Terrible advice from gamebooks

[Otakusensei]

Yeah, you basically got it. But he is right in that if you play a GOO game and someone min-maxes and you feel it ruins the collaborative story telling experience and you had no fun, you could hold up the manifesto as justification that players were the problem and not the fact that X rule allowed the min-maxer to take infinite Y at start and go first. I wouldn't say that the player is blameless in that case, but as a player and GM I expect the product I bought to be at least engineered enough to meet the value. And I certainly don't expect the company to put out a product that can be so easily exploited and then stand behind a manifesto that basically says it's that asshole's fault for using their rules as written.

Otherwise let's just all pretend we're ponies and eat happy rainbows or some shit. That game is free unless you want to donate to my new Kickstarter, Magical Tea Ponies.

[tussock]

The GOO manifesto isn't that bad. The fact is it's super hard to write a set of rules for a proper large-scope RPG that don't explode in a lot of unpredicted ways. Sure, it could be done: with enough money (and thus talented hours thrown at the problem) people can totally do super hard stuff.

But RPGs are still around $40 for a large hardcover book, or less, and just a few of us buy one every five or ten years. That's not much money to throw at such problems. It's not like they're making a relatively simple shooter game that'll sell tens of millions of copies every year after trivial art changes for $80 on a tiny piece of plastic (which will also be full of game-breaking bugs almost every time until patch #3 or so).

Or motor cars, that sell for tens of thousands of dollars each, and still have mistakes in them. Mistakes like "if you drive too fast on under-inflated tyres for years on end the tyres could catastrophically fail", or "if you jiggle the brakes between on and off more than ten times a second it could decrease braking efficiency".

Like, with cars, those weird corner-case faults get fixed. With cheap-ass RPGs, they kinda have to say that if it's hurting, you might just want to stop doing that.

[Kuri Näkk]

he is right in that if you play a GOO game and someone min-maxes and you feel it ruins the collaborative story telling experience and you had no fun, you could hold up the manifesto as justification that players were the problem and not the fact that X rule allowed the min-maxer to take infinite Y at start and go first. I wouldn't say that the player is blameless in that case, but as a player and GM I expect the product I bought to be at least engineered enough to meet the value. And I certainly don't expect the company to put out a product that can be so easily exploited and then stand behind a manifesto that basically says it's that asshole's fault for using their rules as written.

I think you got it wrong. The rules in RPG books are not the only rules of the game. To make it simple, RPG rules normally do not limit what you can say as a character - your options are infinite. It does not mean that in actual games you can insult other players just because the rules in the book allow it. The manifesto is about the meta rules. You can disagree with them - e.g. real RPG is all about optimization! - but you cannot appeal to rules in the book to justify breaking the meta rules. In other words, if an RPG is a non-competitive collaborative storytelling happy ponies exercise then you cannot justify a competitive and aggressive play by referring to a specific rule that technically allows infinite Y.

I find it surprising that some read the GOO manifesto as a disclaimer or excuse for producing sub-par rules for competitive min/max play style. It seems quite obvious to me that the GOO is (clumsly) trying to say that their rules are not written for such play.

The GOO manifesto isn't that bad. The fact is it's super hard to write a set of rules for a proper large-scope RPG that don't explode in a lot of unpredicted ways. Sure, it could be done: with enough money (and thus talented hours thrown at the problem) people can totally do super hard stuff.

QFT. Lot of frustration stems from unrealistically high expectations. Of course, this is not an excuse for producing shit.

[Otakusensei]

The rules in RPG books are not the only rules of the game. To make it simple, RPG rules normally do not limit what you can say as a character - your options are infinite. It does not mean that in actual games you can insult other players just because the rules in the book allow it. The manifesto is about the meta rules. You can disagree with them - e.g. real RPG is all about optimization! - but you cannot appeal to rules in the book to justify breaking the meta rules. In other words, if an RPG is a non-competitive collaborative storytelling happy ponies exercise then you cannot justify a competitive and aggressive play by referring to a specific rule that technically allows infinite Y.

