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Message: <blockquote data-quote="clearstream" data-source="post: 9513045" data-attributes="member: 71699">I'm not questioning "consequences resolution", which I agree is "the modern RPG approach" (a great example being the relocation of the relevant rules in the 2014 DMG to the 2024 PHB), but more homing in on the way your text in 2. points to "consequences" while in 3. it points to "stakes"... the latter being something "we care about". The implication I'm curious about is that the "consequences" might not be something we care about: is that your meaning?If you do not mean that there can be consequences justifying a roll that we do not care about, then aren't 2. and 3. just saying the same thing? Concretely then, I am asking if you intend any substantive difference in meaning between 2. and 3.?Yes, to my reading 2. and 3. are or ought to be counted repetitions of the same thing: the roll is meaningful because we're wagering on it something we care about. I think "stakes" is just the right word for that, due to its historical association with games (I write with Poker stakes in mind.) The reason I find that interesting - that these should be consequences that we care about and agree to wager - is that I have a notion that stakes elevate our play.To try to show what I mean, consider what happens for me the player seated at the table when I describe that my character swings their sword at a dragon and roll 20... a critical hit! Thus far, nothing I'm doing at the table is especially heroic. Rolling a die is trivial - it is no more difficult for me to roll a 20 than a 1 - just as it is no more difficult for me to describe my character swinging a sword at a dragon than it would be for me to describe them making a cup of tea.The way in which stakes elevate all that, is that supposing we're playing in some sort of OSR mode, the consequences of missing could well be that the hours of play I've invested in levelling my character are wiped clean. Reset to zero. And (let's say) that's something I care about. The point here isn't that one should specifically care about character death, but rather that wagering something that I - the real person at the table - does care about elevates the roll. I care whether it's a 1 or a 20. Supposing that I also have the choice not to make the wager at all - to flee, in my example - then there is both a fictional and a real sense in which it is bold to take on the dragon.One could observe that would be true whether or not I rolled dice to do so, yet to elevate the real act the result must be uncertain. Otherwise there is no tension - I'm betting on a guaranteed outcome which isn't really a bet at all. I believe "stakes" to be just the right word in connection with play, due to the sense of wagering something material where the outcome is uncertain.</blockquote>

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