Quote from: Benoist;565802They are bad GMs, and the majority of modules out there are crap.

Well in regards to the second point, i think its a bit disingenuous to campaign against the the nearly nonexistent storygame 'problem' when there is a such a fucking giant issue sitting right at the heart of "trad" RPGs. A far larger group of folks have been fucked and influenced by crap D&D modules than all the story games put together. Where are the pages and pages and thread after thread decrying the crap nature of something that has lain at the heart of the hobby forever? Where is the outrage of the self appointed defenders of the hobby? Nowhere that's fucking  where.
Eyes and motes and shit.

Quote from: silva;565801Vreeg, you and Estar and Ben and I can run sandboxes perfectly and thats fine. And Im not questioning that.

But my experience with the "traditional" roleplaying GM in general is the same as Noisms said: they come up with a "story" that they pull out from their asses and want me and other the players to follow along with our characters. And before someone come up saying they are bad gms, just look at all adventure modules out there and notice 90% of them are pure railroad crap, a story already made from beginning to the end.

Well, I can deal with that.
And I would not know, I have only run my own stuff since the mid 80s.  last time I bought a canned adventure.

But That is why I think they are bad GMs.  Railroading, or any time you only give the 'illusion of choice', is bad GMing.  That is almost worse.  I like calling things what they are, and am far too into immersion as a goal (I freely admit it), but I think there are not enough people teaching/writing about good GMing and too many people producing canned stuff without explaining how to fit it in organically.


*and you added on stuff after i quoted.  A bit uncool.

Quote from: Gib;565804Well in regards to the second point, i think its a bit disingenuous to campaign against the the nearly nonexistent storygame 'problem' when there is a such a fucking giant issue sitting right at the heart of "trad" RPGs. A far larger group of folks have been fucked and influenced by crap D&D modules than all the story games put together. Where are the pages and pages and thread after thread decrying the crap nature of something that has lain at the heart of the hobby forever? Where is the outrage of the self appointed defenders of the hobby? Nowhere that's fucking  where.
Eyes and motes and shit.

Nice point, Aos. From what I see of the early games (OD&D, Runequest, Traveller) the main adventure structure was more on the open-ended/sandboxy side. But some point after that (mid 80s ? early 90s ?) it began to follow the railroady/"storysh" path.

Quote from: Gib;565804Well in regards to the second point, i think its a bit disingenuous to campaign against the the nearly nonexistent storygame 'problem' when there is a such a fucking giant issue sitting right at the heart of "trad" RPGs. A far larger group of folks have been fucked and influenced by crap D&D modules than all the story games put together. Where are the pages and pages and thread after thread decrying the crap nature of something that has lain at the heart of the hobby forever? Where is the outrage of the self appointed defenders of the hobby? Nowhere that's fucking  where.
Eyes and motes and shit.

It's actually the same fucking problem. Shit modules have influenced some GMs expectations who then assumed that's the way adventure prep is supposed to look like, which then causes them to conceive the game's play in terms of "story", which then introduces the "storytelling" bullshit that covers some actually-trad RPGs (WoD games, I am looking at you), which then leads to the next step saying "well I want to build stories but these WoD games actually suck at it" (which was the Forge's argument, cf. the actual brain-damage argument*), which then leads to the idea of coherent game design, and story games proper.

It's all part of the same picture. And yes, it's been a problem for decades. Since the infancy of the role playing game hobby, as a matter of fact. It doesn't make it less of a problem, actually. It just means that it's been present for a long time and that some people only started to wake up once that shit logic had been taken to its natural fucknuts extreme by the Forge and its aficionados shoveling shit non role-playing games at their faces calling them "role playing games".

* From that link: "All that is the foundation for my point: that the routine human capacity for understanding, enjoying, and creating stories is damaged in this fashion by repeated "storytelling role-playing" as promulgated through many role-playing games of a specific type. This type is only one game in terms of procedures, but it's represented across several dozens of titles and about fifteen to twenty years, peaking about ten years ago. Think of it as a "way" to role-play rather than any single title." - Ron Edwards.

Quote from: silva;565801But my experience with the "traditional" roleplaying GM in general is the same as Noisms said: they come up with a "story" that they pull out from their asses and want me and other players to follow along with our characters. And before someone come up saying they are bad gms, just look at all adventure modules out there and notice 90% of them are pure railroad crap, a story already made from beginning to the end.

There are two things a novice referee can get easily wrap their minds around when it comes  to roleplaying game. A plotted out campaign story arc, or a highly structured locale like the dungeon. So it not a surprise that this situation exists even among professionals.

Having ran and manged a LARP chapter for 15 years, I am a firm believer that people can be taught. It not easy nor there is a right way.