I'm gonna stop you right there. I understand that there are "meta rules" to roleplaying just like there are "meta rules" to sports. If a sniper takes out a player as he tries to steal a base that may not be expressly denied in the rules but is still not cool. It goes without say, or at least it should in a law abiding society. You can follow that rabbit hole down to talk about the Spirit of The Rules, Rules and Written, Rules as Read and generate any volume of deep and frothy bullshit. But it all comes down to the expectation that rules mean something because they are invested with a specific and agreed to authority, one the participants in the game are counting on.

The key here is that the rules you purchase, that are written and tested and published, are intended to be a structure that the participants in the game trust. And as such they need to be a quality that they serve the intended purpose. Failures in those rules need to be owned by the creators of the game, the interpersonal fallout of abusing those failures is owned by the person who did it. You don't have to call this shit out anymore than your car manual needs to talk about driving for days on a flat. "When tire is broke, fix" is implied like "Rule doesn't serve intended purpose, find alternative". A manifesto holding up the standard of fair play and fun should be better than what we have here.

Maybe I'm so up in arms over this because I min-maxed the shit out of BESM. It was too fucking easy. Even new players frequently got into trouble by being really really good at one thing and sucking at others. I recall a friend building a character based off a dude from some fighting game. He started building combo attacks and basically made an infinite loop. The GM ended up ruling that if he used it he would be unable to stop it and thus would eventually die while performing it. But I could have just cooked his brain with magic and none would be the wiser. The rules didn't do a very good job of balancing anything, and in light of that manifesto it reflects poorly on GOO.

Again, I'm not saying that GOO was a shitty company that made shitty products and hid behind a shitty manifesto. Far from it, I still have my BESM 2nd ed book and fully intend to bust it out and run a game at some point. But I will be a wise and strict GM. I know the faults and failures of the rules. And because of that, and GOO's need to shame a style of play, I cast a disparaging eye on this manifesto.

[wotmaniac]

Aberrant. For this rant -- the Player's Guide.
(this isn't "bad advice" so much as it's "internally inconsistent")

The Player's Guide opens by telling you that this is absolutely not a superhero game. But later on, they give you a suggested reading list, that is primarily composed of DC and Marvel comics. At some point, they insult you with some asinine story about some dumb bitch that only uses her teleport power simply to avoid rush-hour traffic. I'm sorry, unless my place of business is the inside of a bank vault (or catching those for whom it is), I'm not relegating my bamph power to simply get back and forth to work.

Later in that same book, they try to impress upon you that you are indeed "not Ironman". On that same goddamned page, they turn around and give you all the rules you need for building your own Ironman suit (and then some). Dafuq. Are they actively trying to troll the reader?

Somewhere in that book, the author breaks down and has a frank conversation with the reader about how this is "high-concept" such-and-such; and then goes on to denigrate "lesser" forms of RPing. Given the above, this seems just completely laughable.

[Kuri Näkk]

I understand that there are "meta rules" to roleplaying just like there are "meta rules" to sports. … You can follow that rabbit hole down to … generate any volume of deep and frothy bullshit.

No need to go down that rabbit hole: GOO has stated in the manifesto that certain play style is out. Ergo, you cannot justify the play style by certain specific rules in the book or complain that the specific rules are unsuitable for the play style. This was my point – I was not trying to discuss meta rules in general or the quality of the rules in GOO’s books.

The key here is that the rules you purchase, that are written and tested and published, are intended to be a structure that the participants in the game trust. And as such they need to be a quality that they serve the intended purpose. Failures in those rules need to be owned by the creators of the game

It is one thing to say that the manifesto is terrible in itself. It is quite another matter to say that the rules in the book are nearly broken and therefore the manifesto looks like a bad joke. This was not the original statement. It goes without saying that rules failures are problems with the product. Rules that break without trying are useless also for storytellers.

the interpersonal fallout of abusing those failures is owned by the person who did it. You don't have to call this shit out anymore than your car manual needs to talk about driving for days on a flat. "When tire is broke, fix" is implied like "Rule doesn't serve intended purpose, find alternative".

