Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7393530" data-attributes="member: 42582">As well as what AbdulAlhazred said, I'm pretty confident that Eero Tuovinen is a hell of a lot more learned about Sorcerer, DitV, HeroWars/Quest and the other "standard narrativistic model" games he mentions than posters who have never even read the rules for them!And even consider some of the non-narrativistic games he mentions - Lanefan and Maxperson, have you ever played Trail of Cthulhu? Do you know how the GUMSHOE system works? If not, how do you know whether Eero is right or wrong to say that "narration sharing" would or wouldn't be a good fit for that system?There's an actual thing that actually happens in the world: RPGing in accordance with what Eero Tuovinen calls the "standard narrativistic model". There are certain games that are designed to support this sort of play: Eero mentions some, and there are others too (Burning Wheel; a certain approach to Cortex+ Heroic; a certain approach to Fate; a certain approach to 4e). You can do it with AD&D (I know, because I have) and also therefore I would guess 5e, but in both cases there will be elements of the system that you bump into in the attempt (eg rather weak non-combat conflict resolution).Eero gives a nice account of it. Clearer and more focused than Ron Edwards' attempt in <a href="http://www.indie-rpgs.com/_articles/narr_essay.html" target="_blank">an earlier essay</a>, though less wide-ranging.What is slightly odd about this particular sub-tangent of the thread is to have people who have never read the rules for most of these systems try and explain that allowing a player to declare an action which results in discovery of a secret door whose existence, in the setting, wasn't already noted in the GM's notes or wasn't determined by some other GM-side proxy for notes, like a random roll for secret door existence contradicts Eero's account of backstory authority. When, in fact, some of the games that he points to as fitting with his account of backstory authority permit that very thing, or things like it.It's doubly odd because it's really quite easy to see what Eero's concern is: namely, that narration sharing that collides with GM backstory authority defuses tension and produces anti-climax. He literally tells us as much, and provides illustrations that reinforce the point. And it's then equally easy to see that the sort of action declaration I've just described typically will not have such an effect, and hence he has no reason to object to it. And obviously doesn't, given that he praises games some of which permit it!Do you really believe this?Just to be clear: you assert that, as roleplaying experiences, there is no difference between a TPK resulting from playing through a situation using the combat rules, and the Gm just declaring "rocks fall, everybody dies".And you likewise assert that the only difference between "winging it" (ie the GM making up stuff but pretending it was in his/her notes) and a player declaring an action which, if successful, establishes some new element of the fiction like a secret door, is that the latter is improper winging it because the player knows how the element was authored?Or do you have some other point you're trying to make?</blockquote>

Verification