What makes for a good game?

[RadiantPhoenix]

Other people followed up by shooping that image until the thread got locked.

[OgreBattle]

Someone once shooped a picture of Frank's face onto a dominatrix.

http://tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?t=52894&start=40#242594

You don't even need photoshop to find a Dr. Frank in dom gear:

an actual doctor too

Both are also sass mouthed and have attracted a community considered deviant by the rest in their quest for The Perfect Thing:

"behold the perfection that is die-pool conflict resolution!"

And you have the occasional innocent wander into the Den, with hilarious results:

"This isn't TheRPGsite!"

[Aryxbez]

I don't freak out at all. It's just annoying and tiresome to wade through cookie cutter 3rd grade insults from people I know wouldn't have the balls to say the same thing to someone in real-life.

It doesn't say much for the intelligence of the insulter if that's the best they can come up with.

It's understandable that it can be taken that way, since they don't format their posts in saying "I find your idea stupid", and just simply state "you're stupid, and stupid for thinking that" or whatever. Far as I understand, unless it seems necessary due to scope, they're not "personally" insulting you, but your ideas, they just don't phrase it that way. As for the real-life thing, usually when someone says that, they imply they would beat up that person in real life over words. In the case that you're belittling others insults to "3rd grade" level, if you agree with that implication, how doesn't that make you any less childish? It also sounds more like "Internet Tough guy" in some sense of the word as well, thinking the poster is all tough and buff in real life, put out of his element by the virtual where he can't use his charisma or might to control the conversation (an element of online discussion I find useful, unless the silvery tongues adapt of course). That aside, I wouldn't doubt likes of Frank or Kaelik from still saying what they do in public.

As for Intelligence, I don't think that's accurate, considering some Denners on here are in career level jobs, and given material shown in past, can be considered quite "intelligent". Thusly, I don't feel that holds up....at all, though I imagine I'm also opening myself up for semantics of various rainbows of Intellect (but eh, I think we know better than bog into that nonsense).

I find that posters here tend to come down harder on games that utilize MTP than they do games with outright broken written rules. I mean, AW takes way more flak for "quantum bears" than Shadowrun does for having a bunch of slow bad rules, like never having a version of the Matrix that actually worked (and this is after 5 editions!).

Not at all, just because a given member here may like a certain game, doesn't mean we're unwilling to be objective. If anything actually, it makes us care that much more about it. A true fan of a game should be open to talking about its flaws, and well aware of them as the bits they like.

Though seriously? The Matrix?? perhaps they don't make as many threads for "Fighter threads", *World, or whatever, but there is "Shadowrun Situation", 5th edition Review, and "Ends of the Matrix", both threads thick in page count that I have very little doubts that talks about the Matrix. Nonetheless, rest assured, it's definitely an example of system(s) that are reviled greatly here, in fact it's a given that any edition of Matrix is unworkable.

It really does seem that a lot of posters here would prefer to put the power in the hands of a bad rule rather than a good GM. That's my observation anyway.

I seriously doubt that, if the GM is actually good, then they'd take the super DM every time. As then said DM would be able to dance around all the problems, and keeping things persistent and engaging at the same time (and/or whatever else be the expectations of the group, and then some).

[DSMatticus]

I don't freak out at all. It's just annoying and tiresome to wade through cookie cutter 3rd grade insults from people I know wouldn't have the balls to say the same thing to someone in real-life. Internet tough guys are just lame.

Oh, wow. I would have missed that if Aryxbez hadn't responded. Which... probably would have been for the best. You seem to have a habit of launching incredibly awkward "u suk irl" rants, and I'm pretty sure absolutely no good can come of acknowledging them. But now that I've seen it, I can't let it go without asking: how the fuck did you manage to follow up "you wouldn't say that to my face, pussy" with "internet tough guys are lame" and not realize you were about to find out what your own foot tastes like? That is genuinely fucking impressive.

