I think some of the discussions on these forums over these changes has its roots in role vs roll. The group I play with is much more into storytelling and entertainment then rolling dice and applying results. I am not trying to say either is better or worse then the other, I am just saying as a personal group preference, my players will handicap their characters to tell a good story. I currently have a player running a troll shaman who just learned his powers. He is the only spellslinger in the group. He started out with a magic of 3 and is still unsure how to conjure spirits. While some may say that this is no fun as he can't sling any major mojo and might actually hurt a team, Part of the game for that player is the journey to unlocking more magical secrets. All goes to preference I think. I love wiping out loads of henchmen in a single blow and level whole buildings with nothing but my mind, and We do play that way on occasion, but for the most part we tell a story. Anyone else have any insight as to the roll vs role thing

Trevor L.

I would love to have this conversation. This is playing with napalm close to an open flame though.

My take on this is there is a perfect blend of the two poles of role vs roll, like yin and yang. In the perfect balance they produce the perfect game, maximum enjoyment and like all art make you think and feel so you take something real from the illusion of make believe.

The perfect mix is different in every group and every game hell every moment of play. Like a good cocktail its all a matter of personal taste.

I agree with Pen, a roleplaying game must be a balance of the two, otherwise you are just doing bad dinner theatre or playing a board game. Our beloved hobby exists on the verge of the two.

in the past few years I've learned the fun of mixing the two, especially in that dreaded zone of social encounters. I believe in playing my characters stats and skills and especially rolls. So if I build my character with a load of social skills, I'll play suave, or sophisticated, wordy and social, if I don't have any, then tacturn, grim or quiet. If I spend points on these skills I expect them to do something in game.

Now the really fun part is playing your rolls. Roll your social skill, and then play it accordingly, it can be challenging to play like that on the fly, but can lead to some great encounters and in the case of botches, can lead to some insanely entertaining moments.

I agree, I think you do need a good mix of the 2. Otherwise you need a degree in acting to get through a game. I was just thinking that sometimes we all use the dice a little too much to determine what is right. While that may the case at times, and I in no way discourage that, I think a good dramatic moment should also be about player action regardless of the roll, if the scene calls for it.

Trevor L.

No, you play whichever one your group wants to play. If your group wants to play Shadowrun turned Warhammer, then that's what you play. If your group wants to play Shadowrun turned dinner theater, than THAT is what you play. You mix the two as much as is required to keep your players happy.

which begs the question; are you playing Shadowrun, or are you playing a board game or doing dinner theatre? It's in the mix that it becomes an RPG, otherwise I think one is just obfuscating the fact of the matter.

Is it Shadowrun if I play a game of Escape from New York with trolls, elves, and dwarfs as figures? How about just playing Dawn of the Dead instead?

We all have different views on what is the fun part in roleplaying games. Some people like dinner theater others think it is about the applied mathematics.

Some people like emotional content, others analytical.

The zeroth rule of RPGs (or any other game): The players must have fun. And the GM is also a player, so he gets a vote, too.
If it results in fun for your group, than it's the 'right' way to play regardless of where it is on the role-roll continuum.

I am primarily interested in context and the relationships between characters and their radical sixth world. However, the dice mechanic adds much-needed chaos, and allows me to roleplay situations that are unexpected, and I can play them as such. In a way it is chance that breathes life into predefined roles.

Whenever the "roll vs. role" topic pops up I tend think there is some sample bias at work. If you just casually peruse these forums you'd think SR fans are a bunch of number-crunching rules-Nazis that like nothing better than to bitch about the minutia of a new book and its far reaching implications for the future of the SR universe. But then you need to consider that:

1.) many people spend their time here because they love SR but don't have a group to play with- these types spend a great deal of time reading and rereading rules, generating characters and analyzing mechanics

and

2.) Its a discussion forum. Threads about character concepts and background stories are usually pleasant and short-lived because its easy to find common ground on a cool character or a good story. The threads that really thrash and bleed are the number crunching threads because in many ways there is more to discuss. Its the main reason why many people come here- to compare character builds, get objective feedback or analyze how one rule affects others.

