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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8576666" data-attributes="member: 42582">This claim is not true. It's possible to have very satisfactory RPG sessions without any prep: I've done this in MHRP, Classic Traveller, In A Wicked Age, Burning Wheel, Wuthering Heights, Cthulhu Dark, and other systems.And even if prep is part of play, that is not the same as pre-scripted or pre-determined events. Eg when I ran 4e Dark Sun there was prep (in the form of a map and some backstory) but the events were all made up in the course of play (some by me, some by the players).Getting captured, being ambushed, having foes escape, etc, are (typically) failures for the PCs. So they are things that I might narrate on a failure. But not on a success.There are some RPG systems which make it hard to implement a simple rule of ahead on success, backwards on failure because they resolve discrete tasks performed by the PCs without connecting those outcomes to any broader sense of trajectory. I think non-4e versions of D&amp;D are often played in this way. In that sort of system, having trope-y things happen is probably going to depend more on the GM just inserting their will into the course of play.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 8576666, member: 42582"] This claim is not true. It's possible to have very satisfactory RPG sessions without any prep: I've done this in MHRP, Classic Traveller, In A Wicked Age, Burning Wheel, Wuthering Heights, Cthulhu Dark, and other systems. And even if prep is part of play, that is not the same as pre-scripted or pre-determined events. Eg when I ran 4e Dark Sun there was prep (in the form of a map and some backstory) but the events were all made up in the course of play (some by me, some by the players). Getting captured, being ambushed, having foes escape, etc, are (typically) [i]failures[/i] for the PCs. So they are things that I might narrate on a failure. But not on a success. There are some RPG systems which make it hard to implement a simple rule of [i]ahead on success[/i], [i]backwards on failure[/i] because they resolve discrete tasks performed by the PCs without connecting those outcomes to any broader sense of trajectory. I think non-4e versions of D&D are often played in this way. In that sort of system, having trope-y things happen is probably going to depend more on the GM just inserting their will into the course of play. [/QUOTE]

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