You're actually pretty much the closest thing we've got to an internet tough guy around here, even though you're not quite there yet. You took the not-so-honorable title about the time you went off on that rant about Kaelik being a basement-dwelling loser or whatever because he was being mean to you on the internet, and even though literally no one is trying to take the belt from you, you've upped your game anyway and are now all but issuing actual internet tough guy challenges. I'm almost expecting you to drop a bogus address sometime in the next couple hundred posts and demand people show up and "say that to my face!"

I feel sorry for the high horse you're on; you keep shitting all over the poor thing.

[Cyberzombie]

On gaming den insults and such (put in spoilers to reduce clutter)

It's understandable that it can be taken that way, since they don't format their posts in saying "I find your idea stupid", and just simply state "you're stupid, and stupid for thinking that" or whatever. Far as I understand, unless it seems necessary due to scope, they're not "personally" insulting you, but your ideas, they just don't phrase it that way.

Well, I'm pretty sure they know english well enough to phrase their statements better.

As for the real-life thing, usually when someone says that, they imply they would beat up that person in real life over words. In the case that you're belittling others insults to "3rd grade" level, if you agree with that implication, how doesn't that make you any less childish?

First, I'm not going to beat anyone up on this forum over crap they said on the internet, and they know that, so they can feel confident throwing out lots of insults. Do the same thing to a dude in real life, and you don't know if he's the kind of guy that's going to hand you a beating. Hence why I call people internet tough guys.

As for the "3rd grade" thing, I realize some people go for entertainment value in their posts and do insults for that reason, so I'm pointing out that they're not being funny or entertaining either, because the insults are cookie-cutter and not creative. And for the record, I'm not some forum nazi who can't stand people being entertaining. Once in a while people do come up with a funny insult that's actually worth posting. But endlessly repeating idiot/moron/retard from the "roll 1d6 for insult" table is old.

It also sounds more like "Internet Tough guy" in some sense of the word as well, thinking the poster is all tough and buff in real life, put out of his element by the virtual where he can't use his charisma or might to control the conversation (an element of online discussion I find useful, unless the silvery tongues adapt of course). That aside, I wouldn't doubt likes of Frank or Kaelik from still saying what they do in public.

Internet Tough Guy someone using the anonymity of the internet to throw insults and say stuff they wouldn't normally say in real life. It's a form of bullying where instead of picking on people smaller than them, they try to insult people by being anonymous. Or maybe they can't find people smaller than them in real life? I don't know. Now it might be true that some of the people can and do bully others smaller than them in real life, I don't know. I certainly hope they keep their bullying to the internet, but I obviously can't be certain either way. Though I highly doubt they're willing to try that on someone where there's a risk of them getting their asses kicked. People tend to learn pretty quickly that trolling some raging dude over the internet is one thing, but pissing off someone bigger than you in real life can have some very real consequences.

As for Intelligence, I don't think that's accurate, considering some Denners on here are in career level jobs, and given material shown in past, can be considered quite "intelligent".

Yeah, plenty of people show some actual insight here. I just wish a few posters weren't so concerned with keeping their insult to content ratio high, so we could get back to the discussion, involving actual evidence rather than calling someone an idiot for the 9005th time.

I seriously doubt that, if the GM is actually good, then they'd take the super DM every time. As then said DM would be able to dance around all the problems, and keeping things persistent and engaging at the same time (and/or whatever else be the expectations of the group, and then some).

Honestly I'm not sure. Most of the people here seem more concerned with consistency in the game, even if the consistency creates stupidity. My impression is that many posters here would rather have a game that's predictably illogical and poorly balanced than something that's unpredictably reasonable, as you'd get with a good GM. So long as you get a poor GM who follows the rules, they're fine. But get a good GM who is going to bend things, and now there's a problem.

And that's consistent with the rules-heavy methodology. I personally tend to disagree with some of that methodology, but I can at least understand it. Part of what a lot of people want is a heavy tactical game where it's imperative that PCs can make informed decisions so that it's possible to determine right/wrong options. I can understand the appeal to that, but at the same time I think there are more important things to worry about.

