If D&D were released today, it would be called a "storygame"!

cough...Dungeon World....ahem...it's a bit like D&D, with Classes ("archetypes") and character sheets ("playbooks") and Ability scores and spells and stuff. But they've got rid of the polyhedrals, and just use 2D6 now! So its a Story game!

Fate, xworld, 2d20, Cortex, etc aren't Storygames, but, strictly speaking, they're not 100% RPGs either, since Playing the Game isn't literally playing the Role, you have decisions to make as a player that the character cannot have, you have to "step out" of the role at certain times to play the game.  Do they fall under the umbrella of RPG, sure, but they're really some form of hybrid.  Narrative RPG, Story RPG, whatever you want to call them.

Just like there is a clear difference between an RPG and a Storygame, there's also a clear difference between an RPG that forces you with mechanics to make decisions while not roleplaying vs. one that does not.

Quote from: CRKrueger;969567Fate, xworld, 2d20, Cortex, etc aren't Storygames, but, strictly speaking, they're not 100% RPGs either, since Playing the Game isn't literally playing the Role, you have decisions to make as a player that the character cannot have, you have to "step out" of the role at certain times to play the game.

I totally disagree with all these examples. They may lay claim to doing things differently to other RPGs, but they really aren't. Take games like Toon, Paranoia, Pendragon, Ars Magica, Prince Valiant, Over The Edge etc and you'll find they are all doing this sort of stuff already too. It's a conceit to claim that these new games are categorically different. They are 100% RPGs, with storytelling motifs.

Let's bring this thread back on track, before it gets pushed to "Other Games".

The topic was: Is there anything that trad RPGs can use from specific storygames?
And that is indeed a very interesting question.

Quote from: CRKrueger;968697I define roleplaying as "playing a role in-character" as opposed to "playing a role out of character", and that's what I would call traditional, so by definition it's kind of hard to incorporate narrative or OOC mechanics into a traditional or IC game, because then it's no longer traditional.  I wouldn't want to put any OOC narrative mechanics in my traditional RPGs, because that's not what I want out of traditional RPGs.

I didn't read the OP as "what OOC narrative mechanics are worth pilfering for trad games".

Quote from: ArrozConLeche;968602That's not exactly what I am aiming for. It's more about interesting mechanics that show up in some of those games which might be cool to have in a more traditional rpg.

I read it as "what interesting or new trad (or borderline trad) rules are hidden in storygames that trad gamers don't ever look at because ... reasons."

For that we don't need to define the sharp boundaries between game types. If someone cites a game that for some of us is a storygame, and for others just a trad game with some mild ignorable OOC elements all is well if we (again, some of us) learn something we would otherwise have missed.

Quote from: Itachi;969451Hmmm I thought BtW playbooks were more than that, also containing progression options and other things thematic to that character type, like PbtA playbooks. If that's not the case, you are right.

There's no "progression options", you just level up in the class that the Playbook details (along with the events that lead to you becoming of said class, or stemmed from you being from said class).

Quote from: Nexus;969461I don't disagree with your premise. I was asking if someone had actually straight up called them that, serious question.

No, except the one who tries to throw bullshit everywhere to see if it sticks;).

Quote from: Voros;969530Sorry but that seems to be a distinction in search of a point.

Not at all.

QuoteI'm also often confused by some gamers embrace of terms like simulationist.

It describes pretty well my playstyle...as long as you don't try to use the Forge's excuse for a definition. Why wouldn't I use it?

QuoteI thought this was the lingo of the detested heretic Forgites?

No, the Forge borrowed the term.
Also, I don't find them heretics. I like games like Sorcerer, for example...just not often, and seldom as a main course for extended periods.

QuoteWho first introduced this term into RPG design?

The earlier RPGA (?) model, which introduced a different Three-Fold Model predating the Forge's one by years.
The categories in it are Gamist, Simulationist, Dramatist. And the Sumulationist entry's explnanation is orders of magnitude better than the Forgite's explanation (which is obviously written by people unfamiliar with the playstyle).
Narrativism isn't the same as Dramatism, BTW.

QuoteBut then despite how many claim to hold Ronnie in contempt you see his terms being used by the OSR all the time: heartbreakers, pink slime fantasy, even braindamage. For someone so wrong he certainly had a sustaining influence.

He was right on some things, and wrong on others. His (misre)presentation of simulationism was certainly among the things he was wrong on.
Heartbreakers are an observable phenomenon...yes, I mean the games:D!


