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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Doug McCrae" data-source="post: 4078082" data-attributes="member: 21169">Rules don't do simulationism. Rules are for gamism.The best simulationist system possible is - 'DM decides' - because that will never break verisimilitude. Or, slightly more complicatedly - 'Players and/or DM raise an objection whenever they feel something implausible might occur. DM has final say on what is plausible'. Any rules set (of reasonable size) will, from time to time, produce implausible results.It would take a very, very complicated set of rules to simulate a world. Much more complicated than could possibly fit in an rpg. In fact only a computer simulation could come anywhere near doing the job.Small rules sets, such as are found in rpgs, are only appropriate for games, not sims.Now the way D&D works is there's a game and a sim. The game is the boardgame/wargame of combat and dungeon bashing, which is covered in detail by the rules. The sim is the rest of the world, which has always had light to non-existent rules in every edition. What happens in this sphere is decided by objection raising and DM ruling, as described above.What was so great about 3e, and it seems to be even more true of 4e, is that the boardgame part covered by the rules actually works as a game. It's the only rpg I've ever encountered which is tactically interesting. Which actually contains a fun and functioning game.This is the purpose of game designers, to write the best wargame they can. It has taken them a long time to realise this and many still don't.The freewheeling, just people talkin', sim part of the 'game' has always worked and always will. It doesn't require rules to make it work. If there were really complicated rules describing this part people would hate it. They'd complain the rules weren't letting them roleplay.</blockquote>

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