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Judgement calls vs "railroading"
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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7082968" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>I've been GMing 4e pretty steadily for 8+ years. And it's class system rests on D&D tropes that I've been working with for 30+ years.</p><p></p><p>BW, as I've said, requires kicking the players in the guts. Repeatedly. That's demanding on them, but it can be hard on the GM as well. [MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION] has talked about the "inner"/emotional dimension of this sort of thing upthread, better than I am able to. But using the OP as an example: it's not <em>easy</em> to have the brother decapitated in front of the PCs because they failed a check that brought that whole arc to a head. It's tempting always to interpose one more check, to offer them a chance to get out of jail for free. But at a certain point you have to be true to the fiction and let the guillotine fall.</p><p></p><p>4e doesn't generate this sort of pressure because its maths (not unlike 5e, to which it is the main mechanical precursor for the maths of resolution), is biased heavily in favour of player/PC success. So failures in 4e tend to be minor setbacks on the way to success. It doesn't deliver failures at the rate, and with the stakes, that BW does on a regular basis.</p><p></p><p>Cortex/MHRP I think I've already posted about. Managing the Doom Pool is hard, because it is a mixture of opposition (all checks in MHRP are opposed, and if there is no acting NPC then the Doon Pool is the opposition), "stakes" (if the Doom Pool grows big enough the GM can end the scene, which can cost the players/PCs in fictional terms) and all-purpose GM reource (spending dice to boost NPC checks, add new elements to a scene, etc). I'm getting better at it, but it's not a trivial matter. (When I first bought and started preparing to run MHRP, Doom Pool management was the main topic of conversation - other than silly (and mistaken) rants about the supposed lack of a PC build system - and once you start running the game you quickly see why.)</p><p></p><p>But I wouldn't describe any of this as "drawbacks". They're not flaws; they're differences. In a different domain of gaming, compare five hundred to bridge: lighter, easier to play for fun/with beginners, not as technically demanding (because it's generally enough to count trumps and off-suit court cards); or compare backgammon to chess (similar considerations apply). The demanding character of bridge or chess isn't a flaw though, nor is the light character of five hundred or backgammon.</p><p></p><p>As it happens, I personally enjoy the light card and board games more; turning to FRPGing, I don't know if I would want to run BW alone, but probably it's my favourite at the moment for intensity - but with a larger group I'm enjoying MHRP just as a change of pace that produces some amusing fiction.</p><p></p><p>Well, isn't that fairly obvious? - the "downside" is that someone won't enjoy it.</p><p></p><p>To me it seems to make more sense to talk about the sorts of demands a system puts on participants, known points of weakness or less-than-smooth handling in the mechanics, etc.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 7082968, member: 42582"] I've been GMing 4e pretty steadily for 8+ years. And it's class system rests on D&D tropes that I've been working with for 30+ years. BW, as I've said, requires kicking the players in the guts. Repeatedly. That's demanding on them, but it can be hard on the GM as well. [MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION] has talked about the "inner"/emotional dimension of this sort of thing upthread, better than I am able to. But using the OP as an example: it's not [I]easy[/I] to have the brother decapitated in front of the PCs because they failed a check that brought that whole arc to a head. It's tempting always to interpose one more check, to offer them a chance to get out of jail for free. But at a certain point you have to be true to the fiction and let the guillotine fall. 4e doesn't generate this sort of pressure because its maths (not unlike 5e, to which it is the main mechanical precursor for the maths of resolution), is biased heavily in favour of player/PC success. So failures in 4e tend to be minor setbacks on the way to success. It doesn't deliver failures at the rate, and with the stakes, that BW does on a regular basis. Cortex/MHRP I think I've already posted about. Managing the Doom Pool is hard, because it is a mixture of opposition (all checks in MHRP are opposed, and if there is no acting NPC then the Doon Pool is the opposition), "stakes" (if the Doom Pool grows big enough the GM can end the scene, which can cost the players/PCs in fictional terms) and all-purpose GM reource (spending dice to boost NPC checks, add new elements to a scene, etc). I'm getting better at it, but it's not a trivial matter. (When I first bought and started preparing to run MHRP, Doom Pool management was the main topic of conversation - other than silly (and mistaken) rants about the supposed lack of a PC build system - and once you start running the game you quickly see why.) But I wouldn't describe any of this as "drawbacks". They're not flaws; they're differences. In a different domain of gaming, compare five hundred to bridge: lighter, easier to play for fun/with beginners, not as technically demanding (because it's generally enough to count trumps and off-suit court cards); or compare backgammon to chess (similar considerations apply). The demanding character of bridge or chess isn't a flaw though, nor is the light character of five hundred or backgammon. As it happens, I personally enjoy the light card and board games more; turning to FRPGing, I don't know if I would want to run BW alone, but probably it's my favourite at the moment for intensity - but with a larger group I'm enjoying MHRP just as a change of pace that produces some amusing fiction. Well, isn't that fairly obvious? - the "downside" is that someone won't enjoy it. To me it seems to make more sense to talk about the sorts of demands a system puts on participants, known points of weakness or less-than-smooth handling in the mechanics, etc. [/QUOTE]
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