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

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Maxperson" data-source="post: 9565871" data-attributes="member: 23751">That's true.  Sales tricks do not work on me since I've learned them and they actually annoy me when sales people try them on me. Someone being genuine with me about the product is more likely to make a sale than if they try to sell me on it.   If I don't want it, though, I don't want it and nobody can get me to buy it by just talking to me.  That's far different than no one can trick me.Deciding is as much of a resolution mechanic as rolling a die.  It's just not random.I agree. It just never enhances play for me when it forces my character to do something he would never do under those circumstances. During those times, it severely detracts from play and can ruin the entire character for me.The chance of failure.Depends on the player.  For some players, no.  For some, yes.   It's still apples and oranges, though. But not simultaneously.  I don't believe that anyone is capable of being inside the PC, thinking and acting as the PC would, while simultaneously being outside of the PC looking at, discussing, and resolving a mechanic.  Humans aren't that good at multitasking.I think you can be in the character, step out for resolution, and then hop back in again, but to me that's a lesser method than just remaining immersed for the entire process.They are different methods at arriving at the same place, yes.  I agree that there is a distinction.Should I start calling your method bonkers?Nothing about what I am saying involves anything being known in advance.  The result of what I do is just as unknown during the process as your random resolution mechanic.  With both methods the outcome is just as unknown.Why do you believe that your unknown more interesting/exciting/scary than my unknown?I don't believe that the dice can produce tension closer to the actual situation than inhabiting the character and virtually being in the actual situation. Being immersed in the character and feeling the situation is closer to the actual situation than pulling back out of the character to figure out stakes and having some resolution before going back into the character again.Because physical =/= mental.  Because the PC can know things that I do not.I can put myself into social/mental situations easily and resolve those far better and more accurately than random resolution ever could. I know my PC's personality and beliefs far better than any random resolution system ever could. However, I can't do that with physical actions or the unknown.For example, if my PC is a great sailor, he will have knowledge on sailing that is far superior to my knowledge that basically comes down to, boats have sails.  A resolution process involving aspects of sailing will better represent the PC's ability to sail.  I disagree with you on exploration.  D&D does a fine job at exploration.  With regard to social, rules and mechanics get in the way of that. I can explore my character far better by putting myself into the character and feeling the social situation than any resolution mechanic can.  And I guarantee you that I will be discovering things about my character quite a bit.Rolling a die to discover if my character is honorable or dishonorable in a situation is in my opinion very inferior to being inside my character and discovering through roleplay if he is honorable or dishonorable in that situation.  I would much rather feel the conflict and how he arrives at honor or dishonor than to just watch a die clack clack clack across a table.I already do those things. By immersing myself in the character, I feel tension when he feels tension in the fiction.  I feel nervous when he feels nervous in the fiction.  I feel afraid when he feels afraid in the fiction.  And to a far greater degree than watching that die clack clack clack to let me know if I should be any of those things.,How often are the characters not actually mentally capable of making a choice.  Feeblemind spell comes to mind.Depends on the player.  And also by what unwanted results means.  Is it unwanted because it is a negative to the PC?  Or is it unwanted because it forces a blatantly out of character action?  For me the former isn't unwanted, but the latter is.I know for a fact that it's not immersion breaking, because I do it all the time with it strengthening the immersion, not breaking it like resolution mechanics do.I've seen you(and others here) mention freeform roleplay to me.  That's also not what I am asking for. I'm perfectly okay with not being immersed in my character 100% of the time.  For things that improve gameplay(and yes that is subjective), I'm fine with going out of character to engage in resolution mechanics.  Rolling to find a secret door or disarm a trap for example.  Social situations, though, don't improve for me by engaging social mechanics.  They are useful on NPCs, but detract when used on PCs.  They lessen my ability to feel the fear, tension, etc. that the PC feels.</blockquote>

Verification