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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7411514" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>Well, "advanced" forms of "no myth" RPGs strip away elements that get in the way of play.</p><p></p><p>4e D&D illustrates this in comparison to AD&D. (I choose these two examples because they are both fairly well-known systems. Rolemaster would do just as well as AD&D as a comparitor. So would 3E, I think, but I'm less familiar with 3E.) I'll give one reason why.</p><p></p><p>AD&D places a lot of emphasis on the tracking of small units of time (eg spell durations, light source durations, encounter-checks-per-unit-of-time, etc). It also establishes a lot of tracking of consequences from scene to scene (eg healing rules; spell duration rules again; etc). All these things are barriers to effective scene framing, because they make it hard to close of one scene and change the focus of play to another.</p><p></p><p>Here's another, more tentative, observation about "advanced" mechanics for story now: the way in which Burning Wheel (to pick one example) tracks character wealth is arguably more "advanced" than default 4e. In 4e, wealth is tracked just as in AD&D: PCs collect gold pieces, or gems and the like that they convert to gold pieces; the players track this number on their PC sheets. Which means that buying equipment is primarily an arithmetic exercise and hence not a site of drama. In BW, wealth is an ability rating like any other, and buying equipment is a check like any other. Hence it can be a site of drama.</p><p></p><p>The reason this is tentative is because a game might simply not make the buying of equipment a site of drama, and might raher treat it as an aspect of PC advancement. And then it wouldn't matter so much that it is handled arithmetically rather than as a mode of action resolution.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 7411514, member: 42582"] Well, "advanced" forms of "no myth" RPGs strip away elements that get in the way of play. 4e D&D illustrates this in comparison to AD&D. (I choose these two examples because they are both fairly well-known systems. Rolemaster would do just as well as AD&D as a comparitor. So would 3E, I think, but I'm less familiar with 3E.) I'll give one reason why. AD&D places a lot of emphasis on the tracking of small units of time (eg spell durations, light source durations, encounter-checks-per-unit-of-time, etc). It also establishes a lot of tracking of consequences from scene to scene (eg healing rules; spell duration rules again; etc). All these things are barriers to effective scene framing, because they make it hard to close of one scene and change the focus of play to another. Here's another, more tentative, observation about "advanced" mechanics for story now: the way in which Burning Wheel (to pick one example) tracks character wealth is arguably more "advanced" than default 4e. In 4e, wealth is tracked just as in AD&D: PCs collect gold pieces, or gems and the like that they convert to gold pieces; the players track this number on their PC sheets. Which means that buying equipment is primarily an arithmetic exercise and hence not a site of drama. In BW, wealth is an ability rating like any other, and buying equipment is a check like any other. Hence it can be a site of drama. The reason this is tentative is because a game might simply not make the buying of equipment a site of drama, and might raher treat it as an aspect of PC advancement. And then it wouldn't matter so much that it is handled arithmetically rather than as a mode of action resolution. [/QUOTE]
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