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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Aldarc" data-source="post: 8373053" data-attributes="member: 5142">I'm not following your summation here at all to the point that I'm not sure if we are having the same conversation, which feels a bit frustrating on my end. I do appreciate the fact that you treat this as a game rather than, say for example, local community theater, but it's precisely the fact that it is a game that invites discussing it in terms of game design. Even board games adopt language much like we do in TTRPGs. This is why we can use terms like <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurogame" target="_blank">Eurogame</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Board_wargame" target="_blank">Wargame</a>, and <a href="https://www.dicebreaker.com/categories/board-game/how-to/board-game-types-explained" target="_blank">many more</a> when discussing games like Monopoly, Settlers of Catan, etc. But discussing games in terms of their game design may involve examining how the game designer(s) expects the game to be played one way, but the actual game design or play culture actually pushes the norms of gameplay into another direction. The game designer may not have recognized certain rules interactions, vagueries, or corner cases that prop up. Or the game may claim to be designed for X, but it's not actually good at X type games, but it is actually better suited to Y type games. For example, Hasbro was actually shocked when their research discovered that most people weren't playing Monopoly with the rules as written. I vaguely recall that it was substantially so. Families and play groups were essentially bringing generations of house rules to the game and teaching those as the standard rules. It was only when they learned what typical praxis of gameplay was that they decided to include many of the most commonly encountered house rules in the game. (I feel like a similar case is likely also true for a game like Uno.) Discussing games in terms of praxis is valuable because it represents actual gameplay experience in say the same manner as playtesting or what norms, practices, or strategies form around playing a game numerous times. WotC may have the rules as written, but are they actually being played as intended at most tables? What tends to be the norm at most tables? This may say something about the fault lines of the game design or what people actually want out of the game. What do you have in mind here? Concretely speaking. Of course, but most of their traits, features, and capabilities tend to be about combat, so IME it tends to take up a disproportionately larger part of the game's focus. It is the premise of the thread, but discussion is also about why and how that is the case. Player agency plays a role in that. Greater support for the combat pillar plays a role in that. How XP works and character advancement incentive structures play a role in that. Tools to bypass exploration and its subsequent feedback loop plays a role in that. How central the game design supports exploration plays a role in that. There are a myriad set of factors at play here that reinforce each other. It felt like you were trying to dismiss discussion of player agency by saying that you have never heard it at the table. I have encountered it numerous times in my circles. (None of whom are remotely familiar with the Forge, by the way.) The issue of 'player agency' comes up a lot in discussion and YouTube videos on PCs in TTRPGs, railroading, agency in video games, sandboxes, etc.</blockquote>

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