[X] My Assistant

[Draco18s]

Puzzles? Eww. Break out the espresso and NoDoze.

So...you're a roll player. Gotcha.

[Patrick Goodman]

Come on, guys, this never ends well. As a fellow user, can I please ask you guys to just stop? Before it gets ugly again?

[All4BigGuns]

So...you're a roll player. Gotcha.

Quite an assumption you've got going there just because someone doesn't enjoy convoluted puzzles and other such stuff. You don't have to eschew combat and action to be a "role player", nor do you have to only enjoy Soap Opera games or Investigative games to be that.

Come on, guys, this never ends well. As a fellow user, can I please ask you guys to just stop? Before it gets ugly again?

Done now, just had to make that response to the BS spouted.

[Nath]

Come on, guys, this never ends well. As a fellow user, can I please ask you guys to just stop? Before it gets ugly again?

Yes, you're right. Let's stop this, cancel that fifth edition and stick to the fourth.

[All4BigGuns]

Yes, you're right. Let's stop this, cancel that fifth edition and stick to the fourth.

I could get behind that. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[Fatum]

Well how do you know. Maybe something good will actually happen. There's always hope as long as you're alive.

[Draco18s]

Quite an assumption you've got going there just because someone doesn't enjoy convoluted puzzles and other such stuff. You don't have to eschew combat and action to be a "role player", nor do you have to only enjoy Soap Opera games or Investigative games to be that.

Point was:

"Combat" is not the end-all be-all of a role playing game. "Combat" is roll intensive and (some) people (seem to) enjoy rolling piles of dice, and without that, they are not having "fun."

[All4BigGuns]

Point was:

"Combat" is not the end-all be-all of a role playing game. "Combat" is roll intensive and (some) people (seem to) enjoy rolling piles of dice, and without that, they are not having "fun."

It is the most heart-pumping, adrenaline-inducing and exciting aspect though.

[NiL_FisK_Urd]

Not for all players. Some players (esp. female ones) seem to enjoy actual role-playing way more than just killing stuff.

[_Pax._]

Point was:

"Combat" is not the end-all be-all of a role playing game. "Combat" is roll intensive and (some) people (seem to) enjoy rolling piles of dice, and without that, they are not having "fun."

OF course, there's nothing wrong with that, either.

Treu story: several years back (10, maybe?), I was still part of a university RPG-and-other-games club. I joined a 3.5E Ravenloft game, run by a very "rolE play" sort of guy. And he did, respectfully, express concern that I might not enjoy the sort of game he was likely to run ... focussing, as you just have, on whether or not there would be much combat.

My answer to him, was: "REally for me, it's liek this: if I have a character sheet in front of me, that is by and large a listing of capabilities and modifiers to die rolls ...? It doesn't have to be combat, but I'd like to have a reason to actually look at that sheet, and use something from it, on a semiregular basis. Even if it's just a skill roll, if I drop some dice once or twice a session, and the story is fun, I'll be a happy gamer."

...

Several months later, at the close of the academic year (and thus, that short campaign), he went out of his way to thank me for joining the game and contributing as much to it as I had. And I, meanwhile, had an absolute BLAST of a time. One of the best games I've been part of, ever. And yes, I had reason to drop dice a coupel times during each weekly session - knowledge checks for "what do I know about ___", perception checks, morale checks (hey, it was Ravenloft, lolol), and so on.

Plenty of dice-rolling. Combat ... not so much. (Did I mention, Ravenloft ...?)


EDIT TO ADD: What Fisk said.

[All4BigGuns]

Like I said, it's mainly that the idea of "several sessions go by with no dice rolls" that I find incredibly dull and boring (and while I can't remember which threads off the top of my head, I've seen such posts on these forums). I mean, come on, what's the point in having a sheet if it's never used?

Puzzles are mainly not fun for me because it feels like being back in school...and I hated school.

[Elfenlied]

Not for all players. Some players (esp. female ones) seem to enjoy actual role-playing way more than just killing stuff.

In our group, the girls are usually the ones trying to go the kick ass route while others try to do things smoothly. Still fun, though.

[Draco18s]

Like I said, it's mainly that the idea of "several sessions go by with no dice rolls" that I find incredibly dull and boring (and while I can't remember which threads off the top of my head, I've seen such posts on these forums). I mean, come on, what's the point in having a sheet if it's never used?

Puzzles are mainly not fun for me because it feels like being back in school...and I hated school.

You can have puzzles without eschewing dice.

XCrawl had one I could point to as an example, just because I remember it.