I am not sure that it is so clear. In my experience, not all people realize that many problems in games are the result of different play styles. It is not good to shame a play style but it is not bad idea to draw attention to the fact that no amount of rules will allow you to play happy ponies with a munchkin. Also, when people with boardgame background start with RPGs they really need to be told that rules are just guidelines. Otherwise they may try to drive with flat tires for many sessions.

[TheFlatline]

I understand that there are "meta rules" to roleplaying just like there are "meta rules" to sports. … You can follow that rabbit hole down to … generate any volume of deep and frothy bullshit.

No need to go down that rabbit hole: GOO has stated in the manifesto that certain play style is out. Ergo, you cannot justify the play style by certain specific rules in the book or complain that the specific rules are unsuitable for the play style. This was my point – I was not trying to discuss meta rules in general or the quality of the rules in GOO’s books.

And yet the manifesto says to throw shit out that you want basically. So it's self defeating, and then has the arrogance to say "that's your problem".

And I've played BESM and Sailor Moon (shudder). They're shit systems that the manifesto tries to pass off on you as your problem.

Let's look at tri-stat. It's been *years*, so I may be getting my numbers wrong, but you have 3 basic stats, 2-12, and you roll 2D6 and you are trying to succeed by rolling your stat or under.

So you start out with 12 points. Not too bad, right? But if you spread them out evenly, you have stats of 4 across the board. Which gives you precisely a 16% chance of success on any given roll. And due to how your attack powers either do fuck-all or require mana, you probably have one really good attack per day and the rest of the time you run away screaming like a little girl, and hope that your MC doesn't ask for a screaming or running check, otherwise you're fucked. And 12 attribute points is supposed to be something like an average person.

Well fuck if I have exactly one chance to actually contribute to anything per day, I might as well at *least* give that relevant stat a base chance of succeeding. So I bump that up to a 7. That gives me a 58% chance of success now, but now dividing up the other 2 stats "evenly" one gets a 2 and the other a 3, for 2% and 8% chances of failure on 2d6 straight rolls. So fuck it. Up your 7 to an 8, and get a bump of 14% liklihood of success at the cost of 6% chance of success (8% is right around having to roll 19.5 on a D20 to hit). Congrats, you're now a munchkin min/maxer for wanting to actually *do* something reliably (your main schtick, once per day, which is effective 72% of the time). Any issues you run into the game now are your fault. So your options are fail constantly and get pissed off (which is your fault or MC's fault), or try to make your character meaningful and contribute and become a munchkin, at which point the game is again broken because of you.

If memory serves, you got like 15 attribute points and a few gimmicks, but you could buy more gimmicks with the attribute points, which is fucking pointless *unless* you min/max.

The system was an affront to the hobby, and the manifesto was pretentious bullshit that said "no really, it's not me, it's you honey".

[shadzar]

These rules are written on paper, not etched in stone tablets.
Rules are suggested guidelines, not required edicts.

If the rules don't say you can't do something, you can.

There are no official answers, only official opinions.

When dice conflict with the story, the story always wins.

Min/Maxing and Munchkinism aren't problems with the game; they're problems with the player.

The Game Master has full discretionary power over the game.

The Game Master always works with, not against, the players.

A game that is not fun is no longer a game - it's a chore.

This book contains the answers to all things.

When the above does not apply, make it up.

It's incredibly shitty. I mean, how many consumer products include a manifesto stating that problems with using the consumer product are problems with the user and you're welcome to make your own damn product now that we have your money? Obviously: this didn't save the company.

-Username17

oh so fun it must be to be insane?

i broke apart the lines and will take a stab at reading each one to see what this "thing" says...

These rules are written on paper, not etched in stone tablets.
Rules are suggested guidelines, not required edicts.

"The rules are only guidelines." seems this has been in EVERY edition of D&D until 4th.

If the rules don't say you can't do something, you can.

sometimes it is easier to lsit the few things the "rules" do not allow, rather than EVERYTHING they MIGHT allow. no need for a player to ask "can i jsut walk up to the king and stab him in the face", since the "rules" dont say "face stabbing kings isnt allowed".

nothing new here...

There are no official answers, only official opinions.

