After reading the description of the brain cylinder on the pathfinder srd fansite, I remembered why I don't bother with third edition: the rules are needlessly wordy and insanely clunky and the worldbuilding is shoehorned to fit the rules rather than the other way around.

What is the benefit of rules-heavy exception-based design? In my experience it feels more like a headache.

The ability to have "builds" that interact with the tactical situation, hopefully.

Some players think that if a rule is published, then it's a legal move to make at a game table. Any other move needs a rule written to perform it.

The point of exception based design is that it is not rules heavy. It has a simple core and everything you need to know about a power, skill, or talent is contained concisely within the description. Part of this is achieved by using keywords with standard meaning.

Magic the Gathering employs this to great effect as well as D&D 4th edition.

In games like D&D 3rd edition and GURPS, the power, skills, and talent, build off of a more complex core. Usually describing a set of modifiers and rolls to achieve the result. For example to use the Arm Lock from GURPS Martial Arts requires you know how Grappling works from the Core rules. This is not the case in D&D 4e where a Arm Lock description is sufficient to find out everything you need to know about how use it.

It works very well in presenting a lot of detail in an accessible format. The downside is that if you want to modify it wholesale then it takes a lot of work. For example trying to use D&D 4e for a Ravenloft campaign or a Game of Throne campaign. Because if you all your exception have a particular feel then the only way to change the feel is to rewrite most of if not all of the exception.

Having a "simple core" is meaningless when there are so many exceptions that the core becomes virtually irrelevant. See: Exalted.

Quote from: Kiero;933582Having a "simple core" is meaningless when there are so many exceptions that the core becomes virtually irrelevant. See: Exalted.

Word!

What it can bring to the table, though, is a specialized flavor transported via the mechanics. That is very hard to achieve with all the effect based games out there.
Also, as has been said, some gamers love to read that stuff and try to figure out how to use it/optimize their character. So it kind of becomes a mini-game all on its own. Also, tactical choices and depth.

For myself, most of the time, it is too much of a headache to put up with it. Especially those games that go into an extreme form of exception based mechanics...for example the aforementioned Exalted. What a big clusterfuck of a game.

It allows the creators to churn out book after book of new "crunch" though it increasingly weighs down and obscures the relatively simple core rules until they collapse. Then they can start over again with a slightly changed new edition and repeat the process with a new cash cow to slaughter.  See: Exalted.

I'm with Estar on this one, that exception-based design is supposed to be simpler. Something I often say about 1E initiative is forget the DMPrata outline. The way it works is it's group initiative, each side rolls d6, highest goes first. Common sense exceptions apply. Everything else in the initiative rules were an attempt to codify exceptions into rules. And that's where it took a wrong turn. However, I never thought of 3E as fitting the exception-based design mold. I'm with the OP that 3E was designed for the content to fit the rules rather than the other way around. That's a clear intent to avoid exceptions and to make everything work off of a convoluted system.

I use the Pareto 80/20 rule as a rule of thumb. Imagine a "thorough" system. Like 3E. We would expect that the top 20% most significant rules govern about 80% of the game. So I prefer the game design to be just that. The 20% that covers 80% of the cases. Then, a 1E AD&D style DMG as a catalog of common or highly effective rulings to start covering the remaining 20%. If as a GM I'm not either making a judgment call or accessing one of those nitty-gritty rulings at least one time in ten, then there's probably too much emphasis on rules, not enough emphasis on creativity. On the flip side, if the core rules aren't adequately handling at least two-thirds of what goes on in the game, the rules probably haven't been well thought-out.

The needless detail is the advantage, for those who want every last thing codified (right down to scrotum elasticity).

But, seriously, I feel like rules heavy is for people who want the rules, rather than the people, to decide. Probably feels more "fair" that way? (I really don't know--I'm past my days of minutiae now. At best, it was a thought exercise. Stacks of splats were interesting to read. Never used many of them.)

It does what it advertises. Core system, exceptions to the core for more detail/granularity/options. Almost every system starts with a core, then adds exception mechanics onto it. Some are a lot heavier than others (PF), some have few exceptions. Where you run into trouble is (as Kiero points out) a system that has a core, then a bucket of exceptions that mean you are always using exceptions over the core, rather than the core mechanic.

In general, if you are willing to play the game "as is", heavy exception mechanics tend to do what you need. A lot of them have optional exceptions too, so you can plug and play parts of the system. The downsides are obvious: harder to learn, harder to teach, harder to modify.

