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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8503630" data-attributes="member: 82106">Well, 5e's issue here is mostly the lack of any knowable relation between action and result in the sense of attaining the character's desired goal. So, yes, I want to climb the wall more easily, so I throw my grappling hook. Game interaction happens with some sort of check, and then what? Some fiction surely arises but does that fiction include actually allowing me to climb the wall (at least with a better chance of success?). Technically the GM could require additional checks before concluding that I've created favorable conditions (I think in this example that would be uncool, but its a fairly toy example, non-combat play often includes much more open-ended types of action). I mean, in a sense, 4e was a RESPONSE to this problem in 3.x (where it is basically the same issue that 5e has). They created systems which would codify this sort of thing, the system of powers for combat, and the system of skill challenges which basically pull much of the model used in combat out into general resolution.So, lets imagine the difference in 4e vs 5e here: In 4e a check is part of an SC, and thus resolves something and moves the fiction forward in a definitive way (either for or against the PCs) by an incremental amount. The GM is now constrained to produce fiction which honors that, or else create an incoherent situation. In 5e, something undoubtedly happens, but there isn't much of a constraint on the GM, or guide to say what they need to move on to. The result is the loop is kind of 'soft'. You can also contrast this with DW where moves 'snowball' and thus there is a more definite sense of a direction of play that we're going in. So, my experience is that games like 5e tend to 'wander around' a lot with PCs picking and poking and testing the environment, but often a change in fiction isn't really associated with any definite direction in play. 4e tends to 'move on' since the SC will eventually, perforce, wind down to a conclusion. DW moves on because that's just what DW does! Obviously you can drift 4e or DW and get something closer to 5e, and you can play 5e in a "everything that happens is consequential and you are always moving from the frying pan into the fire." but it isn't inherent to the game.</blockquote>

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