What Do You Think Of As "Modern TTRPG Mechanics"?

[Thomas Shey]

Naw... There is absolutely no functional difference between what WW calls a ST vs what D&D calls a GM. Neither system has mechanics to give players or rules agency over the GM/ST rulings.

While I don't really disagree with your point, I think even at that point there were some differences in how they presented the role of the two. Whether that showed up in play is a different question.

 

[Desdichado]

I don't know for sure about "modern" vs... what, non-modern? Old? Primitive? What's the operating word for "not modern?" I think rather that RPG mechanics have done through waves of what was or wasn't faddish. Modern can be a question of perspective; is it newer than older stuff? Is it older than even newer stuff? Is 3e a modern game? Compared to what other games?

The earliest wave of design was very wargamish, obviously, and focused on tactical type combat. After that, there was a big wave of simulationist mechanics. Even as playstyle went through separate fads, I don't think the mechanics necessarily matched the playstyles super well. We now live in an era of splintered mechanics. 4e and 5e are heavily focused on tactical combat. Although 5e claims to be quick and easy to run and relatively light, it's not compared to other games. Pathfinder is even more gamist, focused heavily on character builds, optimization, and tactical combat. Are these not modern systems? PbtA have gone a completely different direction and have taken the indie game mechanics by storm, with tons of copycat games. This is a relatively "modern" conceit; the idea of narrative meta-mechanics and players forcing the game in a way that previously would have been the sovereign territory of GMs only.

The OSR, ironically given its name and genesis, has kind of devolved into simply rules-light indie games that may or may not even bear much resemblance to D&D specifically at all anymore; I'd say that most of the more recent games in this space are decidedly "modern" in spite of the purported "old school" nature of the playstyle that they're supposed to emulate.

I think the more interesting question, because it's actually answerable, is the last one of the OP; do I care if mechanics are modern or not? No, not in the least. Do I care that the mechanics are fit to function, i.e., do they accomplish what I need the specific mechanics to do better than other alternatives that may have been in place earlier? If they are, I don't care if they're new or old, only that they do what I want them to do. And in that case, my playstyle matters more than mechanics, or in other words, do the mechanics support my preferred playstyle? And that's a bit difficult to define maybe too; I often say that I'm old-fashioned but not old school, that I'm "paleo-trad"; kind of like regular trad play, but without the excesses and stumbles that people made in the late 70s and 80s in trying to define what trad meant, hopefully. My own game is broadly compatible with OSR principles, although I'm not really very aligned with the OSR as a playstyle, but I'm perfectly happy to add any mechanics that I like better as needed, hence I have minions, "action points" of a sort, advantage/disadvantage, etc. and many other "modern" mechanics grafted in. With a playstyle that I consider "Call of Cthulhu horror/investigation" and mechanics that I consider "a heavily revised rules light D&D variation" in a fantasy sword & sorcery-like setting.

But I don't consider my playstyle modern, since it's been more or less unchanged other than refinement of what works since the 1980s. Some of my mechanics are, admittedly, rather modernish innovations that once I saw, I was immediately struck with how well they would do compared to what I was doing previously.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well, that's a different set of problems; you see it often with game systems that are D&D 5e based where you ask if there's a real reason for that in actual design rather than marketing and familiarity, but I've seen some PbtA based games where I had to ask if they really thought about whether that was the best choice for what they were trying to do, too (and to be clear, some others where it absolutely looked like a good choice--I understand perfectly well why Monster of the Week is, for example).

Monster of the Week is the only PBtA I can get behind. We're playing it next week.

 

[Thomas Shey]

It's not a question of special purpose or general purpose tools here. It's the extremely value-laden comparison of intentional vs aimless or the idea that designing a fun game, even if not designing specific purpose tools, could somehow be "aimless" as if it's someone wandering in the wilderness or lacking intention as if it doesn't have an end goal in mind. The pretense is that somehow one is inherently superior to the other.