I tend to be pre-occupied with historical origins and details. As such, I enjoy pretending it's the 70s and that my character just dropped dead for failing a "Save Vs. Death Ray" roll.

You don't have to gimp characters to "roleplay" them. Some of my best roleplay experiences in Shadowrun involved a troll who could shrug off full-auto blasts from a machine gun. I do not understand where people get off claiming that you need to cripple a character in order for it to be roleplay-worthy. In fact, I've seen this sort of thing lead to outright cheating in LARPs.

"Story" characters and "Power" characters are not polar opposites.

True, and "Story" and "Power" are not mutually exclusive too, despite what some people(even good RPG developers) may think.

There is something on the WoTC boards called the "Stormwrack" fallacy, or something along those lines, where the idea is that an 'optimized' (read, munchkined) character can also be roleplayed well. The problem that these power characters create is that it forces the rest of the team to be as super-munchkined as the one munchkin, or be useless and tossed aside. And some players don't have the innate munchkining ability or drive.

But that is not the issue here, the issue is role vs. roll.

And to that effect, I am in the camp that story is paramount, but you have to have a good system to support it. If you SAY that you can't cast spells all day long because of story reasons, then the rules better back that up or you've got nothin'. If you are trying to support sneaky-sneaky tip toe, don't-piss-off-the-guards-or-they-kill-you mentality, then you'd better not have a system that lets you eat lead for breakfast.

I don't see the point of discussion here. It is so simple. It is always:

33% Roll
33% Role
and
34% Rules and Argument of

On the D&D boards it's called the Stormwind Fallacy. The poster who originally proposed it, Tempest Stormwind, put it very well, and it applies to any roleplaying game. I highly recommend the read.

I think some players feel "gimped" or "crippled" characters are better for 'role' play because it is easy to focus their characteristics by some sort of flaw. It's easy for them to see that negativity and use that as their basis for their character, while a number-crunched 'roll' play character may have to spend a lot more thought for their characteristics/role play outside of game penalties.

However, one of my favorite characters is one a friend of mine plays as a deaf sniper. I don't think this makes him a better role player/character. It is the fact that he ignores everyone unless they speak directly at him (his PC) so he can read their lips, and he talks like an ass the whole game.

I love the idea of a character learning their magic in game. To me, I enjoy flaws that my character has to overcome outside the actual mission. Not because I believe munchkins cannot be role played, but for the fact I think the most fun in games comes when you are pinned down, screwed, done for, but somehow come out of it. I love the "Oh Shit! Factor" that crippled characters sometimes have, outside of the GM screwing the player, or a real difficult mission, i.e. Gremlins Flaw (fun!).

These less then perfect characters also give some good variety, besides one or two cyberware parts flopped out and some skills switched around. Of course, when everyone starts taking the same flaws, it gets retarded. ("Not everyone has Cat Allergy, Fear of Large Bodies of Water, Amnesia and a Dark Secret, God Dammit!"- Me yelling at my players.)

It is easy to see role playing when the character has an obvious flaw. It is something the player HAS to cope with, while someone without such an obvious flaw has much more subtle acting to do. This is where I think the assumption that munchkins are not good for role play comes from.

LINK

As far as the game itself is concerned, the roleplaying and the rules are both vital components.

As far as the so-called "roleplaying vs. rollplaying" debate, it's bogus, because it's NOT one or the other. You can have munchkins who don't know the rules, and you can have theater majors who can powergame with the best of them. Creating effective characters and roleplaying well-rounded characters are separate skills - just because you have one and lack the other, don't assume that everyone else is in the same boat.

As far as "The min-maxer makes everyone have to min-max, or be left behind" goes, the opposite holds true, as well. So why should the min-maxer have to gimp a perfectly good character, just because Robbie wanted to play someone with 3 points of near-useless 'ware and the latent awakening quality?

