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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8295010" data-attributes="member: 42582">I had more thoughts about this.When I play Burning Wheel (with my spreadsheet optimiser friend GMing), of the two perspectives you identify I am much closer to the first. My inclination would be to characterise it as what would I do, where the "I" refers to the PC (not the player) but I the player am in some fashion imaginatively projecting myself into the PC so as to render the PC an object of first-person reference. I am not an actor (either in practical ability or in training) but I think this is what some RPGers sometimes describe as the "method acting" approach.When my spreadsheet optimiser friend plays Burning Wheel (with me GMing), I think that he perhaps toggles between perspectives but much more often adopts a perspective a little closer to your second: what should I have Jobe do here so as to accrue checks that will allow him to improve? Sometimes that question will be asked inside a broader context that has been established in something like the first perspective - eg in playing Jobe as Jobe he has commenced a Fight!; but now he decides what move Jobe will make within the conflict because he's conscious of what Jobe needs to do in order to accrue those checks - so Jobe practices his judo throws in challenging circumstances not because that's what Jobe would do but because that's how Jobe can open up Martial Arts skill.In our session of The Green Knight today, I think the default perspective for all three players was what are you going to have your character do to resolve this situation without blowing the Dishonour budget? But because of the PC build and action resolution frameworks, answering that question - when compared to Gygaxian skilled play - produced actions that were a bit more trope-and-theme laden. Some of that, compared to Gygax, was degree and not kind (just as in Gygaxaian play the fighters moreso than the MUs will shove the boulders out of the way and force open the doors, so in our game today it was the buff knight who dove to the bottom of the lake like Beowulf hunting Grendel's mother); but I think some of it really does go to kind and not just degree (there was not a hint of Gygaxian nitty-grittyness, and we had single action resolution rolls covering hours of interaction, producing conversions of miscreants, conjuring up previously uncodified magical effects, etc).And in the final, climactic moment it was interesting to see the perspectives - particularly of two players, including the spreadsheet optimiser - shift to what would my character do? The jolly bard, Jeremiah of Jerusalem, knelt in prayer in the Green Chapel; the valorous but wrathful sorcerer Mendicus went full wrath, as was somewhat forecast by his backstory and build but had somewhat been kept under wraps in his patient and compliant play in the lead-up to that moment. At one point Jeremiah took an action that deliberately made Mendicus's approach less feasible; and likewise refrained from using an ability that would have helped Mendicus out. Because of the direct impact on the scenario win conditions for each PC, this had much more teeth than would (say) some back-and-forth alignment banter between the dwarven fighter and the half-elven ranger in classic D&D.Does making deliberate mechanical choices, within a system that requires some skill to master (see my post not far upthread contrasting the regulars to inexperienced kids) but it overall pretty simple and transparent, to impose one's own thematic/moral vision of the situation on another player and that player's PC, at the cost of that PC's victory on his/her own terms, count as skilled play? I don't want to assert any sort of ownership over the key phrase here; but I do feel we've moved well out of Gygax/Moldvay-esque territory (and also well out of Trad/neo-Trad territory) into the sort of territory where I personally feel much more at home as a RPGer.I've snipped your second question, about the parameters of the DW "defend" move, because I can't add anything useful to the discussion about that between you and [USER=82106]@AbdulAlhazred[/USER].But on the question you've quoted, I do have a view: while conceding that details of design matter, and it's probably possible to think of designs (and maybe they exist in the world) which would make my answer different, my default answer is that including a thematic coefficient makes the cognitive workspace easier. That answer is influenced by my own experience as a player, and as a human being, as well as by my (limited) knowledge of philosophical work on the cognitive function of emotions.To explain the answer: the basic function of a thematic coefficient is to make a subset of the 10 possible moves highly salient, while putting some other (often larger) subset off the table straight away without having to think through any details of how their use would affect the "technical"/"procedural" aspects of the situation. In other words, it narrows the field of choice and the field of acceptable outcomes, making it easier to consider the options and settle on one.A practical example: when my Burning Wheel PC was confronted by a demon outside Evard's tower, in principle the space of possible moves was very great, from fighting to fleeing to who knows what else. If something like this happened in The Green Knight (my go-to example game at present!), there would be additional considerations like how does dealing with the demon factor into the Judgement of Honour/Dishonour at the resolution of the scene? If it happened in classic D&D I might have to start thinking through more technical questions like what is the demon's magic resistance and immunity or vulnerability to my various attack forms.But in the BW context I was able to be guided by my character's Beliefs, including that I am a Knight of the Iron Tower: by devotion and example I will lead the righteous to glorious victory; and further, because my PC was all that was standing between the demon and my wizard companion, that Aramina will need my protection. That second Belief also intersected, on this occasion, with my Instinct If an innocent is threatened, interpose myself. And so it was very easy to decide to confront the demon, hoping that my multiple dice of armour would provide some protection against its attacks!Now I reckon there are other BW players, including my friend, who might approach this decision-space in a different fashion. And for them the thematic coefficient, by introducing another parameter of consequence for the decision, might make things harder. To relate this back to [USER=16586]@Campbell[/USER]'s post and my reply to it earlier in this post, they are not "method acting": they are treating the game as a game even at this thematic level. I think that alternative approach produces less inhabitation of character: because an actual human being who treats emotional parameters as further points of optimisation, rather than as markers of salience that narrow the decision-space, is probably a sociopath, and I'm very confident that most RPGers are not sociopaths, and I'm superconfident that my dear friend whom I've know for nearly 30 years is not a sociopath. He just really enjoys optimisation in game play, and is really good at it!But there are some RPGs where, if you adopt my own preferred approach, you will be hosed for it. Gygaxian skilled play is one. I don't know if I'll ever get to play The Green Knight; but I think it might be a game where I could play pretty closely to my preferred approach and get by. Burning Wheel certainly is, because of the principles that govern action resolution and consequence narration, and that feed those outcomes back into scene framing. When Thurgon attacked the demon he got his arse handed to him, but didn't die (the summoning ended and the demon departed) and he accrued an infamous reptuation in the Hells of +1D as intransigent demon foe.</blockquote>

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