TheRPGSite

Story games...

Ok, I know everyone here loves them, but I'm really not sure what to think personally.

On the Story-games.com website I started a discussion on how to model combat which was copy and pasted from the same thread I started here.

It's an interesting discussion and people contribute ideas, all of which are welcome. However there is mention of the Sorcerer system that, apparently (i've never played it), which bundles initiative and result into the same roll: the result determines how well you did and how quickly you did it. An interesting concept, I asked how that resolved actions that don't require a dice roll and it transpires everything requires a dice roll as that's the nature of opposed/contested actions.

Now I'm not opposed to story games. I don't find the 'swine' label helpful, nor do i see any real point in shuffling threads around to fit an agenda, but I am starting to wonder whether the 'story game' approach is one that I personally would want.

This isn't a rant and it's not intended as a 'those people over there suck' diatribe because that isn't what I think. However there does seem to be a fundamentally different approach to roleplaying games in the attitudes of the fans and perhaps designers of such games. That's their perogative of course. But it's almost as if the difference between 'trad' gamers and 'story gamers is that the former want the outcome of dice rolls to decide what we might call the story, and the latter want the outcome of dice rolls to fit the story, oddly enough.

Also that the rules need to be so simple that there is nothing in the detail of the result that creates any kind of narrative wrinkle or twist to work from. Simplicity is laudable as a design goal certainly but a lot of the time it's the same simple trait roll for every situation, no matter how varied, with no real depth. You must have some measure of depth even if it's relative to other rules, otherwise it's just...well bland.

So here's the example from that discussion; the point was to ask how you resolve initiative for actions using the above system that require no dice roll.

Three people in a room; person A wants to shoot B, person B wants to jump out the window and escpe, person C wants to shut the window.

How do you resolve person C shutting a window? Do you assume that shutting the window requires a dice roll? We are talking a basic window, not some complex machinery.

What about a sniper targetting a terrorist about to detonate a bomb. All the terrorist has to do is press the button, does that require a dice roll?

I'm not knocking these games; maybe i'm just not used to their way of thinking. I don't liek to denigrate other people's ideas, but some of this I really can't get used to. No big deal I suppose, so why did you write about it then? Moan moan moan.

Not sure why I posted this.

I'm not sure what you're asking. The answer depends on the system in use, not on what "story games" do. There is no monolithic story game to answer with.

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;635488Not sure why I posted this.

Not a great way to start a thread, now is it. :D

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;635482It's an interesting discussion and people contribute ideas, all of which are welcome. However there is mention of the Sorcerer system that, apparently (i've never played it), which bundles initiative and result into the same roll: the result determines how well you did and how quickly you did it. An interesting concept, I asked how that resolved actions that don't require a dice roll and it transpires everything requires a dice roll as that's the nature of opposed/contested actions.

The One-Roll Engine (ORE) system does this too: you roll a dice pool of d10s and find out how many "matches" (identical results) you have for each number. Any match is a success. Matches are described as number of matching dice ("width") x the number that these matched dice are showing ("height"). So if 3 of these d10 came up 8, you'd have 3x8. You can have multiple matches from a single roll (e.g. 2 dice came up 7 and 4 dice came up 9, 2x7 and 4x9), which is important in combat and opposed rolls, but not much outside of these.

Width determines how quickly do you obtain your result, while Height indicates the degree of success. So in combat, for instance, Width gives you initiative and Height gives you damage. On a library research roll, Height shows how much information you've gleaned on the subject, and Width tells us how long it took you to find these things out.

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;635482Now I'm not opposed to story games. I don't find the 'swine' label helpful, nor do i see any real point in shuffling threads around to fit an agenda, but I am starting to wonder whether the 'story game' approach is one that I personally would want.

This isn't a rant and it's not intended as a 'those people over there suck' diatribe because that isn't what I think. However there does seem to be a fundamentally different approach to roleplaying games in the attitudes of the fans and perhaps designers of such games. That's their perogative of course. But it's almost as if the difference between 'trad' gamers and 'story gamers is that the former want the outcome of dice rolls to decide what we might call the story, and the latter want the outcome of dice rolls to fit the story, oddly enough.

