, nor talking about some typical systems that might support it like (say) DitV or PbtA or even narrativist-oriented Fate play. Moving from an honest attempt at conveying a summary impression, to honest conjecture: given the sorts of play experiences and play context you describe, I wouldn't be surprised if you've played in groups/at tables where GM duties are rotated fairly regularly, and everyone takes turns playing through everyone else's dungeons and scenarios. And that [I]that[/I] is how you've tended to do shared creativity, rather than via playing a game where collective story creation is done by everyone simultaneously (but not all by being GMs simultaneously - a system like DitV or PbtA has very clear GM/player role demarcations, and it's a recurrent irritation for me on these boards that many posters seem to equate narrativist play with shared authorship of the "spend a point to make such-and-such true in the fiction" variety, where as - as The Forge essays noted 15+ years ago - there's no particuar connection between those sorts of mechanics and narrativist play in the sense The Forge is intersted in). If the attempt at a summary bio and conjecture are way off I apologise. I hope they don't cause offence - they're intended in honest good faith. [/QUOTE]
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