Quote from: Emperor Norton;812050I think honestly that some of the premises of "forge theory" isn't wrong, its that they took the wrong lessons from it.

Like "System Matters". Well, yeah, it does. The way the system plays will influence the game. I mean, that is part of the reason we've all got house rules for our home games right? To make the game run more how we intend. That is why some of us like D&D, some of us like Runequest, etc.

But then they somehow got into their heads that "System Matters" means that all games should be laser focused. And that just... doesn't make any sense at all. Its such a weird jump in logic.

Now, there can be a place for laser focused games (I still think the Leverage RPG creates some of the best heist games), BUT for the most part, an "unfocused" game house ruled to match the table will be able to get to the table more.

Well, I think that there's some level of value in the basic concept, but I think the Forge went in the wrong way with it.

I mean, I don't think it's bizarre to say that "the things that the game supports should be supported by the game mechanics".  If you intend for your game to be highly heroic, with characters fighting through hordes of lesser enemies (for instance), then having a mechanic that allows any single shot to turn into an instant death, no matter who the combatants are, is probably at odds with the goals for the system.

It also seems reasonable that the more things your system tries to do, the more likely it is that you'll have some level of that conflict.

But that's a far cry from saying "ANY attempt to try to do more than one thing is inherently wrong and a flaw of the game".  It says that making a game that does multiple things well is *harder*, and the more things you try to do, the more likely it is that people playing it will have to houserule or fudge.

And that's the thing.  A game that does more than one thing will allow people that have multiple desires for their gaming, or overlapping desires to sit at the table together.  If I like A, and you like B, then we can probably sit at the table and play a game that does both A and B, so long as we're reasonable adults and willing to compromise to some extent.  But a game that only does B won't interest me if I really like A.

And someone that likes A, B, and C is probably better served by a game that does *all* of those things, and allows him to maintain character continuity as he switches between them, rather than have them isolated into totally different games.

But I can see where a game that tries to do TOO MANY things, or too many things that require things that conflict, can get to the point where it's not doing anything very well at all.

It's also worth drilling in to system ideas to see what cool ideas you can uncover, and then go integrate it into a more broad system.

Quote from: Emperor Norton;812050I think honestly that some of the premises of "forge theory" isn't wrong, its that they took the wrong lessons from it.

Like "System Matters". Well, yeah, it does. The way the system plays will influence the game. I mean, that is part of the reason we've all got house rules for our home games right? To make the game run more how we intend. That is why some of us like D&D, some of us like Runequest, etc.

I always took "System Matters" to be akin to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis; that playing D&D would necessarily lead to D&D-ish play, just as language is claimed to influence thought. But people coin new words for new ideas, and making up new house rules would rebut the importance of "System Matters".

QuoteBut then they somehow got into their heads that "System Matters" means that all games should be laser focused. And that just... doesn't make any sense at all. Its such a weird jump in logic.

Now, there can be a place for laser focused games (I still think the Leverage RPG creates some of the best heist games), BUT for the most part, an "unfocused" game house ruled to match the table will be able to get to the table more.

Yes, my interpretation makes this even more senseless: having a separate language specialized for each idea.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;812077I think we have gotten lost in the analogy.

I've been confused from the start: I'm not sure if the toolbox is my game shelf, my campaign, my group of players, a game theme, or the RPG hobby. And then I put ice cream flavors in my toolbox and they all melted. So I propose a meta-metaphor in which each game is a metaphor and we don't want to mix them. Except D&D is somewhere you could find fascist octopi singing swan songs, so I don't think the meta-metaphor supports any particular conclusion or its own weight. But we could add it to the toolbox, whatever that is, just in case.

I think coherent and laser-focused are not the same thing. Coherence is about playstyle rather than necessarily genre or a specific sequence of events. You can have generic/universal games that are perfectly coherent quite easily - I believe I wrote one. The issue is, do the mechanics push towards a certain style of play? Do any of the other mechanics in the game work against it?