Also that the rules need to be so simple that there is nothing in the detail of the result that creates any kind of narrative wrinkle or twist to work from. Simplicity is laudable as a design goal certainly but a lot of the time it's the same simple trait roll for every situation, no matter how varied, with no real depth. You must have some measure of depth even if it's relative to other rules, otherwise it's just...well bland.

That's pretty much my stance (oops) on the topic as well. I have nothing for or against storygames or storygamers, and if someone shows up at my table with a copy of Apocalypse World or Mist-Robed Gate or whatever in tow I'll give it the same clean break I give just about every game that comes my way. (I'd rather be playing octaNe, though :D)

Nevertheless, so far my tastes lie strongly in the traditional RPG camp.

QuoteHow do you resolve person C shutting a window? Do you assume that shutting the window requires a dice roll? We are talking a basic window, not some complex machinery.

[/I]

The bolded bit is the problem - it's like you're trying to simulate reality rather than the genre (thriller ?). Bend to the genre.

As you know, working out who succeeds first is just too bland just by itself so spice it up by having a bidding system - using Chi - so what you're asking the player is - how much do you want to succeed and push your luck/fate/karma or call upon the gods/your drives/motivations/passions. Suss out when you refresh chi (when you succeed first ? when you fail ? laters ?). I prefer - when you fail. You get more ebb and flow that way.

Greg Stolze's "say yes or roll the dice" may apply here. Dramatic interest trumps physics in this sort of gamie. Suie, you can get killed crossing the street, but if it doesn't make for the sort of story you want the game to crank out, you just handwave it.

Now, of course I don't require rolls from PCs crossing the street in odinary circumstances in my very traditional game. Thouygh it may yet come up (e.g. PC cop chasing a perp through crowded streets, botches a skill roll = goes and gets himself hit by car). I like to think that I'm sacrificing a tiny bit of realism in the name of expediency, rather than some overarching aspiration to storytelling; but as a conscientious objector in the storygame wars, I don't really care whether there's a difference. Oink oink.

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;635488Not sure why I posted this.

Thanks for posting anyhow.
My 2c:
I think that the idea that trad gamers want dice rolls to decide the story, storygamers want outcome of dicerolls to fit the story" is an interesting one, and has some truth to it.

That reminded me of this rpg.net thread started awhile back:

http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?578938-Why-I-don-t-like-your-quot-story-game-quot

Particularly this bit

QuoteAnother example is the mechanic used in Dogs in the Vineyard and I believe in other games, where you roll the dice before describing your action. You go into a situation and say in very simple terms what you want to do, then you roll the dice, THEN you describe your actual actions after finding out whether you succeeded or failed. This is pure third person - you can respect your character's decision-making process but you have to jump way out of their perspective to describe all that results from their actions.

Which sort of touches on the idea that not just dice rolls but even character actions don't control so much what happens as get chosen to justify game events.  There was another podcast on that somewhere with Vincent Baker I think (I'm not sure which one it was anymore), where he discussed that aspect, that in a game like say DiTV players/character's are limited by the game rules in what actions they can attempt. The abstract rules generate success/failure in a different way to a trad game, being abstract players can't  try to creatively justify additional bonuses from the physics engine so much.

PS: Unrelated to that Pendragon has the same issue with Initiative, where you can have to roll for an automatic action just to see when it occurs, despite being traditional. In cases like that the roll would really just an initiative roll though with no chance of failure IIRC.

Quote from: Brad J. Murray;635502I'm not sure what you're asking. The answer depends on the system in use, not on what "story games" do. There is no monolithic story game to answer with.

The system in question resolves initiative with the result of the die roll used for the action. Why would I need to roll to shut a window? All that's important is to know when i can shut the window: before or after the guy tries to jump through.

Quote from: The Butcher;635505Not a great way to start a thread, now is it. :D

I confused myself while typing.