And amusingly, Ron says in Sorcerer Annotated Edition that one of his greatest - in narrative terms, too - campaigns of Sorcerer was when he was just playing his NPCs, and didn't have to plan a thing:p. I laughed out loud upon reading this, for reasons that are* obvious!

*Hopefully.

The statement that you should design games to only cater to a narrow segment of players has been proven dubious at best, too. Maybe as an exercise of pure design and as a means to show off your work and impress a narrow (or not so narrow, hopefully) base of fans.

Either way, the statement that simulationism is a Forge term is outright wrong;).

Quote from: Itachi;969451Hmmm I thought BtW playbooks were more than that, also containing progression options and other things thematic to that character type, like PbtA playbooks. If that's not the case, you are right.

There's no "progression options", you just level up in the class that the Playbook details (along with the events that lead to you becoming of said class, or stemmed from you being from said class).

Quote from: Nexus;969461I don't disagree with your premise. I was asking if someone had actually straight up called them that, serious question.

No, except the one who tries to throw bullshit everywhere to see if it sticks;).

Quote from: Voros;969530Sorry but that seems to be a distinction in search of a point.

Not at all.

QuoteI'm also often confused by some gamers embrace of terms like simulationist.

It describes pretty well my playstyle...as long as you don't try to use the Forge's excuse for a definition. Why wouldn't I use it?

QuoteI thought this was the lingo of the detested heretic Forgites?

No, the Forge borrowed the term.
Also, I don't find them heretics. I like games like Sorcerer, for example...just not often, and seldom as a main course for extended periods.

QuoteWho first introduced this term into RPG design?

The earlier RPGA (?) model, which introduced a different Three-Fold Model predating the Forge's one by years.
The categories in it are Gamist, Simulationist, Dramatist. And the Sumulationist entry's explnanation is orders of magnitude better than the Forgite's explanation (which is obviously written by people unfamiliar with the playstyle).
Narrativism isn't the same as Dramatism, BTW.

QuoteBut then despite how many claim to hold Ronnie in contempt you see his terms being used by the OSR all the time: heartbreakers, pink slime fantasy, even braindamage. For someone so wrong he certainly had a sustaining influence.

He was right on some things, and wrong on others. His (misre)presentation of simulationism was certainly among the things he was wrong on.
Heartbreakers are an observable phenomenon...yes, I mean the games:D!


And amusingly, Ron says in Sorcerer Annotated Edition that one of his greatest - in narrative terms, too - campaigns of Sorcerer was when he was just playing his NPCs, and didn't have to plan a thing:p. I laughed out loud upon reading this, for reasons that are* obvious!

*Hopefully.

The statement that you should design games to only cater to a narrow segment of players has been proven dubious at best, too. Maybe as an exercise of pure design and as a means to show off your work and impress a narrow (or not so narrow, hopefully) base of fans.

Either way, the statement that simulationism is a Forge term is outright wrong;).

Quote from: TrippyHippy;969573I totally disagree with all these examples. They may lay claim to doing things differently to other RPGs, but they really aren't. Take games like Toon, Paranoia, Pendragon, Ars Magica, Prince Valiant, Over The Edge etc and you'll find they are all doing this sort of stuff already too. It's a conceit to claim that these new games are categorically different. They are 100% RPGs, with storytelling motifs.

I didn't say those games were the first, I used them because they are games sometimes hit with the "not RPG" claim Voros was talking about.   Sure there were games like James Bond 007 that did similar things.  James Bond 007 is a different form of RPG too.  That's not a conceit, it's a fact.

If I'm not engaging a mechanic through a choice a character made in the setting then it's a mechanic I am engaging as a player.  It's an OOC mechanic.  Some RPGs have OOC mechanics, some do not.  Some have optional OOC mechanics, some have core OOC mechanics.  Whether or not an OOC mechanic breaks IC immersion for someone is subjective.  Whether or not the amount of OOC mechanics trips a threshold of dislike for a player is subjective.  That the mechanics are OOC is objective.

You can mince words however you need to to sleep at night, but there will always be a categorical difference.  Even between "100% RPGs with storytelling motifs" and "100% RPGs without storytelling motifs".  

Quote from: Christopher Brady;968590And the most important thing that these so-called storygames claim?  That RPG's are a cooperative medium.

"Cooperative medium" .... I just realized, that if "taking on a role/character and cooperate with other players to create something that can be described as a narrative or a storyline" is the only thing or the main thing that makes a game an rpg, then you could essentially call the old top-down arcade game Gauntlet an rpg, or Golden axe, or Double-fricken-Dragon!