I think you can avoid the worst power disparities by having the GM let everyone know what kind of campaign it is - I mean not just saying "320 BP, skills capped at one 5 or 2 4's and the rest at 3, resources capped at 30 and Magic/Resonance capped at 3". I mean also saying "You guys are neophyte runners, but street tough, near the top of the heap in the Barrens, but itching to move up the food chain." In such a campaign, the latent awakened mage would be a bad idea.

On the other hand, a campaign with the same numbers could be presented as "You are all graduate students at a local community college, with part-time jobs, with skills that could be useful for a runner to have, but no experience in the shadows before the event that will start the campaign." In that campaign, the guy with wired reflexes II, a smartlink, and an Ares Alpha would be the one that wouldn't fit.

The GM should give those kind of general guidelines, and then, if someone wants to intentionally gimp their character, they should suck it up and deal with the disadvantages. You don't want to be overshadowed by the other runners? Why the hell did you deliberately make a weak character, then? I have gimped characters for roleplaying fun, myself, but I didn't expect to be cut any special breaks for it. If I gave myself a hindrance, I expected it to actually be a genuine hindrance.

I always put 'munchkins' in the group of 'anyone who disrupts the game and takes away the fun of other people.'

This includes rampant cheaty/powergamers(not someone who likes to make a kickass character. Cheaters are a whole other game), OR those 'overactors' who snub anyone who dare play a character who is useful for something, as only gimped characters can have character...I call these 'drama munchkins.' Both are people who I dislike at my table.

Currently our table has some very competent people-750 Karma, our houserules that make getting items easier, and the like. But every one of these guys is fun to play and comes in handy. Three of us are great at combat; one fellow handles the heavier weapons as well as pistols and is hella mean with a knife in his hand, my guy is the unarmed/close-in specialist who also is solid with small arms, another is very scrappy in a fistfight as well as awesome with his monowhip. THe fourth is a medic-he's not too combatant, but he's also our getaway driver and has a lot of other good skills. We are all about the same power level and all have managed to do things well, we also have backup things(the first guy acts as a good side-face and has disguise skills, the private eye fellow has an array of adept powers from killing hands to Sense Memory and Astral Perception and is stealthy with an array of contacts, my fellow is stealthy, good at tailing, and an excellent armorer.)

In other words, we're powerful, but on the same level in our own way. I don't expect our medic to be able to out-fight the other three. It's not the role he chose or even wanted-he wanted to play the support guy. We have fun playing off of each other and the like.

BUT i see the point of the discussion. If half the table wants to play pros and the other half gangers, there can be a problem. But...who 'wins' there? If the people who want to play the pros are forced down, and aren't in the mood(I can play a wide range of power levels, but it really depends on my mood, for instance), then they might not have fun, even with roleplaying. Same for the other side. It's why it's important to determine things like that at the start.

I like a nice mix. I like to throw dice around and watch my guy kick someone in the head for twice the guy's physical damage overflow in one shot. But sometimes I also like to sit there and simply talk with the other players, in character, about happenings around. Sitting around tossing back whiskey, seeing other character's points of view, and the like. We had a great game this weekend. My character has a charge-the 10 year old son of his old buddy when he served as a solider(the buddy passed away and my character took him in two years past, Dependent Level 2 flaw), and it's fun to watch him interact with the kid(played by the GM.) The crew pulled off a near perfect run the other night, too; no casualties, the worst that happened were four guards rendered unconscious via a flash-bang from my character and gel rounds from the other two guys, and one guard tied up.

In any case, I like to roll the dice, and I like to roleplay it out. I like a variety of power levels. I mainly like the ability to play the character I have in my head at the moment.

But I don't agree with extremes-''a character must have 20+ dice to be effective'' or ''a character must be saddled with flaws and not good at anything'' both don't gel with me.

I personally dislike the term "rollplay", it's a catch-all term used to over simplify things so you don't have to argue a point. Like "munchkin", "Min-Maxer" and "Power-Gamer".

Anyways, balancing fluff and crunch in a game is important. The rules act as sort of a neutral arbitrator, and the dice as random X factor that keeps the stories interesting. Games need rules, there are what make things fun and challenging, and they create more creativity pure freedom could ever create. PnP RPGs have a GM not to ignore rules, but to make the rules adaptable, so that no matter what the players try, there is an outcome.

