Quote from: soviet;728184I think we both know that many of the most prominent indie/forgist/swine games (Dogs, Burning Wheel, Sorcerer, Fate, Fiasco, Dungeon World) have actually been pretty successful commercially, clearly not anywhere near D&D standards but I would bet they have probably sold more games than any of the publishers who post regularly on these forums (including me and you). So maybe you want to reconsider this whole commercial success uber alles thing.

First, let's distinguish between general "swine" games, Storygames, and games designed by GNS principles.
"Swine" is a term for a certain pretentious mentality; but its entirely possible for a game to be a "Swine" game and still be an RPG, and not a storygame.  Vampire, for instance; definitely a Swine game, definitely not a Storygame.

A Forge-designed GNS game in theory could be a non-storygame (if it was designed in an attempt to be "G" or "S"), though in practice almost all the games that came out of the Forge were "N" games because Forgists were storygamers at heart; the other two parts of GNS were ways of explaining "Games we don't like", and the few attempts to do these sorts of games were horrible parodies of how Forge Swine imagined regular gamers run games they despise.

Both Storygames (which are in essence all "N" games) and almost all other Forge-designed games that I've seen thus far are not actually RPGs.  Virtually all of them are Swine games, but not all Swine games are Storygames or designed by Forge theory.

So that out of the way, let's look at your particular examples: a few of those you mentioned were not in fact big commercial successes by any measure, a couple were big-hits within the tiny incestuous community of Forge Swine (dogs, sorcerer), because their authors are considered the "great minds" of their movement and the games came out when that movement still had a large following.  People buy Sorcerer or Dogs because it shows their Forge credentials.  Now, you could argue of course that this is a good commercial model for Edwards or Vince Baker, I mean I'm sure they made a tidy sum off it, in the same way that L. Ron Hubbard made a very tidy sum off of his utterly shitty novels because his cult members would buy them out of fanaticism too.  But to me there's a certain difference between something like that and more regular commercial success.

As for the other more recent cases, pretty much every other game you mentioned there that was a commercial success did so by becoming AS CLOSE TO A REGULAR RPG AS POSSIBLE.  In other words, by trying to deceive people or dilute the entire Forge/Storygame Swine ideas.  Dungeon World, arguably the most successful of the bunch (maybe excepting FATE, which I'm not sure was actually designed with GNS theory in mind at all) went so far in that direction that it actually was no longer a Storygame with a thin pretense of being an RPG and instead became an RPG with a thin veneer of pretending to be a storygame (you can say the same thing about FATE, for that matter).
The only one on your list that went the other direction is FIASCO, which is so far from RPGs at all that its become more of a party game; there are games completely outside the hobby that are more reminiscent of an RPG than Fiasco.  You could no more consider Fiasco an RPG than you could that mob-hitman-game (the one where one player is secretly a traitor, or whatever) whose name eludes me at the moment, or various other boardgames that were no way connected to RPGs.

RPGPundit

Quote from: estar;728210Because you can attempt anything as your character

Quote from: estar;728496the situation is universal, you as your character are surprised by four goblins with daggers, what do you do?

Well I could try to resolve it as follows (assume that setting details I describe exist before the encounter).

1) I get hit by two goblins in the initial surprise and but remain standing.
2) I grab the chandelier and swing at one of the goblins and knock him down.
3) As a result of the swing only one goblin can attack (and misses) and the other two have to move into position.
4) I draw my sword and step back so only two goblins can attack me.
5) One hits and one misses, the wounds are slowing me down.
6) I attack and down a goblin.
7) By the end of combat I am severely injured but all four goblins are down.

There is nothing in D&D 3e, Rolemaster, or Burning Wheels that prevents the above occurring.

The second of these is a good example of why I find the rubric "you can do anything" pretty unhelpful - and have seen it be a trap for new players.

For instance, a 1st level PC in RM or 3E can't realistically aspire to do 1 through 7 at all, and a player who has his/her PC attempt it is likely to be generating a new PC in short order. (Because Burning Wheel has armour as damage negation, it might work out differently.)

