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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7762356" data-attributes="member: 42582">I think that the &quot;avatar&quot;/preteneding to be someone else aspect is pretty central to most RPGs. Likewise some sort of resolution system, though many RPGs have only ad hoc or highly-GM mediated rules for resolving conflicts. The resolution system focused around actions declared by the players for their &quot;avatars&quot; helps distinguish a RPG from a non-RPG cooperative storytellling game.Another element that I think is pretty central is the ability to play the fiction. The fiction should matter to resolution, and changes in the mechanical game state should be feeding through to changes in the fiction. This is what distinguishes a RPG from a boardgame or less &quot;open-ended&quot; wargame.My players beg to differ on that one - they play their Milestones to the hilt to earn XP and improve their PCs (probably around 5 to 10 XP per session, for pretty steady improvement - the system suggests after a story arc &quot;resetting&quot; the PCs and that is definitely good advice as it doesn't take too long for the PCs to power up quite a bit).To be fair, he did include loot as an improvement mechanic. That's not essential to Traveller, but it's fairly common to it (whether credits, a better starship, or both).You know there's a US Supreme Court case dealing with this issue (<a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/149/304/" target="_blank">Nix v Hedden</a>)? The short version: there is both a botanical and a folk culinary use of these terms, and tomatoes are fruits in the botanical sense but vegetables in the culinary sense, as they are served as part of the &quot;principal part of the repast&quot;, not as dessert.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 7762356, member: 42582"] I think that the "avatar"/preteneding to be someone else aspect is pretty central to most RPGs. Likewise some sort of resolution system, though many RPGs have only ad hoc or highly-GM mediated rules for resolving conflicts. The resolution system focused around actions declared by the players for their "avatars" helps distinguish a RPG from a non-RPG cooperative storytellling game. Another element that I think is pretty central is the ability to [I]play the fiction[/I]. The fiction should matter to resolution, and changes in the mechanical game state should be feeding through to changes in the fiction. This is what distinguishes a RPG from a boardgame or less "open-ended" wargame. My players beg to differ on that one - they play their Milestones to the hilt to earn XP and improve their PCs (probably around 5 to 10 XP per session, for pretty steady improvement - the system suggests after a story arc "resetting" the PCs and that is definitely good advice as it doesn't take too long for the PCs to power up quite a bit). To be fair, he did include loot as an improvement mechanic. That's not essential to Traveller, but it's fairly common to it (whether credits, a better starship, or both). You know there's a US Supreme Court case dealing with this issue ([url=https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/149/304/]Nix v Hedden[/url])? The short version: there is both a botanical and a folk culinary use of these terms, and tomatoes are fruits in the botanical sense but vegetables in the culinary sense, as they are served as part of the "principal part of the repast", not as dessert. [/QUOTE]

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