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Message: <blockquote data-quote="aramis erak" data-source="post: 9696485" data-attributes="member: 6779310">There is a clear loss condition: It wasn't fun. That you don't understand that others see clear loss conditions speaks volumes about you, but nothing at all about the nature of RPGs.Also: Lacking a win condition is not axiomatically a lack of loss conditions. Lacking a loss condition, however, generally also lacks a win condition, a loss without win is about pushing one's luck or skill, while a win condition without loss conditions is a simple matter of continuing until the win. Also, Moldvay ignored the existence of RPG tournaments and tourney modules...For a comparison: Sim City. There technically is no game defined win condition, but there is a very clear loss condition: your city gets destroyed faster than you can repair.Or most arcade games: no defined win, but out of lives is a loss condition; to get a win condition, one needs to go beyond the rules in the program, and set one's own goals.And it's been «bleep»ing wrong for decades. Moldvay was wrong, and it was as obvious to me in 1981 as it is now.Moldvay comes at it from a naïf perspective; a good thing for the new player to not worry about win/loss... but as logically false as the sun being green; it's grounded in a truth, but misrepresents the practical realities. Realities that humans inherently set goals, and that blackbody radiation never has green dominate the visual spectrum.<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">If one's in it for the story, there are play conditions that result in an unsatisfactory story. That's a loss. Examples include<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Illogical story</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">story is boring</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">story angers the player</li> </ul></li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">If one's in it for the push-your-luck aspects, getting your run ended is a loss. Need not even be a dead PC...  a forced to return to town is just as much a loss in the classic Moldvay/Cook style...</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">If one's in it for the action tactical play, i.e.: a wargamer style, both a talk-it-all-out session and a session where your character fails tactically are both loss conditions.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">If one is in it for the collaboration, for the story input, a GM railroad is a loss condition.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Mission based play as mission success as a potential win and mission failure as an additional failure condition.</li> </ul>Plenty of fairly obvious loss conditions... but only a few potential win conditions. The simplest and most universal being, "did I have fun?" I've had sessions where I didn't. I've quit groups because I wasn't having fun; it felt very much like loss after loss... it was a railroad, it lacked any tactical feel of play, whether that be social or martial conflict.</blockquote>

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