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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ratskinner" data-source="post: 6179456" data-attributes="member: 6688937">Maybe I should explain myself a little bit more....I don't think D&D is a good story game, because it doesn't inherently produce a story structure. So what's that? Well, there's (AFAIK) two schools of thought on that:School the first:The way I learned it in school is (according to Wikipedia) defined by somebody named Freytag. You go from Exposition to Rising Action to Climax to Falling Action to Denouement. Unless its externally enforced by the DM, no edition of D&D (AFAICT) does anything to impose such a structure. Instead, the characters are on an encounter treadmill. I mean, if you could run multiple sessions with nothing but encounter tables.However, this is the method to which D&D most lends itself to DM Story-crafting. The rules may not care about whether or not the big boss fight with the tough solo comes at the beginning or end of the adventure, but DMs often do. Its certainly not hard for a DM (or writer) to pattern an adventure after this structure: Exposition becomes the "Rumors at the Obligatory Tavern" or a reward notice. Rising action is the series of encounters leading up to the big climactic boss-fight. Climax is the boss fight. Falling Action is cleaning up the Encounters we missed or fulfilling sidequests. Denouement is collecting the reward and leveling up.While this may lead us to think "See, Ratskinner! D&D's got story, you just showed it!" In reality that structure is imposed completely by the will of the DM/author. Even editions (2e, in particular) that exhorted DM's to create such a structure did nothing mechanically to reward players or DMs for doing so. 4e makes it easier by making "Encounter Difficulty"="Action" a little more explicit. And when a DM/author does push for such structure, its often seen as "railroading" or "linear". Many of the most-loved adventure modules (to hear people speak of them) are just "sandboxes" that lend themselves very poorly to such a structure.School the Second:This method is rather headier, IMO, and is the method that seems to have influenced Forge thinking the most heavily. The idea is called "Dialectic" and involves starting with a thesis ("Zombies are thoughtless eating machines, and cannot be a part of society.") introducing a conflict with through antithesis ("This zombie has rudimentary thoughts and emotions.") the conflict is resolved into an synthesis ("Zombies and humans can live together in a strange new society."--thank you Warm Bodies) In Forge thinking, games that focus on this sort of resolution are called Narrativist, and generally rely on the game to set up the conflicts and the players to resolve them by creating the synthesis. To do so, the characters have strong mechanical motivations to press their individual theses and the players are rewarded for doing so, often with control over the narrative of the synthesis result.Does D&D do this? Not really. Most characters in most editions have no such thesis statements to uphold. If they have one, it is created solely by the whim of the player and yields no mechanical impact whatever. There are a few old-school exceptions. Namely Paladins and Clerics, and only in games where the DM would heavily enforce alignments (however they conceived them).* However, these usually only come to light when contrasted with an aggravating Thief or Rogue player, who introduces an antithesis do spur the conflict with their LG-ness. The "Holy Roller" party of paladins and clerics usually doesn't experience the need to develop a synthesis. To my eyes, there is a great deal of irony in some of the criticisms of 4e. Often accused of being "new school" or "too narrative", 4e actually eliminates the only elements of the traditional game that drove Narrativist play!How about on the DM side? Nope. AFAICT, no edition provides any mechanical impetus for the DM to engage the players in making any of the "tough decisions" that make up the heart of Narrativist play, nor is he given any particular tools to do so. Tons of advice and recommendations, but no actual mechanics. So far as the rules are concerned, if your Cleric of the Raven Queen never runs into any Orcusian Cultists....them's the breaks. Paladin never met a thief...so what?So, if D&D doesn't do either of these things, why do so many people think its a story game? Well, I think that finding a way to create those things is part of DM skill. Doing so helps to engage the players. However, the rules (generally) offer very little actual help. Additionally, sometimes story "just happens." Stories are how we humans engage the world. In any endeavor as complicated and time consuming as D&D, we will see some stories. I think this is what some of my OSR friends are talking about when they talk about the story emerging "organically". *There is also the short-lived XP by class mechanic.What does D&D actually do well?..... I think it does okay with setting exploration, although not very well by Forge's standards for Simulationism. The DM can start up with some interesting things...a map, some politics, maybe some room for adventure, the seeds of a conflict, etc. Most editions also do fairly well with the Gamist aspects. So what does that get you? A pretty good opportunity for some geeky friends to sit around a table and have a good time acting silly. I think what [MENTION=3192]howandwhy99[/MENTION] is describing sounds like an extreme gamist interpretation to me, but its hard to tell over the web and not being there.anyway...I hope that helps.</blockquote>

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