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<blockquote data-quote="innerdude" data-source="post: 6581902" data-attributes="member: 85870"><p>This is....interesting. I'm trying to compare this to my experiences as a GM, now that I've got some more experience actually under my belt. Up until 2011, In 25+ years of gaming I didn't have the requisite GM experience (nor, frankly the interest or means) to gauge just what exactly my play groups were trying to accomplish during gameplay. </p><p></p><p>D&D 3.x really does push either a highly "gamist" approach (character build, challenges) that takes little interest in "Story Now" per se, or it tries to subsume the gamism into a semi-coherent "simulationism" that tries to build on idea that because characters and NPCs are built on the same framework, that the whole world can be modeled using the basic PC traits/skills/feats (lol, I almost called feats "Edges," my Savage Worlds immersion has taken deep root). </p><p></p><p>It really doesn't focus on "Story" as an agenda, other than through illusionism. </p><p></p><p>But there's another piece to this, which is that I've been highly, highly conscious during my two most recent campaigns (a "traditional " fantasy and a near-future Deus Ex, both using Savage Worlds) of the whole "Say yes or roll the dice" advice. And it's been remarkable what has changed with my group's approach to their characters. </p><p></p><p>Suddenly, their place in the fiction has come sharply into more focus, because I'm not dithering around with them over mechanical and world-building minutiae. Instead of wasting time trying to "optimize" their character, or find mechanical loopholes to "win" a combat/scene, they are more thoughtfully considering why their character has a purpose in the game at all. And it's actually been very jarring for one of my players (my wife's younger sister), who is so ingrained in adversarial GM style that it's taking her some time to sort it out ("What, you mean you WANT my character to succeed at stuff because it's actually INTERESTING when she does?"). </p><p></p><p>And I agree with you, the idea that slavish adherence to causal process interpreted through "rules as physics" makes it much harder to do that (unless you find a system that can radically streamline that causal process interpretation while still producing plausible results). </p><p></p><p>For me, 4e just doesn't meet my minimum levels of internal consistency and causal logic. The metagame "proud nails" of 4e are just too frequent and obvious, though at this point I frankly can't even swallow "core" D&D-isms like armor class, hit points, and "Vancian" magic, let alone be bothered to deal with AEDU. </p><p></p><p>But ultimately, my journey to Savage Worlds was largely driven by the same impulse---I don't want "process sim," I want <em>character-based fictional positioning</em> where the characters have real stakes with what is happening in the fiction. And as you noted, [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION], that is a wholly independent aim as a GM than simply driving "realistic" results. I've discovered that I'm not terribly interested in "realism"---what I'm really after is "plausibility." And that plausibility may be a result of character interaction with the game world, it may be based on genre tropes, it may be based on mechanical interactions.</p><p></p><p>So what it is it about 4e that so uniquely pushes characters into fictional positioning "spaces" that allow for this kind of play? Because even having thoroughly engaged with much of [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] 's descriptions, I still have a hard time understanding how players selecting a bunch of powers/exploits/spells drives this.</p><p></p><p>I know Savage Worlds works in this way because 1) the underlying core mechanic makes plausible "process sim" elegant and easy, and 2) characters generally have more freedom to build their character the way they want (free-form, skill-based advancement vs. class and level). If a character doesn't fit into the player's "vision" it's absolutely no one's fault but their own; there's no "accidental" choosing the wrong class, etc. Players get to really define their own vision for a character, and resolving those character actions mechanically is fast, elegant, and produces plausible results the majority of the time. </p><p></p><p>Because I'm not worrying about mechanical resolution issues, I have huge amounts of freedom as a GM to focus my energies <em>on the fiction</em>. </p><p></p><p>But how does 4e do it?</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="innerdude, post: 6581902, member: 85870"] This is....interesting. I'm trying to compare this to my experiences as a GM, now that I've got some more experience actually under my belt. Up until 2011, In 25+ years of gaming I didn't have the requisite GM experience (nor, frankly the interest or means) to gauge just what exactly my play groups were trying to accomplish during gameplay. D&D 3.x really does push either a highly "gamist" approach (character build, challenges) that takes little interest in "Story Now" per se, or it tries to subsume the gamism into a semi-coherent "simulationism" that tries to build on idea that because characters and NPCs are built on the same framework, that the whole world can be modeled using the basic PC traits/skills/feats (lol, I almost called feats "Edges," my Savage Worlds immersion has taken deep root). It really doesn't focus on "Story" as an agenda, other than through illusionism. But there's another piece to this, which is that I've been highly, highly conscious during my two most recent campaigns (a "traditional " fantasy and a near-future Deus Ex, both using Savage Worlds) of the whole "Say yes or roll the dice" advice. And it's been remarkable what has changed with my group's approach to their characters. Suddenly, their place in the fiction has come sharply into more focus, because I'm not dithering around with them over mechanical and world-building minutiae. Instead of wasting time trying to "optimize" their character, or find mechanical loopholes to "win" a combat/scene, they are more thoughtfully considering why their character has a purpose in the game at all. And it's actually been very jarring for one of my players (my wife's younger sister), who is so ingrained in adversarial GM style that it's taking her some time to sort it out ("What, you mean you WANT my character to succeed at stuff because it's actually INTERESTING when she does?"). And I agree with you, the idea that slavish adherence to causal process interpreted through "rules as physics" makes it much harder to do that (unless you find a system that can radically streamline that causal process interpretation while still producing plausible results). For me, 4e just doesn't meet my minimum levels of internal consistency and causal logic. The metagame "proud nails" of 4e are just too frequent and obvious, though at this point I frankly can't even swallow "core" D&D-isms like armor class, hit points, and "Vancian" magic, let alone be bothered to deal with AEDU. But ultimately, my journey to Savage Worlds was largely driven by the same impulse---I don't want "process sim," I want [I]character-based fictional positioning[/I] where the characters have real stakes with what is happening in the fiction. And as you noted, [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION], that is a wholly independent aim as a GM than simply driving "realistic" results. I've discovered that I'm not terribly interested in "realism"---what I'm really after is "plausibility." And that plausibility may be a result of character interaction with the game world, it may be based on genre tropes, it may be based on mechanical interactions. So what it is it about 4e that so uniquely pushes characters into fictional positioning "spaces" that allow for this kind of play? Because even having thoroughly engaged with much of [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] 's descriptions, I still have a hard time understanding how players selecting a bunch of powers/exploits/spells drives this. I know Savage Worlds works in this way because 1) the underlying core mechanic makes plausible "process sim" elegant and easy, and 2) characters generally have more freedom to build their character the way they want (free-form, skill-based advancement vs. class and level). If a character doesn't fit into the player's "vision" it's absolutely no one's fault but their own; there's no "accidental" choosing the wrong class, etc. Players get to really define their own vision for a character, and resolving those character actions mechanically is fast, elegant, and produces plausible results the majority of the time. Because I'm not worrying about mechanical resolution issues, I have huge amounts of freedom as a GM to focus my energies [I]on the fiction[/I]. But how does 4e do it? [/QUOTE]
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