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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Balesir" data-source="post: 6260227" data-attributes="member: 27160">The last sentence, here, is kind of/sort of what I have come to think and why. No model will not be subject to such criticism as long as you keep trying to model the process.The same prediliction is what will lead to complication. The process in the game world must, to be in the slightest bit plausible, be complicated. If you want to model that process by stepping through it, the system you create will be complex.There are two obvious ways around this. The first is to plump for a simple but highly implausible process as "what happens in this game world" and then argue endlessly over the bizarre implications that has for the game world. The second is not to try to model the process.To me, the second approach seems like a much better option, but that leaves a conflict with a signififcant number of people who seem to feel that they need the process to be modelled step-by-step for some reason.Consider this "system":We model a fight by listing the outcomes. We might settle on this list:- One combatant is dead, the other is fine.- One combatant is dead, the other is wounded.- Both combatants are wounded and exhausted, but neither is dead.Now, we simply define a range of die rolls that corresponds to each of these outcomes.This would be a very simple system. We could even make it moderately realistic by examining real fight outcomes, and we could give a nod to the "game" elements by stipulating how the die roll will be modified for the combatants' respective skills and physiques, their tactical position and whatever else takes our fancy. We have a "simulation" that simulates for us the outcome of combats in our imaginary world. It has the advantage that everyone witnessing the simulation in action can imagine for themselves the process that led to the outcome; no complexity or handwaving of unconvincing elements is needed - everyone can come up with a process that satisfies their needs for verisimilitude and/or faithfulness to genre.But, this method has one big weakness. If the combatants are played by participants as is normal in an RPG, then they have no "locus of control" - they can make no decisions during the simulated fight that might influence its outcome. They miss the fun of "playing the game".My own conclusion from this is that breaking down the system into "steps" is useful only in so far as it allows the players to make decisions about their character's actions. In this light, breaking out a step that determines if an attack "hit" and then separately determining "damage" is unhelpful - possibly, as in the case of the DoaM "debate", counterproductive. A single step of process - or a multi-step process that is clearly divorced from the "fighting" process going on in the imagined game world - might be more helpful. That way, "damage on a miss" would not even be a consideration, since there would be no such thing as a "miss".</blockquote>

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