WYSIWYG. everything intended to be given is given and the manufacturer isnt going to babysit you while you play to answer all the questions you may have. they arent playing in your game, so being YOUR game, you are in charge and RESPONSIBLE for it.

When dice conflict with the story, the story always wins.

if nobody is rady for Bob to whatever to die, and the dice said he should be dead.. then fuck the dice, Bob the whatever lives!

still nothing new here.

obviously and not said would be "when the dice dont conflict with the story, the dice win."

it is YOUR game, play it how you want to.

Min/Maxing and Munchkinism aren't problems with the game; they're problems with the player.

nothing new here. problem players are problem players. you find the game wasnt meant to do something and continue to do it or allow someone to do it, that is your problem. this is a game i guess, not a lawnmower so it doesnt need labels for stupid people like "do not place hand inside mowing deck while mower is running." unlikely to be severed limbs from a game book.

The Game Master has full discretionary power over the game.

the one running the game is the one running the game. this one is a no brainer. it also makes clear, dont call the company and bitch about your GM, cause it isnt their problem, they made a game, not YOUR GM.

The Game Master always works with, not against, the players.

pre-emptively stopping the GM v players attitude many ignorant gamers have. obviously if the GM isnt doing this, they shouldnt be a GM, and it is YOUR place to not allow them to GM. like Mearls said, rules cant make bad players or GMs turn into good one. killer DMs are killer DM because they suck at the game... so dont play with shitty players... which leads to...

A game that is not fun is no longer a game - it's a chore.

if the players arent having fun, they should quit. nothing forcing them to go through the paces in a game they dont like. if the GM isnt having fun he should quit. no point in running a game he has lost enjoyment in.

i see nothing so far that even needed to be written in this as it is all or should be common fucking sense.

This book contains the answers to all things.

WYSIWYG. you bought the book, not the designers. so sue the book not telecommunications methods to figure it out. if you cant use the book, then maybe the game or type of game it is is not for you due to your level of understanding it.

When the above does not apply, make it up.

"The secret we must not let the DMs know is that they dont need to buy books from us or anyone else in order to play" ~ Gary Gygax

"When asked at cons how something worked i would ask people how they would do it, and they find that their answer is not only as good as mine, but many times it was better!" ~ "Zeb" Cook

You are playing the game, not the Mike Mearls, Monte Cook, Dave Noonan, Gary Gygax, Dave Arneson, Richard Garfield's of the world, so play your game your way.

well if that was the whole thing as it was written, i find it a waste of ink and paper. these are things that should not have to be said to real gamers, as they already know them.

i am struggling to find any problem with anything said in what was quoted.

[Ikeren]

i am struggling to avoid finding any problem with anything said in what was quoted.

Fixed it for you.

[darkmaster]

i am struggling to avoid finding any problem with anything said in what was quoted.

Fixed it for you.

To expand upon this, that Gigax quote you gave there was probably not meant to be taken seriously. Because everyone KNOWS they don't need to pay for a role playing game to play one. There are entire, very successful, sites devoted to nothing but that, anyone who's gotten together with a bunch of friends and swung sticks at each other or played cops and robbers knows that. People don't pay for role playing games, what they pay for is a system of fairly and consistently adjudicating conflicts. When a developer basically says that the results of that system aren't their problem that is insulting in a very basic way because that is all you payed them for and if that system isn't good enough to warrant the price you have been ripped off because no matter how cheep the system might have been it will always have cost more than free.

[RadiantPhoenix]

I think there is some price at which, "cool ideas," is worth it.

It's probably not a lot more than the time investment, though.

