What's more important: core rules or adventures?

[NN]

I dont know and dont care about the importance of adventures to 4E.

But I am sure that, were you to launch a new system or setting, a good early set of adventures would be vital. I want to see the mechanics or cool setting details in action.



BTW, isnt the utterly useless sample adventure a staple of all Fantasy Heartbreakers. (Heres a fantastic new system thats so much better than D&D!...oh and by the way, to prove it heres a sample adventure which would D&D players would have laughed as cliched in 1978)

 

[GSHamster]

I think this question would be better phrased as: Which has higher marginal value, rules or adventures?

Let's say you already own 3 rulebooks and 3 adventures. Would you rather buy another book of rules or another adventure?

 

[Crazy Jerome]

First, I'll give you a somewhat different answer depending on whether you mean more important for the game to be a commercial/critical/celebrity success, versus more important for the game to run well at a given table and thus satisfy the participants.

I'll not spend much time on the wider option. I'll merely note that if you produce adventures that people really do enjoy simply reading, you'll have a measure of the wider success that has little to do with the game at the table. Nor does this difference stop there.

Limited to working at a table, though, I say that there are certain minimums that have to be met, and from then on, there is an inverse relationship between the importance of the system versus the adventures. That is, if the system and the adventures are all bad enough, it really doesn't matter, right? Which would you rather have, me banging on your right thumb with this ball peen hammer, or dropping this mini sledge on your bare toe?

Get over that barrier, and the inverse relationship takes hold. Got barely adequate adventures. Hey guess what, I better be able to easily roll my own using the system, even if not predisposed to do so, and the system better be good enough on its own to justify this work. Start making your adventures better, and there isn't such pressure on the system. Make them a whole lot better, and suddenly some of those warts in the system-- that didn't matter all that much when the system was caring your group bodily though bad adventures--start to look a bit iffy.

 

[howandwhy99]

The core rules are what are used repeatedly regardless of the adventure.

The adventure is the interesting configuration of those core rules into a playable scenario.

Think of it like a Rubik's Cube. The relatively stable pattern of mechanics that makes up the puzzle are what we'd call the core rules. The configuration of the cube is the adventure. What the players attempt to do with it is up to them.

Another analogy is computers. A computer computes, it is designed for code breaking, manipulation, and storage. A computer game program is a particular code designed to operate within the computers already designed configuration. The level building or game elements designed with the particular game program is the adventure, a configuration of the code. These don't have hard and fast terms in the computer game industry, but they basically include "game engine" "core game" and "game expansions".

To really answer the question depends upon the player. In a game of Advanced Squad Leader do you not care what scenario you play, as long as you are playing ASL? Then you prefer the core rules. Is it the particular ASL scenario (module) you want to play and don't really care if the rules are house ruled or if it is even run under a different system? Then you prefer adventures.

Like most people here I'd answer both. The adventure design and the core rules design both need to be well crafted.

And, like needing a good computer to run a game, a good RPG referee or GM is needed to really run a quality game. Neither the core rules nor adventure need come from them, but they must be conversant and prepared with both before play.

 

[chaochou]

Trying to think of my personal preferences...

When I'm GMing I guess my priority is with the rules - they have to be offering me something, new possibilities, new way of handling drama or action or scenes or stories. I have to be excited by the possibilities.

A while back I got Beat to Quarters, an rpg about the crews of Age of Sail warships. I thought the genre might be interesting, but having got it - well, it's okay, but it didn't make me go 'Yeah, I'm running this!'

Recently I got hold of a copy of Weapons of the Gods, and even though I'm really deep in a game of Apocalypse World right now in the back of my mind I know I've got to run a crazy king-fu kick-ass martial arts game sometime soon.

I can't GM unless I'm enthused by the rules.

As a player, both is the ideal. If I was forced to play a one-shot game with one being terrible and the other being great (rules or scenario) - I'd go for terrible rules.

 

[caudor]

Core rules without adventures is like a smile with a missing tooth.

 

[Zelda Themelin]

I like core rules, but I always have adventures from any system if they seemed interesting, for inspiration or use as they are or if it was really good adventure I converted it to system I play at time.

I order form Paizo a lot. I miss old Dungon magizine, but Paizo modules are fine too. My little gripe is that they always stop at lv 16. And I think, that alone proves that they didn't fix enough issues of 3.x to Pathfinder what comes to high level play.
There isn't single module meant for higher level and that's on purpose.

So my gripe is. While you make core rules and adventures, make sure those adventures cover whole spectrum of levels/power level or don't make those levels exist at all. Seriously. I like higher level play, and it annoys me that I will have to start making my own adventures completely on my own just when it gets most complicated and would be really nice to have some support from experienced designers. Who are experienced enough to know not to go there apparently. And my D&D games never stop at lv 16, they usually stop at lv 24.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think the core rules are very important because those are the game. However i prefer there to be a single rule book (perhaps a monster manual) and all other books to be adventures and setting material ( both because i dont like having to invest in a growing rules system and i dont like growing rules systems). I very rarely run modules as written but i do use them for ideas, npcs, maps etc.

 

[Wicht]

I order form Paizo a lot. I miss old Dungon magizine, but Paizo modules are fine too. My little gripe is that they always stop at lv 16. And I think, that alone proves that they didn't fix enough issues of 3.x to Pathfinder what comes to high level play.
There isn't single module meant for higher level and that's on purpose.

Give this a try for a high level module using the PFRPG ruleset.
The main difficulty with writing a high level module is the reality that each high level group is going to be vastly different, possessing vastly different abilities. Coliseum Morpheuon addresses this in, what I like to think is, a productive, engaging manner.

 

[Zelda Themelin]

Thank you, looks interesting. However I don't think various abilities (at least itemwise) would be problem if Paizo would just continue their adventure paths with 1 extra module. I don't mean all the time, but sometimes. Some of those more potential to go there, than others.