Just a set of tools you learn to achieve different outcomes. People can be taught these technique and all that required is a willingness to learn. That for the most part these techniques don't require a huge amount of talent to use.

I focus on learning, developing, and teaching how to run sandbox campaigns. There is a set of techniques that makes sandbox campaigns easy to prep and manage and allow players to feel that their decision has meaning.

These techniques overlap but are not the same as those required to make a Adventure Path, easy to prep, manage, and allow players to feel their decisions have meaning.

Adventure Paths and Sandbox seem Antithetical to each other but each has their place. And tabletop roleplaying campaigns are notorious for being a blend of different elements due the flexible nature of roleplaying game.

For example the Majestic Wilderlands game I running now involves the players being members of the Red Hawks, a mercenary band. They get missions. However it is a sandbox campaign, just the players choose to start out that way. I don't know what going to happen, they could all quit the Red Hawks next session, try take it over, or far more likely just try to complete the current mission they are on.

Quote from: Gib;565804Well in regards to the second point, i think its a bit disingenuous to campaign against the the nearly nonexistent storygame 'problem' when there is a such a fucking giant issue sitting right at the heart of "trad" RPGs. A far larger group of folks have been fucked and influenced by crap D&D modules than all the story games put together. Where are the pages and pages and thread after thread decrying the crap nature of something that has lain at the heart of the hobby forever? Where is the outrage of the self appointed defenders of the hobby? Nowhere that's fucking  where.
Eyes and motes and shit.

That is what the free market for. Thanks to the spread of the Open Game License, the Internet, and Print on Demand,  gamers can work around the damage.

For example 3.5e to 4e and the resulting birth of Pathfinder.

Quote from: Gib;565804Where are the pages and pages and thread after thread decrying the crap nature of something that has lain at the heart of the hobby forever?

Dragonlance? Moar liek Dragonglans amirite.

AD&D2e? Moar liek GayD&D2e amirite.

Quote from: Benoist;565814It's actually the same fucking problem. Shit modules have influenced some GMs expectations who then assumed that's the way adventure prep is supposed to look like


It's all part of the same picture. And yes, it's been a problem for decades. Since the infancy of the role playing game hobby, as a matter of fact.

My own observation is that it went wrong from the first modules published in the 70s.

When Bledsaw and Judges Guild demonstrated to TSR that support products will sell. TSR started releasing their own. However since this is at the dawn of everything the only thing that was ever done that was remotely published were the tournament modules being used at Gen-Con and other conventions.

Because conventions were running D&D Tournaments which needed to be fair all the sessions using a module had to be run essentially the same. So the modules were fully keyed with every needed room fully described.

These modules were photocopied, (or mimeographed) and distributed among the tournament referees. So it not a great leap to just layout it professional, do some editing, and release that as your product.

Except that not how most referee ran their home campaigns. Plus a fully keyed, fully described dungeon, DOESN'T SCALE. There is a point where it not publishable because you can't release it and make a profit. Sure it was tried in the d20 era but all those projects were murder to complete. Something I got a first hand taste of with the Wilderlands of High Fantasy.


The best example I found of how dungeons were actually done is the First Fantasy Campaign specifically the notes for the Castle Blackmoor Dungeon, and in Judges Guild's Tegal Manor the first Mega Dungeon published.

For me the clincher is this photo


There is a higher rez version floating around, but if you zoom in even with the picture I have you will see there is no way that formatted like a published modules. There is not enough pages in that binder to cover the maps that have been seen.

I write about it in this post.

What most referees did, from reading stories, and looking at the few notes that were avaliable,  was use sketch notes, and random tables, TO MAKE SHIT UP ON THE FLY. In short they improvised their way through their campaigns. What ends up being written down are the things to jog their memory about the place.

I think the Tournament style dungeon were fine for the purpose they were originally meant for, running organized play events. But for the larger hobby they were an absolute disaster.

Because as the only published example of what an adventure looked like it forced people into a certain pattern of play. And from that it only a short leap into Dragonlance's Adventure Path, then from that roleplaying games are about story.

Don't get me wrong, these can be fun, and if well written and designed even memorable fun. Something that Paizo been pretty good at.

I believe there is a publishable alternative. The Minimal Dungeon. The basic idea is that I can teach you how to run my adventure in whatever form I wrote in.

Gygax could teach somebody how to run Greyhawk using that binder he is holding. In fact did with Rob Kuntz when he became co-DM.

Now that binder Gygax holding isn't publishable. You need to write up how to run the dungeon using it, just like I could to teach you how to build the metal cutting table my company makes.

The part I haven't figured out is that whether this can be done in a lot less pages than a Tournament Style module. I think it will be, based on the rough drafts I been working on.