In my experience what works with card games doesn't work with roleplaying games. Are publishers trying to create hybrid card RPGs? That's the impression I get when I see printable cards being sold on OneBookShelf. It feels too much like video games to me.

I don't know about anyone else, but for me RPGs are supposed to be collaborative CYOA. The rules are just there to adjudicate the outcome of conflicts... like whether the action hero lands in a pool or a dumpster, not whether he outruns the fireball or gets incinerated.

Quote from: Kiero;933582Having a "simple core" is meaningless when there are so many exceptions that the core becomes virtually irrelevant. See: Exalted.

That not the advantage, the advantage is that if you are handed a sheet of abilities everything you need to know is one the sheet. The only thing you have to have memorized is the meaning of a few keywords and a handful of core mechanics. It one the keys to Magic the Gathering's success as a game and it works well at reducing complexity.

I am going to take a stab at what you are really talking about which system mastery. In the case of RPGs this means understanding all the options and picking the ones that that realizes your vision of the character (combat or otherwise). In this case yes an exception based design can be more difficult to master. When done wrong you have to comb through multiples lists of dozens of powers, and abilities to get a grip on the range of possibilities. I agree that is not a good thing.

But it doesn't change the fact that it will be far easier to play if you were handed the sheet for an arbitrary a Exhalted or D&D 4e character vs. GURPS or Harnmaster. Like most designs it has advantages and disadvantages.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;933769In my experience what works with card games doesn't work with roleplaying games. Are publishers trying to create hybrid card RPGs? That's the impression I get when I see printable cards being sold on OneBookShelf. It feels too much like video games to me.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;933769I don't know about anyone else, but for me RPGs are supposed to be collaborative CYOA. The rules are just there to adjudicate the outcome of conflicts... like whether the action hero lands in a pool or a dumpster, not whether he outruns the fireball or gets incinerated.

That a personal preference, you are neither right or wrong in your assertion. Players of GURPS and the Hero System have just as much fun as players of Microlite. One point you are wrong on is that somehow the rules make a RPG campaign a video game or something other than what you believe RPGs are. What make a campaign feel like that how the referee runs his campaign and how players play their character. The rules effect this by making it harder or easier to realize what they are shooting for. But it never impossible to play what you want with a given set of rules. Just more or less work.

Quote from: estar;933782That not the advantage, the advantage is that if you are handed a sheet of abilities everything you need to know is one the sheet. The only thing you have to have memorized is the meaning of a few keywords and a handful of core mechanics. It one the keys to Magic the Gathering's success as a game and it works well at reducing complexity.

I am going to take a stab at what you are really talking about which system mastery. In the case of RPGs this means understanding all the options and picking the ones that that realizes your vision of the character (combat or otherwise). In this case yes an exception based design can be more difficult to master. When done wrong you have to comb through multiples lists of dozens of powers, and abilities to get a grip on the range of possibilities. I agree that is not a good thing.

But it doesn't change the fact that it will be far easier to play if you were handed the sheet for an arbitrary a Exhalted or D&D 4e character vs. GURPS or Harnmaster. Like most designs it has advantages and disadvantages.

Not system mastery, something far more fundamental than that: the ability of the GM to run the game. Unless they simply cede understanding of the various exceptions at work around the table, they have to have a grasp of how all those things work and interact with each other, and all the additional exceptions their NPCs will be using too.

Quote from: estar;933784That a personal preference, you are neither right or wrong in your assertion. Players of GURPS and the Hero System have just as much fun as players of Microlite. One point you are wrong on is that somehow the rules make a RPG campaign a video game or something other than what you believe RPGs are. What make a campaign feel like that how the referee runs his campaign and how players play their character. The rules effect this by making it harder or easier to realize what they are shooting for. But it never impossible to play what you want with a given set of rules. Just more or less work.

GURPS seems a lot better written than Exalted or Pathfinder based on my previous reading of the books. The text is generally cleaner, more concise, and doesn't waste pages and pages with pointlessly redundant information or worthless effects designed to cater to uncreative special snowflakes. Pathfinder has a huge problem with redundant effects that could be replaced with spell or condition references; compare FantasyCraft. Exalted has thousands of charms, most of which are worthless situational modifiers, because something like Qwixalted somehow limits character diversity. GURPS doesn't suffer either of those problems.

The only problem I have with FantasyCraft or GURPS is needing to remember so much. As far as design goes I envy those amazing editors and proofreaders.