While I know that this site considers DW to be an Official RPG Product (Swine Un-Approved), the game has clear storygame roots, which is something I'd like to discuss briefly.  In a traditional RPG, the rules are very clear-cut in how they function: when you want to sneak, you roll Stealth; when you want to swordfight, you roll Swordsmanship; and so on.

This is the strength of traditional RPGs: the player says something, rolls the dice, and it happens.  But in a storygame (or even DW), the rules are not clear in this regard.  I've seen a lot of confusion and consternation on how moves are triggered in the game, when to roll, and when the DM is supposed to act.  I mean, someone on SomethingAwful wrote up a huge long guide on how the game is supposed to be run because it was too hard for new players to understand.

Maybe it's just poorly-explained rules, but I think that it has more to do with the idea that everyone is sharing in a narrative experience rather than playing a game.

Shrug.  I just finished a six-month campaign of DW and it's pretty fucking obvious when a move triggers.

"I'm gonna kill the fucker."  Hack and Slash.
"I'm gonna jump past the monster and protect the girl."  Defy Danger, then next 'turn' Defend.
Et cetera.

All this "narrative first" is just a fancy-ass way of saying "Tell what you're trying to accomplish, don't spout rule shit."  Just like D&D back in 1974.

Of course, I've seen people complain that they couldn't understand CHAINMAIL, so maybe the problem is that people are stupid.

Quote from: Archangel Fascist;733389While I know that this site considers DW to be an Official RPG Product (Swine Un-Approved), the game has clear storygame roots, which is something I'd like to discuss briefly.  In a traditional RPG, the rules are very clear-cut in how they function: when you want to sneak, you roll Stealth; when you want to swordfight, you roll Swordsmanship; and so on.

This is interesting, because one of the issues with traditional games is that it's often not quite clear what a single roll of a skill actually means in terms of its in-game consequences. Okay, so I made my Sneak roll; am I past the guards? Well, maybe; or maybe you're just past one of the guards, and now you need to Sneak again to get past the next one.

But that's okay, because we have a GM who is empowered to make those decisions--to set the stakes for any given roll, as it were--and after a while the GM learns how to run a traditional game, get the pacing right, and make it all flow naturally, effortlessly. But it's possible that the "ease" and "naturalness" of the traditional RPG style are merely familiarity with its conventions.

Because you do have to run DW differently; each roll resolves a conflict rather than a task, and the pacing suffers if you try to use it for task resolution (as I have done). But I don't think it's because "everyone is sharing in a narrative experience"; it's because what a die roll represents is slightly different.

Would I like this game if I liked Rules Cyclopedia or B/X D&D? What's with the "begins and ends with the fiction" stuff that I've read about online? I don't know much about it.

Well, from THIS old fart's viewpoint, it's just a different way of saying the same old shit.

"Begins and ends with the fiction" is just another way of saying "Just tell me what you're trying to do, I'll tell you what dice to roll."

"I want to sneak past all these guards and hide behind the altar."  Okay, that's a Defy Danger.

Et cetera.

Really, for those whom DW gave them a new insight into playing, good for them; anything that's fun is great.  And I like playing DW just fine.  It's just nothing really new or earthshattering.

I wonder if it seems new in relation to later iterations of D&D where "sneak past all these guards and hide behind the altar" would take half an hour and twenty die rolls.

Quote from: Old Geezer;733399All this "narrative first" is just a fancy-ass way of saying "Tell what you're trying to accomplish, don't spout rule shit."  Just like D&D back in 1974.

QFT.

I was under the assumption that this was the way all people played RPGs, until I started reading web forums.

Quote from: Endless Flight;733407Would I like this game if I liked Rules Cyclopedia or B/X D&D? What's with the "begins and ends with the fiction" stuff that I've read about online? I don't know much about it.

As far as I've been able to find out Teh Fiction refers to the result of play.

Quote from: Endless Flight;733407Would I like this game if I liked Rules Cyclopedia or B/X D&D? What's with the "begins and ends with the fiction" stuff that I've read about online? I don't know much about it.

"The fiction" is a pretentious way of saying "stuff that's happening in the game."

Quote from: Archangel Fascist;733419"The fiction" is a pretentious way of saying "stuff that's happening in the game."

To be fair it refers specifically to the stuff happening in the players' imaginations and not the stuff physically happening at the table. That could be a useful distinction to make.

Quote from: Dan Vincze;733423To be fair it refers specifically to the stuff happening in the players' imaginations

It's still pretentious. People have referred to that distinction for, literally, longer than I've been alive.

"In the game world" or, heaven forfend, "in-character" or some other commonly used and easily understood phrase.

Plus, "the fiction" as a phrase directly assaults the suspension of disbelief. It's a pretentious and pointless way of phrasing something common and easy to understand.

For someone like Old Geezer, DW really is no different, because he doesn't really play any differently.  For a lot of people, they read DW and conclude they don't need formalization of the process they've internalized over many years, even decades.

For people who haven't been playing that way, and may have been looking down on D&D from the narrative side of things, the old school style with Baker Story-cred is a revelation.  Plus, the rules easily allow a more narrative style of play.

So it exists as a kind of permission-slip from the hipsters allowing trenders to engage in old-school play?

Quote from: Dan Vincze;733423To be fair it refers specifically to the stuff happening in the players' imaginations and not the stuff physically happening at the table. That could be a useful distinction to make.

That actually makes it sound more pretentious, not less.

I think I'll just stick to Rules Cyclopedia.

Quote from: Daddy Warpig;733427It's still pretentious. People have referred to that distinction for, literally, longer than I've been alive.

"In the game world" or, heaven forfend, "in-character" or some other commonly used and easily understood phrase.

Plus, "the fiction" as a phrase directly assaults the suspension of disbelief. It's a pretentious and pointless way of phrasing something common and easy to understand.

While the word "fiction" isn't commonly used - traditional RPGs have been using similar terms like "scene", "story", "chronicle", "plot arc", and more for decades - from James Bond 007 to Star Wars D6, and more. Many current RPGs continue to use such language - White Wolf most prominently, but also lots of others.

Similarly, there was a point when "graphic novel" was a considered a pretentious term for a comic collection - but these days its just the norm.