QuoteAnd I'm wondering how a strategic-level game is an RPG.

There is differences:

Strategic Adventure Gaming
or
Playing Strategically Important People.

You can have strategic gaming, and never ever rule anyone else than yourself. Wilderlands is a classic example of a sandbox/strategic Adventure background.

The difference between playing a sector duke and just playing (I say just, because FFW can be part of being a sector Duke) is the same difference as between taking part in a military exercise at brigade level and playing Panzer General on your PC.

Or the difference between playing PBEM empire building games and playing ASL Online.

Really, totally different beasts.

Nice Over-Analysis there, but did any of you answer David R.'s 3 questions?


- E.W.C.

Quote from: blakkieCall it what you want it is still there. Afterall rules are just suggestions from front cover to back, right? Certainly that is my POV. Isn't it yours?

That's my basic assumption.  

Quote from: blakkieWe actually are pretty damn close on a lot of subjects. This one too....except you refuse (and I really do expect you capable of at least a passable job if you tried) to sort out and write down all that good stuff in your head in a nice light, sturdy framework. Ironically it is the same thing driving you that'd work to keep it lean and flexible that keeps you from doing it at all.

Probably. We're far more similar in tastes than might be suspected on first glance.

Quote from: blakkieWhat would happen if you sat down to write an essay about how you handle social character interactions in a game and accidentally wrote it in "rules" form?

I'd probably burn it. I'd be reall iffy about the essay part in the first place.

-clash

Quote from: flyingmiceI'd probably burn it. I'd be reall iffy about the essay part in the first place.

You and David both.

How about you just type it up and then delete it. But first I'll send you a malware keywatch program have a sexy legal-teen friend of mine send you an email with the attachment Pics_From_My_WILD_MMF_Weekend_In_Mexico.JPEG.EXE that you can open and peruse for your own personal enjoyment. Then after you've openned it up fire up your wordprocessor type out the document, save the file, and then delete it without even bothering to print it out. It'll save you a match or two.

Quote from: blakkieYou and David both.

How about you just type it up and then delete it. But first I'll send you a malware keywatch program have a sexy legal-teen friend of mine send you an email with the attachment Pics_From_My_WILD_MMF_Weekend_In_Mexico.JPEG.EXE that you can open and peruse for your own personal enjoyment. Then after you've openned it up fire up your wordprocessor type out the document, save the file, and then delete it without even bothering to print it out. It'll save you a match or two.

Stop writing this stuff while I'm drinking coffee! Now I have to get a sponge!



-clash

I said restate, but you could only give me a link? I guess I'll have to quote the link then.

What blakkie claims he is arguing against is this:

Quote from: blakkie"What it boils down to is basically whatever Settembrini has decided he wants in a game gets tossed into "Adventure" and everything else gets sorted into a (big) bin called "Thematic". Everything gets sorted into one of the two categories even if he doesn't actually understand the item/rule/game/whatever in question. So trying to figure out things by the names or even some sort of objective rationale is an exersize in futility...."

If you are arguing that this is what he actually thinks, I would say you have misunderstood the issue, possibly deliberately.

You don't have to accept the defintions of the difference between thematic and adventure games to argue against them. I certainly don't demand that you accept them.

I shall restate for the third time.

Adventure games are a larger category of roleplaying- these are games in which characters go places and do stuff. Often there is a party. If there is a party then there are certainly relationships between players and other party members. Often there are NPCs. If there are NPCs, then there are certainly relationships between pcs and NPCs. But the important thing is: there are adventures and thats the focus. You could also have themes going on from time to time .. but they aren't necessary.

Thematic games are games which are not about adventure, but rather concern themselves with tackling thematic issues. The old forgie concept of a "premise" (which in their terms means a question such as 'what are you willing to risk for X' or something like that. So there might be an adventure framework going on, but the entire focus is not on guys going places and doing stuff, but rather on exploring the thematic issues that have been hard-coded into the rules. There is a whole list full of gimmicks that some people came up with to support this idea: everything from 'conflict resolution' to 'relationship maps'. All of this stuff is there to support theme.

Now- according to this definition you can take any old game and play it thematically. D&D, The Fantasy Trip, Gurps, Amber, whatever. And relationships is a moot point anyway. As has been proven by every single respondent on this thread.

I suppose maybe you could play a thematic game as an adventure game. I kinda doubt it, but maybe.

Quote from: KoltarNice Over-Analysis there, but did any of you answer David R.'s 3 questions?


- E.W.C.

The "3 questions" are an obfuscation, and don't actually prove what people apparently thought was being proved.