Quote from: rawma;812115I've been confused from the start: I'm not sure if the toolbox is my game shelf, my campaign, my group of players, a game theme, or the RPG hobby. And then I put ice cream flavors in my toolbox and they all melted. So I propose a meta-metaphor in which each game is a metaphor and we don't want to mix them. Except D&D is somewhere you could find fascist octopi singing swan songs, so I don't think the meta-metaphor supports any particular conclusion or its own weight. But we could add it to the toolbox, whatever that is, just in case.

That was fun.
Now, i'll explain:
The toolbox is the game system, the tools are the roolz.

I would say that, for example, 3e strongly promoted a certain playstyle, and was decoherent/incoherent/abcoherent/woodeding for stuff like careful gameplay, avoiding combat, extensive social plots, and so on.

For me, that's a good entry point to start considering modifications that can be made to fit playstyles I want, or different playstyles that might work better, or... whatever.

I think my biggest problem with Forgey stuff is that the playstyles and cladistics of RPGs that they use seem utterly foreign to most of the gaming I've engaged in.

For example, I'm interested in identifying how much players are interested in character background, socializing IC or OOC, how much combat people want vs. how much gets fatiguing, the scope of adventure, how much players are interested in 'touring' a ficitonal place, and so on.

The whole 'exploring character themes through RPGs' is something that seems to be an interest a SMALL fraction of gamers are interested in. Which is fine, but trying to jam those experiences and declare Narrativism (or whatever) as 1/3 of gamers is just dumb.

So is making up terms that suggest one thing but in your jargon means something utterly different that you can never quite explain to anyone's satisfaction.

Quote from: Catelf;812129That was fun.

Add it to the toolbox or the ice cream truck or the breakfast menu (available all day)!

Quote from: Will;812131The whole 'exploring character themes through RPGs' is something that seems to be an interest a SMALL fraction of gamers are interested in. Which is fine, but trying to jam those experiences and declare Narrativism (or whatever) as 1/3 of gamers is just dumb.

Whoever said that 1/3 of gamers prefer narrativist games?

Quote from: rawma;812132Add it to the toolbox or the ice cream truck or the breakfast menu (available all day)!

All I know is that trying to turn a screw using ice cream is doomed to failure :-)

Quote from: soviet;812134Whoever said that 1/3 of gamers prefer narrativist games?

True, but if hardly anyone has ever played that way, why are you bothering everyone and coming up with special terms for it?

I mean, I'm sure some people play RPGs in the nude, but I'm not going to put that as a significant part of 'explaining all RPGs' theory.

Edit:
Amusingly, I'm basing this on the spirit of 'system matters' -- if your 'system' is including something as one of three parts of your overarching theory, clearly you think it's an important part of gaming as a whole, eh?

Quote from: Will;812136True, but if hardly anyone has ever played that way, why are you bothering everyone and coming up with special terms for it?

I mean, I'm sure some people play RPGs in the nude, but I'm not going to put that as a significant part of 'explaining all RPGs' theory.

Well the point is that it's a viable playstyle that can be fun. I don't know what other reason anyone would need.

This is true for narrativism as well. :-)

Note that narrativism being a playstyle doesn't mean that narrativists are a player type. Or simulationists, or gamists, etc. People will have preferences, sure, but I think most people can enjoy most types of game. For example my group, including myself, are primarily D&D players and have been for generally somewhere between 2 and 3 decades. But we still enjoy a bit of narrativism (Other Worlds) now and then. There are things OW can do that D&D can't, and there are things that D&D can do that OW can't. It just depends on what kind of game we feel like playing.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;812077I think we have gotten lost in the analogy.

People are talking about playing with their tool.

Quote from: soviet;812036You don't throw in a few crisps, some salad, a burger, and some chocolate into your favourite soup.

That's a really weird analogy: Crisps by themselves aren't a meal. Burgers are often served with crisps on the side. A salad consisting of only lettuce and nothing else is a pretty shitty salad. And soups consisting of only one ingredient are also pretty bland.

And chocolate? Christ, we dip everything and its cousin into chocolate.

Quote from: soviet;812134Whoever said that 1/3 of gamers prefer narrativist games?

There is an implication, given that it is one of three named styes, each given 'equal billing'.