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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8347033" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>There is no "rule zero" in MHRP/Cortex+ Heroic. Nor in Agon 2nd ed. Nor in Burning Wheel.</p><p></p><p>Here is some relevant rules text from Burning Wheel (I'm quoting from the Gold edition, pp 24, 30 ; the text in Revised is no different):</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Let’s start with the core of the Burning Wheel system. We call it “Intent and Task.” . . .</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">When declaring an action for a character, you say what you want and how you do it. That’s the intent and the task. . . .</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">what happens after the dice have come to rest and the successes are counted? If the successes equal or exceed the obstacle, the character has succeeded in his goal—he achieved his intent and completed the task.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">This is important enough to say again: Characters who are successful complete actions in the manner described by the player. A successful roll is sacrosanct in Burning Wheel and neither GM nor other players can change the fact that the act was successful. The GM may only embellish or reinforce a successful ability test.</p><p></p><p>Given that tasks, in BW, can include recalling things (Wises and similar checks) or noticing things (Perception and similar checks) or hoping to meet someone (CIrcles checks); and that intentions can include <em>I want it to be true that Evard's Tower is near here</em> or <em>I'm hoping I can see a ewer or bucket or similar vessel around here, to catch the blood</em> or <em>I'm hoping to meet my brother now that we've returned to my homeland</em>; it follows that the sacrosanct character of a successful role can absolutely bind the GM by constraining content and situational authority. That is, we can have <em>player narrational authority</em> (I'm hoping to meet my brother) leads, via a successful check, to <em>player content authority</em> (OK, your brother is here) to <em>shared situational authority </em>(the scene now has to be one of meeting with the brother, due to the successful check, but it is the GM's job to frame that scene having regard to the obligation to honour the success - in the game where I was playing, the GM had my brother come down the road driving a cart and telling me that he was on his way to get more wine for "the master" - ie the embellishment tied into other elements of known backstory, like the degradation of my brother and my homeland, while also promising further possibilities - in PbtA terms this is classic "thinking offscreen").</p><p></p><p>Rule zero has no work to do in this game.</p><p></p><p>Prince Valiant is written more than 15 years earlier and isn't quite as forthright. Here's some text (pp 5, 8, 18, 41):</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">The big difference that sets Prince Valiant, The Storytelling Game apart from most games is the cooperation, simplicity of interchange, and striving for equality that occurs between participants. . . .</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Players do not have unlimited freedom. The Storyteller may give the player advice first, and he may prevent a player’s intended action from occurring if it is unrealistic or statistically unlikely. Essentially he says “you never did that.” However, the Storyteller should try not to veto a player’s announced action just because he didn’t expect it, or just because it might change the way the adventure was going. . . .</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">All conflicts, tests of skill, and other challenges in Prince Valiant, the Storytelling Game are resolved by flipping, or “throwing,” a number of ordinary coins. . . .</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Ask the other players their opinions in sticky situations. The cooperative effort will be fortified. . . .</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">The rules given here are guidelines, and may be overruled by the Storyteller at any time for any reason. Most importantly, the Storyteller has the right to change the way things happen in the story. . . . This arbitrary power is central to the art of oral storytelling. Anyone who stands up in front of others has a right to adjust his statements to the tone, emotion and needs of the crowd. Some examples of this intervention include the appearance of a boat at an opportune moment of escape after players have bungled every other opportunity, or the apparently arbitrary change of mind exhibited when a cruel sultan chooses to imprison the characters rather than kill them outright as he had sworn. By far the most tempting use of the fiat is to save the life of a character.</p><p></p><p>As that last paragraph indicates, Prince Valiant is infused with more sentimentality and less "grit" (for lack of a better word) than Burning Wheel. This is also evident in its rules about damage - the GM decides what happens to a character who suffers damage, how severe it is, and how long it takes to recover (the only mechanical implication of being dropped to zero in a pool is that <em>for the moment, the character is out of the action</em>). But there is no scope to disregard successful checks; nor any need to.</p><p></p><p>4e D&D underwent a change in the statement of the role of the GM. From the PHB (p 8):</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">The Dungeon Master has several functions in the game.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">*<strong> Adventure Builder</strong>: The DM creates adventures (or selects premade adventures) for you and the other players to play through.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">* <strong>Narrator</strong>: The DM sets the pace of the story and presents the various challenges and encounters the players must overcome.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">* <strong>Monster Controller</strong>: The Dungeon Master controls the monsters and villains the player characters battle against, choosing their actions and rolling dice for their attacks.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">* <strong>Referee</strong>: When it’s not clear what ought to happen next, the DM decides how to apply the rules and adjudicate the story.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p><p></p><p>In the Essentials Rules Compendium (p 9), that last point is changed to read:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px"><strong>Referee</strong>: The DM decides how to apply the game rules and guides the story. If the rules don’t cover a situation, the DM determines what to do. At times, the DM might alter or even ignore the result of a die roll if doing so benefits the story.</p><p></p><p>I regard that as a retrograde step, part of the broader mission of Essentials to take 4e back towards earlier versions of the game.