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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Guest&nbsp; 85555" data-source="post: 8802988">I don't see this as a one size fits all. Ideally the rulebook should outline an approach, or not outline one at all, based on the style the game is trying to achieve, what the audience wants to do with the game, and based on how much flexibility they want individual game groups to have. Once you are prescriptive, that does make people feel more locked into one way of doing things. For some games that is going to work, for others it isn't. My own preference, even for things like fireball, more recently has been less prescriptive and as open as possible to GM interoperation (but that is just preference and it still requires some basic outlining of mechanics). I think this is really a question though of how formalized a procedure you want for moments of play. I think Umbran meant scene in the sense of a scene from fiction or a movie, which is different from the sense of a scene happening in life or happening in a game not trying to emulate fictional scenes (when I think scene from a movie, book, or play, I associate those with framing, structure, etc). Outlining process for how this stuff is managed can be helpful, especially if groups are struggling with it, or if they want some of the benefits that come with a more structured approach. But I also find this stuff can be very stifling (at least for me). I need a much more fluid approach, that arises naturally through the conversation the players and GM are having. Not every instance of that plays out the same, and in every group I find it is different. But the problem with formalizing it to me, is it imposes a process on people and means that pattern is going to play out each time (rather than allowing different patterns to emerge naturally and fluidly over the course of play and conversation). I do think this varies from game to game in terms of whether it is useful or needed, and from group to group. Offering advice on this is probably helpful in a Game Master Book, but it probably ought to be done non-prescriptively, where an array of approaches to it are offered and a discussion of not using a process is covered as well. In a game like Hillfolk, having a clear structure to how scenes operate really help in my opinion. That game wouldn't play the same if we approached it like we approach our bog standard fantasy RPG campaigns. But but the same token, applying that structure to my bog standard fantasy campaigns, which I've done, makes them very different (not worse, not better, just different). There may be times when I'd welcome that kind of process to my regular campaign, but most often I just want a relaxing evening where the conversation around what is happening and where things go next, is natural and fluid (and not something where we are ether trying to pin down a process or imposing a process)</blockquote>

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