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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5827654" data-attributes="member: 42582">S'mon's account of my style seems roughly accurate - and Elf Witch's also. It is Forge-y by ENworld standards, I think, though probably not by Forge standards. The basic approach is strong GM authority over scene framing (it's not a sandbox) and strong player authority over PC response to said scenes (it's not a railroad). Plot emerges out of this.Backstory authority is shared, although for the players tends to be confined to their PCs and immediate environs (eg players can introduce cities, secret societies etc for their PCs to come from, belong to etc, but they generally can't make up that the NPC they just met is actually their PC's long lost father). Theme is an evolving thing, but is driven by the choices the players make in relation to their PCs, and the scenes the GM frames in response to those choices. Given we're playing Rolemaster and D&D, we're not talking Forge-type themes here, but the sort of stuff that can be done with classic fantasy tropes. Think movies like Excalibur or Hero, but often not getting to quite those levels of grandeur!As to whether D&D supports this style of play - it can be done easily enough in AD&D if you ignore alignment, use a variant XP system, and don't start at 1st level if you want to have much combat. Rolemaster is good on the PC build side but has some issues on the action resolution side. I don't think 3E is especially good for it, because it has much the same action resolution issues as Rolemaster without (I think) the same degree of support on the PC build side.As it turns out, I've found 4e to suit it very well because it offers strong support on the PC build side and its action resolution mechanics don't get in the way at all.How common this sort of D&D play was/is I wouldn't know. I've run D&D/Rolemaster more-or-less like this since 1986 and Oriental Adventures, although I'm better at it now then I used to be.</blockquote>

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