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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Stormonu" data-source="post: 5034710" data-attributes="member: 52734">I disagree.  The reason for combat rules were there because you couldn't take the DM (or player) outside and beat them with a stick to a get a result.  You could use your own interpersonal skills to try and talk make a deal with the DM playing the Duke, answer a riddle or how you were going to open a particular door or what not.  Back in the day, Gary and crew thought this to be the superior way to handle things.  The random rolls in early D&D were only for those things you couldn't do sitting at a table - picking a lock, disarming a deadly trap, using magic or sucker-punching an illithid.From at least 1E or earlier there were consistent rules for other things in D&D besides combat.  And those rules were "your character knows what you know."  This was the old answer for things that came up in the game.  Later on, it became more and more important to separate what your character knew and could do from what you the player knew and could do - thus expanded mechanics for systems beyond combat.  By 3E, the difference between what the character could accomplish and what the player could accomplish had reached its greatest point.  Perhaps the best example is the use of Knowledge checks to know information about monsters.  Compare that to 1E and 2E where what you knew about monsters depended largely on how many times you'd encountered them in past sessions/campaigns or read out of the MM.Quite true, what is usually telling is how much time is spent on combat rules and options vs. other part of the game.  Likewise, its often telling in whether combat is a different subsystem or is rolled right into the system's overall framework.  None of these stop a game from an RPG, but they sure point a finger on what they think is important.  Dungeons & Dragon Miniatures/Mageknight/Battletech is definately a wargame.  You don't do anything but fight.Look at White Wolf's game - combat is handled pretty much like any other skill check in the game (ability + skill, count rolls on 1d10 that are 8 or higher).  Combat generally has no more subsystems than any other part of the game (compare the Majesty power of a Deava vampire to the Brawling attack of a Brujah vampire, for example).  You could be in fights all night in a WoD game, or just one and it would only give you 1 XP - of possibly 5.1E leans towards rule resolution dealing with combat.  You don't gain XP in this version for non-combat activities - the only way to literally go up is kill monsters and steal their treasure.  There are some out-of-combat abilities (thief's abilities, some spells, optional "secondary roles" and the like), but most role-playing in the game only comes out of the gaming advice in the PHB & DMG and not rules.  Yet, during its day it is most decidedly thought of as an RPG.2E is like 1E, but adds in XP for things beside combat.  Many options are added in (like kits and NWP) that have little or nothing to do with combat but are designed to round out the character.  I'd personally say in many ways it's evolved into a full-fledge roleplaying system, though it still (heavily) shows its wargame roots.3E pretty much falls in the middle; a more intense subsystem for combat that supports a battlegrid and multiple resolution rolls to decide outcome, with a skill system that can handle results with a single cast of the die for most actions beyond the combat arena.  Still, while heavy on combat there are plenty of abilities and items that have nothing to do with combat (Quaal's feather tokens, as a minor example).  An RPG with a heavy wargame simulator, to be sure.4E gives the impression it leans towards an even heavier combat engine.  Skills and Skill challenges cover some aspects beyond the combat arena, but the game moves towards a more 1E approach to non-combat situations; your character is good at it if the player says so (and the DM agrees).  Oddly, most of the RP advice has moved to the DMG, where players may never see it.  Does an RPG need rules other than combat rules to be successful?  I believe it does, or you're just playing a boardgame/wargame.  You can RP in those as well, but it's not the norm or the game's intent you do so.  Is 4E, with its heavy combat emphasis, then an RPG?  Yes, though more in the 1E sensibilities than the more modern RPGs that I'm used to dealing with (Lot5R, WoD, Serenity, Burning Wheel, etc.)  However, I think 4E has become polarized to those who enjoy a tactical game of combat to a fantasy world simulator or storytime hour.</blockquote>

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