Unless the group is just ignoring the action resolution mechanics and free-roleplaying, they have a huge impact (in conjunction with the PC-build rules) in determining what the scope of viable action is for any given PC.

Quote from: Phillip;728436Pemerton, what was to you the point of ensuring that your priest would be a better fighter than the warrior played by the dude who was big on playing an effective fighter? What do you think was the point to the DM of letting you do that and keeping the other fellow in the dark?

I read the book (Players Option: Skills & Powers) and built a PC. Everyone else seemed to be doing the same thing - I can't remember how many people built their PCs at the same time, but I know all the building happened sometime outside the actual session. I didn't know my PC was significantly mechanically more effective until play started. I just assumed (i) that the game designers had built a reasonably balanced build system, and (ii) that the other players were using it.

Once I found out that the other guy didn't know much about building characters in a points-buy system, I showed him the ropes.

As for why I built an effective character, because I don't really enjoy 1st level AD&D that much - it's basically a survival lottery - and so I wanted to give my PC every edge that I could.

What the GM was thinking I don't know. I didn't think much of him as a GM at the time - I was playing the game because a couple of friends were - and time hasn't changed that opinion. He definitely had a favourite player (not me) whose PC was the focus of the campaign as far as the GM was concerned. And I think he may have enjoyed the "shock value" of seeing my PC actually bust out in play. I don't think he was the sort of GM who cared whether or not each player had a PC with a good mechanical capacity to impact the flow of the game. He was from the school that assumed the GM was in charge of the game, and the players were just there to add a bit of dialogue.

Ouch! Unsupervised and unreviewed green usage of PO: S&P, greenhorns who wanna play a concept, and noted GM favoritism with marked disinterest of other players' fun in his frustrated pursuit as an author.

Yeah, that's about as close to a late 1990s perfect storm as you can get. Probably would have to run a railroady shlock FR adventure with Drizzt & Elminster as tour guides to get worse. Unless there was cross Mary Sue promotion of his oWoD Lesbian Stripper Ninja Bastet or Dual-wield Katana Weretiger Samurai. In retrospect, sorry to say your campaign was DOA.

Quote from: pemerton;730010The second of these is a good example of why I find the rubric "you can do anything" pretty unhelpful - and have seen it be a trap for new players.

For instance, a 1st level PC in RM or 3E can't realistically aspire to do 1 through 7 at all, and a player who has his/her PC attempt it is likely to be generating a new PC in short order. (Because Burning Wheel has armour as damage negation, it might work out differently.)

Unless the group is just ignoring the action resolution mechanics and free-roleplaying, they have a huge impact (in conjunction with the PC-build rules) in determining what the scope of viable action is for any given PC.

I read the book (Players Option: Skills & Powers) and built a PC. Everyone else seemed to be doing the same thing - I can't remember how many people built their PCs at the same time, but I know all the building happened sometime outside the actual session. I didn't know my PC was significantly mechanically more effective until play started. I just assumed (i) that the game designers had built a reasonably balanced build system, and (ii) that the other players were using it.

Once I found out that the other guy didn't know much about building characters in a points-buy system, I showed him the ropes.

As for why I built an effective character, because I don't really enjoy 1st level AD&D that much - it's basically a survival lottery - and so I wanted to give my PC every edge that I could.

What the GM was thinking I don't know. I didn't think much of him as a GM at the time - I was playing the game because a couple of friends were - and time hasn't changed that opinion. He definitely had a favourite player (not me) whose PC was the focus of the campaign as far as the GM was concerned. And I think he may have enjoyed the "shock value" of seeing my PC actually bust out in play. I don't think he was the sort of GM who cared whether or not each player had a PC with a good mechanical capacity to impact the flow of the game. He was from the school that assumed the GM was in charge of the game, and the players were just there to add a bit of dialogue.

