Storytelling vs Roleplaying

[tyrlaan]

But really guys, why's everyone trying to segregate each player into their own category all of a sudden? Seems like for 2 weeks now people have been discussing each gaming style and trying to sort out who should be classified as what. Aren't we all RPG gamers? It doesn't matter how you play it as long as you're playing in a good group. No need to get bent out of shape because some guy from another group doesn't like how you play D&D

This.

What's the point of all this? Did we all just get tired (finally) of the 4e love/hate wars that we need a new argument of the season?

Will the roleplaying community and/or industry suddenly awaken to some sort of renaissance because we have pegged the distinctness of story-telling vs. roleplaying? Or, in other words, how is this long-winded thread in any way constructive?

 

[Ariosto]

No one games the way EW implies.

Baloney! It stands to reason that EW role-plays in that sense; I know that I and the others in my group do. That's the only way I've seen 4e played, and I find plenty of people on forums -- playing a wide variety of RPGs -- who do so, and consider it the conventional meaning of "role-playing" in an RPG. People playing roles with computer programs in place of GMs necessarily do so as well, unless they write additional programs.

It is the most "realistic" feature of our typically fantastic games!

 

[Cadfan]

There's a conflict with traditional games and storytelling:

You can't be challenged if you can control the world as an author.

This argument doesn't exist because people disagree with you. It exists because some people have decided to apply a strange mixture of a "one drop rule" to player authorial control, such that your example of chirping crickets becomes not merely a benign example of how people roleplay by making assumptions and additions to the gameworld which the DM can then correct if he chooses. Rather, as the tip of an iceberg inevitably reveals the presence of the mountain beneath the waters, it is taken as conclusive evidence that the gates to the Hades of PC authorial control have been flung open, and demons are spilling out.

 

[Ariosto]

Will the roleplaying community and/or industry suddenly awaken to some sort of renaissance because we have pegged the distinctness of story-telling vs. roleplaying? Or, in other words, how is this long-winded thread in any way constructive?

Will the roleplaying community and/or industry suddenly awaken to some sort of renaissance because someone publishes a new game? Or, in other words, how is this long-winded designing and publishing of game after game in any way constructive?

Nobody is forcing anybody to partake of it. If one does not like it, then one is free to ignore it.

 

[Ariosto]

Rather, as the tip of an iceberg inevitably reveals the presence of the mountain beneath the waters, it is taken as conclusive evidence that the gates to the Hades of PC authorial control have been flung open, and demons are spilling out.

Maybe, although I have not seen it. In any case, what "some people have decided" hardly makes it illegitimate for the rest of us to discuss the matter.

 

[Obryn]

What's the point of all this? Did we all just get tired (finally) of the 4e love/hate wars that we need a new argument of the season?

Like I said above, it's just another way to draw lines in the sand to prove that one person is playing RPGs right, and other people are doing them wrong. In this case, so wrong they're not even playing an RPG anymore, but a different kind of game entirely. (And what's more, they're too clueless to even figure that out, so it's a good thing that a few people in this thread have taken the time to beneficently point out who's really playing role-playing games and who's not. It's educational, you see.)

-O

 

[LostSoul]

Rather, as the tip of an iceberg inevitably reveals the presence of the mountain beneath the waters, it is taken as conclusive evidence that the gates to the Hades of PC authorial control have been flung open, and demons are spilling out.

Yeah. I shouldn't have worded it so strongly.

I believe there is a tension between adversity and storytelling. It's more of a continuum than a binary, with different groups drawing the line in different places.

 

[Scribble]

One of the reasons I actually think we're NOT in the golden era of gaming is because of how "stuck" people have become on what IS or ISN'T an RPG, what IS or ISN'T D&D, what IS or ISN'T good for the hobby, etc...

It seems like at one point, D&D was this amorphous ever changing "idea" really. There wasn't one thing that people demanded be D&D. New rules came in, new locations, new philosophies... To me that was the BEST part.

Now it seems like people have just gotten too stuck in their ways. New ideas come along, and instead of being excited, or at least accepting, they get up in arms about how "This isn't D&D" or "This isn't role playing!"

At best, this makes me sad. At worst angry.

 

[tyrlaan]

Will the roleplaying community and/or industry suddenly awaken to some sort of renaissance because someone publishes a new game? Or, in other words, how is this long-winded designing and publishing of game after game in any way constructive?

Surely you are attempting to imply that the answer to both is "no," in which case I hope you're joking. That said, a conversation regarding the constructive qualities of releasing new products is probably best served as a forked thread should you want to seriously discuss this, since it really has no bearing on this conversation.

Nobody is forcing anybody to partake of it. If one does not like it, then one is free to ignore it.

This angle isn't a relevant counter to my comments. If I came to this thread claiming something along the lines "stop please, I find your posts offensive," then you would be 100% valid in your counter. But that's not my point.

My point is that this kind of destructive behavior isn't doing us, the gaming community, or the gaming industry any good. My point is that all this internal bickering doesn't DO anything beneficial for anyone. This need to label everything in its own little neat container serves what purpose exactly? From where I'm standing, I have to agree with Obryn's take on this.

 

[Doug McCrae]

The broader topic is one dearer to me, as I see the development of the story-game as having been hindered by a reluctance to set aside "legacy" assumptions. Maybe some people see ways in which unthinking adoption of "war-game" concepts has at times constrained experimentation in the RPG field.

You think rpgs should focus on one aspect rather than compromise? 100% gamist or 100% narrativist or 100% simulationist, no in between. You're a Forge-y, you are. Which is quite unexpected.