[shadzar]

People don't pay for role playing games, what they pay for is a system of fairly and consistently adjudicating conflicts. When a developer basically says that the results of that system aren't their problem that is insulting in a very basic way

then a problem with that last part if the buyer expectations. did the manufacturer agree that was what they were selling you? Caveat Emptor.

the first part is what computer games are for. anyone buying a TTRPG in book form and expecting the first part has failed as a consumer. designers make games they like for the most part, save for the morons making games for that company that destroyed their own game by playing to the lowest common denominator. you cant make a game that everyone will like, only YOU can make a game that you will like. so that is the point i think Gygax was making... you dont need to buy ANY RPG books as in you cannot buy your own imagination. either you have one or you dont.

i have never heard it phrased by anyone in a REAL conversation that they bought an RPG because "it fairly and consistently adjudicates conflicts". what you here is it is fun, it is compelling, it is addictive, it has the right genre, etc.

and the result you have with ANY game or system are your own fault, not the systems. you will NEVER know with the books alone what the designers really were thinking, even with all this twatter and other crap online if you scour and find some portions to explain it. any level of complexity beyond about 4 pieces of data will make a game system play billions of different ways.

and seeing that not everyone will always agree with ANY designer the moment the game is played by anyone, there will always be house-rules, and not knowing what the designers created, means that those house rules will instantly break any game in an unexpected way. but being YOUR game at YOUR table, it is YOU that has to fix it, as YOU caused it to break.

this doesnt mean some games dont suck a barrel of cocks, but for the largest part most are playable, you jsut have to know what you are doing since you cant learn from the designers home game by playing in it, and if anything like Gygax, the designer probably doesnt play by what is sold on the market but a bunch of houserules that suits him better rather than whatever for the lowest common denominator.

[darkmaster]

Okay I'm going to assume you're just trolling because no one is that fucking stupid.

The ONLY thing separating a TTRPG from improve night down at the Y is the rules system you're using. If someone says "they had fun" or "it's addictive" in response to being asking how they feel about a game that response is a direct reaction to how effectively the rules work. That is to say, how well they resolve conflicts. They might not realize that but that's what it is because games that don't have good rules for resolving conflicts tend to be less fun.

But seriously the entire point of TTRPGs is to have rules to resolve conflicts so the game doesn't dissolve into "Bang! I shot you" "no you didn't!" "yeah I did!" You know kind of like every argument on here.

[shadzar]

But seriously the entire point of TTRPGs is to have rules to resolve conflicts so the game doesn't dissolve into "Bang! I shot you" "no you didn't!" "yeah I did!" You know kind of like every argument on here.

if that were true, then nobody ever would say "I'm playing D&D", when they mean Pathfinder, WoD, Shadowrun or whatever else.

ANYTHING can still devolve if the rules arent agreed on, and BERY few people agree with 100% of what the designers of an RPG put in the books they offer to sell.

otherwise AD&D and Boot Hill is the same game with novel changes, there could be no "edition war" over 1st and 2nd, or any of those and 3.x or 4.x...

yeah the rules are important, but it isnt the rules you are buying or the resolution system, just the presentation. at the end of the day when your dice are laying in their storage place or hidden by your cat, they ARE the mechanics and jsut comparing a die to a chart or another die is the ONLY conflict resolution in ANY TTRPG book.

you need a book to compare the result of a die roll to a chart or another die roll?

[zugschef]

that didn't make any sense whatsoever...

[bosssmiley]

Warhammer Chaos is just Runequest Chaos.

I'm pretty sure it's mostly Nemesis 'Khaos.' Seriously, reading about Torquemada and his Terminators and their anti-alien crusade really makes you wonder how GW didn't get sued out of existence as soon as 40K dropped.

At the time 40K:RT was fermenting GW had a couple of the more lucrative 2000AD game licences (Judge Dredd, Rogue Trooper) and it was practically a law of nature that the lads into GW were into 2000AD as well. Perfect marketing synergy that was making £££s for both GW and IPC.

It helped that the companies were operating in a cultural environment (80s Britain) that wasn't so rabidly cut-throat about IP exclusivity as present-day America. Both sides had enough smart, self-aware people involved that "Yeah, but you ripped it off from Metal Hurlant/Mad Max/Michael Moorcock." could defuse priority arguments before a lawyer fight derailed the lucrative gravy train of gamer/comic fan money.

[darkmaster]

you need a book to compare the result of a die roll to a chart or another die roll?

Yes, because without a point of reference there a) are no charts to compare against and b) you dice rolls mean nothing. Seriously, you're talking about how the rules are about resolving conflict while arguing against the rules being about resolving conflicts, please stop now.