</p><p></p><p>A similar change is found between the 1977 edition of Traveller and The Traveller Book from the early 80s: the latter, consistent with the emerging zeitgeist, introduces text about the GM fudging dice rolls and covertly manipulating the fiction so as to ensure the story unfolds as intended.</p><p></p><p>My own view is that a RPG that needs the GM to "rule zero" things in order to work is just a poorly-designed RPG. And if the outcomes of action resolution are not going to be treated as binding, then what is the point of resolving actions - is it just to give the GM suggestions as to what they might decide happens next?</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 8347033, member: 42582"] There is no "rule zero" in MHRP/Cortex+ Heroic. Nor in Agon 2nd ed. Nor in Burning Wheel. Here is some relevant rules text from Burning Wheel (I'm quoting from the Gold edition, pp 24, 30 ; the text in Revised is no different): [indent]Let’s start with the core of the Burning Wheel system. We call it “Intent and Task.” . . . When declaring an action for a character, you say what you want and how you do it. That’s the intent and the task. . . . what happens after the dice have come to rest and the successes are counted? If the successes equal or exceed the obstacle, the character has succeeded in his goal—he achieved his intent and completed the task. This is important enough to say again: Characters who are successful complete actions in the manner described by the player. A successful roll is sacrosanct in Burning Wheel and neither GM nor other players can change the fact that the act was successful. The GM may only embellish or reinforce a successful ability test.[/indent] Given that tasks, in BW, can include recalling things (Wises and similar checks) or noticing things (Perception and similar checks) or hoping to meet someone (CIrcles checks); and that intentions can include [I]I want it to be true that Evard's Tower is near here[/I] or [I]I'm hoping I can see a ewer or bucket or similar vessel around here, to catch the blood[/I] or [I]I'm hoping to meet my brother now that we've returned to my homeland[/I]; it follows that the sacrosanct character of a successful role can absolutely bind the GM by constraining content and situational authority. That is, we can have [I]player narrational authority[/I] (I'm hoping to meet my brother) leads, via a successful check, to [I]player content authority[/I] (OK, your brother is here) to [I]shared situational authority [/I](the scene now has to be one of meeting with the brother, due to the successful check, but it is the GM's job to frame that scene having regard to the obligation to honour the success - in the game where I was playing, the GM had my brother come down the road driving a cart and telling me that he was on his way to get more wine for "the master" - ie the embellishment tied into other elements of known backstory, like the degradation of my brother and my homeland, while also promising further possibilities - in PbtA terms this is classic "thinking offscreen"). Rule zero has no work to do in this game. Prince Valiant is written more than 15 years earlier and isn't quite as forthright. Here's some text (pp 5, 8, 18, 41): [indent]The big difference that sets Prince Valiant, The Storytelling Game apart from most games is the cooperation, simplicity of interchange, and striving for equality that occurs between participants. . . . Players do not have unlimited freedom. The Storyteller may give the player advice first, and he may prevent a player’s intended action from occurring if it is unrealistic or statistically unlikely. Essentially he says “you never did that.” However, the Storyteller should try not to veto a player’s announced action just because he didn’t expect it, or just because it might change the way the adventure was going. . . . All conflicts, tests of skill, and other challenges in Prince Valiant, the Storytelling Game are resolved by flipping, or “throwing,” a number of ordinary coins. . . . Ask the other players their opinions in sticky situations. The cooperative effort will be fortified. . . . The rules given here are guidelines, and may be overruled by the Storyteller at any time for any reason. Most importantly, the Storyteller has the right to change the way things happen in the story. . . . This arbitrary power is central to the art of oral storytelling. Anyone who stands up in front of others has a right to adjust his statements to the tone, emotion and needs of the crowd. Some examples of this intervention include the appearance of a boat at an opportune moment of escape after players have bungled every other opportunity, or the apparently arbitrary change of mind exhibited when a cruel sultan chooses to imprison the characters rather than kill them outright as he had sworn. By far the most tempting use of the fiat is to save the life of a character.[/indent] As that last paragraph indicates, Prince Valiant is infused with more sentimentality and less "grit" (for lack of a better word) than Burning Wheel. This is also evident in its rules about damage - the GM decides what happens to a character who suffers damage, how severe it is, and how long it takes to recover (the only mechanical implication of being dropped to zero in a pool is that [I]for the moment, the character is out of the action[/I]). But there is no scope to disregard successful checks; nor any need to. 4e D&D underwent a change in the statement of the role of the GM. From the PHB (p 8): [indent] The Dungeon Master has several functions in the game. *[B] Adventure Builder[/B]: The DM creates adventures (or selects premade adventures) for you and the other players to play through. * [B]Narrator[/B]: The DM sets the pace of the story and presents the various challenges and encounters the players must overcome. * [B]Monster Controller[/B]: The Dungeon Master controls the monsters and villains the player characters battle against, choosing their actions and rolling dice for their attacks. * [B]Referee[/B]: When it’s not clear what ought to happen next, the DM decides how to apply the rules and adjudicate the story. [/indent] In the Essentials Rules Compendium (p 9), that last point is changed to read: [indent][B]Referee[/B]: The DM decides how to apply the game rules and guides the story. If the rules don’t cover a situation, the DM determines what to do. At times, the DM might alter or even ignore the result of a die roll if doing so benefits the story.[/indent] I regard that as a retrograde step, part of the broader mission of Essentials to take 4e back towards earlier versions of the game. A similar change is found between the 1977 edition of Traveller and The Traveller Book from the early 80s: the latter, consistent with the emerging zeitgeist, introduces text about the GM fudging dice rolls and covertly manipulating the fiction so as to ensure the story unfolds as intended. My own view is that a RPG that needs the GM to "rule zero" things in order to work is just a poorly-designed RPG. And if the outcomes of action resolution are not going to be treated as binding, then what is the point of resolving actions - is it just to give the GM suggestions as to what they might decide happens next? [/QUOTE]
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