I saw there are some GMs having a discussion on youtube (hit rates, around 100, so its pretty much just the GMs discussing amongst themselves) about the concepts that I think many GMs read about and fight about online.
and I think that for the most part, its just a somantics argument.
A Living world (where the setting exists despite the players) and player-friendly GMing (where only challenge-appropriate things can ever happen).
Its hard to even look at the topic line without cringing.. are we arguing worlds or GMs? maybe that would be a healthy start.
I think that the broader topic is what kind of game are you playing, and maybe roleplay has become too inclusive?
Roleplay games, as I have defined in this blog involves several things, Roles, Play and Game. A role is not an Avatar, its a set of personal traits that the player acts out in accordance with his role. The choices the person makes are guided by this role. Play, because we're supposed to be having fun, exploration play, conquest play, character play, play-acting, the like. And a Game, because it has a set of rules, usually they are a set of world mechanics which define how the players can interact with the world.
So if we're arguing about a board game style RPG, mice and mystics, descent, talisman, myth or heroquest, then we're talking monsters vs heroes in a once off session (that can be extended). There are usually balance rules that make sure players have a fair chance to win, because of the 'board game' mechanic.. concentrate, follow the rules, figure out the puzzle, use tactics and beat the bad guy/monsters.
So of course, if your players are coming from this board game angle, they are going to expect the game world to scale to match their level. They treat the game as a 'board-less, board-game' These players often like miniatures, tactical rules.
The Forge's article calls these kinds of players Gamists, I want a better title for it, and until someone with a PhD can come up with a better one, I'll just keep using board-gamer and Gamist.
Living Worlds on the other hand, are supposed to be living. Alive. They follow their own rules, players are nothing to do with the world. It is as it is, and characters enter it, they play their game, but the world doesn't care if they do the right thing, go the right place, or go off track into the deepest darkest hellhole and get swallowed whole.
Living worlds include a lot of real life things, like trees that make you commit suicide if you touch their leaves. Imagine players horror if you added that to your campaign. Sorry Bob, your character touched the death Apple tree, from now on, every time you use that hand, make a -4 con check or you just can't and we'll do a poison check each hour to see if you get an all over -1 to everything. How to get rid of it? sorry, steroids not invented yet.
The kinds of Players and GMs that want to play in these games are sometimes called simulationists, I think of them as realists, which of course gets many people angry with the comment "your playing in a world with dragons and magic, how is any of this real?" (bad grammar included). The Realist wants the world to exist within a set of pre-defined rules, and they don't want the rules to change, just because a player doesn't like it, they want to feel like what they are doing, could be real somewhere, and breaking the world rules mid-play really breaks that immersion, the fun disappears when its all just 'made up by the GM as he goes'
I can see a 'player friendly' GM is going to nerf the Gympie-Gympie plant, in favour of the game continuing. It kills the entire game if a player just ups and dies because of a seemingly random situation. Russian Roulette Roleplay: All this hard work and effort I put into my character, and at the start of each session we all roll a d6, anyone who rolls a 1, dies!
So a GM needs to bend a little of the living world in order to make it a game, but how much bending is too much?
and I think that for the most part, its just a somantics argument.
Living Worlds vs/& Player-Friendly GMs
First up lets look at what the bulk of the community seems to think these two mean:A Living world (where the setting exists despite the players) and player-friendly GMing (where only challenge-appropriate things can ever happen).
Its hard to even look at the topic line without cringing.. are we arguing worlds or GMs? maybe that would be a healthy start.
I think that the broader topic is what kind of game are you playing, and maybe roleplay has become too inclusive?
Roleplay games, as I have defined in this blog involves several things, Roles, Play and Game. A role is not an Avatar, its a set of personal traits that the player acts out in accordance with his role. The choices the person makes are guided by this role. Play, because we're supposed to be having fun, exploration play, conquest play, character play, play-acting, the like. And a Game, because it has a set of rules, usually they are a set of world mechanics which define how the players can interact with the world.
So if we're arguing about a board game style RPG, mice and mystics, descent, talisman, myth or heroquest, then we're talking monsters vs heroes in a once off session (that can be extended). There are usually balance rules that make sure players have a fair chance to win, because of the 'board game' mechanic.. concentrate, follow the rules, figure out the puzzle, use tactics and beat the bad guy/monsters.
So of course, if your players are coming from this board game angle, they are going to expect the game world to scale to match their level. They treat the game as a 'board-less, board-game' These players often like miniatures, tactical rules.
The Forge's article calls these kinds of players Gamists, I want a better title for it, and until someone with a PhD can come up with a better one, I'll just keep using board-gamer and Gamist.
Living Worlds on the other hand, are supposed to be living. Alive. They follow their own rules, players are nothing to do with the world. It is as it is, and characters enter it, they play their game, but the world doesn't care if they do the right thing, go the right place, or go off track into the deepest darkest hellhole and get swallowed whole.
Living worlds include a lot of real life things, like trees that make you commit suicide if you touch their leaves. Imagine players horror if you added that to your campaign. Sorry Bob, your character touched the death Apple tree, from now on, every time you use that hand, make a -4 con check or you just can't and we'll do a poison check each hour to see if you get an all over -1 to everything. How to get rid of it? sorry, steroids not invented yet.
The kinds of Players and GMs that want to play in these games are sometimes called simulationists, I think of them as realists, which of course gets many people angry with the comment "your playing in a world with dragons and magic, how is any of this real?" (bad grammar included). The Realist wants the world to exist within a set of pre-defined rules, and they don't want the rules to change, just because a player doesn't like it, they want to feel like what they are doing, could be real somewhere, and breaking the world rules mid-play really breaks that immersion, the fun disappears when its all just 'made up by the GM as he goes'
I can see a 'player friendly' GM is going to nerf the Gympie-Gympie plant, in favour of the game continuing. It kills the entire game if a player just ups and dies because of a seemingly random situation. Russian Roulette Roleplay: All this hard work and effort I put into my character, and at the start of each session we all roll a d6, anyone who rolls a 1, dies!
So a GM needs to bend a little of the living world in order to make it a game, but how much bending is too much?
The Last few years I've been doing Westmarches style, where the story is the point of it all. Players make up characters for that session OR a continuing character for many sessions. But the players choose the difficulty of the mission, as per their skills, and the GM just runs the world as is. so it feels like a nice balance of the two issues above.
The world has a few interesting missions, some low level, some high level. Then also players are free to do their own thing. Recently my team decided to go drinking and meeting NPCs and trying out some magic potions. I managed for the first time ever, to pull off a clever time-loop where they caused their own adventure, so that felt like a GM playing his own game, rather than the players playing theirs.
I didn't have to bend anything.. luckily.
Anyway, that's my thoughts on the matter.. even if its a bit of a ramble.
I didn't have to bend anything.. luckily.
Anyway, that's my thoughts on the matter.. even if its a bit of a ramble.