Essentially the party had to stand in certain places (obvious trap doors) and then answer trivia questions. Largely speaking as players we didn't know the answers but if we did we were free to answer. If not, our characters had knowledge skills, we'd roll dice, the GM would spout off whatever answer (fake/real) the character would have come up with, and then the result of that action happened.

[CanRay]

I read "Ultra-Low-Powered" and imagined a Black Trenchcoat MacGyver campaign.

~Umi

No armor, no cybernetics, no firearms... Ultra-low-powered doesn't mean not badass.

And not a swiss army knife or duct tape to be seen!

[Tashiro]

It is the most heart-pumping, adrenaline-inducing and exciting aspect though.

Strangely, not for me. For me, social confrontation, where you know you can't 'win' by combat, tends to create the heart-pumping tension. It triggers the fight-or-flight instinct, and neither is actually a possible action, leaving your mind fluttering between a variety of options to try to resolve the situation and come out ahead.

[Tashiro]

Like I said, it's mainly that the idea of "several sessions go by with no dice rolls" that I find incredibly dull and boring (and while I can't remember which threads off the top of my head, I've seen such posts on these forums). I mean, come on, what's the point in having a sheet if it's never used?

Puzzles are mainly not fun for me because it feels like being back in school...and I hated school.

Who says the sheet doesn't get used? It has a list of your capabilities and resources, what you 'bring to the table' so to speak. You might get the odd dice roll, even without combat. Social awareness tests, cold reading, persuasion checks, and the like. Perception tests are also a big one - noticing things which may be overlooked, seeing who is coming in and out of the social scene, etc.

[nezumi]

It is the most heart-pumping, adrenaline-inducing and exciting aspect though.

No, the most heart-pumping, adrenaline-inducing, exciting aspect is when you're trapped, you can hear the monster approaching, you don't know anything about it except that your guns seem to have no effect.

Combat, especially for games with low game-complexity, oftentimes come down to "oh, it's my turn again? I try to hit that one. Three successes. Okay GM, now you roll, while I go back to my laptop." I don't know how anyone can find that exciting, and I truly hope that SR5 either reduces the combat mechanics to the point that my players don't have time to go back to their laptops, or makes them complex enough that they are thinking about their next move as soon as their last is over.

[Tashiro]

Combat, especially for games with low game-complexity, oftentimes come down to "oh, it's my turn again? I try to hit that one. Three successes. Okay GM, now you roll, while I go back to my laptop." I don't know how anyone can find that exciting, and I truly hope that SR5 either reduces the combat mechanics to the point that my players don't have time to go back to their laptops, or makes them complex enough that they are thinking about their next move as soon as their last is over.

Hmm. For one of the games I designed, combat is done as such: Describe what you're doing, describe your intent. Die roll. Depending on degree of success / failure, you get to describe the outcome, or it gets taken out of your hands and someone else describes what goes on from there. The tension comes from trying to keep the narrative out of the game master's hands, so you can control the flow and pace of the game. So far, I've had nobody who's played complain about the engine. You want to control the flow, so you can decide which attributes to use to get things done - playing to your strengths, while the game master can try to control the narration to play to your weaknesses.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

I could get behind that. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

Yeah, me too... As I will not have the funds, nor the desire, to purchase a whole new set of Shadowrun Books. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)

[_Pax._]

Yeah, me too... As I will not have the funds, nor the desire, to purchase a whole new set of Shadowrun Books. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)

Same here, especially nto doubling up and buying the HeroLab equivalents, too.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

Same here, especially nto doubling up and buying the HeroLab equivalents, too.

Yep, so 4A is it for me... not bad, though, as I think 4A is just about what I want in Shadowrun. *shrug*

[binarywraith]

It is the most heart-pumping, adrenaline-inducing and exciting aspect though.

Eh, heart-pumping, adrenaline-inducing combat, in a tabletop system where seconds in-game are measured in minutes of dice rolling? Nah.

Play a bit of paintball instead. Mechanics are for conflict resolution, but the narrative that presents those conflicts and the character interactions that forward them are the whole point.

[Grinder]

Different styles of play exist. We got that. Points have been made, opinions on this topic are clear. Now move on.

[Shortstraw]

I would like some information on the invasiveness of various paracritters. These days there are feral cats and pigs everywhere in Australia (not to mention cane toads), ferns and snakes in the everglades etc. So by the 2070's which species have escaped (from zoo's or from guarding facilities or from being pets) and gone native.

[Umidori]

No armor, no cybernetics, no firearms... Ultra-low-powered doesn't mean not badass.

Are you implying that MacGyver is not badass? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

~Umi