One thing I think is important is that rules and roleplay are not mutually exclusive. They can work together. We ourselves operate in a world of rules, we know what we can and cannot do. If we jump off a building, we fall, it we touch a stove, we get burned. RPG's are no different, they just follow a different rule set. The characters may not know how the rules work, but they know what works and what doesn't work. How much you care about the rules doesn't determine how good of a role player you are, in fact people who ignore the rules and game mechanics tend to make crappy characters.

For example, in a D&D campaign I played a few years ago we had a large party, but two people stood out. One was a half-orc drunken boxer. He was an expertly made character, every feat, every magic item choosen with absolute precision to make him as tough as possible. He could jump into a group of enemies and beat them to death with the corpses of the ones he already killed. We all loved him, not just because he was powerful, but because he was a great character. He always had a good joke, keep my character from getting too evil, and had something positive to add to every situation.

On the other hand we had a fighter with a 8 constitution and a 12 strength(for reference, think melee street samurai with 1 body and 3 strength and agility). They had pages of backstory about how they where a sickly child and how they fought all kinds of difficulties in their life. Their character build also sucked horribly, the character was a fighter, but was incompetent at fighting, instead focusing on social skills. When asked why they didn't play a more social class they replied that it didn't make sense for the character. Anyways, apart from being useless, the character was was downright annoying to be around. There where a good actor to be sure, and their backround was interesting, but everything they did and said wasn't supported by their character(they didn't have the perform skill but claimed to be a magnificent dancer), and everytime they god their rear handed to them in a fight we can to consider how they became an adventurer in the first place. Basically, your...munchkinhood, has nothing to do with RP ability.

Another thing I should bring up is that different systems have different amounts of rules intensities. Shadowrun is very high on the crunch scale, with few systems(aside from D&D) being higher. On the other end, something like 7th Sea and Paranoia is on the fluff in, rules are light, flexible, and made to be ignored when needed. Some systems, like world of darkness, are in between. Shadowrun is a rules heavy system, if you want to keep the feel of the game you have to be picky on where you ignore the rules.

One last thing is that rules are discussed heavily on this board because that's all we have in common. Ever group is different, but the core rulebook is something we all have in common.

I prefer the term Drama Queen. You can be a drama queen without being a disruptive munchkin, although usually the drama queen is more disruptive than the traditional munchkin.

That is my experience too. The munchkin usually gives the GM headaches but rarely intrudes into what the other players' space. The munchkin in my experience has more of a Me vs GM attitude.

The drama queen on the other hand justifies her actions with, "But that's what my character would do..." when casting Mind Control on another PC. The drama queen is all "Me, me, me!"

And then of coarse you have the Dramakin Munchqueen- an evil amalgamation of the two that ruins the game for everyone. I have certainly had the un-pleasure of dealing with such players.

I think the DMG 2 for D&D 3.5 called them psychodramatist in it's description of player types and styles. I have to give huge props to whoever wrote that section since it was the most complete and unbiased assessment of play style I've ever read. Anyway, I'm in full agreement. There's nothing more disruptive then a psychodramatist that has a horrid tendency IMO to play idealized versions of there own ego and self concept regardless of how unrealistic or disruptive this may be.

I have seen many times where such a player will justify there actions because it's "what my character would do..." even if it means screwing over the group and even a campaign. It's stuff like is when you're playing something in the horror genre and the player insists vehemently that there character would never suffer from fear or psychological collapse because it's not in there character. The worst incident I can think of is when a player who's character was the 'rebel' he wanted himself to be refused to surrender his weapon to a town militia in Twilight 2000 nearly getting the entire party killed in a trivial encounter because his characters rebellious ego fully out weighed any concept of self preservation, ethics or morality.

I think because roleplaying is a collection of concepts, a lot of antagonism developes due to differing interpretations and conceptual boundries of those ideas.

