Will the complexity pendulum swing back?

[Desdichado]

It never left. Rules light may be the darling of the indie internet crowd, but every game that is leading in sales is extraordinarily crunchy. To me the question isn't is crunchy going to come back, it's is it ever going to freakin' wear out its welcome and leave.

 

[Kichwas]

Compared to what? What are some RPGs that you think are less crunchy than 1e was?

Almost every RPG ever published with the possible exception of Rolemaster but I think that was just a hge pile if charts. Last saw it in maybe 86 so memory is fuzzy.

But I am not sure I have ever seen a more obscure and overly mechanical for no gain RPG than AD&D 1E RAW - which is how we ran it because we were raised to feel cheaters were bad so you run the rules or you’re a cheater and don’t get to play. We were preteens and up till high school freshman and the idea that being a cheater who changes the rules might be ok and not cheating didn’t occur to us.

So we just slogged through.
Some of ya’ll might have been older or had mentors to tell you otherwise but we went from little kids getting punished if we cheated to being on our own with an insane technical manual and knowing you got in trouble if you cheated so don’t. And by the time we’d grown up more we’d moved on to less crunchy games. I moved a couple times in those years and every group I found was the same: RAW or get booted out for cheating.

Didn’t even hear if “Rule 0” until BESM in the late 90s.

Granted I rarely was willing to play AD&D once I found The Fantasy Trip and then Champions.

But since 1981 I am not sure I have seen a more complex RPG. I did see one that had one section that was complex - Other Suns that used trigonometry to do star ship fuel and travel times. The rest if the game was simple.

But peopke who say AD&D 1E wasn’t crunchy because they ignored all of the rules weren’t playing AD&D 1E. They were playing their own system.

 

[TwoSix]

Why? Thespianism just gives context and perhaps a circumstance bonus to the Charisma roll.

Because time spent discussing rules options and tactical complexity is time that you aren't speaking in character.

 

[cranberry]

No one finds that insulting to the next generation? I think their is a better explanation, and I think Jacob is hitting on it here...

You asked for everyone's view and that's what you got. If you just wanted an echo chamber that reflected your own view, you should have indicated as such.

 

[kermit4karate]

Almost every RPG ever published with the possible exception of Rolemaster but I think that was just a hge pile if charts. Last saw it in maybe 86 so memory is fuzzy.

But I am not sure I have ever seen a more obscure and overly mechanical for no gain RPG than AD&D 1E RAW - which is how we ran it because we were raised to feel cheaters were bad so you run the rules or you’re a cheater and don’t get to play. We were preteens and up till high school freshman and the idea that being a cheater who changes the rules might be ok and not cheating didn’t occur to us.

So we just slogged through. Granted I rarely was willing to play AD&D once I found The Fantasy Trip and then Champions.

But since 1981 I am not sure I have seen a more complex RPG. I did see one that had one section that was complex - Other Suns that used trigonometry to do star ship fuel and travel times. The rest if the game was simple.

But peopke who say AD&D 1E wasn’t crunchy because they ignored all of the rules weren’t playing AD&D 1E. They were playing their own system.

I think you're pulling my leg here so I decline to take the bait.

 

[Kichwas]

I think you're pulling my leg here so I decline to take the bait.

No.

Have you ever seen the 1E DMG?

There’s no RPG book in existence that even comes close to it in crunch and complexity.

 

[kermit4karate]

No.

Have you ever seen the 1E DMG?

There’s no RPG book in existence that even comes close to it in crunch and complexity.

Totally disagree, but I'm sure I'm biased.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

No.

Have you ever seen the 1E DMG?

There’s no RPG book in existence that even comes close to it in crunch and complexity.

....I know a little bit about the subject.

And based on that, I would say that I can 100% guarantee that you were not, in fact, playing 1e RAW.


(Simply because no one, and I mean no one including Gygax played 1e 100% RAW)

 

[Kichwas]

If you are specifically talking about "social combat" I suppose so. But having a wide range of combat maneuvers available (just by way of example) wouldn't impact your ability to roleplay negotiations with the Duke, would they?

Yes that is something I encountered.

social maneuvers compete with die rolls, modifiers to succeed or fail, degrees of success, and ranks or a progress system you have to track.
- as a core system to resolve a social encounter.

It is in PF2E but I suspect most people ignore it. However it has been pushed as a feature in 3 of their adventure paths so I kept bumping into it and GMs would of course want to try it out.

Either they quickly threw it out and we went back to roleplaying or they stuck with it and the games got increasingly frustrating because rules were overwriting roleplay, or outright blocking certain kinds of narratively relevant roleplay from having any impact.

Again the point where a GM should just say “well yes, you say that, he says this.” But if they followed that Influence system it would say “XYZ doesn’t work here”…

The last GM to be a stickler on using it “broke me” for Pathfinder.

 

[Kichwas]

....I know a little bit about the subject.

And based on that, I would say that I can 100% guarantee that you were not, in fact, playing 1e RAW.


(Simply because no one, and I mean no one including Gygax played 1e 100% RAW)

We did.

We also bounced off it fast.

But there were even editorials by Gygax that were angry rants against people who didn’t use the rules right.

I do find it odd that so many folks here claim they didn’t use the rules if the book if the game they claimed to play. That was just the norm everywhere I went back in the 80s.