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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7385530" data-attributes="member: 42582">I think "story now" is demanding not so much in the mechanical sense (4e or BW is mechanically demanding, but HeroQuest revised or Cortex+ Heroic really aren't) but in that the player has to have some vision for where s/he wants the game to go.And in any game that's not completely light-hearted, s/he has to be prepared to stick to some sort of vision even as his/her PC suffers adversity. I think that can turn out to be surprisingly hard for some players.This clear statement of preference made me think about my own.Introspection is hard, but I think I want to say this: most important to me is player engagement with, and investment in, the fiction. I want the players to care what happens in the game. I want it to go beyond mere pretending and into (what I call) "inhabitation". Things I think of are a player saying "I feel really good about not having killed that bear" - where they chose to tame rather than fight the bear not because it was easier (an elite 13th (?) level challenge either in combat or as a skill challenge) but because they cared about the life of an animal. Or the party spending an hour debating what to do about the name of the Raven Queen, because some want to promote her and others want to constrain here. Or the player of the epic tier fighter who is now the god of imprisonment giving an impassioned speech in the court of Yan-C-Bin about the fate that will befall any djinni who help precipitate a Dusk War - and spending an action point to make sure that the Intimidate check is a success.I've got nothing against crunchy mechanics - I play 4e and Burning Wheel, and spent nearly 20 years playing Rolemaster - but I don't want my RPGing to feel like wargaming. The mechanics should support inhabitation, and help my character feel like my character. They shouldn't create a pull to expedience that gets in the way of playing my character.For me, it is these reasons that make me favour a player-driven game. I'm sure creativity is in there somewhere, but that's not the primary concept or description that I emphasise.</blockquote>

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