Comments on: RPG Rules and the Direction of Causality

By: The Seven-Sided Die » Fiction first

The Seven-Sided Die » Fiction first — Fri, 29 May 2009 02:09:32 +0000

[...] serendipitously discover a post of Joshua’s from two months back on the very same subject. In RPG Rules and the Direction of Causality he describes how causality can flow either from the game world to the rules, or from the rules to [...]

By: The Rules Gap | A Butterfly Dreaming

The Rules Gap | A Butterfly Dreaming — Thu, 07 May 2009 14:07:39 +0000

[...] Tales of the Rambling Bumblers touched on this in an excellent post about two months ago, but it comes to mind now because of what I wrote about in my previous post, and because of several unrelated recent conversations I’ve had with other gamers and bloggers. My take on it is slightly different from Joshua’s; for one thing, I’m coming at it from the player perspective instead of the system perspective. [...]

By: r_b_bergstrom

r_b_bergstrom — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 19:21:31 +0000

Personally, I'm much happier with the world defining the rules. Too many games are written without any thought to what kind of reality the rules foster. I used to play with some yahoos who tended to poke at those things. While I don't game with them any more, they left a lasting impression on me. If the rules (and their implications) don't make sense, I ditch the rules. That said, I've found that for one-shots and public games with strangers, I tend to let the rules reign supreme. Of course, I also tend to run very rules light games in those situations, so it doesn't matter that often. r_b_bergstrom’s last blog post..To Sandbox, Or Not To Sandbox

By: Tales of the Rambling Bumblers » Blog Archive » 4e For Grognards?

Tales of the Rambling Bumblers » Blog Archive » 4e For Grognards? — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 16:12:46 +0000

[...] you have to reverse the direction of causality in the system: cause and effect have to flow from the game-world to the rules, not from the rules [...]

By: gleichman

gleichman — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 15:26:26 +0000

I am so going to write an article on this Friday. I have a slightly different view of the matter from the “rules define the world” PoV…

By: Joshua

Joshua — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 15:03:21 +0000

@G’noll – even so, it’s a question of primacy. Even if, as with magic, you start with the rules as the only description you have, if you regard the world as primary, then you are obliged to come up with a game-world explanation of why the rule (what is it about armor that means mages can’t wear it) and that in turn will have effects that may be reflected in new rules. It makes a difference whether no armor is because, say, metal interferes with magic (implications might be leather armor is ok, metal jail cells can hold wizards), or it’s just cumbersome (implication might be that a wizard could wear armor if he was of sufficiently high dex, or it was magic armor of a special light-weight construction, or if not that then he can wear armor all he wants as long as he’s willing to give up casting spells while it’s on).

If you regard the rule as primary, not only is there no obligation to come up with a game-world explanation, you probably resist having the players ask for one so as not to be obligated to come up with more and more elaborate explanations of why the logical implications of your initial explanation don’t follow…when really all you have is “the rule is the rule, and nothing can be inferred that is not the rule.”

By: G'Noll

G'Noll — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 14:13:20 +0000

Interesting discussion. I am not sure the two approaches are utterly mutually exclusive, however. Your reference to OD&D magic users and armor is a good example: The world defines the rules, but the rules describe the world.

This sort of thing is pretty much inevitable in fantasy gaming: Even if it is explicitly stated that the rules are an attempt to descripe an underlying reality, when it comes to magic, the rules are often the only things we know about that reality. So we have a situation where the rules shape our image of the underlying reality, and our image of that reality is in turn used to interpret the rules.

I am currently trying to build such an underlying reality out of T&T’s magic rules; it is WORK…

By: Joshua

Joshua — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 16:24:53 +0000

@Gleichman- Yeah, I have a pretty strong preference that way, though I tried to make my presentation of the options fairly neutral. I also have a pretty strong preference for consistency and predictability, so that players can plan without treating the GM as an oracle, so there’s a definite tension there. That’s probably why I spend so much time thinking about rules and tweaking them, instead of just sticking with one “good enough” system and just making ad-hoc rulings every time it fails the fidelity test.

By: Gleichman

Gleichman — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 12:33:50 +0000

I'm trying to recall, but isn't your default approach to this 'causality flows from the game world"? Gleichman’s last blog post..Rationales for Mechanics

By: Tommi

Tommi — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 07:14:17 +0000

My way is that fiction determines causality and if there is something uncertain and interesting than the rules pick one of the fictionally plausible results. There’s never a conflict, because there’s no assumption that the rules must be used in some standard way in some standard situation.

I consider games where there are conflicts between what would happen and what the rules say to be broken where the conflicts are possible.