For example, role vs roll is to me is simply whether you like to play your character more or less than you like to use dice, to achieve things in game. There is no right answer per say its all situational with your gaming buddies.

Power gamer vs Drama queen, is a similar but seperate issue. Still a matter of play style and both examples of a player not taking into account were to draw the line as their actions are detracting from other peoples fun.

Finding the right head space for everyone to agree on the nebulous concepts of an enjoyable game is the single most important act of cooperative play.

Missing that zone leads to real conflict and so a lot of emotional out pouring and erm *debate*.

Its very easy to become defensive when someone challenges what you consider to be *right* TM and sometimes the mature thing to do is just to stay calm, agree to disagree and walk away.

There is no right way to play or to create a character save by the shared idea of the group your with and your personal preference. Hence why I feel there is a balance between all the conflicting drives and desires where everyone has fun.

Bingo!

-paws

I think dramakins and munchkins have problems that exist outside of the game and live mostly in their own heads. They seem to be the Me Firsts, everybody look at me, mommy and daddy didn't love me enough.

It's like if they conquer and control the entire game (by making their character the center of the game by overstepping their boundries) we will understand and love them.

And no, I don't believe all min/maxers are munchkins - just the people who play their characters like munchkins.

First, I'm a little confused about why everyone isn't trying to kill one another by now. I thought that's how these "role vs roll" discussions were supposed to go?

Anything I'd say about the argument has been said, so I want to toss out something about munchkins.

I've found that a devious - um, I mean, clever - gamemaster can turn even the most munchkined character into a great opportunity to roleplay. What happens when a "super-human" shows up in a society? A person who is good at everything with no flaws? They get attention - lots of it. People want to be trained by them. The news wants to write stories about them. Their name and face get plastered all over the place. Tough guys target the character to prove that the character "ain't so tough" or to prove their own worth.

In a sense, perfection is in itself a flaw, and one that can create wonderful role-play opportunities.

You're wrong, I hate you, hope you get VITAS and die!







Is that better, Endroren?

In my game, when the character playing the burned-out troll decided to trap the PC's building "because that's what the character would do", I didn't think there was anything wrong with it.
No PC was killed when the explosives went off and the building collapsed, but if they had been, I would have let the story go this way (the players could use Edge if they wanted their character to survive anyway.)... And everyone at my table seem to think this way.

So I guess this makes us roleplayers, if such a clear-cut distinction exists.

Whew. For a minute there, I thought maybe I'd accidentally left the internet! Thanks, Bastard!

That was great

I do think what it all comes down to is there are an infinate number of ways to play a game and an infinate number of players to do it(relativly speaking of course.) I think that is what is great about this forum. We all use it as a way to bond wheather it be yelling at each other or congratulating each other. The fact that we love this game so much is testament to what the devs are trying to do.

Group Hug



Trevor L.

I've been gaming now for 30 years, and maybe my interpretatio of the terms is archaic, but I seem to remember that when the term rollplaying was used, it meant a game tha was nothing more than "I attack; roll to hit," etc. I.E. where the players didn't even try to bring role playing into things.

On the other extreme were the pure roleplayers, who were sometimes shocked that the game had stats

I consider the best style to be a balance of the two; I'm not the most suave and charismatic guy in the wrld, but if my character has the appropriate skills, should my character get penalized because I can't choose the perfect James Bond words? Similarly, if I'm the world's best hacker, if my character doesn't have the skills, should my character be able to hack into Shadowland on a whim?

That's where cheating comes into play. People with good social skills who translate those skills over to their Uncouth characters are cheating just as badly as a rules munchkin.

Previous versions did not include this so it was nice to see it added in with 4th. Moving forward to expand upon the story/characters is what matters most times. So taking this into account you are best off accommodating the types of players in the group. Sitting down with each player beforehand to gauge their gaming motives goes a long way to avoid issues during actual play. You can use this information during prep time to focus on molding how and when you will use the rules for the given material during the session. In the end playing for the group as opposed to the game is what it all comes down to. Without the group the game is just a bunch of books.

