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General Tabletop Discussion
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Tension, Threats And Progression In RPGs
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<blockquote data-quote="Hussar" data-source="post: 7731085" data-attributes="member: 22779"><p>An interesting thought. I watched the Youtube article linked above. He makes a pretty decent argument. In a video game, if you remove all elements of failure then, it really isn't a game anymore. I can see that. The problem with how that relates to the current discussion though is that the current discussion posits that only death or loss of equipment are valid failures. Sure, in a first person shooter, if you play on God Mode, it's not really much of a game anymore. But, even though D&D 5e is far less punishing than OD&D, it's not God Mode. Because we're talking about RPG's, win/loss has a much broader scope. Sure, you can lose by dying. You can lose by breaking your sword. But, you can also lose by failing to rescue the princess. </p><p></p><p>I remember years ago playing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles with a very good friend of mine. In the scenario, your characters must rescue hostages being held at a school by bad guys. ((It's a long time ago, and I'm fuzzy on the exact details)) Now, when we played through it, we crushed the bad guys, but, all the hostages (or at least most of them) died in the process. Talking about the adventure later, I called it "Massacre at ____ School". My friend, who ran the game, corrected me immediately and said, "That's not the name of that scenario. That's what YOU turned it into." <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite8" alt=":D" title="Big grin :D" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":D" /></p><p></p><p>So, yeah, we totally failed even though we killed the bad guys and didn't lose any equipment.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Hussar, post: 7731085, member: 22779"] An interesting thought. I watched the Youtube article linked above. He makes a pretty decent argument. In a video game, if you remove all elements of failure then, it really isn't a game anymore. I can see that. The problem with how that relates to the current discussion though is that the current discussion posits that only death or loss of equipment are valid failures. Sure, in a first person shooter, if you play on God Mode, it's not really much of a game anymore. But, even though D&D 5e is far less punishing than OD&D, it's not God Mode. Because we're talking about RPG's, win/loss has a much broader scope. Sure, you can lose by dying. You can lose by breaking your sword. But, you can also lose by failing to rescue the princess. I remember years ago playing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles with a very good friend of mine. In the scenario, your characters must rescue hostages being held at a school by bad guys. ((It's a long time ago, and I'm fuzzy on the exact details)) Now, when we played through it, we crushed the bad guys, but, all the hostages (or at least most of them) died in the process. Talking about the adventure later, I called it "Massacre at ____ School". My friend, who ran the game, corrected me immediately and said, "That's not the name of that scenario. That's what YOU turned it into." :D So, yeah, we totally failed even though we killed the bad guys and didn't lose any equipment. [/QUOTE]
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