D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[Maxperson]

Particularly if we're supposed to suppose it is down to only those things explicitly listed in text... every... single... time.

But if someone wants to make that sort of argument, surely they can cite specific mechanics text to back it up.

I've seen games that tell you what results do and after the 12th time you trip on a stink bug it starts getting old.

Games should tell you how you succeed or fail(skill, magic, luck etc.) and let the DM narrate the details of it.

 

[Enrahim]

I guess I just feel like if something "is diegetic"--even "is diegetical"--then we should all agree it is so.

It should not be, "Well, to me, that's diegetical. But to Alex, it's not-diegetical. And to Pat, it's debatably-diegetical. And to Sam, it's diegetical on odd-numbered days of months, and not-diegetcal on even-numbered days, except February 29th, where it is diegetical only if it happens before noon, and not if it happens after noon."

That is, when we talk about diegetic music, that's...a thing everyone agrees on. Either the character in the film is experiencing that music, or they are not. That's...pretty much essential to what "diegetic" means, in-context. There isn't, and can't be, any subjectivity in whether the music is diegetic. It's possible to be factually mistaken, e.g. to have missed how the decrescendo in the music corresponds precisely to the moment where the character turns down the volume on their MP3 player (or whatever)--but it's not possible for Alex to assert that they feel the music is diegetic, while Pat asserts that it feels non-diegetic to them, and both are correct.

That seems utterly essential to what "diegetic" means. Why should that be abandoned?

I thought it seem like you and @clearstream agree in this regard? You are just elaborating on different ways this can be lost. Clearstream seem to caution against fragmentation in the meaning of the word while you seem to be cautioning against that a proposed meaning of the word could allow for two individuals correctly identifying something as both diegenic and not.

I think both concerns should be possible to acheive. One simple improvement might be to bake in some requirement against logical contradictions into the term. Another could be to recognise that the context of the game (not just game system, but entire play, social contract and all) is important to aproperiate understanding the term given the dynamic nature of the medium. (This possibly not to dissimilar to how Saruman's fate is diegenic in the extended cut of LotR, while more debatable in the original teathrical release)

I think this can be done in a way that is universal and objective enough, that it do not fall into the definition from preferences problem.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Simulation is simply fake cover for 'GM says' which facilitates railroady GMs to appeal to their own authority.

It's a doublethink tool for GMs trying to hide their authorship of the fiction behind 'this is the plausible outcome' while leaving the 'which I'm choosing to author instead of an almost infinite set of other plausible outcomes' unstated.

The doublethink is important too. Illisionism - which is to say railroading while denying it - relies on all kinds of bogus 'analysis' to act as cover when placed under scrutiny. 'Simulation' is one such piece of cover - probably the biggest and most used. A nonsense word which means whatever the railroader needs it too in the moment .

Now you've done gone and said it, the unasprechlichen! That raspy sound you hear is the knives being sharpened. Something is going to need blood!

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Now you've done gone and said it, the unasprechlichen! That raspy sound you hear is the knives being sharpened. Something is going to need blood!

But is that a diegetic sound?

I don't think it is practical, possible or even desirable to have a RPG where the GM doesn't to some degree make decisions that affect the direction of the game. It is just about under what sort of principles the GM operates when making those decisions.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I guess I just feel like if something "is diegetic"--even "is diegetical"--then we should all agree it is so.

It should not be, "Well, to me, that's diegetical. But to Alex, it's not-diegetical. And to Pat, it's debatably-diegetical. And to Sam, it's diegetical on odd-numbered days of months, and not-diegetcal on even-numbered days, except February 29th, where it is diegetical only if it happens before noon, and not if it happens after noon."

That is, when we talk about diegetic music, that's...a thing everyone agrees on. Either the character in the film is experiencing that music, or they are not. That's...pretty much essential to what "diegetic" means, in-context. There isn't, and can't be, any subjectivity in whether the music is diegetic. It's possible to be factually mistaken, e.g. to have missed how the decrescendo in the music corresponds precisely to the moment where the character turns down the volume on their MP3 player (or whatever)--but it's not possible for Alex to assert that they feel the music is diegetic, while Pat asserts that it feels non-diegetic to them, and both are correct.

That seems utterly essential to what "diegetic" means. Why should that be abandoned?

While I agree with you that most of the time, it’s very easy to determine if something is diegetic or not in an RPG, there are instances that are less clear. Certain player side resources and the like… Cavegirl used Blood Points in Vampire as an example on their blog.

I think there’s likely some gray area on the topic when it comes to such instances, and that might actually be worth discussing.