QuoteThe One-Roll Engine (ORE) system does this too:

Yes, i have some familiarity with it, but it's not to my taste personally. It all sounds like weights and measures really and relies and fairly substantial dice pools.

There are other problems with the result=initiative system not least of which is that it doesn't replace traditional initiative, which you may only need to roll once per combat (as per 40k for instance), in terms of speed. Since you need to know when someone can act, whatever they do, you need to roll, which is a bit of a curious twist when many story game systems also advocate only rolling for actions that are important (a good principle all round, shared by trad gamers as well). I would also submit that it requires a lot of work from the GM; for each player it's simple, pick a trait and roll. But the GM has to decide for each NPC up front, then roll for each NPC, then record/memorise every NPC and PC's results to calculate the final order of events and go from there.

QuoteThat's pretty much my stance (oops) on the topic as well. I have nothing for or against storygames or storygamers, and if someone shows up at my table with a copy of Apocalypse World or Mist-Robed Gate or whatever in tow I'll give it the same clean break I give just about every game that comes my way. (I'd rather be playing octaNe, though :D)

Nevertheless, so far my tastes lie strongly in the traditional RPG camp.

Quote from: Sean !;635514

So do mine. I'm happy to check out any game that appeals to me, no matter who made it. What separates story games the most for me is that the design ethos seems to revolve around a couple of mechanics or the presentation thereof (eg playbooks), but no real setting. Nothing to get one's teeth into. The main appeal of games, for me, is cracking open a nice book and getting into a new world and finding good mechanics that support that. I don't really see that with games like AW or Sorcerer.

QuoteThe bolded bit is the problem - it's like you're trying to simulate reality rather than the genre (thriller ?). Bend to the genre.

The problem is deciding when someone acts. All action scenes use reality to some degree, otherwise it just becomes a silly fantasy where nothing has any meaning. Reality means people fall out of windows, smash through glass, get shot and hurt themselves. If that refernece point isn't there the scene has no meaning.

QuoteAs you know, working out who succeeds first is just too bland just by itself so spice it up by having a bidding system - using Chi - so what you're asking the player is - how much do you want to succeed and push your luck/fate/karma or call upon the gods/your drives/motivations/passions.

That's a reasonable idea, but i suspect it's too much hassle in play. Besides people will want to plan ahead so they will think "how do i know whether something even more bizarre is about to happen, i better act conservatively", so it becomes self defeating. Setting up regular refresh points is difficult in the environment of rpg's. They aren't like boardgames where you can collect 200£ each time you pass go as the board is a fixed size. The board is the imagination and it's entirely subjective.

Quote from: The Butcher;635520Greg Stolze's "say yes or roll the dice" may apply here. Dramatic interest trumps physics in this sort of gamie. Suie, you can get killed crossing the street, but if it doesn't make for the sort of story you want the game to crank out, you just handwave it.

It's not about saying yes, it's about working out when. You can't assume the guy leaping out the building has more narrative authority than the guy operating the window, so why shoudl the latter have to say yes?

The core concept to dwell on here is the difference between task resolution v. conflict resolution.

Task resolution is very discrete in time-space. Being a small effect with potential big ramifications, greater lack of control is allowed as nothing further down the line has been determined.

Conflict resolution is larger in time-space. Success determines more than one discrete task in the future, often determining several as if a pre-written part, or 'narrative' if you will.

People at the table will have vying narratives proposed; however group genre expectations limit what sort of narratives will be acceptable (no random orbital satellites raining laser death in S&S Conan). People contest other conflict resolution narratives by bidding wars, which may trigger additional whizbangs and widgets for other people at the table in their conflict narrative bids later. The winning bid's dice roll thus conforms to being the degree with which the winning conflict narrative is accepted.

That is why both the dice roll and the character action options feel constrained. They are constrained for different reasons, one being acceptable character actions through table genre expectations, the other being succeeding dice roll interpreted through the winning conflict narrative. However the source cause of this is the same, a shift from discrete time-space resolution to broader time-space resolution, a.k.a. task v. conflict resolution.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;635585Thanks for posting anyhow.
My 2c:
I think that the idea that trad gamers want dice rolls to decide the story, storygamers want outcome of dicerolls to fit the story" is an interesting one, and has some truth to it.

