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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7519383" data-attributes="member: 42582">This seems an obvious non-sequitur.The best moments in a sporting match, or a sporting season, can be entirely related to the game as played by the rules of that game. (Eg they needn't involve external elements llike, say, a crowd pouring onto the pitch.)The best moments in a performance can be entirely related to the performance as a performance. (Eg they needn't involve eternal elements like, say, someone forgetting his/her lines or a string on an instrument breaking.)I have no idea why you would think or assert that the performance of any system cannot involve change, or variation, or highs and lows, or better or worse examples. That's not true in sport. It's not true in music. It's not true in spaceflight. Why would it be true in RPGing?I find this hard to follow, but again it seems like an obvious non-sequitur.You seem to think it's a virtue of a RPG experience that it involve variation and memorable moments. So why would you regard it as a failure of a RPG system to deliver that?I used the word system. Not rules-as-written. Nor mechanics. They're your phrases, and to the extent that you think they carry meaning that is different from system then I'm going to reject your attribution of them to me.Furthermore, I asserted - and will reiterate - that if your best RPGing moments are coming about when you ignore the system, then the system isn't fit for purpose! You see to be treating ignoring the system and not bringing anything else into it except the rules-as-written as mutually exclusive alternatives. That doesn't seem all that plausible to me, and again - insofar as your argument rests on it - I reject its attribution to me.To evaluate an action declaration in a good RPG system requires having regard to the rules of the game, and also requires having regard to the fictional positioning of the PC, and also requires having regard to the details of the declared action. That's the system in action. If all your best RPGing moments come from ignoring the system - eg if it's unmediated GM decision-making about a player's proposal that some awesome thing should happen - then they system is not fit for purpose. It's not doing it's job of taking action declarations + fictional positioning as input, and delivering awesome moments of play as output.I take it that you disagree with me - that there is nothing wrong with a RPG system that does not reliably deliver awesome moments of play in the way I describe, and that has to be ignored to get the most memorable moments. But I'm not sure why. What is the point of the system, in your view, if not to deliver awesome moments of play in response to player's declarations of actions for their PCs?</blockquote>

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