NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Campbell" data-source="post: 7074168" data-attributes="member: 16586">I am somewhat vexed. I have something to say that I fear may be somewhat counterproductive if I do not say it in the right way. Still, I feel like it needs saying.Let's get something out of the way. Techniques like fronts, GM moves, PC-NPC-PC triangles, relationship mapping, and scene framing are absolutely useful tools that have wide applications to a variety of ways to approach roleplaying games. Also even if you do not buy into them in the same way I do the principles listed in games like Apocalypse World can be fruitful to at least consider. This is something that I want to encourage. If there is interest I would be more than happy to discuss this stuff.  I have experience applying these techniques in a host of games, including some fairly mainstream games.Here's where I get a little contentious. I do this with the best of intentions.The notion that we can be flexible in our application of technique and decision making process, but yet consistently achieve similar results to the principled and dedicated application of these same techniques in the hands of a skilled practitioner of the approach the techniques were developed to support is something I have trouble with. The mental framework and principles that support a particular sort of play are not the sort of thing you can slip in and out of like a comfortable pair of shoes. The clarion call of your other play priorities, techniques, and natural way of doing things will always be present in the background. Even within the confines of a particular discipline you will often be called upon to prioritize one principle over another from time to time. Knowing what to do when is a skill that is honed from continued application and very much subject to the vagaries of the moment, the other players, and the fiction in play at that moment.I am not saying these techniques have no use outside of the confines of their particular approach. Far from it! We all develop an approach or set of approaches to running a given game that is uniquely suited to our particular interests, those of our fellow players, and the tools provided by the game we are playing. As our skills are honed this changes over time. We are faced with new challenges and adapt to changing circumstances. I just feel that an integrated, deliberate approach is best.What I am trying to get at here is any particular way to play a roleplaying game comes with its own unique set of tradeoffs. I also feel that the way we think about things has a tremendous impact on the play experience and culture of play at the table even if we don't like talk about it.</blockquote>

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