And on the topic of Shadowrun versus AW: Mostly I point that out simply because one could rather easily call SR a big pile of garbage rules wise, the same way you do for AW. I mean it is highly inefficient, has sections that flat out don't work, and it's on it's 5th edition. But it's generally regarded as a good game here. Now, that's not saying I don't like Shadowrun, because I do, though mostly for the setting. I think there's definitely a strong bias here in favor of rules-heavy games. Even ones that flat out don't work in many places are considered superior automatically to something rules-lite, and that's all I was pointing out.

Since as I said above, many people would rather have a fixed rule, even if it's broken, rather than something that relies on DM discretion, which could work sometimes in the hands of the correct DM.

[Leress]

Honestly I'm not sure. Most of the people here seem more concerned with consistency in the game, even if the consistency creates stupidity. My impression is that many posters here would rather have a game that's predictably illogical and poorly balanced than something that's unpredictably reasonable, as you'd get with a good GM. So long as you get a poor GM who follows the rules, they're fine. But get a good GM who is going to bend things, and now there's a problem.

And you would be wrong...completely.

[Kaelik]

Do the same thing to a dude in real life, and you don't know if he's the kind of guy that's going to hand you a beating. Hence why I call people internet tough guys.

...

Though I highly doubt they're willing to try that on someone where there's a risk of them getting their asses kicked. People tend to learn pretty quickly that trolling some raging dude over the internet is one thing, but pissing off someone bigger than you in real life can have some very real consequences.

Do you not get how insane this makes you sound? Have you graduated from high school? Do you live in the Sudan?

The idea that saying mean things to people results in fights is so fucking absurd for an adult to say that I have no idea what you are going on about. Do you honestly at any point in any conversation with friends or colleagues hold back because you are afraid they might hit you?

What profession do you work in, boxing?

Internet Tough Guy someone using the anonymity of the internet to throw insults and say stuff they wouldn't normally say in real life. It's a form of bullying where instead of picking on people smaller than them, they try to insult people by being anonymous. Now it might be true that some of the people can and do bully others smaller than them in real life, I don't know.

In what way do you distinguish you calling us "Internet Tough Guy Bullies" from us calling you an idiot?

I mean, you are insulting us. On the internet, where we can't punch you in the face for this insult. So how is this different exactly?

[Pixels]

Honestly I'm not sure. Most of the people here seem more concerned with consistency in the game, even if the consistency creates stupidity. My impression is that many posters here would rather have a game that's predictably illogical and poorly balanced than something that's unpredictably reasonable, as you'd get with a good GM. So long as you get a poor GM who follows the rules, they're fine. But get a good GM who is going to bend things, and now there's a problem.

Quite the opposite! The principle I see folks here state over and over is that to commit a rule to a game, it absolutely must be better than MTP. If your rule is just MTP with frosting on top you're selling me something I already had, but if your rule actually makes things illogical or unfun you have committed a grave game design sin. A poorly built game is worse than a game that has no structure at all.

[Cyberzombie]

Honestly I'm not sure. Most of the people here seem more concerned with consistency in the game, even if the consistency creates stupidity. My impression is that many posters here would rather have a game that's predictably illogical and poorly balanced than something that's unpredictably reasonable, as you'd get with a good GM. So long as you get a poor GM who follows the rules, they're fine. But get a good GM who is going to bend things, and now there's a problem.

Quite the opposite! The principle I see folks here state over and over is that to commit a rule to a game, it absolutely must be better than MTP. If your rule is just MTP with frosting on top you're selling me something I already had, but if your rule actually makes things illogical or unfun you have committed a grave game design sin. A poorly built game is worse than a game that has no structure at all.

I've seen people say that, but when it seems to actually choosing which games are good compared to which games are bad, people here seem to always take the rules-heavy game with bad/nonfunctional rules over the rules-lite which is mostly MTP.

