Quote from: RPGPundit;606399But seriously, your argument is meaningless, because if we're emulating PROTAGONISTS OF A STORY, that's not a genre. That's just a literary technique. By your logic, because Drrzt doesn't die in the Salvatore novels, no D&D character should ever die either; and because Captain Kirk doesn't die from a random klingon disruptor blast, no character should ever die that way in any sci-fi game.

Wait, what? So, having any mechanics that are reserved for the PCs only or PCs and major NPCs now makes an RPG a storygame? That seems to open a whole new can of worms.

Quote from: skywalker;606405wait, what? So, having any mechanics that are reserved for the pcs only or pcs and major npcs now makes an rpg a storygame? That seems to open a whole new can of worms.

AND THEN COLEMAN CHARLTON WAS A RON EDWARDS

(lowercase)

Benoist waited. The forums before him blinked and sparked out of the air. There were storygames in the Roleplaying Games (RPGs) Main Forum. He didn't see them, but had expected them, now for years. His warnings to Cernel RPGPundit were not listenend to and now it was too late. Far too late for now, anyway.

Benoist was a machine that kills fascists for fourteen years. When he was young he watched the forums and he said to Gygax "I want to play Tenra Bansho Zero, Gary."

Gygax said "NO! YOU WILL BE BRAIN DAMAGE BY STORYGAMES!"

There was a time when he believed him. Then as he got oldered he stopped. But now in therpgsite he knew there were storygames.

"This is RPGPundit," the facebook crackered. "You must fight the storygames!"

So Benoist gotted his new avatar and lokced a thread.

"彼は私たちを殺すつもり," said the swine!

"I will use arguments at him," said the Kaiu Keiichi and he explained his thinking. Benoist swore at him and tried to ban him. But then the forums locked up and they were trapped and not able to ban.

"No! I must ban the storygamers," he shouted!

The facebook said "No, Benoist. You are the storygamers."

And then, Benoist was a kugutsu.



This is a work of fiction. All similarities to existing people, forum personas, role playing games or works of fan fiction are purely incidental. Doom: Repercussions of Evil originally copyright by Peter Chimaera. Probably.

Quote from: vytzka;606256Rolemaster Standard System had optional Fate points that let you minimize effects of criticals.

And then Coleman Charlton was a Ron Edwards.

(yeah yeah gone for real now)

I knew there was a reason i never picked up RMSS.

RMII baby!

Yeah but I think mostly the same folks worked on RM2 that did on RMSS (except for, among the bigger names, Monte Cook towards the tail end of RM2). So I'm afraid your second edition is still infected by the retro-future Forgeist cooties.

(RM2 is probably a saner choice if you only have to use one but SS did make some fun advances with the supplements)

Quote from: vytzka;606417Benoist waited. The forums before him blinked and sparked out of the air. There were storygames in the Roleplaying Games (RPGs) Main Forum. He didn't see them, but had expected them, now for years. His warnings to Cernel RPGPundit were not listenend to and now it was too late. Far too late for now, anyway.

Benoist was a machine that kills fascists for fourteen years. When he was young he watched the forums and he said to Gygax "I want to play Tenra Bansho Zero, Gary."

Gygax said "NO! YOU WILL BE BRAIN DAMAGE BY STORYGAMES!"

There was a time when he believed him. Then as he got oldered he stopped. But now in therpgsite he knew there were storygames.

"This is RPGPundit," the facebook crackered. "You must fight the storygames!"

So Benoist gotted his new avatar and lokced a thread.

"彼は私たちを殺すつもり," said the swine!

"I will use arguments at him," said the Kaiu Keiichi and he explained his thinking. Benoist swore at him and tried to ban him. But then the forums locked up and they were trapped and not able to ban.

"No! I must ban the storygamers," he shouted!

The facebook said "No, Benoist. You are the storygamers."

And then, Benoist was a kugutsu.



This is a work of fiction. All similarities to existing people, forum personas, role playing games or works of fan fiction are purely incidental. Doom: Repercussions of Evil originally copyright by Peter Chimaera. Probably.

Bit early in the A.M to be so drunk.

It's past noon over here.

(I am way drunk though, you called it.)

Quote from: RPGPundit;606399Right yes, just like how Roy Fokker and Ben Dixon died in totally meaningful ways in that series, which was clearly not about the meaningless horrors of war. Total genre emulation going on there.

Roy Fokker and Ben are clearly not the main characters.  Macross is an action show centering on a love triangle (that's out of the creator's mouth) -- the main character is Rick/Hikaru, or if we're being very generous, they're Rick/Lisa/Minmei.  It's not Roy.  It's not Ben.  It's arguably not even an expansive enough category to hold Max.  

QuoteBut seriously, your argument is meaningless, because if we're emulating PROTAGONISTS OF A STORY, that's not a genre. That's just a literary technique. By your logic, because Drrzt doesn't die in the Salvatore novels, no D&D character should ever die either; and because Captain Kirk doesn't die from a random klingon disruptor blast, no character should ever die that way in any sci-fi game.

Again, these literary techniques you rail against are all elements of genre.  You don't get genre without things like that.  And you're delving into postmodernism -- D&D is an RPG, but Drrzt books are heroic fantasy based on that RPG to sell books, and so Drrzt doesn't die unless he's going to fight his way out of Hell or something.  But if I wanted to make an RPG that reflected being able to play Drrzt, then I'd be within my rights to give the PC some kind of plot immunity to random, meaningless death, because Drrzt has that.  (And this is certainly not the first time that a licensed novelization character works to different rules than he would in the underlying source material.)