That reminded me of this rpg.net thread started awhile back:

http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?578938-Why-I-don-t-like-your-quot-story-game-quot

Particularly this bit


Which sort of touches on the idea that not just dice rolls but even character actions don't control so much what happens as get chosen to justify game events.  There was another podcast on that somewhere with Vincent Baker I think (I'm not sure which one it was anymore), where he discussed that aspect, that in a game like say DiTV players/character's are limited by the game rules in what actions they can attempt. The abstract rules generate success/failure in a different way to a trad game, being abstract players can't  try to creatively justify additional bonuses from the physics engine so much.

PS: Unrelated to that Pendragon has the same issue with Initiative, where you can have to roll for an automatic action just to see when it occurs, despite being traditional. In cases like that the roll would really just an initiative roll though with no chance of failure IIRC.

That thread (and i have not read all 58 pages!) articulates better than I have.

Thing is, in all games i've ever read/played, rules add to the experience. That is to say, some detail is necessary to increase the opportunities, storytelling, narrative environment open to the players. While simplicity is absolutely a virtue story games do seem to revolve around a level of simplicity that can be off putting.

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;635600The board is the imagination and it's entirely subjective.

The board is the rules, framing the action.

Quote from: Opaopajrthe source cause of this is... a shift from discrete time-space resolution to broader time-space resolution, a.k.a. task vs conflict resolution.

This.


An example:

In Shadowrun (task reslution), if I want to snipe at that police car and make it out of the highway, I must:
1. roll my firearms skill for the shot,
2. GM rolls for the car driver to resist the damage
3. GM rolls for the driver to keep control of the vehicle under fire,
4. GM rolls on some scatter table to see where the vehicle goes to, and if it goes out of the road,
5. GM rolls the conseuqneces if the car crashes (passanger npcs damage, car explosion, etc)

In Apocalypse World (conflict resolution), it would be
1. Player declares his intentions ("to put the police car out of the road") and rolls relevant ability. If it a success, the car is out of the road. If its half-sucess, GM improvises some hard choices and ask the player to pick: a) the shot missed but player keeps his own position hidden, or b) the shot hits, the car is out the road, but players position if revealed to the passengers that (oops) just survived the crash. If its a fail, the GM improvises the worst possible outcome for the situation (the shot misses AND his position is revealed )

First game tries to physically simulate (and roll) for each individual action involved. Second game groups all actions in a bigger "time chunk" (and just 1 roll) and see what happens. Whats best will depend on your group tastes and playstyle, and each game premise.

P.S: notice that Apocalypse World is not a storygame, but a (fairly) traditional rpg, really. No shared narrative or story rules at all.

Quote from: Opaopajr;635609The core concept to dwell on here is the difference between task resolution v. conflict resolution.

Task resolution is very discrete in time-space. Being a small effect with potential big ramifications, greater lack of control is allowed as nothing further down the line has been determined.

Conflict resolution is larger in time-space. Success determines more than one discrete task in the future, often determining several as if a pre-written part, or 'narrative' if you will.

People at the table will have vying narratives proposed; however group genre expectations limit what sort of narratives will be acceptable (no random orbital satellites raining laser death in S&S Conan). People contest other conflict resolution narratives by bidding wars, which may trigger additional whizbangs and widgets for other people at the table in their conflict narrative bids later. The winning bid's dice roll thus conforms to being the degree with which the winning conflict narrative is accepted.

That is why both the dice roll and the character action options feel constrained. They are constrained for different reasons, one being acceptable character actions through table genre expectations, the other being succeeding dice roll interpreted through the winning conflict narrative. However the source cause of this is the same, a shift from discrete time-space resolution to broader time-space resolution, a.k.a. task v. conflict resolution.

I haven't seen so much bullshit on the internet since the last time I used the Internet Bullshit Generator.*




*yes this is a real thing

I was going to start a new thread on this question, but I think asking it wihtin this thread might be interesting.

