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

[EzekielRaiden]

What is happening that there is a die roll that determines whether the thing succeeded or failed followed by description of the event of success or failure. Almost all skill checks and similar work like this, and there is not anything retrocausal about it, the narration and the dice roll are the same event.

But like I have said many times, the issue with the runes is not that it is retrocausal, but that it is acausal. What is happening in the mechanics and what is happening in the fiction are disconnected, creating divergence in decision spaces. This is not some trivial technicality, but something has an actual observable effect on how the game will be played.

I see completely identical causality relations in these two things.

 

[Enrahim]

You break the sim by drawing acausal odds from stats that supposedly measure diegetic things.

Still can be more sim than D&D though...

 

[Umbran]

This is not some trivial technicality, but something has actual observable effect on how the game will be played.

Yes. So...?

Like, it is no news flash that games with different rules play differently. That is precisely why we have them! If all games played exactly the same, it would follow that there would only be one game on the planet!

While, of course, you get to choose what game is at your table, more broadly, we are far, far better off with diversity and differences.

 

[Enrahim]

I see completely identical causality relations in these two things.

Causality relation in the mechanics might be the same, but player input is different. This causes there to be a different causality relation from player input that affects the decision space for the player.

 

[FrogReaver]

Still can be more sim than D&D though...

D&D is a bit of a moving target. Do you mean d&d played as a simulation, if so then I’d disagree. Do you mean d&d played in one of the myriad of other styles, if so then I’m sure it can be.

 

[FrogReaver]

Yes. So...?

Like, it is no news flash that games with different rules play differently. That is precisely why we have them! If all games played exactly the same, it would follow that there would only be one game on the planet!

While, of course, you get to choose what game is at your table, more broadly, we are far, far better off with diversity and differences.

I’m not sure if you or I am misunderstanding here, but there’s quite a bit of denial that such a difference even exists. Hard to have different play stem from something which is the same in both games. Yet we all agree there are playstyle differences so their must be some rules/mechanics differences.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Yes. So...?

Like, it is no news flash that games with different rules play differently. That is precisely why we have them! If all games played exactly the same, it would follow that there would only be one game on the planet!

While, of course, you get to choose what game is at your table, more broadly, we are far, far better off with diversity and differences.

I mean yeah, you'd think. But every time someone says that "personally I don't like a narrative game due this difference" then certain people will go for thousand pages trying to claim that there is no actual difference!

 

[Enrahim]

D&D is a bit of a moving target. Do you mean d&d played as a simulation, if so then I’d disagree. Do you mean d&d played in one of the myriad of other styles, if so then I’m sure it can be.

Well, if you have something that can basically be kitbashed into anything, it is hard to imagine it not possibly being better than everything else no matter what metric you look at as long as you just fine tune it enough in the given direction

I think making D&D "good sim" might require more effort than running a more beer and pretzel monster bashing game with little traces of anything sim. I would guess it is this kind of effort @pemerton would have in mind when stating a preference for certain other games to scratch their sim itch.

 

[Emerikol]

I mean yeah, you'd think. But every time someone says that "personally I don't like a narrative game due this difference" then certain people will go for thousand pages trying to claim that there is no actual difference!

And that is what I was talking about being irritating. I experienced this long ago in the dissociative mechanics threads during 4e. It is very hard in these situations to get people to see it. In fact, seeing it would probably ruin their current way of playing so they likely aren't ever going to see it.

 

[FrogReaver]

Well, if you have something that can basically be kitbashed into anything, it is hard to imagine it not possibly being better than everything else no matter what metric you look at as long as you just fine tune it enough in the given direction

Sure that’s what I was getting at.

I think making D&D "good sim" might require more effort than running a more beer and pretzel monster bashing game with little traces of anything sim. I would guess it is this kind of effort @pemerton would have in mind when stating a preference for certain other games to scratch their sim itch.

I think that what elements make for ‘good sim’ depends on what you want to simulate. I think it also depends on whether there are other major game components that interfere with whatever you want to simulate.