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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8291270" data-attributes="member: 82106">Yeah, I don't know that we are in disagreement really. I was just clarifying the whole 'hybrid' thing.You can discuss ANYTHING in the abstract. I can say "Cars have engines." This is clearly an abstract statement about cars, a GENERALIZATION. So, I could think of this as a statement about the Platonic car, it has an engine <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />. Generalization is a form of abstraction, or a process by which abstraction is achieved perhaps (and again, you can use generalization as both a noun and a verb, so yay English!).I don't think 'take away stuff' is at all secondary. Abstraction, the process of generalizing things, IS a process of removal of differences. The whole ART is that of understanding which differences are trivial and which are not, and which characteristics in common are particularly salient. I don't think TTRPG rules are abstractions. Some of them (for a loose reading of 'rules') may be 'templates' (IE a character sheet is a template which you instantiate, creating an instance of a character, I'll note this is almost exactly software engineering parlance!).OK, I am not dying on any hills here today, but as I stated above, I think that your favored definition of abstraction is not fundamentally different from mine. They both partake of the idea of 'instantiation' and generalization. Love can be described in abstract terms, but it only exists to the degree that it is instantiated in particular examples (OK, don't get carried away on the metaphysical dimensions of that, if you happen to be a Platonist then we will have to at least agree that it isn't worth talking about things which are never instantiated, since we can know nothing about them, even Plato must agree here...).I would say you may be skipping a step. That is, maybe your players are so fixated on certain instantiations of particulars of a mode of play that they cannot abide its absence (IE wandering monsters), but at least if I am designing a game I certainly would not start with "there will be wandering monsters, or else it isn't fun." I'd start with the idea of test against an environment with player skill as a paramount principle of play, and then maybe I work my way to Wandering Monsters as a solution to some issue (IE Dave or Gary must have introduced them as a driver to get players to stop camping or something similar).Good??!!! Hoooo boy! We're in deep water now <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f644.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":rolleyes:" title="Roll eyes    :rolleyes:"  data-smilie="11"data-shortname=":rolleyes:" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f644.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":rolleyes:" title="Roll eyes    :rolleyes:"  data-smilie="11"data-shortname=":rolleyes:" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f644.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":rolleyes:" title="Roll eyes    :rolleyes:"  data-smilie="11"data-shortname=":rolleyes:" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f644.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":rolleyes:" title="Roll eyes    :rolleyes:"  data-smilie="11"data-shortname=":rolleyes:" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f923.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":ROFLMAO:" title="ROFL    :ROFLMAO:"  data-smilie="18"data-shortname=":ROFLMAO:" />Yeah, all the little elements of DW basically add up to player agenda. It isn't something that you get beat over the head with, like DM agenda. I mean, it is supposed to be up to the players basically what they want the story to be about, so they need some leeway. As a story ABOUT the characters, DW certainly does want character focus. I have always found this to be the most difficult part for me, as I came up in RPGs during a time when 'pawn stance' was pretty much how it was done.</blockquote>

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