Presentation and Rules Are Different Things

[MichaelSomething]

Excessive purple prose, overly scholarly text, pretentious wording, burying key rules in walls of text without headings or bullet lists… we’ve all seen these patterns before and they can be a deterrent to reading or learning a game fully.

What do you have against Gygaxian writing???

 

[Reynard]

That's exactly where reading the material is, barring really major changes in major sections, least likely to help.

I'm sorry but I legitimately don't buy this. If you read the manual with intention, you find the differences.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Why do you ask?
Note: I suggested no such thing.

I'm wondering why it is relevant that being a more niche product makes it harder to be a "big fish".

 

[Thomas Shey]

I'm sorry but I legitimately don't buy this. If you read the manual with intention, you find the differences.

Man, I've read rules specifically looking for changes and missed them. You don't have to believe that, but its true. And in most of the cases there were other members of the group (including a couple power gamers) who did the same, and also missed them.

This is no different then editorial passes missing new errors because they're so used to looking at the section. And I can promise, that happens all the time.

 

[HaroldTheHobbit]

I used to love reading massive purple prosey, fluffy rpg tomes with complex rules that took work to parse. But nowadays the reading rpg books for fun has lost its lustre.

My goto game is Savage Worlds. Even though it's not totally stripped, its core and companions are pretty thin. Lists of edges, spells etc are short and managable, and the books are readable as actual books of rules and gaming frameworks. It's paid by content rather than paid by words.

My second love is Dungeon Crawl Classics. The core is phat, but most of that are tables that is automated in Foundry, hence I don't need to memorize them. Actual rule sections are short and intuitive, and the book manage to mediate the intended playstyle without hundreds of pages of fluff.

But I'm more and more drawn to even more stripped OSR stuff. Probably that goes hand in hand with the evolution of my GMing style and preference. Just give me a good, short frame of rules, and let me and my table make fun sh*t up.

 

[Theory of Games]

I used to love reading massive purple prosey, fluffy rpg tomes with complex rules that took work to parse. But nowadays the reading rpg books for fun has lost its lustre.

I will always be stunned that there are people who read (the often overly-complicated) rules of a ttrpg for fun. Like, they know they will probably never play the game, but they read it as a form of entertainment. Not saying that's a bad thing, just that it's so different from why I read ttrpgs.

But just "scanning" the rules can lead to all sorts of wild opinions, like "D&D is a combat-focused game". That's never been true by any standard you could think of. But if you haven't studied the material, it's very easy to be confused about the topic when discussing it with others. Or, MAYBE, if I just scan over the rules of a game, then when I actually play it, I get confused or perhaps aggravated because my limited understanding of the game prevents me from seeing what this game IS and HOW to play it correctly. As a long-time GM, I run into this nearly every other session and this is also why I really enjoy gaming with Rules Lawyers.

We can play the games any way we want, but playing RAW can be fun as well.

 

[aramis erak]

I don't know who needs to hear this, but the way rules are presented is a different thing than those actual rules themselves. You can like a game and really dislike the way it is laid out, explained or otherwise presented. We all have preferences for what a rulebook looks and feels like, and how we like to have the rules of the game presented.

Agreed with caveat: it the rules presentation is sufficiently bad, you never get to the rules.

I literally cannot read 7th Sea 2e due to John's font choice.

 

[aramis erak]

I will always be stunned that there are people who read (the often overly-complicated) rules of a ttrpg for fun. Like, they know they will probably never play the game, but they read it as a form of entertainment.

I am one of those.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I am one of those.

Me too. All day long.

 

[cbwjm]

Agreed with caveat: it the rules presentation is sufficiently bad, you never get to the rules.

I literally cannot read 7th Sea 2e due to John's font choice.

Font choice is important, for sure. I can't remember what it was I never finished reading, I just remember an RPG book where the font was so horrible to read I more or less opened the book and closed it straight after.