Person vs. `Puter

[pawsplay]

In a tabletop RPG, you can do anything you can logically describe (I call this the "freedom principle"). That is not true of CRPGs. If you are playing City of Heroes, you can't burn down the hedges in Perez Park. If you are playing World of Warcraft, you can't learn the language of the enemy or become a traitor or mediator. If you are playing Knights of the Old Republic, you can't attempt to disarm someone.

With a human GM or storytelling process, you can go "off the map" in terms of rules or setting. In a CRPG, you can do neither.

 

[Agamon]

Ripping your arms off is just like eating chocolate. It's just painful instead of tasty.

Actually, maybe someday a CRPG will be just like a human DM. I think we need to fear that day though...

 

[Doug McCrae]

In a tabletop RPG, you can do anything you can logically describe (I call this the "freedom principle"). That is not true of CRPGs. If you are playing City of Heroes, you can't burn down the hedges in Perez Park. If you are playing World of Warcraft, you can't learn the language of the enemy or become a traitor or mediator. If you are playing Knights of the Old Republic, you can't attempt to disarm someone.

With a human GM or storytelling process, you can go "off the map" in terms of rules or setting. In a CRPG, you can do neither.

I feel the reverse is true. In single player sandbox-style crpgs like Morrowind I can go anywhere I want, use whatever rules (aka mods) I want or change the difficulty setting. In a ttrpg I have to follow the plot the other players and DM want to follow/run. I can't just change the rules, I have to have DM permission. If I ask for the difficulty to be changed the DM will start a thread on ENWorld about his whining players.

 

[xechnao]

I feel the reverse is true. In single player sandbox-style crpgs like Morrowind I can go anywhere I want, use whatever rules (aka mods) I want or change the difficulty setting. In a ttrpg I have to follow the plot the other players and DM want to follow/run. I can't just change the rules, I have to have DM permission. If I ask for the difficulty to be changed the DM will post on ENWorld about his whining players.

You can also play by pacing back and forth, right, left with arrow keys as long as you want. In a tabletop rpg you can't do this.

 

[pawsplay]

I feel the reverse is true. In single player sandbox-style crpgs like Morrowind I can go anywhere I want, use whatever rules (aka mods) I want or change the difficulty setting.

Let's say you change the rules. That makes you a game designer. But you still can't go anywhere you haven't mapped or do anything not allowed by the rules set.

In a ttrpg I have to follow the plot the other players and DM want to follow/run.

Um, no. TRPGs don't even have plots, as such.

I can't just change the rules, I have to have DM permission.

That's also true of a CRPG, you're just your own DM. But in a TRPG, you can still declare you are making an action, any action, and ask for the DM to adjudicate it.

If I ask for the difficulty to be changed the DM will start a thread on ENWorld about his whining players.

What does that have to do with anything?

 

[pawsplay]

You can also play by pacing back and forth, right, left with arrow keys as long as you want. In a tabletop rpg you can't do this.

I've seen it done.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

What does that have to do with anything?

I think it has a lot to do with the fact that though the constraints are different in a TRPG they are still constraints.

 

[Cadfan]

I voted "are," just because I don't like the arguments made by people in that thread who objected to the point that Hong was making. It was a good point.

RPGs are RPGs. Playing them on the computer is different from playing them in person, but they are still RPGs. The DM does take on the role of the computer, or, the computer takes on the role of the DM. Both perform different tasks with different degrees of proficiency, and the resulting experience is different, but the role is the same.

 

[Scribble]

In a tabletop RPG, you can do anything you can logically describe (I call this the "freedom principle"). That is not true of CRPGs. If you are playing City of Heroes, you can't burn down the hedges in Perez Park. If you are playing World of Warcraft, you can't learn the language of the enemy or become a traitor or mediator. If you are playing Knights of the Old Republic, you can't attempt to disarm someone.

With a human GM or storytelling process, you can go "off the map" in terms of rules or setting. In a CRPG, you can do neither.

This speaks more of technology level then anything.

The human brain at this point is still a much better DM then a computer brain.

At some point, I have no doubt we will create an artificial intelligence capable of creating new patterns and solving problems with said new patterns.

At that point CRPGs will be = to TRPGs, if not better. (As the AI would be much faster at handling off the beaten path scenarios.)

 

[pawsplay]

I think it has a lot to do with the fact that though the constraints are different in a TRPG they are still constraints.

It's a nonsensical description of a limitation. CRPGs have difficulty settings, TRPGs do not. Why? Because TRPGs are not limited to any particular difficulty setting, any consistency. You can stick a Tarasque in a dungeon for a 1st level adventurer.

If you are comparing what you can do as a CRPG modder or designer, then you need to compare that to what a DM can do, not just a player.