See, that quote you're citing is exactly what I disagree with. Back in the day the game used to grind to a halt while we looked up the rules and argued about things like the order of rolls, trying to find actual written rules for "weird" situations, and so forth.

The story with the most pathos of all is how accident and error and our cosmic insignificance wreaks havoc upon the best laid plans of men.

If I don't apply the rules as written each and every time in a strictly consistient way there would be no end to the moaning and equivocation when player characters are killed. But if there is absolute consistency that's the only way you can have player characters die and the "simulation" keeps running.

Furthermore, I can't say that I like story. There, I've gone and said it. Every time I've participated in a game where someone attempted "story" usually there were too many disparate elements and characters I didn't care about and I was totally confused and indifferent about one quarter of the way through. Most peoples' stories are lame and stupid, which is why there are very few truly great writers of science fiction. And even among many of the well-liked authors in my personal opinion most of them suck and are unrealistic and somewhat too self-referential. So there, story sucks. Screw story. Bring on the hoardes of enemies and my binder full of characters and let the flanking begin.

The best stories are allegories or social commentary anyway. The original Star Wars were based on the writing of Joseph Campbell, who in turn was a mythologist who basically articulated myths and Freudian/Jungian psychology as a kind of archetype-based critique or embodyment of the societies which produced them. Rambo: First Blood was almost pretty much an allegory about the alienation of returning Vietnam veterans in the United States. Conan the Barbarian was John Milius' commentary on finding the strength to embody Nietzche's ubermensch in a society controlled by intellectually lazy conformist hippies. Lone Wolf McQuade was pretty much about contrasting the rugged vitality and uncompromising morality of the rural man with the petty abstractions, machinations, and pomposity of left-wing politicians and municipal bureaucrats.

The stories that are all caught up in little characters and their personal mental problems and petty struggles never become great, nor do they attain the cultural resonance, of the above stories. There are scads of fiction authors who write pretty well and they entertain and they have all these cute sardonic characters, but as much fun as it can be to pass the time reading their sarcastic banter, the stories aren't *great*. The above stories, on the other hand, are *great*.

Basically, it's not about "characterization" and petty anxieties and boring relationships. That really gives you the goosebumps and keeps your heart pumping as you lie in bed at night is blood, iron, gunpowder, rage, and struggle against insurmountable odds.

I find your view of contemporary literature intriquing. Your bias towards ACTION!!! with a capital A is noted, understandable mind you, but noted.

I will point out that if you treat a TT game as merely simulation, then perhaps I should point out we have these things called computers which are ONLY capable of sticking to the rules.\

I do prefer story to a degree. I prefer the artful elegance of a triple cross when executed appropiately, which is hard to justifiy when you only are interested in how many bullets you can keep up in the air at the same time.

Computers are some of the best GMs. They are fair(as much as the rules themselves are fair), consistent, never play favorites and cannot be bribed with snacks(or other, ah, favors). It is when you add in the human element that claims of biasness, unfairness, cheating get in the way. Everyone has their own view of what is fun; when the GM is human, his view is also included because the GM needs to have fun too. The threads that spawn the most heated "discussions" are the ones that a player come here and complain how his GM screwed his character over or those that GMs post how much trouble a PC in his game is causing him. A computer won't do that, it can't - for now.

The triple cross is justified by how many bullets you can keep in the air at the same time.


But the problem is those cheaters get away with it precisely because their social skills are good. A rules munchkin is not likely to get away by making friends and influencing people and such social people are much more insidious and sneaky because they influence you to think they are good players. They know the right buttons to push and right words to say and how to say it.

That doesn't mean they're not cheating. A GM should call them on it, just like they'd call a rules munchkin on it. The fact that they can argue with a smile shouldn't dissuade the GM from enforcing the rules fairly.

Cain, by rights, the GM should be able to enforce the rules fairly.

But the guys I am talking about are the Pornomancers of Real Life, they can make you believe amost anything they want. Afterall, all they need to do is convince the GM it makes a good story...

This only skews things towards players who have superior social manipulative skills. Convince the GM that it is a good story and "fairness" & "consistency" can be ignored, afterall, those people crying foul are "powergaming out of control".

