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Message: <blockquote data-quote="innerdude" data-source="post: 6847839" data-attributes="member: 85870">The problem I see with evolving RPGs in a "board game" direction is that they run directly opposed to the primary value offered by an RPG over a board game in the first place --- evolving narrative and a sense of control over the narrative. I've said it before on these forums, but the 100%, pure unadulterated "gamists" who really don't want to engage RPGs on anything other than a tactical challenge level would really better be served moving to something else. cRPGs, tactical board games, Magic, Android: Netrunner, the Drizzt/Ashardalon board games, whatever. Trying to turn an RPG purely into an exercise based on "board game" principles simply defeats the purpose. You can have tactical game aspects AND shared narrative experiences in an RPG, but the farther you go towards the tactical game side, the harder it is to make a workable RPG. The people who want the shared narrative aspects simply get frustrated, because they're spending too much time in the tactical portion of the game, and the tactical gamists just start to wonder why it's so much stinkin' work just to get to the "fun parts" of smashing orcs. And I think the proliferation of the "tactical-pseudo-RPG" games we see on mobile devices bears this out. How many people at your job do you know who pour hundreds of hours and dollars into stuff like Clash of Clans and Star Wars: Commanders, yet you'd never once think of approaching them to join your RPG group? (I know at least a dozen people who fit this description.)I had a friend in grad school who was exactly this way. He'd geek out over Batman Asylum on XBox360, play HeroClix 8 to 10 hours a week, and had a fantasy book library a mile long----but simply had zero desire to cross over and even try an RPG. And frankly, I respected him for that. He knew exactly what he was looking for. I think part of the problems RPGs have is that we all know a guy/gal like that that we're sure would love to "cross over" to RPGs if we could just give him/her the right experience, when really, they just like the tactical fun of building a card deck / party of heroes and seeing how well it blasts stuff to pieces.I'd be willing to posit that though there is some crossover between the self-identified "board game" and "RPG" crowds, the flow of cross over is vastly unequal. I'd bet that the vast majority of  self-identified "RPG" players would also self-identify as "board gamers." Whereas I suspect only a small minority of "board gamers" also self-identify as "RPG-ers."</blockquote>

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