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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6015625" data-attributes="member: 42582">Agreed, and saved me the trouble.I agree with this.But I don't agree with this: it seems to presuppose that the function of the rules is to model or determine some fictional content. Whereas, RPG rules can have a different function, of setting parameters around the narration of the fiction by the participants in the game. And 4e mechanics are frequently like this. So, for example, when a PC falls down a cliff, takes 80 hp damage, and survives, the mechanics don't tell anyone exactly what happened in the fiction: they just set parameters around narration (eg there was a fall, and the PC survived - they leave it up to the table to narrate the "how" of survival, which will take into account that, with 80 hp, we're probably talking a paragon PC).With these sorts of rules, it doesn't generally make sense to talk about "flavour trumping RAW" or vice versa. The RAW set the parameters. Flavour is then narrated on the strength of that.No jerkiness at all.My response reflects my own views and preferences.4e works very much in the following way (the quote is from <a href="http://www.indie-rpgs.com/articles/21/" target="_blank">here</a>):Gamist [= "step on up"] and Narrativist [= "story now"] play often share the following things: *Common use of player Author Stance (Pawn or non-Pawn) to set up the arena for conflict. . . *Fortune-in-the-middle during resolution, to whatever degree - the point is that Exploration as such [= working out what exactly has happened in the fiction] can be deferred, rather than established at every point during play in a linear fashion. *More generally, Exploration overall is negotiated in a casual fashion through ongoing dialogue, using system for input (which may be constraining), rather than explicitly delivered by system per se.Those who criticise 4e tend to object to all these features of the game: they dislike the Actor Stance that the game sometimes encourages, because they see it as at odds with immersion; they dislike the fortune-in-the-middle (derided using such phrases as "Schroedinger's hit points"); they dislike the fact that the content of the fiction is settled by the group using mechanics and genre considerations as constraint, rather than "reading it off" the mechanics.This is "rules over story" only in the sense that the fiction is narrated within the mechanical constraints, rather than the mechanics being adjusted to reflect some prior conception of the fiction. For me, at least, the point of playing this way is that it avoids railroading - because, in practice, those who subordinate the mechanics to some prior conception of the fiction are going to prioritise the GM's conception of the fiction.4e actually does have mechanics for narrative control: race, class and power selection, paragon path and epic destiny selection, etc (eg if a player chooses for his/her epic PC to be a demigod, that is an exercise of narrative control that constrains the GM).But the main respect in which 4e supports narrative play is its lack of mechanics that impede, and the presence within it of mechanics that support, scene (= encounter) focused play.</blockquote>

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