Cain, by rights, the GM should be able to enforce the rules fairly.

But the guys I am talking about are the Pornomancers of Real Life, they can make you believe amost anything they want. Afterall, all they need to do is convince the GM it makes a good story...

This only skews things towards players who have superior social manipulative skills. Convince the GM that it is a good story and "fairness" & "consistency" can be ignored, afterall, those people crying foul are "powergaming out of control".

Letter and spirit of the quote is where everyone will always fall in various locations. I read it and it does not say to me to toss rules completely out the window or bow down to everything the players expect/beg/bribe from you. Sometimes pulling out the rules lawyer card has to be done. Just limiting it during a session to avoid it from becoming the norm can go a long way. There is always time later on to go over in detail what needs to be adjusted or worked out to rectify things down the road. This is why sometimes acting like the "Computer GM" benefits no one. Working within the rules but not strictly by the rules in every single down to the most menial situation can help avoid it from becoming stale or just another mechanical response.

PS Forums have and will always suck as a method of debate.

I read that rule and see how terribly prone to abuse it is. Even more so than any other rule that a potential rules lawyer can abuse, everything is potentially within the rules if you can persuade the GM that it is so. The GM is a single point of contact and apply enough pressure to that single point and the GM will break. An "AI GM" benefits everyone but favors no one.

How/why else would you create characters in preparation to roll-play? There is no challenge if there is no challenge, right?

Play the character, roll the dice, use the rules, it all tells the story. The dichotomy is false. An illusion created when you select the wrong game (system, set of rules) for the experience and the type of story you want to end up with.

Certainly true enough but that just opens it up to another view that an "AI GM" is only as good as the programming. In most cases that ends up being flawed due to the human factor involved in its creation. While some versions of the "Human GM" have outdated firmware, fragmented systems, slow IO protocols or various other anomalies they can still allow the adapting of a situation given enough time and resources. From a gaming standpoint using both factors together can bridge the gap between flaws in each. With that said, what needs to be done is more synergy between the two things which relies on someone actually creating the tools to achieve that. It makes me wish I knew more about programming languages than the few basics I have picked up in the past.

So anyway, how did we end up talking about the "AI GM" again?

Read my post again, Cain. What I was saying, and, granted, I may not have been terribly clear, was that a character with a high skill should not be penalized just because the player of that character is not James Bond. And on the flip side, if James Bond is the player, if his character doesn't have the skills, well, his character should be able to do only those things his skills indicate. (Within reason, of course. If a character comes up with a great idea to convince NPX X to do Y, I'd give him a chance to convince the NPC based on the character's appropriate skill.)

If we're not playing by the rules then I'm wasting my time at the gaming table. We're no longer playing a fair game with challenges and numbers to crunch on the fly. We're just having a popularity contest at the table where the most sycophantic player gets the GM to aggrandize or validate his or her character in any number of ways.

Signed.




Well, i do.
The allegoric quality you attribute to certain narratives is just one possible aspect of what constitutes a great work of literature, film, visual arts or what have you : providing several layers of meaning that interact, enhance each other, create thought-provoking contradictions and so on.
I believe that focussing on individual characters, their relationships and their personal issues is a constant source of revelations about the human condition- observing the people around me and the way they connect to each other to create groups, networks, societies and civilizations yields exciting new insights every day.

What i don't give a damn about is plot.
Screw that overrated bullshit, a good author...wait!
Damn, i'm digressing here.

Who gives a damn about authors?
This a site devoted to role-playing games.

We don't need authors.
We don't tell stories.
We don't have to.
Not at our gaming table.

We have instruments that provide something not paralleled by any other game or narrative.
The integration of narrative as a means of play, as well as play that facilitates narrative.
The incredibly flexible world-building and world-maintaining engine known as the GM.