Is your argument that a 1st level character (under 3E) can't take on four opponents an indictment of the game mechanics? A 1st level character (even if a pure warrior) has most likely only had a handful of actual battles. Taking on four opponents, even for a much more highly trained fighter, is a difficult task. Within 3E that's four chances at them scoring a natural 20. Realistically that is one person desperately trying to keep track of four incoming attacks. I don't see that as an indictment of any game system. It is  a tough spot for anyone to be in. Those are Alexander the Great or Cyrano de Bergerac type odds.

Quote from: Tetsubo;730015Is your argument that a 1st level character (under 3E) can't take on four opponents an indictment of the game mechanics? A 1st level character (even if a pure warrior) has most likely only had a handful of actual battles. Taking on four opponents, even for a much more highly trained fighter, is a difficult task. Within 3E that's four chances at them scoring a natural 20. Realistically that is one person desperately trying to keep track of four incoming attacks. I don't see that as an indictment of any game system. It is  a tough spot for anyone to be in. Those are Alexander the Great or Cyrano de Bergerac type odds.

That doesn't seem to be his argument, though. He seems to be saying that when you tell someone, "You can do anything in this game," you're not exactly telling them the truth. Depending on the game, you may be actively misleading them, since some games will constrain character in-game options rather severely.

Quote from: Bill White;730024That doesn't seem to be his argument, though. He seems to be saying that when you tell someone, "You can do anything in this game," you're not exactly telling them the truth. Depending on the game, you may be actively misleading them, since some games will constrain character in-game options rather severely.

Telling a new person at gymnastics, "You can do anything" might be inspirational but isn't a statement of reality. A new person at something is a new person at something is a new person at something. I don't see that as showing a game system is failing. Is there any system in existence that allows a beginning character to do *anything*? I still think that is a a very leading and misguiding stance to take.

Quote from: Tetsubo;730028Telling a new person at gymnastics, "You can do anything" might be inspirational but isn't a statement of reality. A new person at something is a new person at something is a new person at something. I don't see that as showing a game system is failing. Is there any system in existence that allows a beginning character to do *anything*? I still think that is a a very leading and misguiding stance to take.

This is a good point. It is also worth pointing out, no one is saying you can try and succeed at anything you want in the game. When people say you can do whatever you want, they are really saying "you can attempt anything." Holding the statement to its literal meaning would require you to give the players omnipotent powers at the start of the first session, and i dont think anyone has ever meant that when they use those words.

Quote from: estar;728496I agree that mechanical steps to resolve the swordsmen being surprised and the ensuing combat will be completely different. But the situation is universal, you as your character are surprised by four goblins with daggers, what do you do?

Yes, it's true that the scenario you described could happen in any of those three systems.


The specific point I was going for, however, is that the odds of each outcome are quite different in different rulesets.  It's not simply a question of equivalent power across the different systems, because the relative weight given to different factors (e.g. sword skill superiority, outnumbering, the whim of chance, the effectiveness of ranged weapons) is different.

In (some editions of) D&D, you're more or less insulated from surprising outcomes when facing low hit-dice monsters; their most damaging attacks have a well known upper limit.  In Rolemaster, a runaway open-ended roll can eviscerate you on the first round of combat, regardless of your skills.  In Burning Wheel, the main risk would be getting swarmed and locked, then being stabbed to death while helpless.

The in-character decision-making process takes this into account.

Quote from: pemerton;730010I read the book (Players Option: Skills & Powers) and built a PC. ue.

Not really weighing on this particular aspect of the discussion, but this book was quite controversial among the folks i gamed with. We had several groups in my area and only allowed it, because most of us considered 1) broke in terms of balance and 2) part of a effort to turn D&D to a skill/power based game so it could compete with Vampire (hey, it was the 90s), or at least to appeal to that demographic.

All i remember about it is me and a friend running through some if the potential combinations and deciding the book wouldn't be used in either of our campaigns.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;730046Not really weighing on this particular aspect of the discussion, but this book was quite controversial among the folks i gamed with. We had several groups in my area and only allowed it, because most of us considered 1) broke in terms of balance and 2) part of a effort to turn D&D to a skill/power based game so it could compete with Vampire (hey, it was the 90s), or at least to appeal to that demographic.

All i remember about it is me and a friend running through some if the potential combinations and deciding the book wouldn't be used in either of our campaigns.