I don't disagree that's a pretty semantically loaded term when used too broadly; I do, however, think in at least some cases its not inaccurate. As I said, if you're just plopping down subsystems as you get to them (and its hard to see some games as having been done otherwise) I don't know that I can see "aimless" as an inappropriate term. I think the cases where people have designed a coherent game system that doesn't really seem aimed at what you'd expect it to be aimed at are a different beast (though whether the term to use for that would be more complimentary I'm not sure).

 

[loverdrive]

Well, that's a different set of problems; you see it often with game systems that are D&D 5e based where you ask if there's a real reason for that in actual design rather than marketing and familiarity, but I've seen some PbtA based games where I had to ask if they really thought about whether that was the best choice for what they were trying to do, too (and to be clear, some others where it absolutely looked like a good choice--I understand perfectly well why Monster of the Week is, for example).

Honestly, at most PbtA games I scream "what the hell are you doing?!" and I'm famously a big fan of the Apocalypse World.

It's very, very rarely I see a PbtA game that seems to understand how the engine works, and what it's good at. Night Witches, Undying, Urban Shadows, Monsterhearts, Monster of the Week (although I think it's overall pretty shabbily built) and... Nothing else.

Most of the time I see games about slow tense investigations or cute fluffy friendship is magic adventures or deep character explorations being built on top of a resolution system specifically geared towards making sure that everything will always go downhill and all and any situation can instantly break out in violence. Y'know, like you'd expect in a world where everyone is always starved for something.

...I'm also guilty of such inane designs too. Swords under the Sun is truly my worst game.

Spoiler: rant

And there's also plenty of just outright slop. The Root RPG doesn't seem to be designed at all, Avatar RPG is... What the hell is even going on in that game, it doesn't seem to be accurate to the show nor interesting on its own — but it's fine, those aren't games anyway, they are merch.

You don't buy Avatar Legends RPG because you want to play it, you but it because you watched the show as a kid and it was fun and it's capitalistic hellscape of 2025 and all hobbies are just consumerism.

 

[Thomas Shey]

There's a bit of a gap between "knowing the difference between them" and "actively denigrating one" though.

General purpose tools are not "aimless", and dismissing them as such does come across as pretty condescending or pretentious. Sorry.

I'm not defending the semantic loading on this if you see my follow-up post.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Honestly, at most PbtA games I scream "what the hell are you doing?!" and I'm famously a big fan of the Apocalypse World.

It's very, very rarely I see a PbtA game that seems to understand how the engine works, and what it's good at.

Most of the time I see games about slow tense investigations or cute fluffy friendship is magic adventures or deep character explorations being built on top of a resolution system specifically geared towards making sure that everything will always go downhill and all and any situation can instantly break out in violence. Y'know, like you'd expect in a world where everyone is always starved for something.

...I'm also guilty of such inane designs too.

That may be a result of PBtA engine being a victim of " New Hotness Syndrome" (despite not actually being all that new by now). It is IMO somewhat trendy to use.

 

[Thomas Shey]

We're talking about whether or not someone is designing with intent, or aimlessly.

Here you appear to be explicitly stating that it is impossible to have a valid intention other than to have mechanics tied to the overt support of a single clear theme. That Steve Jackson designs aimlessly and without intent, because his game lacks an adequate theme.

Look at my further posts and see if you still read me as saying that.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I'm not defending the semantic loading on this if you see my follow-up post.

But you are using the term knowing the loading is there and will be noted.

 

[SableWyvern]

Look at my further posts and see if you still read me as saying that.

Yes, I do still read it that way.

From this post, it appears you're saying that's not what you mean but, in that case, I have no clue what point you were intending to make.

In the context of the overall discussion, your position appears to me to be that GURPS lacks a single overt theme with mechanics designed explicitly to support engaging with that theme in play, and thus you conclude that the designer lacked a clear intent.