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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5768936" data-attributes="member: 42582">That's very generous. (And so is the rest of your post.)I only came into this thread because you mentioned me in an earlier post.That could well be true. I think it's very hard to judge these things on a messageboard, and I swing back and forth.Sometimes I think that these discussions about playstyle exaggerate differences that may not be so apparent in the real world of playing a game at a table. But then I read posts (although I haven't got any particular posts in mind at present) that make me think that some people really do have different ways of playing.The main difference for me, between the way I GM 4e and the way I've GMed more "mainstream" (simulationist, exploration-focused) RPGs in the past, is that in 4e I have to exercise less discretion as a GM in toggling the mechanics on and off in the interests of pacing/structure. In all sorts of ways (the rest rules are just one example, the skill challenge rules another) it facilitates the "closing" of scenes without them dragging on with no natural, mechanically-delivered stopping point. (And I don't like the GM-override aspect of just suspending the rules. It also tends to produce the metagaming issues your model bridge example discussed.)This is what I was hoping for from 4e when the preview conversations were happening, and as far as I'm concerned the game has delivered. And so it was with these sorts of hopes and expectations in mind that I read Wyatt's DMG, and it is with the confirmation of experience that I reread it. And one thing I see him saying - and, for me, the most important thing - is that not everything that happens to the PCs is part of play. Not everything engages the action resolution mechanics. Some things are just colour, and the GM should cheerfully (and quickly) free-narrate through them. The implication - cashed out in other parts of the rules - is that this will not disempower but empower players, because they will get to make the choices where the real action is - and those choices will contribute colour, but not only colour.(There is the incoherence I mentioned in response to BryonD about who has authority over framing situations. I don't think I've ever said that the game as presented is perfect!)No worries. I'm always happy to talk about my play experiences. (Naturally, I try to present them in a favourable light! - in particular, I edit out most of the kid-wrangling, which can spoil all structure and pacing. Of course, Wyatt's DMG tells me to hire a babysitter, but having the kids with me has become integral to my RPG experience - for me and two other players, taking the kids with us is part of the quid quo pro for the "RPG widowhood" of our partners.)For my group, game 20 is a year later, and in that time there will have been enough variation in encounter/scenario structure, tropes etc that any recognised resemblence will serve the purposes of nostalgia rather than repetition. I agree with all this except for the first paragraph. It makes me revise my earlier comment - given that one of the players had worked out there were hidden mages behind one of the two unexplored doors, I should not have left it to chance that the doors be inspected in the suspense-building order.The discovery was made by the player - who paid attention to how the spell-channelling pillars worked in the earlier encounter. And it was part of that player's PC's role/character - he is the scholar-mage who is the weakest PC in combat but their out-of-combat go-to-guy for all things mysterious and magical.All of this, as you say, contributed to the nice way in which the sequence played out. If it had been different - no anticipation, or anticipation due to a different player working out, the pacing considerations would have been different (and, on the whole, less urgent, because less would have been at stake for just the reasons you give).I think what I'm saying - that the Wyatt quote is not terrible advice, and not outrageous.As I posted a little bit above, I agree with BryonD that the quote captures what many don't like about 4e. But that is because of what 4e is. It's not anything specially objectionable about the quote.</blockquote>

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