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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ariosto" data-source="post: 4908928" data-attributes="member: 80487">The specific play style to which EW refers has a narrow focus -- but that focus is on the element that originally distinguished RPGs from wargames, the specifically role-playing element. To exclude other elements may be unhelpful, but a game excluding that element (other than in the superficial sense that one can apply to absolutely any game) would, I think, not sensibly warrant being called an RPG.Hungry Hungry Hippos by itself falls into that category, as did the Chainmail miniatures rules set that was a precursor to the mechanics of D&D.Role-playing in the critical sense comes in with the scenario that puts such mechanics to use. Before Arneson first "dungeon mastered" an expedition into the mazes of Blackmoor, he had played in and moderated a number of "Braunstein" games. He combined the basic concept of those very free-form games with his innovative dungeon-exploration situation, adapted Chainmail to his needs, and added the very appealing feature of advancing characters to successively more powerful "levels" (starting, for instance, as a normal fighting man able to attain the rank of "hero" and eventually "superhero").One could likewise take the HHH apparatus as a convenient means for resolving conflicts (or other affairs with doubtful outcomes) in a much wider-ranging Hippos game. Dice, hit points, and so on, are convenient and familiar (due to the influence of D&D) means, but hardly definitive.By the same token, one could pick up an RPG rules-set and revert the game right back to a wargame. Combining that detachment from role-identification with "fudging" of whatever dice-rolls don't suit, one could change it firmly into a story-telling enterprise.</blockquote>

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