[tussock]

This forum argues about rules. If you've got a free pdf game with three rules, the argument is done in half a page, and you don't really need to revisit it ever. If you've got a game with a hundred supplements with over a hundred new rules each, and uncounted potential interactions, you can talk about it for the rest of your life and never repeat anything (though you will, many times).

But more importantly, Pathfinder and D&D have a minimum of hundreds of times more players as any rules-light game on the market. The games which come anywhere near the top sellers at any time have huge numbers of rules too. That popularity, whether fair or not, means conversations about rules-heavy games will be more popular, with more people joining in and talking over each other.


Those things compound each other. Three people talk about Fudge for a page and that's it, there's really nothing more to be said, ever. Scores of people drudge through Pathfinder for years and slowly uncover more evidence for systematic design flaws and the hidden options that kinda fix them, barely even touching on most of the expansion books.

[Aryxbez]

Well, I'm pretty sure they know english well enough to phrase their statements better.

Far as I understand it, it's a posting style of the Den to phrase it the way they do. Also implied they don't really Preview their messages before sending, and do so swiftly. So in their fluid typing, I imagine don't really think to phrase it in a specific way for someone.

Do the same thing to a dude in real life, and you don't know if he's the kind of guy that's going to hand you a beating. Hence why I call people internet tough guys.

While I suppose you didn't specify yourself when mentioned prior, bu this time, time came up before that, really does give the implication; "wouldn't say that in real life!" note to be more specified at you. Otherwise, it can come off as odd that you start talking about a theoretical "other person" who would possibly beat up whatever poster here for insults. Though does serve to explain your bit on "Internet Tough Guys".

Yeah, plenty of people show some actual insight here. I just wish a few posters weren't so concerned with keeping their insult to content ratio high

Explanation on that is here, just ignore any insults toward your person. Notion of "passive aggression" in that link is an actual problem of most other Forums, where need to fear what you say, less you get banned by Mods waving their authority around like their own phallus.

But it's generally regarded as a good game here.

Reason for that with Shadowrun 4th edition, is it has a good core resolution system. It's fast, easy, and its method works well enough for social interactions as well (least, better than what we have far as "social systems" go). If you look at the 5th edition SR review, does include all the things that 4th edition did a major clean-up of, and like 3rd ed D&D, that helped out immensely. Now yeah, they have some major underlying issues in their minigames, and some deeper issues too (Street Sam v.Awakened divide), ones we'll condemn as they come up in conversation, and are not ignorant of either. As I said prior about "fans", we can like a game, but not going to be ignorant about its flaws, quite the opposite in fact. Aside from those bits, what it serves to do on more base level works quite well and consistently.

I've seen people say that, but when it seems to actually choosing which games are good compared to which games are bad, people here seem to always take the rules-heavy game with bad/nonfunctional rules over the rules-lite which is mostly MTP.

Thing is with that, more "rules-heavy" tend to be more consistent with their results, and provide material that keeps a game going into a campaign. Whereas Rules-lite are generally good for a one-shot, or short few sessions. As well that with Rules-lite, over time more and more rules will get added, be it through supplements or group making new rulings for things want in their game. Eventually, that makes it no longer "rules-lite" obviously, and if it's just random rulings of no real consistency, then it's not really a game, and pretty much just MTP (MTP's not bad, but you sure as hell don't need to play a game to do what is free). If a game isn't really providing consistent framework with its rules, and I'm making up the results as I go, then it's not really useful for"cooperative" storytelling.

A rules-lite game with "degrees of success" table that could provide me a detailed explanation with plenty of examples on what each tier of success indicated in its ruleset would go a LONG way for me (I've been told that FATE accomplishes this w/examples?)

Plus, Spycraft is a game that is "rules-heavy", but because it didn't provide an RNG, it becomes useless as a game (in case you needed an example of a rules-heavy game that is condemned).

