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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8935934" data-attributes="member: 42582">This seems very paranoid to me.I'm using the phrase map-and-key to describe an approach to RPGing that I learned from reading Tom Moldvay's rulebook some time around 1982/3.Ditto. I've got no idea what "guessing game" has to do with it. I mean, flattering as it is to be the object of all this speculation, it's also pretty bizarre. There seems to be some sort of weird projection on your part.It's interesting to reflect on how play changes when it is still map-and-key based, but the map, and perhaps parts of the key, are known by the players as well as the GM.I've used this approach in Classic Traveller play. I would say that it tends to make framing a more prominent and "extended" part of play - the various participants at the table point at the map, talk about who is going where doing what, etc - and tends to downplay resolution - because everyone at the table can see straight away where the imagined characters are going, work out what they might see, etc. I'm not 100% sure this is the right word, but I want to say it gives play a certain languid quality.I think it contrasts quite a bit with Torchbearer, where the map-and-key are hidden when the players (via their PCs) first encounter them, are revealed under the pressure of tests and "the grind", and then - once known - are typically not revisited in any detail ("fun once").I replied to a post where you asked what "map and key" means. I answered. I'm sorry that you found my answer insulting.If what you were asking is "what guessing game and other pejorative things are implied by the phrase" you'll have to ask FrogReaver, ClusterFluster and yourself because those are things you're bringing to the table.I'm talking about an approach to RPGing that I learned from reading Moldvay and Gygax, that I believe was first invented by Arneson. One participant - the GM - draws a map and writes a key. Other participants - the players - create imaginary characters which are part of the "world" in which the mapped-and-keyed place is located. The GM uses the map and key to describe what those characters  are aware of in their environs ("framing"). And when the players describe their characters doing things - eg walking through a door, looking around a corner, etc - the GM resolves that action by reference to the map and key.I guess there are some RPGers somewhere who have never played an RPG in this sort of way, but I think it's pretty common. In fact it's so common that many RPGers, in my experience, struggle to envisage other approaches to framing and resolution, and approaches to prep that don't involve prepping a map and key (such as AW threats and fronts).</blockquote>

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