Of course, it helps to be clear about what you actually want.
IME most computer RPG designers assume their players want to “beat the game”: that is, to do whatever the game makes challenging as efficiently as possible. And they design for that, clearly signaling what the assigned challenges are and providing a steadily progressing path of greater challenge and increased capacity to handle those challenges. (As you and EY point out, this often involves completely implausible strategic considerations.)
This is also true of a certain flavor of TT RPG, where the GM designs adventures as a series of challenging obstacles and puzzles which the players must overcome/solve in order to obtain various rewards. (And as you suggested earlier, one could also imagine a social RPG built on this model.)
In other (rarer) flavors of TT, and in most forum-based RPGs, it’s more like collaborating on a piece of fiction: the GM designs adventures as a narrative setting which the players must interact with in order to tell an interesting story.
It can be jarring when the two styles collide, of course.
Well, that’s portentous. Is this meant as a back-reference to the things you’ve already discussed in this thread, or as an intimation of things left unsaid?
Is this meant as a back-reference to the things you’ve already discussed in this thread, or as an intimation of things left unsaid?
The former, but I suppose both apply. Either way I thought enough had been said and wanted to exit the conversation without particularly implying agreement but without making a fuss.either. A simple assertion of position was appropriate. While strictly true saying “further conversation would just involve spinning new ways of framing stuff for the purpose of arguing for a position and generally be boring and uninformative” would represent connotations that I didn’t want to convey at the time. The conversation to that point was positive and had merely exhausted the potential. Quit before it is just an argument.
Sure.
Of course, it helps to be clear about what you actually want.
IME most computer RPG designers assume their players want to “beat the game”: that is, to do whatever the game makes challenging as efficiently as possible. And they design for that, clearly signaling what the assigned challenges are and providing a steadily progressing path of greater challenge and increased capacity to handle those challenges. (As you and EY point out, this often involves completely implausible strategic considerations.)
This is also true of a certain flavor of TT RPG, where the GM designs adventures as a series of challenging obstacles and puzzles which the players must overcome/solve in order to obtain various rewards. (And as you suggested earlier, one could also imagine a social RPG built on this model.)
In other (rarer) flavors of TT, and in most forum-based RPGs, it’s more like collaborating on a piece of fiction: the GM designs adventures as a narrative setting which the players must interact with in order to tell an interesting story.
It can be jarring when the two styles collide, of course.
There is far more than a difference of styles at work.
Well, that’s portentous. Is this meant as a back-reference to the things you’ve already discussed in this thread, or as an intimation of things left unsaid?
The former, but I suppose both apply. Either way I thought enough had been said and wanted to exit the conversation without particularly implying agreement but without making a fuss.either. A simple assertion of position was appropriate. While strictly true saying “further conversation would just involve spinning new ways of framing stuff for the purpose of arguing for a position and generally be boring and uninformative” would represent connotations that I didn’t want to convey at the time. The conversation to that point was positive and had merely exhausted the potential. Quit before it is just an argument.
Since you asked.