Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="bsss" data-source="post: 9866039" data-attributes="member: 7054302">As I was writing my reply, I realized this became a spectrum question for me.I don't find hyper-opinionated games very compelling, personally, and I don't think it's a worthy design goal unless you are coming in intending to make a game specifically in whatever particular niche. The reason I don't hang my hat on Blades-like games is because, as you say, Blades' intended playstyle is baked in. It would be ridiculous to use Blades to play a game without the conceit of scores and factions, and I personally see that as a limitation, because I don't always want to participate in that kind of story (not that it's bad, or that Blades is bad, it just doesn't get me going, most of the time). I feel like it falls into a space where you are very specifically playing Blades in a way one might play a board game and it's very obvious what you can/should and cannot/should not be spending your time on. No one plays Dune (the board game) to evaluate Paul and Chani's romance, and no one (I assume) plays Blades to have heroic tales of paladins defeating evil.That said, I think Blades is an example that does have a strong style and supports it well. Certainly the people who are into that style seem to like it for that purpose a lot. I bounce off that design approach because I like toolkits more, or even "somewhat opinionated" games like 13th Age. 13th Age takes a "bigger tent" approach to its intended playstyle --- the narrative can be many, many things, but a commonality of 13th Age stories ought to 1) be centered on Big Damn Heroes, and 2) have some combat, most of the time. This is definitely an intent that runs throughout the game, but it has much more space for a table to operate and tell the story they choose. Rogues, monster hunts, maintaining justice/peace, participating in court intrigue, being pirates, etc., all fit into the game without inherently being at odds with the core style elements.Is Blades better than 13th Age at facilitating a game about scores? Probably, if the table cares about it to that depth, but probably no better if all the table is really interested in is having fun rogue times or if they value other elements that Blades doesn't have. I personally don't like the --- what I'd call --- pigeon-holing on that end of the spectrum.</blockquote>

Verification