I'm writing a framework of the rules I intend to use for my game right now. I have some basic ideas, but I find that it's getting very easy to be sucked into increasing levels of complexity (more tea vicar!). I intend for opposed rolls to be very simply a contest of trait roll vs trait roll; highest result wins. But I'm finding myself wondering how much detail for opposing situations I need

IE: as well as combat, do i need rules for social combat (might be fun), arm wrestling, tea drinking, beer drinking contests, chess, vehcile chases (yes, actually)? How much do I need? I don't know whether some or all of these things will turn up.

I think its just a matter of what aspect you would like to emphasize (if any). Combat is unanimously chosen because of the hobby wargaming roots, but nothing holds you from making it just another simple trait vs trait roll.

By the way, if your other thread is any indicative, you could have combat as a simple roll, but deepen it when a 1 on 1 duel happens.

 (I think Castle Falkenstein makes exactly that - simplify general combat, but deepen it with a more elaborate rules when its duel time)

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;635625IE: as well as combat, do i need rules for social combat (might be fun), arm wrestling, tea drinking, beer drinking contests, chess, vehcile chases (yes, actually)? How much do I need? I don't know whether some or all of these things will turn up.

IMHO:
Arm wrestling: just a str check
Social combat: optional (you can make it a simple stat/skill roll, or let PCs play it out). Unless there's a class/role that does it as their main thing.
Tea ceremony: maybe a skill roll, if that ?
Beer drinking: not really, no.
Chess: Int roll or hobby skill roll of some kind.
Vehicle chases: IMHO, combat movement/initiative should cover chases - separate chase systems are a patch on the combat system not working.

I guess build essential stuff first, then other stuff if you need it.

Quote from: silva;635630I think its just a matter of what aspect you would like to emphasize (if any). Combat is unanimously chosen because of the hobby wargaming roots, but nothing holds you from making it just another simple trait vs trait roll.

By the way, if your other thread is any indicative, you could have combat as a simple roll, but deepen it when a 1 on 1 duel happens.

 (I think Castle Falkenstein makes exactly that - simplify general combat, but deepen it with a more elaborate rules when its duel time)

As I recall CF had a very specific set of rules for a duel using playing cards (like the rest of its system); you had to incorporate rests at certain points as well. I never actually used the system, but it was intended as entirely separate and not part of combat: a system for proper formal duelling as a spectacle, not an aspect of combat. Though I'm sure you could have a duel take place surrounded by combat.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;635739Social combat: optional (you can make it a simple stat/skill roll, or let PCs play it out). Unless there's a class/role that does it as their main thing.

Not sure how I feel about social combat. It's become a popular gaming concept over the last decade though I'm not convinced it actually works. It sounds like something that could be useful: the virtue of mighty heroes as a literal weapon. But in practise it just sounds like a might pain in the ass.

Quote from: silva;635617If its half-sucess, GM improvises some hard choices and ask the player to pick: a) the shot missed but player keeps his own position hidden, or b) the shot hits, the car is out the road, but players position if revealed to the passengers that (oops) just survived the crash.

Quote from: silva;635617P.S: notice that Apocalypse World is not a storygame, but a (fairly) traditional rpg, really. No shared narrative or story rules at all.

The thing you consistently fail to grasp Silva is that the half-success decision above is narrative control.  The character can have absolutely no way of deciding whether his shot missed and he's hidden, or whether the shot hits and his position is revealed. None.  It's the player who makes that choice and the choice is made based on how he, the player, wants the game to go from there.

You still play the character, but every half success, there a chance to do a "time-out" and decide how things are going to branch.  There doesn't need to be, you could have half-successes simply be modifiers, or GM narrated complications, but to have the player decide things that the character has no control over is OOC metagame and a form of narrative control.

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;635827Not sure how I feel about social combat. It's become a popular gaming concept over the last decade though I'm not convinced it actually works. It sounds like something that could be useful: the virtue of mighty heroes as a literal weapon. But in practise it just sounds like a might pain in the ass.