QuoteYou're not, at this point, talking about emulating genre at all, you're talking about emulating literature; which is to say, you're trying to use a meaningless position to try to sneak in Storygaming through the back door.
Since its an established Landmark of RPGs that they are not meant to have "creation of story" as their main goal, your point is invalid.

I'm not trying to sneak storygaming through anything; unlike you, I don't have a horse in that fight, I don't care about storygaming, and as I've made clear throughout this thread, my definition of traditional RPG and its goals is far more expansive than yours.  You can keep drawing lines in the sand, but I suspect they're meaningless to most of the gamers out there, or at least most of the ones I've encountered.  I respect people like Benoist who say, "Hey, I see what GAME X is doing, and I don't like it."  But it doesn't mean that it makes GAME X or its ilk any less an RPG for my purposes.

And honestly, I find it hard to argue with you about this, because your whole claim to relevancy in the field of Internet punditry is predicated on there being some war between storygamers and trad gamers, and before that indie gamers and trad gamers, and before that WW fans and everybody else.  Because of that remarkable self-interest, anybody interested in getting to the heart of this matter is well off by not letting someone like you, interested in arbitrary distinctions for personal self-interest, to do things like set out landmarks or decide where the boundaries of the playing field are.  I'm sorry, but there it is: any definitions you lay out are as suspect as a storygame designer who wants to co-opt every meaningful evolution in mechanics over the last decade.  Both of you have very real reasons to move goalposts and self-servingly define key definitions.

Quote from: vytzka;606417And then, Benoist was a kugutsu.

Benoist is a kugutsu?!?! This explains so much! :rotfl: ::tosses Aiki token to vytzka::

I've only played TBZ the once, but I'd put it at 50/50 RPG/Storygame, depending on what elements the table decides to focus on.

The structure of play is divided into Acts and Scenes, and players can spend their bennie tokens to "force" other PCs into scenes based on reasons as storygame-y as "hey, wouldn't this scene be cooler if this character was present?" A table could easily choose to ignore that application of the tokens and play more traditionally.

Our GM still did almost all of the scene framing, and could easily have done all of it if she hadn't been sat playing with hardcore storygamers.

Based on what I know of Benoist (I'm a longtime lurker) I reckon he's right in that it ain't for him.

This is speaking just for myself, but I’ve always had a problem with games that allow the character the choice of not dying, or “character immunity”. I’ve found that without the specter and potential for death, there’s really no true heroism, because the ultimate risk is not on the table. I want every battle to have the potential to be lethal.

If I wade into battle and know that the worst that happens is that I’m knocked out, because this isn’t a “meaningful” fight, that takes a lot of the drama away from me. It feels like killing time until I get to some greater goal. I want there to be a possibility of death any time I’m doing something dangerous, whether it’s fighting a thug in a tavern or going up against the Despot of the Galaxy. I understand there’s this idea of genre or literary emulation, but if that’s the case, I suppose it’s not something I’m particularly interested in emulating, however you define it.

In my games, heroes can die on the 4th level of a forgotten cavern in a puddle of slime, unmourned and undiscovered, or they claw, scrap, and barely survive their way to 20th level and glory. Or, they might get hit with a particularly lethal arrow trap their first morning out of the village and that’s it. I want chance, I want folly, and I want the ever-present threat of death. Otherwise, what follows feels like a cosmic application of the NFL’s red jersey for that character, until we get to something that is “really important”.

That’s ok, though; I’m not really the target audience for this game. The conversation, such as it is, just sort of steered towards this topic.

Scene framing (when pertaining to Tenra Bansho Zero) is pretty much an admittedly very loaded and somewhat poisoned term for the GM saying "Ryu and Ken have reached the temple. When you approach the guards, they raise their weapons. What do you do?"

Zachary: how does it compare to the fact that a high level fighter can literally not be killed with a single sword stab in most D&Ds (barring exceptional circumstances like coup de grace and the like)? Do you think it's related?

Quote from: vytzka;606436Zachary: how does it compare to the fact that a high level fighter can literally not be killed with a single sword stab in most D&Ds (barring exceptional circumstances like coup de grace and the like)? Do you think it's related?

No, I don't believe so. If I've carefully nurtured my Level 10 fighter through all manner of peril, but get in a fight with a pack of trolls, I can still die. I don't have the option to note that it isn't a part of my character's destiny, or doesn't fit in to my plans to usurp the Tyrant of the North, and live to fight another day. It might be inglorious, but that's how the chips fell. Whether Level 1 or Level 20, when he dies, he dies.

In a revelation which might explain much, I am a long-time Rolemaster player and GM, so I am used to the continual possibility of death in combat--something that doesn't change at Level 5 or 15.

I can't check it at this exact moment but I think in Tenra Bansho Zero they could still kill or eat your character once you've fallen unconscious. It's just considered a total dick move (and IME prevents more interesting situations than it encourages).

Quote from: vytzka;606440I can't check it at this exact moment but I think in Tenra Bansho Zero they could still kill or eat your character once you've fallen unconscious. It's just considered a total dick move (and IME prevents more interesting situations than it encourages).

Does it directly say in the text it's a dick move (or the equivalent), or is that more garnered from from group/player input/experience?

I'll get back to you on that.