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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Emberashh" data-source="post: 9322744" data-attributes="member: 7040941">Perhaps unwise on my part to invite myself to talk to you again, so lets agree upfront not to argue. I'll answer questions but I'm just not going to engage any disagreements. I think we know how each other think at this point. The reason I did this though is just to note they are being snarky about a post I recently made, <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/theorycrafting-crafting-and-gathering.701654/post-9322400" target="_blank">right over here.</a> I do enjoy that you like the idea of it, even if the implementation may not get the same reception. It is cool. But in terms of how I'm using it and how that relates to a thematic premise, context becomes important. I'm writing story and lore into every single game mechanic. Thats best exemplified by how I wrote my take on races, which you can see an example of below, with what I lovingly call my Varangian Pigeon Swedish Chef people and my Maritimey Pirate Bears. Naturally, mechanically theres a lot here that might not have immediate significance if you haven't learned my game, but that's nothing to worry about for what we're talking about here. If you read these, you should find that there's a substantial and singular vision unifying all of this worldbuilding thats interlaced with how players choose to express who their characters are and where they come from. And if one reads carefully, they should notice too a lot of different story threads that not just those who pick from these could pull on, but so could anyone. But more than that, is the thematic core that players get to choose when their choice in a People interacts with their choice of Class, because Classes (of which I won't share an example because the few I "completed" are in desperate need of being entirely rewritren now that they're like, multiple versions of the game behind) are written in the exact same way, interlaced with lore, but also with a clear thematic guide into the story of that Class.When you are a Broad-Wing Knight, you're not just a big viking bird that sounds like the Swedish Chef. You are a part of a rich and storied People, and a Culture within them thats famous the world over not just for being scary as hell but also for their wonderful cuisine, praised the world over for its use of wild greens. And as a Knight, you aren't just a dork in steel, but a person of honor and Chivalry. Skilled at the arts of War and finer points of high society, and a Warrior of uncanny skill with a blade, a Knight is about becoming yet another who would find eternal glory on the battlefield, if not in song or legend, then surely in a glorious death. All of that story is given to you as a baseline to work with to explore your own, unique journey. And all of it is reflected mechanically. As a Martial you can don your wings in armor, and can move with your normal speed, reflecting exactly why the Broad-Wing are so damn scary. And as Broad-Wing, you get to use that imposing presence as a great boost in social scenarios, which blends immaculately well with the choice to play a Knight (or one of the Barbarians,  Bards, or Rogues). And apropos, your Peoples propensity for foraging for greens doesn't come to you as a piddly boost to just that, but as a fantastic tool to help your friends find anything they go looking for. This is all why I loved Dungeon Worlds original idea for Racial Class abilities, and why I scaled it up so every People has something very appropriate for every kind of Class. All of these things blend a rich lore with deep gameplay elements to, ultimately, help to immerse you into the world, so that when you want to explore a story, you're not just conjuring up plots. You're already a part of the world, and tied to so many things that could be happening, all you need to do is just play, and you'll come out the other end with a story to tell. And if you push a little bit more? All the better. Crafting on its own can, in fact, be an impetus for story and character motivation. Tolkien, the great inspiration to us all, laces Middle Earth with things like that, and nobody would dare to say that the story of the Silmarills, of the Arkenstone, or the significance of mining for Mithril, or something as innocuous, if wondrous, as Lambas were all pointless trivialities. In a book, focusing on how these things came to be doesn't work as that would seldom be appealing. But the key is that we are playing games, and so "doing" matters, not necessarily just telling. So while one might prefer something less robust than my take, Crafting that is just telling I don't think cuts it.</blockquote>

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