Oh, probably. I can't say I've ever played a system that uses a lot of 'social combat' rules but most systems do them badly since:
- results are usually unrealistic, since human behaviour is too complex to model.
- they can potentially take away player choices if NPCs can do it too
-they reduce roleplaying in favour of just rolling the dice and using the powers
- characters with sufficiently ridiculous social skills may stop normal combats too often.

The best social combat system I can think of is probably for Dogs In the Vineyard - I think its design mitigates at least some of the results above since it includes relationship values and the like in the dice results, since PCs or NPCs can always switch from talking to gunfighting (effectively just at a penalty instead of being automatically pacified by a high result), and since it uses trait rolls rather than skill rolls every character is on a vaguely even keel. I'm suspicious about whether it has roleplaying, though.

Quote from: CRKruegerThe thing you consistently fail to grasp Silva is that the half-success decision above is narrative control. The character can have absolutely no way of deciding whether his shot missed and he's hidden, or whether the shot hits and his position is revealed. None. It's the player who makes that choice and the choice is made based on how he, the player, wants the game to go from there.

You still play the character, but every half success, there a chance to do a "time-out" and decide how things are going to branch. There doesn't need to be, you could have half-successes simply be modifiers, or GM narrated complications, but to have the player decide things that the character has no control over is OOC metagame and a form of narrative control.

Krueger, I took some liberties in my example to illustrate the difference between task vs conflict resolution. The actual choices in AW moves are much more restricted and grounded in-character. (Its even possible that Justin enters here any minute and critique my example :D )

Further, its entirely possible to put the options in a way as to turn it into a more in-character decision. Ex (for that same half-success roll):"Daud, you dont feel safe to make the shot without exposing yourself. Do you make it anyway, even if it blows your cover?"

There, you have it. ;)

But you have a point, nonetheless - even with more restricted choices, there are choices for the player to make. I just think its no more offensive to in-character/1st person positioning than other things we see in rpgs, like fate/luck/hero/karma points, or, to be more nitpicky, the kind of absolute situation assessment and tactical set-pieces all players are able to do while in combat situations, that his character should never be able to (thus also breaking the in-character/1st person premise).

Quote from: silva;635963I just think its no more offensive to in-character/1st person positioning than other things we see in rpgs, like fate/luck/hero/karma points

Fate, luck, karma or what have you still keep the player firmly in the driving seat of their character, and only their character. Stepping out of that seat and making decisions from another perspective entirely doesn't just wreck immersion, it serves to deliberately dissociate the player from their character.

Roleplaying first emerged as a phenomenon because as the number of "characters" approached one, players began to care more about them, eventually ending up with a much more visceral experience than their predecessors, wargames. It hurts when a character dies because there is an attachment.

The further from that unique position you get, the further away from the heart of roleplaying you get. I don't really care if it seems weird or "brain damaged" that people can form attachments to imaginary constructs, it's how it seems to work, and it's a lot of fun.

Take a look at th link in my sig thre for more information about the reality behind shared narrative games. It's no surprise that ghost whistler and many others are finding it hard to swallow that particular dish.

Quote from: The TravellerFate, luck, karma or what have you still keep the player firmly in the driving seat of their character, and only their character.

Disagreed. These mechanics give the player power over the situation/story/scene beyond any capabilities the character itself could plausibly have.

Idem for the total situation assessment and tactical set pieces cited before - in a real circunstance, no character could have such clear and complete capacity for analysis as we have in the table, their reason clouded by emotion, motivation, fatigue, pain, etc. If we players ignore these, then its also out-of-character decision. Its you THE PLAYER taking the decision, not the character. In other words, its a higher, oniscient and onipresent, entity who is taking the decisions for the character. (granted, some games do include these factors through psychological atributes - Pendragon virtues, Unknown Armies sanity metters, Riddle of Steel drives, etc - but theyre the exception, not the norm )

So, next time youre at your comfy D&D/Vampire/Shadowrun table, and the GM explains the situation in detail while giving you a minute to assess it and calmly decide what to do ("hmmm.. If we do this, that happens... If we do that, this may happen.. what about we..."), sorry but youre already out-of-character/immersion broken. The "driving seat" is not in character anymore, its your comfy sofa in your warm and safe living room. ;)

Quote from: silva;636032Disagreed. These mechanics give the player power over the situation/story/scene beyond any capabilities the character itself could plausibly have.