But conflating blatantly non-diegetic things like a player rolling a die as a diegetic thing because it’s representative of something in the fiction of the game… that’s a pretty blatant display of ignoring the whole point in making the distinction to begin with.

Yes. Or at least I'm better at it than a pile of text.

And no, I don't think an archeologist is better at figuring out what some random piece of writing is than I am without reading it first. That piece of writing could be a grocery list, poem, a request for aid or a billion other things. That's why they work so hard at translating things and don't just guesa.

You don’t think that an archaeologist , contacted due to a discovery of ruins in Jordan with pictographs on the wall would have a better guess than anyone else about what those symbols might mean?

This is how you get Rolemaster. You don't want that.

Yeah, no one wants simulation!

Oh wait…

 

[Enrahim]

Simulation is simply fake cover for 'GM says' which facilitates railroady GMs to appeal to their own authority.

It's a doublethink tool for GMs trying to hide their authorship of the fiction behind 'this is the plausible outcome' while leaving the 'which I'm choosing to author instead of an almost infinite set of other plausible outcomes' unstated.

The doublethink is important too. Illisionism - which is to say railroading while denying it - relies on all kinds of bogus 'analysis' to act as cover when placed under scrutiny. 'Simulation' is one such piece of cover - probably the biggest and most used. A nonsense word which means whatever the railroader needs it too in the moment .

And noone told me! Are you saying that all those wonderfully moments I had, witnessing the cool ideas my players came up with unfold in my simulation, was us playing the game wrong?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Yeah, no one wants simulation!

Oh wait…

I think Rolemaster is great warning example for those who wish to pursue simulation, myself included.
All things in moderation and so forth.

 

[Lanefan]

Not quite the argument I'm making though. I'm saying that because the die includes all the intangible reasons for why you failed or succeeded a check, we can't really look to the mechanics for guidance on how we succeeded or failed. It's too nebulous. Sure, you have the results. But, the mechanics are pretty silent on how that result was achieved.

Given the extreme degree of in-game variability of situation and circumstance where a check might be made, I'd posit the mechanics almost have to be and remain silent as to guidance of the fiction; as guidance appropriate to one situation would inevitably be near-useless for a boatload of other situations.

Example: think of all the different in-fiction situations that might call for a climbing check, and there's a lot of 'em. Then try to apply a universal guidance mechanic as to why-how a climbing check fails.

Not so easy, is it. Far easier, and also far more flexible, is to leave it to the DM to fill in those bits as appropriate to the situation at hand. And yet, if the DM does it right, this can still end up very simulationist from the player's perspective (i.e. the perspective that matters).

My argument is that in order for mechanics to be considered simulationist, they need to provide some guidance to the narrative about how a result occured. Since ALL mechanics give you results, and only some mechanics provide guidance as to how that result was achieved, I think the argument is fairly sound. Guiding the narrative about how a result is achieved seems a fairly clear way to differentiate simulationist mechanics from other styles.

I wonder if maybe you're putting too much emphasis on pure mechanics when deciding what's sim and what isn't?

What matters to me as a player is whether the setting my character is in consistently simulates both a) itself and b) a modicum of reality. By this I mean do its overarching physics (gravity, weather, etc.) work as they do in reality, and do its fantastic eements work consistently within themselves and also within the reality-based simulation. If yes, problem solved; and the "how" doesn't matter.

 

[Old Fezziwig]

I think Rolemaster is great warning example for those who wish to pursue simulation, myself included.
All things in moderation and so forth.

Rolemaster is for cowards and communists. Real simulationists play HârnMaster.

(Full disclosure: I love HârnMaster on paper. I still need to run it to see if that holds up after playing it.)

 

[Pedantic]

Simulation is simply fake cover for 'GM says' which facilitates railroady GMs to appeal to their own authority.

It's a doublethink tool for GMs trying to hide their authorship of the fiction behind 'this is the plausible outcome' while leaving the 'which I'm choosing to author instead of an almost infinite set of other plausible outcomes' unstated.

The doublethink is important too. Illisionism - which is to say railroading while denying it - relies on all kinds of bogus 'analysis' to act as cover when placed under scrutiny. 'Simulation' is one such piece of cover - probably the biggest and most used. A nonsense word which means whatever the railroader needs it too in the moment .

Right, which is why I narrate all player actions as the outcome of a small army of bugs that follows them around, puppeting their PCs, and they nod along.

Do you need to enjoy congratulationing yourself for seeing through the matrix here, or could you do that somewhere else, so we can get on with figuring out why we like these games?