Essentially, it stretches the definition of "rpg" way too wide.

EDIT: Wow, my response is wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy late.......
xP

Quote from: Justin Alexander;969541Roleplaying Game = Game in which the mechanical decisions being made are directly associated to decisions being made by the player's character (i.e., the act of playing the game is literally playing the role).

Storytelling Game = Game in which the mechanics determine which player has the narrative control necessary to determine the outcome or details of the game world.

The argument can be made that these are related forms of games, but there's clear value in the distinction for the same reason that there's value in drawing a distinction between Poker and Twilight Imperium. Yes, they're both games (and The Terminator and The Mirror are both films), but claiming that there's no useful distinction between the two is just willful obfuscation.

So by this definition, Beyond The Wall and Other Adventures is a 'Storygame' because it has Fortune Points, and all the players, including GM, get together and build the world, namely the village, that the characters come from.

Huhn.

Quote from: AsenRG;969596The earlier RPGA (?) model, which introduced a different Three-Fold Model predating the Forge's one by years.
The categories in it are Gamist, Simulationist, Dramatist. And the Sumulationist entry's explnanation is orders of magnitude better than the Forgite's explanation (which is obviously written by people unfamiliar with the playstyle)..

   RGFA, actually--from rec.games.frp.advocacy, the Usenet group that started hashing the threefold model out in the mid-90s.

   I didn't participate in the discussions, but I remember seeing some of them.

I think it's more productive for the effects of this discussion to read the question as "Is there anything traditional RPGs can use from non-traditional RPGs?" This way, we can count James Bond 007, Ghostbusters, Pendragon, Burning Wheel, Fiasco, Fate, Apocalypse World, etc all in the same, non-traditional group, besides sidelining the tiresome classification arguments on storygames.

And yes, as shown in the responses, there is a lot of good things that can be adopted, and is being adopted lately, by traditional Rpgs from non-traditional ones.

Quote from: Itachi;969642I think it's more productive for the effects of this discussion to read the question as "Is there anything traditional RPGs can use from non-traditional RPGs?" This way, we can count James Bond 007, Ghostbusters, Pendragon, Burning Wheel, Fiasco, Fate, Apocalypse World, etc all in the same, non-traditional group, besides sidelining the tiresome classification arguments on storygames.

And yes, as shown in the responses, there is a lot of good things that can be adopted, and is being adopted lately, by traditional Rpgs from non-traditional ones.

I like those terms, much less baggage.

Quote from: estar;969443Traveller

Apparently, there's stuff that storygames can use from specific traditional RPGs.

Quote from: 3rik;969651Apparently, there's stuff that storygames can use from specific traditional RPGs.

And they are doing that already;).

Quote from: CRKrueger;969597I didn't say those games were the first, I used them because they are games sometimes hit with the "not RPG" claim Voros was talking about.   Sure there were games like James Bond 007 that did similar things.  James Bond 007 is a different form of RPG too.  That's not a conceit, it's a fact.

So now we are going to retrospectively go back and start labelling these games as being 'story games' when, in fact, they never sold themselves as such? Does this mean that any innovation or variation from old school D&D that promotes something akin to telling a story is also to be categorised as a 'different form' of game? For example, RuneQuest ditched classes because they wanted something more narratively natural - does this make it a story game too? Heck, D&D5 had Backgrounds with associated personality rolls - does that make it a story game too?

The James Bond RPG is an RPG. That is the fact, and to say otherwise, precisely, IS a conceit.

I do draw a distinction with a game like Microscope, specifically because in this game you don't actually have to have players playing any role to make it work. The mechanics simply operate as collaborative tools to create stories. Role-playing can be used once scenes are set, but there aren't any mechanics for it and it's largely a by-product of the created narrative, not the other way round. That is a clear distinction. It makes it closer to something like Once Upon a Time, where again you don't have to roleplay at all.

For other games like Sorcerer, Fate, Apocalypse World, etc, any distinction cited is just pure guff. There is no real structural distinction in how these games are played differently to D&D, just various ideas that play within the same form. People often cite Vampire as being a game that 'pays lip-service' to narrativism, when it's basically structured the same way as other rpgs but just discusses storytelling a lot. The truth is that these other games are exactly in the same category too. In every one of them, you have a narrator/GM/referee/whatever describe scenes for players to respond to. The players describe their actions and roll dice (or whatever) to determine outcomes. They are all RPGs.