So the idea of someone flinging fireballs from their fingers doesn't bother you but the concept of a character having "luck" or being "touched by fate" is completely out of character and meta? If a player decides to modify an attack roll by using a certain skill, that's no more of a challenge to suspension of disbelief or immersion than if the same player uses luck to do similar.

The key thing here of course is that the player is acting through the character.

Of course a game which claims hardball realism should have neither magic nor luck, but in most games it's an accepted part of the genre.

Quote from: silva;636032Its you THE PLAYER taking the decision, not the character. In other words, its a higher, oniscient and onipresent, entity who is taking the decisions for the character.

Is this the part where you start buzzing and bellowing "DOES NOT COMPUTE!!" before your head explodes?

Trav, dont sidestep my argument.

I will repeat:

Why do you think altering the fiction with "hero points" ("bad roll pal, you die... or you could use those hero points to alter this outcome.." ), or having absolute oniscience in a situation the character could never have ("ok, my character is badly hurt, fatigued, and emotionally stressed, but Im still able to perceive all this info you just told me, and I have 1 minute to calmly decide what to do next ?"), is not considered out-of-character / out-of-immersion / third-person acting ?

Answer that first, please. Dont sidestep.

Quote from: silva;636032Disagreed. These mechanics give the player power over the situation/story/scene beyond any capabilities the character itself could plausibly have.

In some cases, perhaps. But most luck point systems boost the stat in question: either extra dice to roll, or a greater postitive modifier. They don't, certainly not all, alter the environment or allow for an auto win.

I will like some clarity on "Luck Points":

In just about every traditional RPG I've seen this is represented by a task re-roll, bonus, etc., to have that task then interpreted by the GM. At most I've seen it exchanged for direct GM-interpreted salvation.

In Storygames I've seen this where the player takes narrative control of the conflict, anywhere from a whole scene to a 'full round' of tasks. The shift in interpretive power is pretty obvious between them.

However, there are many games I have yet to play.

So which "Luck Points" are we talking about here?

Quote from: silva;636032So, next time youre at your comfy D&D/Vampire/Shadowrun table, and the GM explains the situation in detail while giving you a minute to assess it and calmly decide what to do ("hmmm.. If we do this, that happens... If we do that, this may happen.. what about we..."), sorry but youre already out-of-character/immersion broken. The "driving seat" is not in character anymore, its your comfy sofa in your warm and safe living room. ;)

Ideally that is not allowed by the rules from older RPGs. That whole "...a meaningful RPG cannot be had without proper time keeping!!" comment by Gygax fits here. It's why gameplay examples had declared actions first, and those who hemmed and hawed in the example were skipped.

Granted though times have changed and WotC D&D and the like have migrated more towards turn-based tactics. Many play tables nowadays assume this play style where long periods of table collusion can occur regardless of game-related time and space. Makes a lot of the older spells which bought players additional out-of-game thinking time, like D&D's Withdraw priest spell or In Nomine's Ethereal song of Tongues (actual telepathy), redundant -- but that's a by-product of the play style, not the system.

QuoteSo which "Luck Points" are we talking about here?

Anyone that allows you to re-roll a failure and/or retcon a just occurred scene/situation and/or add in sudden events. Example: Shadowrun karma, Ars Magicka Whimsy cards.

QuoteGranted though times have changed and WotC D&D and the like have migrated more towards turn-based tactics. Many play tables nowadays assume this play style where long periods of table collusion can occur regardless of game-related time and space... but that's a by-product of the play style, not the system.

Sorry, if the system doesnt have anything to say about it - and it doesnt in all games Ive seen so far - then the fault is on the system, not playstyles.

Well the older games were explicit about not allowing table collusion during and after initiative. So they cannot be faulted at all.

