Quote from: Itachi;847620So, thats a yes ? You agree we can measure speed of play ?

No.

A beginner with a system will always be slower than an experienced player of that system.

Even experienced players might not know, or care, about the rules, so might need assistance.

Some people take longer to roll dice - believe me, I have played with someone who shakes the dice several times, pauses, shakes them again, gets ready to roll, shakes them again and then, for good measure, shakes them a final time, each shaking taking about 10 seconds.

So, what you need is a group of people who know all the games you are going to measure really well, who don't chit-chat, who don't shake dice for a long time and who just roll the dice, get the results, mark them down, on to the next one. Basically, robots.

Games work at different levels and the speed of play is different. RuneQuest lovingly describes a combat, HeroQuest can do a whole combat in a single roll. Does that make HeroQuest objectively better?

Quote from: Itachi;847620So, thats a yes ? You agree we can measure speed of play ?

Yes, one can measure speed of play at least to an extent.  However, whether "speed of play" is an important design criteria is subjective.  I demand fast, abstract combat because I get bored by combat in RPGs that regularly lasts more than about 10 minutes. I demand fast character creation because I what to spend my time as a player playing my character not designing my character and as a GM I have no interest in carefully building NPC to get their points right or the like, it's a fucking waste of my limited time.  Other people, just as  reasonable and rational as I am, however, have no problem with RPG combats that average 40-60 minutes and take 5 to 10 minutes to setup with minis and terrain and love spending hours creating a character and referring to 6 to 10 rulebooks during the process.

So is "speed of play" measurable? Sure. Does a game's "speed of play" make it objectively better or worse than another game? Not really as whether "speed of play" to a desired goal of game design varies from person to person.

Quote from: Itachi;847620So, thats a yes ? You agree we can measure speed of play ?

You can measure speed of play but if the results are better or worse as far enjoying the game goes is a matter of taste.

Quote from: RandallS;847650Yes, one can measure speed of play at least to an extent.  However, whether "speed of play" is an important design criteria is subjective.  I demand fast, abstract combat because I get bored by combat in RPGs that regularly lasts more than about 10 minutes. I demand fast character creation because I what to spend my time as a player playing my character not designing my character and as a GM I have no interest in carefully building NPC to get their points right or the like, it's a fucking waste of my limited time.  Other people, just as  reasonable and rational as I am, however, have no problem with RPG combats that average 40-60 minutes and take 5 to 10 minutes to setup with minis and terrain and love spending hours creating a character and referring to 6 to 10 rulebooks during the process.

So is "speed of play" measurable? Sure. Does a game's "speed of play" make it objectively better or worse than another game? Not really as whether "speed of play" to a desired goal of game design varies from person to person.

Exactly. See I'm the opposite of what you enjoy. To me if a combat takes 10 min. then it's probably not worth doing and while I do enjoy abstract concepts in RPGs, a good combat system is something that I really enjoy. Our 4E combats tend to run in the 30 to 45 minute range with big boss fights taking approx. an hour. I do get the occasional 15 min ones but that's usually a rare instance.

I also agree that the speed of play is subjectively better (or worse) for gamers and their preferred style.

Walls and walls of text..see what happens when we bandy the word "objective" about? It's a TASTE EXPLOSION!:-)

Quote from: cranebump;847686Walls and walls of text..see what happens when we bandy the word "objective" about? It's a TASTE EXPLOSION!:-)

* insert blowjob joke here *

Allow me to settle the question on measuring the quality of RPGs:

1) My favorite game is the best.

2) Your favorite game suxxors.

3) If your favorite game is also my favorite game, you are playing it wrong.

You are welcome, I am here all week, please try the chicken.

Quote from: Spinachcat;847728Allow me to settle the question on measuring the quality of RPGs:

1) My favorite game is the best.

2) Your favorite game suxxors.

3) If your favorite game is also my favorite game, you are playing it wrong.

I'd sig this if I was still sigging quotes.

Quote from: Itachi;847615How about the criteria "speed of play" ? Is it also subjective for you guys ? If yes, how so ? Here, lemme propose a comparison:

Shadowrun 4e vs Dungeon World.

1) Character creation. Whats faster, the point-buy one (Shadowrun) or the "fill the form" one (Dungeon World) ?

2) Combat mechanics. Whats faster, the highly structured one (Shadowrun) or the highly abstracted one (Dungeon World) ?

Do you think its possible to reach an objective conclusion here ?

If you can get a quantified metric of "speed of play" -- or ANYTHING else -- it's still a subjective choice how important it is.

End of story, children. Even if Big Sky Daddy says, "I say that guy's priorities are the One True Way, and I am the LORD,"  the Big Lebowski really is correct. At least, that's my opinion ...

I personally don't like D&D system parts but I love some of the setting conceits. Also, the OSR stuff I have picked up and 5e are generally fast to prep, easy to run, and fast to create characters. There's not a lot of fuss to get from idea to play. That can make the "whole experience" more fun. It remains one of the easiest games to teach and comes with the "popularity" button firmly pushed (especially with something shiny and sexy like 5e).

I can accomplish some of these goals with my favorite game. I just have to make characters for newbies, prep several standard convention scenarios or "one shots", and put some effort into how MFG is going to work from game to game. But I like the fiddly bits in certain places. It suites what I want now.

I'm sure YM(does)V, you probably like your fiddly bits in other places, and I'm cool with that.

In related news, the only time I apologize for D&D is to my long-standing childhood friends who have diligently remained by my side despite the long string of absurd face-hiding-wincing-in-shame fuck-ups I have perpetrated against them. Since D&D was the most common game ran in my childhood, it naturally comes up in said apology. My friends are smart enough to know (and remember) that those fuck-ups are squarely my fault and had nothing to do with the game. I of course, took much longer to realize this, hence my deep and abiding love for them.

AD&D has nothing to apologize for.  If anything, other RPGs need to apologize to it.

My recent, short lived AD&D campaign, mainly died because we just don't play that way.  I really wanted to do it by the book but my players fixated on talking to a humanoid frog for the first session and spent the second session pushing each other in a pool and partying with the fair folk.  When the fair folk took them to a dungeon instead of showing them the way out of the forest  one player asked "Is every npc in your world out to screw us?"  Which, given what she did with the satyr, seems like an insincere question?

I think AD&D is marvelous for what it is but many of the accusations leveled at it back in the day are apt.  It is at its heart, a war game.  You can do many other things with it but that's really the heart of the matter.  Knowing what you are and doing what you do well isn't something to apologize for.

Even so, I'll stick to Rolemaster and GURPS until the day when I can convince players to suffer through my own games for more than one session.  

Quote from: PhillipIf you can get a quantified metric of "speed of play" -- or ANYTHING else -- it's still a subjective choice how important it is.

Speed of play is always important, no matter your design goal. Lets say we have two games A and B aiming to the same overall playstyle and goals. If game A does everything that B does but also manage to be faster at it, then game A will be better.

And this closes the issue, really: AD&D (1e and 2e) are considered the worst D&D editions simply because it reaches it's design goals in a manner way more inefficient than any other edition.

Quote from: RPGPundit;849148AD&D has nothing to apologize for.  If anything, other RPGs need to apologize to it.

Agreed.  Or so says my personal bias.  

Yet 3e and 4e is slower in actual play than 1e and 2e by a magnitude, sheer combat alone ensures that. Are you thus suggesting by that metric that 3e and 4e should be considered even more worse than 1e and 2e, the currently worst editions according to "received opinion"? And that this is an objectively closed case?