They were valid questions!! Oh for pity's sake!!

 YEah David may have carried over an argument with Sett from another thread/forum - so what??

 Those 3 questions were still interesting by themselves.


- E.W.C.

See even if you had rules for this kind of thing--relationships don't always work. Players can't be forced to care. If a rule shows up and tries to force that connection, most players won't feel the same about the relationship as one that simply builds naturally from events in play.

Quote from: Abyssal MawThe "3 questions" are an obfuscation, and don't actually prove what people apparently thought was being proved.

What I think was proved in this thread was that the vast majority of people who answered this thread thought character relationships in an RPG game were important. Nothing further can be inferred from this, as respondents were a self selected minority of a self-selected minority of a self-selected minority. It has no statistical validity as a poll indicating any wider validity.

That said, I found the questions interesting enough for me to answer on their own merit, and found the answers of others as interesting as the questions.

-clash

Quote from: SettembriniThere is differences:

Strategic Adventure Gaming
or
Playing Strategically Important People.

You can have strategic gaming, and never ever rule anyone else than yourself. Wilderlands is a classic example of a sandbox/strategic Adventure background.

The difference between playing a sector duke and just playing (I say just, because FFW can be part of being a sector Duke) is the same difference as between taking part in a military exercise at brigade level and playing Panzer General on your PC.

Or the difference between playing PBEM empire building games and playing ASL Online.

Really, totally different beasts.

Isn't a sector duke PC just an in-game wargamer persona? What's the RPG element in a game like that? Diplomacy rules published as an appendix to FFW?

How does that mesh with the whole Adventure (rather than thematic) game idea? Adventuring is about drifting from one episode to the next, Conan-style. But Fred the Great is not a drifter. Fred the Great is what Conan becoems when he retires from adventuring.

On that note, I don't see how a Wilderlands hexcrawl is remotely "strategic"; where strategic = resource management at a higher organizational level than tactical. Again, the goals of a hexcrawl aren't necessarily starting small and eventually ruling the mapboard, if that's what you imply.

So, how is playing one guy "strategic," how is playing strategically "adventurous," and where does the role-playing come in?

Quote from: KoltarThey were valid questions!! Oh for pity's sake!!

 YEah David may have carried over an argument with Sett from another thread/forum - so what??

 Those 3 questions were still interesting by themselves.


- E.W.C.

Agreed. I answered the three questions without looking at the thread/posts that prompted David to ask them. In and of themselves, the questions are both interesting and merit discussion.

[On other topics, note that adventure can be a theme -- the term "thematic" doesn't mean "non-adventurous"]

Quote from: blakkieRules are about what we say is important.

This is flatly wrong for many, many people.  This concept is why so many of the story gamer crowd don't understand how other people actually play.  They make an assumption like this and extrapolate from it, without asking people if it's right.

It's not right, what is important in the game and what the game has rules for are not necessarily at all related, sometimes they are inversely related.

Quote from: blakkieDo we make/use/propagate rules about something because we think it isn't important?

Often yes, because those things are not important we don't want to spend time playing through them with rp, so we use rules.  Things we think are important we want to rp through, so we don't have rules for them.

Seriously, your tastes may not be mine, you just can't make sweeping assumptions like that with any accuracy.

Quote from: BalbinusThis is flatly wrong for many, many people.  This concept is why so many of the story gamer crowd don't understand how other people actually play.  They make an assumption like this and extrapolate from it, without asking people if it's right.

It's not right, what is important in the game and what the game has rules for are not necessarily at all related, sometimes they are inversely related.

Often yes, because those things are not important we don't want to spend time playing through them with rp, so we use rules.  Things we think are important we want to rp through, so we don't have rules for them.

Seriously, your tastes may not be mine, you just can't make sweeping assumptions like that with any accuracy.

Yes!

-clash

Quote from: blakkieWhat would happen if you sat down to write an essay about how you handle social character interactions in a game and accidentally wrote it in "rules" form?

It would lose its flexibility and for me at least would stop being fun, because I actively don't want rules to cover that stuff in most cases.

You're proselytising, not only that but you're using non-standard meanings of words like rules for rhetorical effect and intentionally misunderstanding people.

Why?  All it does is fuck up these kinds of conversations.  You know what the word rules means, and in ordinary English it does not mean the sum total of all formal and informal patters of human communication.  Redefining words doesn't make you right, it just makes you impossible to meaningfully talk to.

I mean, the question I quoted, you know the fucking answer Blakkie, you're just playing rhetorical games to win points in some debating exercise.  Frankly, I think you can do better than that.