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Message: <blockquote data-quote="clearstream" data-source="post: 8512248" data-attributes="member: 71699">I'm not aiming for completeness, although that might turn out to matter. The granularity of deconstruction I'm thinking of is at the level of process. Good call about stakes: at the process level what are some of the main alternatives that you discern? (Side note: I'd be happy to receive any links you have to good abstract deconstructions of TTRPGs.) There are many takes. It seems almost a given that one comes to regret any taxonomy.A question that motivated this is - in what ways are the wholes greater than the parts? I think there is a common intuition that they are, and I can also see some unexplored combinations (or at least not in games I can readily bring to mind.) That in turn was prompted by a poster attempting to draw a distinction between 5e and DW on the grounds of character ability modifiers.The first process I looked at was the stochastic method. My framing is that the function of the stochastic method is to choose between possible subsequent worlds. When we're about to roll, multiple worlds are possible. Once the dice have fallen, we'll agree on one world. RNG is the die. P captures the modifiers player has assembled. World captures the game world parameters (AC, DC etc.)RNG + P + WRNG + PI wondered if there needed to be a C for circumstantial or cumulative modifiers? Or a D for modifiers a DM feels should apply, but that aren't mandated by anything else? I question whether D is ever indicated in either system (my imagined very informed and judicious Jo DM would never call D because any D must be a C or W.) What are some features that the stochastic method contributes toward the whole?<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Including P in both cases encourages players to seek to draw the fiction toward their chosen play style. It lets them say something about the fiction they'd like to be involved in.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">There are feeling aspects to the choice of RNG, and there are differences in distribution that are felt for instance in limiting modifiers, but overall I find the RNG itself rather moot. Both assign each possible world to a range of numbers. The norm in 5e is to have about a 60% chance of inhabiting a kinder world. In DW that's nearly the same. (I am not forgetting that there are more or fewer possible worlds depending on the number of ways results are interpreted. If DMG options are used, they're similar.)</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Adding W in my view has significant impacts on the whole<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">considering the Czege Principle, it won't be as desirable for players to contribute to establishing the fictional situation</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">it leans into pre-established fiction, encouraging puzzle-solving and exploring the game-world to find tractable points (find the point in the "maze" that W is least considering your P)</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">it adds work, drawing attention to the game-world (and away from other things)</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">it reifies a separateness between characters and world</li> </ul></li> </ul>I'm sure one could and probably should say much more! A more complete list might be needed, but perhaps not. What I find most fascinating is the ideation potential in encapsulating the processes and recombining them. But - and I feel this is something you could have sympathy with based on what you have said - some wholes might well be greater than others. Either way, one can see ways the games are differentiated, and ask if the differences are necessitated (by preferring greater wholes, or noticing antipatterns) or flexible (we might have different criteria for "greater" and profitably try other combinations.)[EDITED][POSTSCRIPT One value I found in this process-level breakdown, is reassessing the 5e RAW asking - what is necessitated in RAW if we are concerned for a consistent whole, and what are perhaps traditional assumptions on matters that 5e RAW leaves open to interpretation? One, maybe, is any immutability of pre-established fiction, and even of DM as necessarily sole owner. The latter, though, is less well indicated - in part due to that W.]</blockquote>

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