This format also has the virtue of also serving as an example of just how creative and flexible tabletop roleplaying games are. And teach novice referee by example on how to do that.

Quote from: Benoist;565814It's actually the same fucking problem. Shit modules have influenced some GMs expectations ...

I can't wait to see what you do with the rough draft I sent you.

Quote from: estar;565826That is what the free market for. Thanks to the spread of the Open Game License, the Internet, and Print on Demand,  gamers can work around the damage.

For example 3.5e to 4e and the resulting birth of Pathfinder.

This same process should be sufficient for storygames as well.

Quote from: Gib;565836This same process should be sufficient for storygames as well.

And has

Quote from: Dan Davenport;565780It doesn't matter if the player sees a physical representation of this character in 3rd person IRL or refers to his character in 3rd person. If the player is experiencing the setting only via his character's senses and affecting the setting only through his character's abilities, he is playing the game 1st person. "My character attacks the orc" is still playing 1st person. "My character attacks the orc and hits" is playing 3rd person.

Dan, you are making perfect sense and I understand exactly what you are saying, but as someone who has seen term after term get folded, bent, spindled, and mutilated into something else entirely once it starts getting used in broader discussions about role-playing games, I can pretty much guarantee to you that the meaning with get distorted, ever bit as much as terms like "immersion", "simulation", "story", and bunch of other terms did as soon as someone associates speaking in third person at the table with third person role-playing.  Someone is going to look at that middle example of a person talking in third person yet calling it first person and insist that you are wrong and it's third person.  And having seen that happen again and again, I'm convinced that longer multi-word terms or phrases to describe a particular idea in game theory is far better than reusing and repurposing a simpler term that comes from, say, discussing literature.  You can do whatever you want but don't say you weren't warned when people start misusing what you are saying and getting it all wrong.

Quote from: silva;565801But my experience with the "traditional" roleplaying GM in general is the same as Noisms said: they come up with a "story" that they pull out from their asses and want me and other players to follow along with our characters. And before someone come up saying they are bad gms, just look at all adventure modules out there and notice 90% of them are pure railroad crap, a story already made from beginning to the end.

And having played with both casual gamers and players who are also GMs, I would argue that there are plenty of casual players who want the GM to have a story for their characters to follow through because that's what they are looking for.  You'll find plenty of evidence of such players in the form of GMs complaining in online message boards about players who won't take the initiative and do anything unless the GM lays the adventure out in front of them for them to follow.

Quote from: John Morrow;565840Dan, you are making perfect sense and I understand exactly what you are saying, but as someone who has seen term after term get folded, bent, spindled, and mutilated into something else entirely once it starts getting used in broader discussions about role-playing games, I can pretty much guarantee to you that the meaning with get distorted, ever bit as much as terms like "immersion", "simulation", "story", and bunch of other terms did as soon as someone associates speaking in third person at the table with third person role-playing.  Someone is going to look at that middle example of a person talking in third person yet calling it first person and insist that you are wrong and it's third person.  And having seen that happen again and again, I'm convinced that longer multi-word terms or phrases to describe a particular idea in game theory is far better than reusing and repurposing a simpler term that comes from, say, discussing literature.  You can do whatever you want but don't say you weren't warned when people start misusing what you are saying and getting it all wrong.

You're correct that language evolves, no doubt about it. I just also stand by the truism that words mean things, and I think those meanings are valuable for clear communication. To use an extreme example, I don't think I should be obligated to call bike riding a "roleplaying game" just because someone insists that it is.

Quote from: Gib;565804Well in regards to the second point, i think its a bit disingenuous to campaign against the the nearly nonexistent storygame 'problem' when there is a such a fucking giant issue sitting right at the heart of "trad" RPGs. A far larger group of folks have been fucked and influenced by crap D&D modules than all the story games put together. Where are the pages and pages and thread after thread decrying the crap nature of something that has lain at the heart of the hobby forever? Where is the outrage of the self appointed defenders of the hobby? Nowhere that's fucking  where.
Eyes and motes and shit.

No and bullshit, Aos.
 You are willing to talk about the amount of words and pages written about one thing versus another, yet decry the conversation about what the words mean???

I am willing to concede (and this is not much of a consession, admittedly, for those who read my few posts) that modules and canned shit leads people astray...hell, I don;t use them and haven't for decades...a company's modules are often attached to their own particular 'onewayism'.  
(mark that one for later convo)

But not understanding the importance of congruency of meaning and language is pure idiocy.  I don't ever say shared narrative is bad.  I just rail againt it the same whay I do with fools who conflate corrolation with causation. The problem you are so willing to relagate to disingenuity is 'merely' meaning and definition.

I like your stuff, and expect better.