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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jack7" data-source="post: 4709126" data-attributes="member: 54707">I personally agree with this approach OS. The game would do much better to provide a list of possible Combat and Non-Combat "Roles" and then let the players decide what their "roles" in any given situation will be.Then if the players and DM want to construct rules-heavy milieu particular formats for exactly how and for whom those roles can be played let them do so, and if not leave things loose enough for the players to determine how their own roles will be executed and fulfilled.I think the looser things are the more likely the players are to develop constructive, valuable, flexible roles and the same for the DM who runs his NPCs. Plus roles then don't become so tightly "programmed" that outsiders can automatically figure out who has what "roles." And the players can't automatically figure out what roles NPCs have or what exactly they are capable of doing in their own roles. Too many modern games have lost much of their sense of "surprise," "wonder," and "flexibility." They are as much if not more tightly programmed than a video or computer game. Modern RPGs don't need more heavy "scripting," to spur the imagination of the DM and players, they need far less.Although I would do it differently I like KM's break down on "role possibilities and potentials." I like the fact that they are basically loose ideas and that they allow different variations of capabilities, not just limited to "direct and restrictive class function."I think though generally speaking the looser the better, and the more the players have control over the issue, and not the designers (except the offer basic suggestions as to possibilities and potentials) the better the "role idea" will function, both in combat and in non-combat situations.I'm not for over-complexity in design approach though individual games could make the system as complex or as simple as they want. I think a lot of times game designers (I am not speaking about anyone in particular, just the modern design approach and imperative) make things far too complex, caught up in their own idea of how brilliant they are and so regiment a lot of things that epically in a role play game, should just be role-played and left up to the DM and the players.That is to say many modern games would do much better to tightly regulate and "rulerize" a smaller number of things, and to simply trust the players and DM to do their own development for their own game. The game provides a working skeleton and some of the internal organs, the DM and players provide the actual flesh and the nervous system.</blockquote>

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