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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8279867" data-attributes="member: 82106">The challenge is in defining some such set of mechanics. I mean, Saving Throws, and Hit Points, and to an extent ability scores, AC, etc. do produce some sort of mechanical underpinnings. You also have equipment lists, and other resources that your PC has (spells perhaps). These can all be managed. OTOH there really are few, if any, rules for how that management works (IE what damage do you take from a trap, the GM's key may say, but there's no other rule for that like 4e has). As I said before, this CAN work in terms of the 'dungeon' (a series of physical and mental challenges which are discrete and bounded, largely independent, and present themselves in sequence). It is MUCH harder and eventually impossible once you get into more complex situations like social situations, or even overland exploration. I think you COULD build a stronger system though. It would include only mechanics that are concrete (IE a check that tells you how far you jump is OK, but one that handles whether you brought along an extra torch is not). It would need to include a mechanism for handling assisting another PC (IE the bard in my previous example). This gets you to the level where at least SOME GM arbitration in less nailed down situations can fall to specific rules and process. However, now you reach the issue of where 3e and 5e are at. That is, nothing tells us what the proper context and process is for when checks are required or what they signify in terms of change in the fiction. Usually other sorts of 'hard moves', like casting a spell DO show you how to handle that, in D&D. 4e tried to add skill challenges for that purpose, but that requires unlinking the results of the check from the specific fiction related to what you were trying to do. That seems to be the point at which SP really gets broken completely. Systems like 3e and 5e do break it before that though, because of that lack of context for checks something like Diplomacy can be arbitrarily potent in the fiction and bypass enough detail (elision) that it trips most people's "this is not SP" trigger.</blockquote>

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