Of Mooks, Plot Armor, and ttRPGs

[The Shadow]

Double post, sorry.

 

[loverdrive]

But I think we differ in our opinions as to where the G part of games does/should reside. I think strong operating rules which govern the 'Process of Play' such as those present in Apocalypse World (and thus at least some of its descendants) are, if not absolutely necessary for G to exist, vital in terms of evolving play in the kind of direction you speak of.

I'll post a proof-of-concept game soon-ish (probably around a week or two), as well as try to structure the whole idea better

 

[The Shadow]

In RPGs, the simulation is typically in service to other concerns - frequently supporting a desired narrative genre.

This is what I was getting at above, when I said that it isn't an end in itself, but a means to other things.

And that may be much of what people can get hung up on - if simulation is really the primary concern, RPGs seem a really odd choice.

Speaking as someone who adores worldbuilding, let's face it, one of the worst things that can happen to the pristine beauty of a freshly-made world is to loose a bunch of players in it.

 

[niklinna]

Speaking as someone who adores worldbuilding, let's face it, one of the worst things that can happen to the pristine beauty of a freshly-made world is to loose a bunch of players in it.

When I was a freshman in college, there was a poster up in the dorm cafeteria for bets on the upcoming sportball game. I knew nothing about sportsball, but I wrote some random numbers on it anyhow. And I won! I won a beautiful sheet cake for my floor. So I took it up there and the guys were all excited and happy (even though they hated me) and they said "Let's eat it Viking style!" and I didn't know what that was but I soon found out as they just reached out with bare hands and tore the cake to bits and shoved handsful of cake into their mouths and threw pieces at each other and got it all over the carpet and walls and we all got a bill for the cleaning later.

In other words, "You can't have your cake and have your jerk dorm hallmates eat it, too."

Shoulda just snuck it into my room and enjoyed it by myself.

 

[Pedantic]

Now, there's a bunch of reasons I can think of to play typical RPGs instead of those other things - but none of them are the simulation itself. RPGs are never as good at simulation as dedicated simulation games. In RPGs, the simulation is typically in service to other concerns - frequently supporting a desired narrative genre.

And that may be much of what people can get hung up on - if simulation is really the primary concern, RPGs seem a really odd choice.

I think this is generally correct, but it's probably wrong to reach for genre emulation here. The kind of games I (and I imagine @Micah Sweet) are probably in conversation with genre, but are more likely to read as deconstructions than anything. You could read the whole LFQW thing as commentary on the problems of a lot of genre fiction, for example. Or look at superheroes, with the Batman vs. Superman comparisons.

Genre conventions that can't survive the cold harsh light of a mechanical model don't generally get to, or you're compromising the design to achieve them. They are very much part of the fiction that is subordinate to the system, unless pointed included, and even then only if they don't violate temporality or compromise other systems. It's rare to see serious objections to say, a subdual damage mechanic that lets you knock people out with headblows fairly harmlessly.

Here's where our (@Micah Sweet and my) tastes might diverge. I would then subordinate the systems to the demands of a game. Indeed, I'd only reach for simulation to begin with because it produces the most varied and most interactive game states. I have yet to see anything else that effectively strings together sets of action declarations in as unbounded and interesting a way.

For example (and I realize this is as an invitation to tangent, but I think it's explanatory enough to risk), my solution to the LFQW problem is that it's unethical to print a Fighter class, and that any particular model of martial combat is less important than an interesting system and coherent resulting setting.

 

[Umbran]

I think this is generally correct, but it's probably wrong to reach for genre emulation here. The kind of games I (and I imagine Micah Sweet) are probably in conversation with genre, but are more likely to read as deconstructions than anything.

"Deconstruction of X" is itself a genre, so I don't find this to be at odds with what I said.

 

[The-Magic-Sword]

Interestingly, the way I think of HP is simulative, but not to the real world, its to a world that happens to make for a fun game, and to some kinds of fantasy fiction that I think are a good fit for the games themselves and are most popular these days. So for instance, this is what a character might look like at full HP:

Here's the same character after they've lost some hit points:

There is an awful lot of fiction, much of it which IS even more closely aligned with modern TTRPG fantasy (e.g. swords and elves and orcs and wizards), that uses a dynamic like this most of the time. Where characters can take a bunch of hits (so you don't get the ludic dissonance of hits not really being hits), and you can see the damage on their body, but simultaneously none of it really compromises their fighting ability or represents a specific wound-- the closer they are to toppling over, the more exaggerated the generic battle damage is, maybe even starting to include things like a clearly broken arm, but as far as any of it goes, it's still pretty abstract-- you don't track the broken arm the same way you don't track facing, despite your character obviously facing a certain way. This is pretty much hit points as 4e conceptualized them-- you could say the second picture is a depiction of being 'bloodied' which to that game means half HP.

To me, this can still be a perfectly good simulation, because the world it simulates is one where combatants have this ability to take hits well beyond what you or I can, and the way this durability is understood is that individual parts of them don't break the same way, but the body as a whole can take enough of a beating not to go on. HP is actually kind of an ideal mechanic for simulating that state of battle damage, and 4e actually did a great job because it created the bloodied condition, which then lets it hang things off of that state-- like someone getting stronger when they've taken enough damaged to be pushed, which is actually a GREAT SIMULATION of some of the things we see in this kind of fantasy fiction.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I don't know what stance they are taking, but I think I can see at least one place where folks might get confused.

So, you are playing RPGs, and say that simulation is your primary concern. Do I have that right? That brings a lot of questions to mind.

Most games out there are about people with swords and wizards doing battle, or superspies, or people flying around in spaceships fighting evil empires or other action-adventure stuff.

If realistic simulation is the primary goal, why aren't you choosing farmers? Agricultural simulation is a thing. Or lawyers? Or basic real-world soldiers - Advanced Squad Leader does a whole lot more in terms of realistic simulation of combat than D&D does. Civilization and SimCity have lots of more realistic simulation of things too.

Now, there's a bunch of reasons I can think of to play typical RPGs instead of those other things - but none of them are the simulation itself. RPGs are never as good at simulation as dedicated simulation games. In RPGs, the simulation is typically in service to other concerns - frequently supporting a desired narrative genre.

And that may be much of what people can get hung up on - if simulation is really the primary concern, RPGs seem a really odd choice.

That just the "magical elf-game" argument again. I like fantasy and science fiction. I also like history. Fantasy RPGs combine these things very effectively, and I'd prefer the parts of those RPGs that correspond to reality to actual model it as closely as is practical.

For the record, Civilization is my favorite video game of all time. I prefer Civ V.

 

[Micah Sweet]

"Deconstruction of X" is itself a genre, so I don't find this to be at odds with what I said.

See, your entire argument is the same, "you don't want what you say you want" I am already on record as saying I am sick of hearing about my preferred playstyle. Sim is no less valid than gamist or narrative play, no matter what the Forge and Edward's have to say about it.

 

[The-Magic-Sword]

Notably, I think some people would absolutely eat up a Stardew Valley esque farming simulator TTRPG if someone did a decent job writing one (and they may have, I can't think of any, but they might be out there.)