I don't have a copy of any WotC D&D so I have to go off of experience. But that is where I saw the most of that playstyle. If anyone can answer that with chapter and verse that is on them.

And I completely disagree about rerolls being narrativist and storygamey. It is still about task resolution.

QuoteAnd I completely disagree about rerolls being narrativist and storygamey.

And I didnt say the contrary, really.

QuoteWell the older games were explicit about not allowing table collusion during and after initiative. So they cannot be faulted at all.

I don't have a copy of any WotC D&D so I have to go off of experience. But that is where I saw the most of that playstyle. If anyone can answer that with chapter and verse that is on them.

Are you sure this isnt a feature exclusive of (very) old D&D editions? Like, pre-80s old ? (as I started gaming with late 80s games, that could explain it)

I know right off the top of my head that SJG In Nomine that several attunements and songs can only function with the same declared action assumption, and that was 1997.

And D&D 2e is 1989 and throughout the 1990s.

I'd have to scrounge my other books for WW, Pinnacle, AEG, but... the nineties are not the pre-eighties.
:p

Post 2000 things were different in many ways.:D

Interesting. How many seconds those games suggest giving the acting player before him deciding on a action?

While I think this feature may not be desirable in more tactics heavy games (Shadowrun, D&D3/4), in others, more immersion/tension focused ones (CoC, AW) it could be really interesting.

Most was GM judgment, because describing an action can be quite variable in terms of seconds, but the books said to not let the process linger over a minute. 2e said skip someone delaying to come back to them, but if they cannot respond a second time they are frozen in hesitation that round. Another immediate example from IN SJG was how initiative order placed mental communication before mental casted powers before physical communication before movement before physical attacks, and how short certain song/attunement messages must be during a combat round.

Adding hard mechanics over declaration (outside the general colckwise v. counter-clockwise advice) would overly complicate things, and I don't have any of the grotesquely crunchy 80s rpgs to verify how they did it. The recommendation for extremely short action declaration was strong, and sequence of round resolution formalized, but I did not see much heavy mathematics on formalizing action declaration in my games. Does not mean they did not exist, and they definitely had ideas on how rapid action declaration should be. They got the who, what, when, where, why, and suggested how, but not always a formalized how.

Stories have to be meaningful.

Now, why the hell would I want to "play" the story of some incompetent hack when I can be reading Hesse, Wilde, Bioy Casares, Dostoyevski?

I play the game for the game, the "story" is what remains after the session.

If a question is important enough to answer, and we can't decide on an answer, then tossing a dice is a solution.

We can make it more complicated by coming up with arguments that get quantified: Joe is a famously agile football player, Sam needs to turn around, Abe is slowed by wounds, Ike has further to go ... down to as much minutia as we happen to find it entertaining to consider.

It's a matter of personal taste. I wouldn't go about polling strangers; the opinions that matter are those of my players!

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;635625But I'm finding myself wondering how much detail for opposing situations I need

IE: as well as combat, do i need rules for social combat (might be fun), arm wrestling, tea drinking, beer drinking contests, chess, vehcile chases (yes, actually)? How much do I need? I don't know whether some or all of these things will turn up.

If you really don't anticipate a lot of need, then don't sweat it.

There are gazillions of RPG books and magazine articles covering all sorts of things, for the most part because they either

(a) happened to be big enough deals coming up in actual play in this or that campaign, or
(b) really fired some GM's imagination.

(Well, that's how it used to be before more 'pros' got into the racket and started writing stuff just to fill a specified number of pages.)

"Tea drinking?" I thought, but I should not be surprised since people have turned out everything from Dropped Oil Lamp Tables to Waist Size Generators.

The play is the thing, wherein you'll catch the nuances that really swing for *your* campaign.

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;635597The system in question resolves initiative with the result of the die roll used for the action. Why would I need to roll to shut a window? All that's important is to know when i can shut the window: before or after the guy tries to jump through.

I agree completely, which is why all the resolution systems I'm currently testing are effectively initiative systems, which generate 'not now' instead of 'fail' results.