And the most broken part is the cleric part.
They put up the number of points needed to build each class and the inherrent imbalance in the native cleric class was exposed as a result. The cleric with good combat, good hp, and good magic is inherrently imbalanced however the imbalance is weighted against the clerics role as a healer such that in most games the imbalance is mitigated.

However, if you remove those restrictions and you allow the cleric to redistribute the points that would go into its base construction anyway you like then you create a broken class. So you can make a cleric of the god of thieves that has all thief abilities of a thief of the same level and still has clerical magic and clerical thaco and so is simply superior to a thief. Likewise you can buy up combat skills to fighter level etc, etc.

Skills and powers is basically a good idea poorly implemented. There are a couple of better versions out on the web

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;730032This is a good point.

No, it's not. It's the worst kind of ridiculous geek parsing of a common phrase.

"What do you want for dinner?" "Oh, anything's fine. Surprise me." Would any reasonable person expect to get a plate with a piece of old tire and a pile of pennies on their plate at that point?

Christ, are the lot of you such a bunch of social shitwits that normal human communication is beyond your fucking grasp?

I really take the essence of "you can do anything you want" as "you can try anything that you can describe your character attempting", in contrast to pre-RPG commercial games in which action was circumscribed by defined rules/moves. The younger generation of gamers, who themselves are often geeks steeped in CRPGs, shooters, and MMOs, seem oblivious to the revolutionary nature of TTRPGs at the time they were introduced--not only relative to board and card games like Monopoly and Whist, but even compared to board wargames and most miniatures.

That said it's certainly true that different RPGs have quite different encoded assumptions about what's possible for a PC of a given type and experience level. But the difference is relatively unimportant considering a robust understanding between GM and player about how close to reality the overall game will hew, along with experience that furthers that understanding (i.e. interpersonal and game-mechanical exploration). I'd add that it's a lousy GM who doesn't know their rules set of choice well enough to create proper expectations.

Quote from: Tetsubo;730028Telling a new person at gymnastics, "You can do anything" might be inspirational but isn't a statement of reality. A new person at something is a new person at something is a new person at something. I don't see that as showing a game system is failing. Is there any system in existence that allows a beginning character to do *anything*? I still think that is a a very leading and misguiding stance to take.

I'm not particularly invested in this argument, but I don't think the gymnastics analogy quite holds. Notice how it presumes that "you start at 1st level" (i.e., with a novice, inexperienced, or untrained character). But if I'm coming to fantasy RPGs having only read the fiction that it's based on (Appendix N, maybe), then I might assume I can start out in play with a character who's as capable and as badass as the ones I've read about.

Of course, it's reasonable to assert that "you can do anything you want" means that, once you've got a character, you can attempt to do anything that is appropriate and practicable for a character of the sort you've got. But part of the promise of RPGs is also that you can be anyone you want, and that's much less restrictive.

As usual a dash of common sense and a willingness to explore the activity instead of taking an a priori nonnegotiable position is the solution. A theory of RPGs which doesn't take that into account is at best naive at worst special pleading. In fact you can see this in the late-Forge approaches which began finally to acknowledge the "social contract" (obscured as usual by misappropriating outside jargon), but it was too little too late for those who see RPG analysis as a matter of deduction from rules in vacuo.

(I don't remember pitching a fit at age 10 when my very first character, a hobbit thief, died in combat with giant spiders in the 2nd or third room.)

Quote from: Black Vulmea;730104No, it's not. It's the worst kind of ridiculous geek parsing of a common phrase.

"What do you want for dinner?" "Oh, anything's fine. Surprise me." Would any reasonable person expect to get a plate with a piece of old tire and a pile of pennies on their plate at that point?

Christ, are the lot of you such a bunch of social shitwits that normal human communication is beyond your fucking grasp?

BV, I do not believe we are in disagreement. Tetsubo seemed to be supporting your point here unless I am misunderstanding one of you. I thought tetsubo was disputing the notion that telling someone 'you can do anything' is untruthful or a problem with the system.