Quote from: Saurondor;895309But if the sword is as sharp, the shield as strong and the armor as effective when they are at 100% of their structural capacity as when they're at 1% then it really doesn't affect play until it reaches 0%.

Even changing slightly the damage a sword does after each hit or parry with the blade or decreasing the chance for a character to succeed at hitting or defending when wounded, doesn't alter the ability to model the combined outcomes with one (or two) die rolls. It just makes the table of results larger so you might need to roll another dice or two to accommodate the larger number of results and the smaller probability of any given outcome.

Quote from: Saurondor;895307Isn't the real question not if it is itself a simulation or not, but rather if it can be told apart from a simulation?

Not at all, unless you are a fan of illusionism, which I am not. The topic of this thread is not "How to get a good narrative while pretending to follow rules of simulation".

Quote from: Bren;895323Even changing slightly the damage a sword does after each hit or parry with the blade or decreasing the chance for a character to succeed at hitting or defending when wounded, doesn't alter the ability to model the combined outcomes with one (or two) die rolls. It just makes the table of results larger so you might need to roll another dice or two to accommodate the larger number of results and the smaller probability of any given outcome.

Correct, although I'd add a bit more to that. When what you mention does happen then the PCs MTTD roll and the creatures MTTD roll are no longer independent. It can be modeled like you say, just like the simpler version, and yes it becomes much larger and complex, but the big difference is not the length of the tables, it's the fact that one outcomes now depend on one another. It is then that we see the emergence of real initiative, not that initiative of the die roll to see who goes first, but rather the initiative of who's leading the battle. In the previous model, the simpler and independent model, the surprise factor only benefits you the first round. If you roll an MTTD of 8 then only one round catches your enemy off guard and the remaining 7 are just rounds of attrition. That's why in the simple model initiative only matters if the two parties roll similar MTTDs. You can win initiative every round, but if my MTTD is higher in that encounter I'll outlive your character. On the other hand if the game mechanics can deny your opponent the ability to deliver damage or reduce the ability to deliver damage over time, then the first rounds are crucial. You can control the encounter even without delivering damage as long as your opponent is impaired from delivering damage as well.

Quote from: Manzanaro;895330Not at all, unless you are a fan of illusionism, which I am not. The topic of this thread is not "How to get a good narrative while pretending to follow rules of simulation".

So what, in your opinion, distinguishes one from the other? Say a game is taking place inside "a black box", how can you tell a simulated story from an authored story without seeing what's going on inside?

Quote from: Saurondor;895333So what, in your opinion, distinguishes one from the other? Say a game is taking place inside "a black box", how can you tell a simulated story from an authored story without seeing what's going on inside?

This is irrelevant, as a GM is not outside, but entirely privy to why things happen within the 'box'. And if you haven't scoped out my opinion about what distinguishes simulation from narration at this point, over 100 pages into the thread? There is nothing I could say that will suddenly illuminate you.

Quote from: Manzanaro;895335This is irrelevant, as a GM is not outside, but entirely privy to why things happen within the 'box'.

So? You're saying that you can tell the difference as an observer because you see a narrative or simulationist process taking place. So you know it's authored or simulated by seeing how it happens, but not actually by reviewing the output of such process?

For example I'm outside your table, and I'm not privy to why things happen within the 'box' of your gaming table. Unaware of the inner workings of your gaming table I need to know what's the difference, if any, between your simulated and authored output as viewed by an external observer. It is quite relevant.

Dude. I have said this before. I am not talking about hypothetical imperfect observation. I do not give a shit about that topic. I am talking about what is actually going on.

What you are talking about is 'illusionism' and it is a) easier to notice than you probably think and b) completely outside of my interest.

Quote from: Manzanaro;895340Dude. I have said this before. I am not talking about hypothetical imperfect observation. I do not give a shit about that topic. I am talking about what is actually going on.

What you are talking about is 'illusionism' and it is a) easier to notice than you probably think and b) completely outside of my interest.

It's important and not illusionism because if somebody provides you with an authored solution that is indistinguishable from a simulated solution you'll probably reject it on the grounds that you see it as authored and not simulated even if the outcome is exactly the same.

Quote from: Saurondor;895346It's important and not illusionism because if somebody provides you with an authored solution that is indistinguishable from a simulated solution you'll probably reject it on the grounds that you see it as authored and not simulated even if the outcome is exactly the same.

Unbelievable.

Quote from: Saurondor;895337So? You're saying that you can tell the difference as an observer because you see a narrative or simulationist process taking place.

Observers are irrelevant. Players are irrelevant. Only Manzanaro the GM is relevant. And Manzanaro already knows he is authoring because he is the one who is "pretending to follow rules of simulation."
   
