NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8426110" data-attributes="member: 42582">I am going to post some sincere responses.To me there seems to be a big difference between playing Earthsea - which has been mentioned upthread, as an example (referring to <a href="https://d66kobolds.blogspot.com/2020/09/free-kriegsspiel-worlds-not-rules-etc.html" target="_blank">this blog</a>) - and playing Greyhawk. To the best of my understanding, Greyhawk as GMed by Gygax is not a fully-realised fiction like Le Guin's novels. It's a megadungeon with some associated stuff that includes an Alice in Wonderland pastiche, a King Kong pastiche, etc.I'm also not sure that "playing Greyhawk with Gary" can be prised off the fact that Gary is an experienced wargame referee and designer who brings a certain set of play sensibilities to his table (as can be seen very clearly in his DMG, among other works).Tekumel is obviously a bit different in this respect, although personally I think it's striking how close the Empire of the Petal Throne rules adhere to "exploration of the underworld" play. I don't know if this was Barker's concession to wargaming, or reveals something about the parameters of his fictional conception - I guess Jon Peterson or Shannon Appelcline has probably addressed this question.This paints a particular picture of the way in which your players want to engage with their RPGing.This reminded me of <a href="http://www.indie-rpgs.com/articles/2/" target="_blank">this</a> and <a href="http://www.indie-rpgs.com/articles/3/" target="_blank">this</a> from Ron Edwards:Exploration and its child, Premise The best term for the imagination in action, or perhaps for the attention given the imagined elements, is Exploration. Initially, it is an individual concern, although it will move into the social, communicative realm, and the commitment to imagine the listed elements becomes an issue of its own. When a person perceives the listed elements together and considers Exploring them, he or she usually has a basic reaction of interest or disinterest, approval or disapproval, or desire to play or lack of such a desire. Let's assume a positive reaction; when it occurs, whatever prompted it is Premise, in its most basic form. To re-state, Premise is whatever a participant finds among the elements to sustain a continued interest in what might happen in a role-playing session. Premise, once established, instils the desire to keep that imaginative commitment going. Person 1: "You play vampires in the modern day, trying to stay secret from the cattle and coping with other vampires." [See atmospheric, grim, punky-goth pictures] Person 2: "Ooh! Cool!" Person 2 might have liked the grittiness of the art, the romance of the word "vampire," or the idea of being involved in a secret mystical intrigue. Or maybe none of these and an entirely different thing. Or maybe all of them at once. It doesn't matter - whatever it was, that's the initial Premise for this person. . . . The key to Gamist Premises is that the conflict of interest among real people is an overt source of fun. It is not a matter of upset or abuse, and it is certainly not a "distraction from" or "failure of" role-playing. <ul style="margin-left: 20px"> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">A possible Gamist development of the "vampire" initial Premise might be, Can my character gain more status and influence than the other player-characters in the ongoing intrigue among vampires?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Another might be, Can our vampire characters survive the efforts of ruthless and determined human vampire hunters?</li> </ul> . . . Narrativist Premises vary regarding their origins: character-driven Premise vs. setting-driven Premise, for instance. They also vary a great deal in terms of unpredictable "shifts" of events during play. The key to Narrativist Premises is that they are moral or ethical questions that engage the players' interest. The "answer" to this Premise (Theme) is produced via play and the decisions of the participants, not by pre-planning. <ul style="margin-left: 20px"> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">A possible Narrativist development of the "vampire" initial Premise, with a strong character emphasis, might be, Is it right to sustain one's immortality by killing others? When might the justification break down?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Another, with a strong setting emphasis, might be, Vampires are divided between ruthlessly exploiting and lovingly nurturing living people, and which side are you on?</li> </ul> . . . Simulationist Premises are generally kept to their minimal role of personal aesthetic interest; the effort during play is spent on the Exploration. Therefore the variety of Simulationist play arises from the variety of what's being Explored. <ul style="margin-left: 20px"> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Character: highly-internalized, character-experiential play, for instance the Turku approach. A possible development of the "vampire" premise in terms of Character Exploration might be, What does it feel like to be a vampire?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Situation: well-defined character roles and tasks, up to and including metaplot-driven play. A possible development of the "vampire" premise in terms of Situation Exploration might be, What does the vampire lord require me to do?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Setting: a strong focus on the details, depth, and breadth of a given set of source material. A possible development of the "vampire" premise in terms of Setting Exploration might be, How has vampire intrigue shaped human history and today's politics?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">System: a strong focus on the resolution engine and all of its nuances in strictly within-game-world, internally-causal terms. A possible development of the "vampire" premise in terms of System Exploration might be, How do various weapons harm or fail to harm a vampire, in specific causal detail?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Any mutually-reinforcing combination of the above elements is of course well-suited to this form of play.</li> </ul> The key to Simulationist play is that imagining the designated features is prioritized over any other aspect of role-playing, most especially over any metagame concerns. The name Simulationism refers to the priority placed on resolving the Explored feature(s) in in-game, internally causal terms.I think this is a good explanation of the pretty wide variety of ways in which a RPGer can want to play this.</blockquote>

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