"The term 'GNS' is moronic and annoying" – well this should be an interesting interview

[MGibster]

Where's @Snarf Zagyg when you need him? This seems right up his alley.

 

[Thomas Shey]

He says the rulebooks are a mess, and that people having fun playing AD&D 2nd ed are selecting from and/or adding to the books to create the actual game they're playing.

This actually relates to @kenada's point about design. A lot of published RPG books take it for granted that the players of the game will build a good chunk of the process of play themselves. Gygax and Arneson got away with this, because they expected their readers/players to bring tabletop wargame intuitions and procedures to the table. But it's weird that RPGing has stuck to that paradigm - of presenting incomplete rules texts - for so long.

Not universally, of course, but in many cases.

Once a hobby develops certain cultural expectations, it can be very hard for them to get dislodged. Even more so when people have convinced themselves an element is a virtue.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I immediately think of people like @pemerton and @Manbearcat who do seem to be getting a lot of happy, satisfying gaming.

Really, this is is an artifact often as much of the injured-wail effect, where if someone is just getting by acceptably or having an active good time, you'll rarely hear about it; its the problems you'll hear about.

Its one of the reasons looking up a given medical procedure is usually a mistake; you'll always here ten times as many things about it going wrong as right, but if you investigate the actual statistics, the actual occurrence is the other way around or mores so.

 

[dragoner]

Ron Edwards is the John Galt of the RPG scene. Who? lol

 

[kenada]

I understand your urge here, but the truth is, genuinely original work is rare in everything; even the majority of what most people consider high quality creations are recombinations that do something useful, different or entertaining.

Hence more. Look at how many video games are released (e.g., ~14k were released on Steam last year per SteamDB). A lot of those are crappy or derivative (or asset flips), but sometimes someone hits on something new or an interesting take on an existing genre.

 

[niklinna]

Hence more. Look at how many video games are released (e.g., ~14k were released on Steam last year per SteamDB). A lot of those are crappy or derivative (or asset flips), but sometimes someone hits on something new or an interesting take on an existing genre.

He keeps putting out remixed editions! This seems to be the latest.

 

[Bacon Bits]

Yes, but is he wrong?

Given that GNS is, in part, supposed to tell you why people have fun playing RPGs... Yes, he is probably wrong. Because, IIRC, many of the games he claims are "bad" or "played wrong" are, for the people actually playing them, wildly fun.

In other words, for a theory that's supposed to describe why people have fun with RPGs, it doesn't seem to describe why a lot of people are spending their free time having fun playing the RPGs that they do. Instead, it tries to tell those people that what they're doing is badwrongfun. That's weird. A design theory shouldn't tell us why the players are wrong. It should tell us why the design is wrong. Because we have to trust that the players are going to choose what works best for what they want.

At best, I think you could say that sometimes people play games too long. After they've worn out their welcome, and grown to identify the warts, and can't see the fun for the frustrating mechanics, people continue to play the same games instead of maybe moving on to a better one. But, at worst, I think that can be explained simply by friction and sunk cost fallacies. I don't think you need to say that a game is bad simply because you stop having fun with it. You can't easily extract an objective truth from subjective experiences, especially ones as complicated as social activities. There's all kinds of idioms and psychology around this kind of behavior. "The grass is always greener," "perfect is the enemy of good," "force of habit," "inertia," "this game is good enough," "friction," etc.

People continue to play World of Warcraft long after they've exhausted all the content. They do so often because it's simply habit and it's where your friends are. The game stops being the point of the activity. The point is to hang out with friends and do some activity. It could be bowling or poker or board games or D&D. I think for a lot of people, the purpose of the game is to be the activity that fades into the background but fills space when there's nothing else going on. The enjoyment changes from learning new things and challenging yourself, to exercising your practiced skills in a flow state.

Honestly, it feels like trying to say that people ride bicycles to challenge themselves athletically and to improve their sense of balance, which is pretty true of people picking up bike riding or taking up competitive racing. But people just use bikes as a vehicle, too. Or to see things, or get out of the house.

 

[Bacon Bits]

I think your only experiencing a fraction of the medium then, maybe? Mechanics and process of play can lead to a number of things. I might agree there's an immediacy to narrative in RPGs that is not generally present in other games, certainly not with the same depth. Verisimilitude might not always be the primary goal though.

You're going to have to be more specific.

 

[Wolfpack48]

Of course that can often be less a flaw in the game per se, than them using the wrong tool for the job. And there can be any number of practical reasons for doing that, most of them more social than anything else.

Yep, in the video he mentions it could be cultural as well as rule based. I think he wanted to focus on rules that would lead to better tools and hence improvements at the table. And give more alternatives if the table isn't a good fit. For tables where all are having fun, there's nothing to worry about.

I do remember he bashed 2e pretty harshly. Maybe that was more due to organization and the growth of all the classes in the splatbooks(?). Not sure about that part of the video.

 

[Wolfpack48]

Given that GNS is, in part, supposed to tell you why people have fun playing RPGs... Yes, he is probably wrong. Because, IIRC, many of the games he claims are "bad" or "played wrong" are, for the people actually playing them, wildly fun.

In other words, for a theory that's supposed to describe why people have fun with RPGs, it doesn't seem to describe why a lot of people are spending their free time having fun playing the RPGs that they do. Instead, it tries to tell those people that what they're doing is badwrongfun. That's weird. A design theory shouldn't tell us why the players are wrong. It should tell us why the design is wrong. Because we have to trust that the players are going to choose what works best for what they want.

He veers strongly away from GNS theory in the videos and focuses more on tables with players who are struggling with their current tables or rules or player agency. He goes out of his way in the video to define 'bad' as player unhappiness with their current cultural and rule approaches, not 'bad' games. He's pointing to narrative approaches as one of things that can help those players.

He doesn't bash games much here - well, 2e and White Wolf a bit...but focus is mostly on helping players who want to be having more fun in the hobby.