He isn’t going to reject authoring. He wants authoring so he can get a better narrative than what he would get by using his simulation. But not just any old authoring, only authoring that can pretend to follow his rules of simulation is allowed.


One might wonder for whom is he pretending? But that asking that question might lead one to conclude he was engaged in a different form of illusionism. And that would be bad. But pretend simulation isn't bad.

Hey Bren I got a great idea. Go fuck yourself.

You, who doesn't even use his own stupid fucking definition of 'simulation'. No wonder you like the word 'equivocate' so much. It's what you do best.

Sorry Maarzan, I guess I woke the baby.

Hey Bren, did you know Maarzan agrees that simulation doesn't include time skipping? Give him hell dude! You are arguing for what you really believe after all, and you disagree with that premise! Tell Maarzan what an idiot he is!

Quote from: Bren;895173It seems that you are saying that for a conversation to be important in a setting run by principles of simulation then the conversation has to  have occurred. If the conversation didn't occur, it couldn't have been important and thus any such conversation is assumed to have been unimportant.

Did I understand you correctly?



Details on semantics

• By an important conversation, I mean a conversation that meaningfully effects or changes the characters or the game world in some way.  
  

• A conversation occurs in a simulated world if it is played out, either in detail or abstract or if it is deemed to have occurred by the GM. So conversations may occur between NPCs that are unknown to players, where the GM accounts for the effects of the conversation without playing the conversation out in some solitary fashion. For example, two NPCs may be deemed to have had a conversation in which they formed an alliance. This alliance will effect the PCs and the game world even though the GM never bothers to determine the exact wording of the conversation that formed the alliance. The conversation is deemed to have occurred and to be important.
  

Some abstraction is necessary because of limited ressources. So some information loss is inevitable with this. Thus it is up to the participiants to check whether relevant information is concerned (which most probably means interesting for them regarding whatever their focus of interest is) where their characters are involved.

Thus everything with a focus gets simulated as best possible and everything else has to go with the abstractions or assumption of inertia. A critical dialog that doesn´t follow from one of these ways just didn´t happen in a world with this level of focus on the situation this dialogue would have happened in.  

Yes, that means, that when noone wanted to do a dialoque in char and noone bothered to check for events (most probably because those events seemed unlikely enough) the assumption is everything not mentioned in the Player Recognization Sphere (PRS )  didn´t happen and thus all dialogues that would probably have been happening where unspectacular same of old stuff with details below the treshhold of importance visible on this level of abstractions. That doesn´t mean there were no dialoques at all.  

These results are directly visible with everything that is in the spotlight perceived by the player characters. Parallel the GM has to move on his world to stay consistent and living, but what is not in PRS happens offstage with the GM in a sim game using the same methods internally, that would have been used at the desk for situations inside the PRS ( I had for example one evil guy blowing himself up, while preparing some risky, bad surprise to the chars) communaly. This is not directly visible and thus not influenceable to the characters, but may get known and/or influence them later.


Regarding: Schrödinger GM.
As long as the results are falling inside the possible result range of the simulation, it will be indistinguishable without further means. But usually it doesn´t stay with one such decission and with increasing numbers of events (and probably getting more and more dramatic) things get more and more unbelieveable until someone redraws the rest of his trust in the GM.
And with the idea of fun come some expectations how things will be done. If some sportsman is doing sports competively he doesn´t want someone manipulating results - even to his benefit or someone fixing the results of your scientific experiments to give "nice numbers". You don´t want the lottery to be staged, even if your chances where low to begin with and you don´t want to have to recognize that what you have seen and the poeple you met on your culture trip to some distant land was all a fraud with actors and prepared stage.

SO even if it is not recognizabel at the start it is still a break of trust and will lead to bad blood once its cover blows.

Maarzan, I find it curious how so many of your conclusions echo the things that I have been saying earlier in the thread. I just don't feel you have entirely sorted out the implications yet, but you will get there.

You might note that I have never once advocated what you call Schrodinger's GMing by the way.

As far as Bren's position? Let me clue you in. He doesn't have one other than to oppose mine.

This dude argued with me for tens of pages about the definition of simulation and how there was no such thing as a partial simulation, only to completely abandon his own arguments when he realized they didn't actually allow him to claim that I don't operate under principles of simulation.

Not sure if this is some grudge from RPGnet that I forgot about, or he is just an asshole.

I at least give you credit for having a legitimate interest in the topic and actual opinions, and I can see you are actually THINKING about what is being said rather than just offering pure knee jerk responses.

Keep thinking, is my advice.