When i GM, i always aim at building a consistent world in which i can always assume that the RAW will not let me down if it is applicable in a given situation.
I don't care what result "fits the story best".
I don't have a story.
I have a setting.
I have characters, these have goals and ressources.
The players have characters, these have goals and ressources.
In the typical, conflict-heavy settings of most RPGs, these goals and therefor the characters and ressources inevitably clash.
This creates conflict, which is open in it's course, it's twists and it's outcomes and which is dynamic throughout the game.
Which is unforeseeable, surprising and exciting due to the creativity and ingenuity of my players, who are. within the rules, free to do what they want because that is what our game is good for and what no other game besides tabletop RPGs can provide.
The desire to tell a predefined story destroys that, ruins the very advantage our hobby has over computer RPGs, boardgames, oh, and novels as well.

I don't have to come up with a story, nor do i have to tell one as a GM.
When the conflict has been resolved, we have a story.
The tension created by this conflict does not rely on dramatic conventions- it is the life of beloved player characters that is at stake here, because i always roll openly, because i play it rough, because i for the hell of it do let player characters die "just" because of a botched dice roll.
You don't need the structure of a five-act play to produce drama under these circumstances.
That's for the wussies who fudge rolls to pamper their player's egos and their own feeling of overestimated artistic importance.
These are the guys who need crutches such as "don't let the dice get in the way of a good story".
Go write a novel or get a blog or whatever, creative writing is fun and all, i encourage you to do it, but leave me alone with that at my gaming table.

Dice cannot get in the way of my group and me creating a story collaboratively by struggling against the game world.
They are one of the things that ensure that the act of coming up with the actions will always be entertaining during play, even though a written accord of it may sound dull and dramatically unrefined to an outsider who wasn't there with us and felt the adrenalin rush as the PCs fought for their goddam fictional lives because they do not have the unspoken immortality of blockbuster movie protagonists, but because they can be killed by everyone, because they CAN die a meaningles death at the hands of a gutterpunk with a Sandler TMP and a bullet with their stupid street name on it.

This is directed by John Hobbes, not by John Woo.
That is why i will never let "story" get into the way of a good game.

Of course, there are situations where an action's outcome is so obvious that i don't have to roll unless a player should absolutely insist on it.
As well as there are areas where the rules are vague, incomplete or outright missing and it becomes necessary to create a plausible ad hoc mechanism to resolve the situation.
This is where narrating comes into play- and here, it means NOT that i start to rub my literary ambitions into the player's faces and screw over their plans to railroad them through my assumedly brilliant plot (screw that self-important bullshit! Screw all those wanky fools who mistake our hobby for another chance to annoy the world with their talentles drivel!), but that i tell the players what they encounter, the players tell me what they want to do and common sense is used to asign a dicepool and a treshold to it.
People have been gaming like this for decades and it has facilitated creative, fair and challenging games even in systems with very incomplete rules.

Ad hoc adjustments of plausibilities ARE a workable tool of the GM- what matters it that he does NOT use it to come up with a "dramatically apropriate" result, which will lead to biased, unbelievable and contested outcomes.
But instead that he makes a judgement that is transparent, plausible and finds the consensus of the group.
This is often a difficult task, but it is possible to do so.
Just keep in mind that you are not an allmighty narrator who stands above the law, but that you are just the arbiter of a commonly accepted set of rules and that you rely on the consensus of your fellow players.
If they have any guts, they will also accept judgements that have negative consequences for their characters.

Nowhere in any of my replies have I specifically or even alluded to the notion of not using the rules. *shrugs*

Anyway, Rasumichin gives a decent rundown of things above. An outline with possible directions is about the limit of the story writing process that needs to be done for most game systems. The old Choose Your Own Adventure books are an example, they allow for different pre-defined branching outcomes beforehand along with a final goal. What happens on the way is up to the those taking part as long as the GM is prepared enough beforehand or very good at reaction creations. DnD 4e adventures are now mostly just a bunch of encounters with very little in the realm of story and in many cases include at most 1 paragraph of flavor text with the rest being stats and tactics. The newest Shadowrun mission like those before it is mainly the setup along with info on possible associated situations or info that involves one of the follow up sections. Overall they are just stripped down versions of the basic 3 act structure.