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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Balesir" data-source="post: 6504850" data-attributes="member: 27160">Indeed - I didn't say that there were no RPG systems that had a "no-hit-points" paradigm, just that FATE wasn't really one of them. I like HârnMaster for a certain flavour of roleplaying precisely because it has such an approach to character life and health. On the other hand, I like D&D 4E precisely because it doesn't.I have listed these quotes together because my response to both is covered by the same basic points:1) I apologise for mis-wording my original post (teach me to post late at night in a hurry to get to bed...), but the description  [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] gives of naive realism outstrips mine in just about every respect. I would add, however, that the "fact sampling" of our perceptions can be shown to result in us each having more or less flawed and diverse pictures of the world*, even given such objective reality as there is. One description of the situation might be to distinguish hallucinations - which are perceptions that have no cause in external objective reality, but are generally caused by mental illness or chemical effects on the brain - and differing models of the world generated by our brains, each in response to a randomly sampled set of perceived external objective reference points. Having different mental models of the world as a result of sampling differences or differences of interpretation might reasonably be described as "normal", even though all such models - absent hallucination - will be in conformance with the sampled objective facts that have been registered by the perceptions of the individuals involved.This might be clearer in example. If we walk together past a tall, blonde woman while in conversation, we will likely both register a random sample of facts about her. I might notice that she is female and tall; you might notice that she is female and blonde. If we are asked about the person standing by the way as we walked by, my mind might construct a picture of a tall, red-haired woman while your brain constructs a memory of a medium height blonde woman. Even though we might disagree on her stature and hair colour, we would agree that (a) there was someone there and (b) it was a woman. Seldom will we completely agree about things that were not facts, whereas the things that we agree upon - especially if asked about the bystander individually rather than together - will generally have been objective facts.2) I see the objective reality of RPGs as being provided, in part, by the rules. Just as seems to be the case in real life, the objective reality does not look very much like the mental model of the world (be it game world or real world) that we hold in our heads. Nevertheless, if we have world-models in our heads that conflict with the objective reality, we have a problem. From this perspective, the player who imagines "the character beaten and unconscious with broken bones" when the rules are quite clear that they could be roused back into the fight at any moment by an Inspiring Word is suffering from the game-equivalent of an hallucination. They are perceiving something that is not eventuated by the elements present in the game's "objective reality". Players' perspectives of just how the "objectively real" facts about the situation in the game translate into what their character is perceiving and experiencing can harmlessly differ - just as personal perspectives and interpretations differ in the real world - provided that they accord with the "objective facts" presented by the defined game situation and the game rules. Where they do not so accord, the character was either mistaken (as in the case of the "red haired" woman) or deluded.*: This can be seen for yourself by trying the "flashed face illusion" - you can google for it or, if you are signed up with EdX, watch it in Session 2 of their "Thinking 101x" course.</blockquote>

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