Opinion: But It's So Gamist!!

[apoptosis]

The gamist rules you cite would only have an impact on the narrative element of the game where those rules are in conflict with preconceived notions you bring into the game.

Narrative is easier to fix than unbalanced or impractical rules.

END COMMUNICATION

Similar to Hussar

Most your complaints are not about narrativism but about simulation.

Simulation is where you care about evoking a certain "feel" to the world and that PCs should be consistent to this "feel"

Generally speaking simulation is the bugbear as it tends to be in conflict with gamism and narrativism at different times.

Say the world having powerful magic-users is a defining part of the world. Different approaches to this:

Gamist - the rules are such that characters have equal power. There is a higher proportion of high-level wizards compared to other classes.

Simulation - AD&D, high-level wizards were more powerful than any other class

Narratavism - Somewhat irrelevant; all that is cared about is the story of the characters. Though you could have rules that allow for one player to play a really powerful wizard but still has no greater impact on the story than a less powerful warrior.

Within any pen and paper role playing game, the story or narrative is only as good as the DM, but the game is only as good as the rules. I will take a good game with a crappy DM over a bad game with a good DM any day.

This i completely disagree with though. i can play horrible games with a good DM and they usually are fun. Good rules with a crappy DM will almost always be a crappy game.

 

[Nymrohd]

I think a large issue here is that the D&D genre has switched between gamist, narrative, and simulationist approaches in different editions. I understand and concur that when an explanation is only gamist with no attempt of comprise to the narrative and simulation style that is bad design, but in the long run it is beside the point.
D&D does not have a clear identity mainly because as the root roleplaying game it is expected to server all three approaches. While other systems can be built so as to serve one or two of said approaches at the same time, D&D will always have a more diverse crowd to cater to.
The thing is that since any game within reason will not be able to cater to all three styles, people who are especially loyal to a certain style of gameplay will have to house rule part of the game's ruleset. A game that was built to be narrative or simulationist would be harder to house rule for gamist interests than a gamist design is to house rule for narrative or simulationist interests. That is because the gamist approach is the one which is most dependent on the ruleset (since it requires precise balance within combat).
As I said I too would prefer that certain decisions that seem purely gamist had not been taken. But at this point they have been taken already. And I can say that from the limited information I have available, that 4E D&D will be far less restricting and far easier to house rule for me than 3E ever was. And that is largely in part of the gamist design approach.

 

[small pumpkin man]

No. The gamist rules can destroy suspension of disbelief for sake of an elegant mechanic, and prevent the possibility of stories you might want to push because the precious crunch needs to be consistent.

e.g. "Warlords" don't make sense in a D&D party IMO, and them using magic makes even less sense, yet the gamist rules suggest they exist, because they're fun to play. I'll have to ban them. This is easy to do in this case, but what about deeply rooted gamey things that don't make sense?*

The idea of a character in a mercenary group who's main contribution is one of organization and leadership is part of the fantasy genre, the fact that low level "Warlords" have as much to do with real world "warlords" as a LE Paladin has to do with Roland or Lancelot doesn't really make them inappropriate, it's just a name. (and the magic thing, that was in regard to the power source in general, and I really hope they back off on that, or they're going to have a lot of nerd rage in their direction).

And it's not an either/or thing. There's always a temptation to get lazy and compromise flavour for crunch because it makes your rules more streamlined, but the answer is to go back to the drawing board and come up with a better rule that meets both needs, not just the gamist one.

What WOTC should have done is gone, "hey, nice rule, but all magical rings not functioning except at high level just doesn't make sense, and conflicts with genre assumptions. Let's try some other way." They didn't. The game is worse for it.

Except of course, we have no explanation as to why they changed rings, I personally believe the reason was thematic, not mechanical based, "lets make rings special and interesting" not balance reasons, because otherwise, why make only rings like that? I like the idea that rings are different somehow, and hope the explanation they give explains the why and the how better than currently has been.

*: By "don't make sense" I mean in terms of genre context. Giant, firebreathing lizards make sense there - those wings are really big. Magic makes sense there. Near-impossible warrior feats make sense there, but within limits - really superpowered stuff without the influence of magic or "epic power of legends" doesn't make sense there.

Absolutely, ultimately the idea is to make the game fun, engaging and representative of the genre, all the other stuff is just how to get there.

 

[Giltonio_Santos]

The point of gamist mechanics is to create robust rules that work in as wide of variety of situation as possible. Gamist mechanics are situation agnostic - you should be able to apply gamist mechanics every time and they should give you a predictable result.

I see your point, and for me it's a solid one, but I just don't agree that the gamist mechanics are simply a good thing to the game. If they're adding in one session of the game, they may be just removing from another.

As a DM who likes to tinker a lot, I've used the 3E generic mechanics to create the most various settings for my campaigns. It's cool like the gamist approach really helps with that; generic balance is typically easier to work with.

But I feel that the strength of generic robust rules is also the weakness of the system. The 3rd edition took some of D&D flavor from the rules, and it seems that 4E will take even more.

Each time it becomes easier to make your own game, but flavor-wise, we lose something that is all about D&D flavor. Someone who sees the rules just as the set of tools to create the setting would get a lot more from GURPS; the thing about D&D is that the rules communicate something about what you're playing.

I believe this is the reason why L5R fans hated the d20 version and Alderac ended up returning to the system they had once built to be a slave of the story needs.

A D&D example I see is that of the saving throws. Fortitude, Reflexes and Will runs so smooth and is so generic that anyone can easily grab the concept and use it without problem. That's fine, but saving vs. death magic or vs. breath weapon screams fantasy in a way that no description of a fortitude saving throw made by your DM, no matter how rich, can emulate.

