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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Andre" data-source="post: 4718392" data-attributes="member: 25930">Systems may or may not encourage "role playing", however one defines the term. But they have a huge impact on play styles.For example, when FASA first released the Star Trek RPG, they intentionally made phasers overwhelming. A near miss would knock out the average person, much less a direct hit. The point was they wanted to discourage combat, so they made combat very deadly - literally one roll could wipe out your character. So the rules encouraged - through risk/reward - to find non-combat solutions (in theory, at least).D&D, on the other hand, has always encouraged combat. Many of the rules center around combat. "Balancing" classes centers around combat abilities. In earlier versions, XP were awarded for only two achievements: acquiring treasure and killing things. I still remember Gary's article saying that characters who do not kill a monster deserve no experience because, well, they didn't kill the thing.Likewise, Champions/HERO uses various character disadvantages as part of character design. Psychological disads are generally seen as "cheap" points and many players load up their character with them. Those rules encourage players to develop that side of their character - not just the stats, but the character's personality. Systems, such as D&D, which ignore such fluff do not discourage players from developing backstories for their characters, but Champions actively encourages it. Does this add or subtract from roleplaying? That's up to the individual group. I've gamed with any number of players who always roleplay the same, regardless of the character and the rules. But the system seems to always impact how people will play a particular game - more for some than others, but always some impact.</blockquote>

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