Maybe the Warlord and the Dragonborn will be a blast to play, maybe they're everything we always needed in a matter of gamist needs, but the bard (or any other class left out of the first PHB, for the purpose of this reasoning) and the gnome had a story in this game. I have some friends who love D&D but are not following 4E news, and I know that at least one of them will find it just weird to look through the new PHB and find a favorite missing: "What kind of D&D is this? No bards/druids/gnomes?"

Improving the game is good, but I think D&D has some important roots that help us differ any fantasy from D&D fantasy, and tinkering with them to make a better (if less flavorful) game should be done with a lot of care.

Cheers,

 

[rounser]

The idea of a character in a mercenary group who's main contribution is one of organization and leadership is part of the fantasy genre,

It has the effect of assuming that every D&D party with one in them operates akin to the Black Company. Warlord is a first in that here is a class that affects the archetypes of the other PCs, even the nature of what an adventuring party is, turning it into a military unit rather than a band of heroes.

It even implies a hierarchy - that other PCs respect this character enough that they follow his or her orders. This strikes at the heart of what D&D is about, the conceit of the "adventuring party" and what it is.

There are far more heroes that operate on their own terms and wouldn't accept orders than there are military units in dungeons. Conan and Merlin wouldn't take it, why should your PC?

the fact that low level "Warlords" have as much to do with real world "warlords" as a LE Paladin has to do with Roland or Lancelot doesn't really make them inappropriate, it's just a name.

Paladin is a disused name, ripe for redefinition (although, to court hypocrisy, IMO D&D's holy knight class should just be called "Knight", and just go with the difference between the class abilities and what a knight really is similarly to the way the druid is handled, rather than introduce a D&Dism of a name, which paladin effectively is because people on the street don't know it).

Warlord still has currency, and connotations which don't suit the class. Where's the army? The land? The genocide? The implied villainy? The implication of the term "lord" that this character is high level? Heck, where's the war? That's a lot of connotations. It's a poor name for those reasons - there's too much to handwave there IMO.

(and the magic thing, that was in regard to the power source in general, and I really hope they back off on that, or they're going to have a lot of nerd rage in their direction).

Or perhaps not. It's been a lazy way to introduce special powers to a class that shouldn't be magical since the 1E ranger or earlier. 2E's bard followed suit, but under the "jack-of-all-trades" banner which sort of operated as an excuse. The 3E assassin was a bit of a trainwreck in that respect too, casting spells (???). If people are happy with them, then the 4E warlord is just more of the same.

I'd like to see them all get hit with the redesign hammer, and get unmagicked.

 

[Henry]

But I feel that the strength of generic robust rules is also the weakness of the system. The 3rd edition took some of D&D flavor from the rules, and it seems that 4E will take even more...

A D&D example I see is that of the saving throws. Fortitude, Reflexes and Will runs so smooth and is so generic that anyone can easily grab the concept and use it without problem. That's fine, but saving vs. death magic or vs. breath weapon screams fantasy in a way that no description of a fortitude saving throw made by your DM, no matter how rich, can emulate.

I definitely empathize with your point; the only problem I have is in determining the difference between a necessary flavor/rules change and one which is unneeded. To me, the saving throw change was needed, because the original five save categories did not cover enough bases, whereas the 3E saves covered all the ones I can possibly think of. To me, that one was needed, flavor change or not.

 

[jdrakeh]

The opposite is not true of narrative or simulationist mechanics. Take, for example, the level limitations on demi-humans in 1e and 2e. This is an example of a narrative mechanic - the purpose of the level limitations was to create a world which was humanocentric, which is in keeping with the feel of the edition.

You're using Forge jargon incorrectly. Demi-human level limits have nothing to do with Story Now (i.e., Narrativism) in the Forge sense of the word. Narrativist mechanics allow for the creation of story elements during actual play. In terms of Forge theory, demi-human level limits were almost purely Gamist (they were imposed to balance demi-human abilities with human abilities) and a bit Simulationist (via Tolkien) thrown in.

[Edit: Nevermind, I see that somebody else beat me to it. Still, when you apply the correct terminology, this thread takes on an entirely different light. As somebody else stated, the issue being discussed has almost nothing to do with Narrativism (as D&D has never had much of anything to do with the concept in question) but, rather, is about degrees of simulation and gamism.]

 

[Agamon]

How dare they make a game with game-like rules. Preposterous!

This was an old anti-3E argument, too. Ironic, that.

 

[rounser]

This was an old anti-3E argument, too. Ironic, that.

Only if you're into edition wars. Personally, I think other editions can be taken to task for similar reasons, and have a similar amount of "less-than-good" as a result.

It certainly didn't help the 3E assassin's believability to have spells, or the 1E ranger, IMO. Maybe you could read into that that it's something to be best avoided.

 

[theredrobedwizard]

What WOTC should have done is gone, "hey, nice rule, but all magical rings not functioning except at high level just doesn't make sense, and conflicts with genre assumptions. Let's try some other way." They didn't. The game is worse for it.

As much as I dislike the works of Tolkien, his books are where this conceit about having to be more powerful to use Rings of Power (as I'm inferring from the description of what Rings are meant to represent in 4th Edition) comes from. As also noted in the Magic Items article, the One Ring doesn't follow the rules of other magical rings by virtue of it being an artifact.

If Tolkien isn't a genre assumption for at least 1/2 the gaming populace, I have no frakking clue what is.

-TRRW