[Kemper Boyd]

Being super aggressive at everyone isn't very conductive to actually discussing things though, pretty much the other side of the coin when it comes to passive-aggressiveness.

[Stinktopus]

Being super aggressive at everyone isn't very conductive to actually discussing things though, pretty much the other side of the coin when it comes to passive-aggressiveness.

I gave a perfectly reasonable set of guidelines for examining game quality on page 2, and was met with deafening silence. People being shitty to each other can keep a thread going for 16 pages.

[MGuy]

I'm surprised that anyone can think A+World is catching more flack than other games on here. The Pathfinder is Bad thread is 100+ pages. The reason *World is even being brought up so much is because 'someone' keeps bringing it up.

[Stubbazubba]

Being super aggressive at everyone isn't very conductive to actually discussing things though, pretty much the other side of the coin when it comes to passive-aggressiveness.

I gave a perfectly reasonable set of guidelines for examining game quality on page 2, and was met with deafening silence. People being shitty to each other can keep a thread going for 16 pages.

Welcome to the internet?

Actual discussion content is a lot harder to produce than knee-jerk reactions and beating each other with ad hominem and logic. Not only do you have to make an assertion here, you have to poo poo all over someone else's if you want it to go anywhere.

Perhaps surprisingly, academia is kind of like that, too: you don't just publish a paper without identifying who's assertions you are supporting/disproving and what those assertions are. I mean, I suppose you could, but it is that context that engages the rest of the academic world.

Here it's the same way, except we're OK with content-less counterattacks (which academics also do in "reviews") and ad hominem (which academics occasionally do, too).

tl;dr Stop being reasonable, engage with someone in the conversation. Content is optional.

[shadzar]

Looking at the threads on this forum, , what makes for a good game?

Here you will find mostly pampered players who want to play a narrative game without rules. They want no challenge for the most part and the numebrs to all be fake and take a back seat to whatever the player whims are at the moment.

What makes a good game:

1. an enjoyable theme/atmosphere

2. a rich setting that draws you into it

3. a game, something that challenges the player's skills. that is what a game is a combat of skills

4. some sort of story to connect yesterdays play with tomorrow's

5. some rules that brings all those things together.

sadly most modern games miss many of these things or jsut work on #5 without even having any reason to hve rules other than for the sake of having rules.

3rd misses on 1~3
4th misses on 1~4
5th seems to be working with 1~4 in mind, and then failing at #5 because it is trying to apply 1, 2, and 4 to broadly without focus. the theme doesnt match the story, etc...

as for the other off-the-wall RPG I know little about them because they failed at #1. post-apoc, modern, sci-fi, etc are not enjoyable for a TTRPG when a video game is needed to do them right and justice. in most cases there is just too much going on in them to have to account for, but in post-apoc it is like medieval+today a new dark ages, so why bother playing Battlefield Earth being Cyclo or Human, when you can do much more with existing fantasy medieval TTRPG?

Modern games also focus too much on the "win", because everyone must pass get a participation reward be able to feel like winners, instead of the play being the focus, and when you get tired you just do something else. Like playing basketball for 10 hours you get burned out and decide to watch some TV instead, and you will play some more ball another day. TTRPGs and everything else works that way.

What makes a bad game is maybe a more important question.

1. trying to be everything to all people
2. trying to copy fads/trends/pop anything because it worked for someone else, so try to use the gimmick yourself
3. no focus on the purpose of design
4. design for the sake of corporate income
5. trying to keep a trademark or copyright alive for the sake of keeping anyone else form using it

[silva]

sadly most modern games miss many of these things or jsut work on #5 without even having any reason to have rules other than for the sake of having rules.

Interesting point, and I agree. There is a trend where games try to cover all possibilities in the world and end up losing its initial premise/scope, or else deliver a tome with hundreds of pages of rules for the player to learn before being able to play the most basic game session. Its like having to read the whole bible when all you want is just sing Ave Maria.

Two recent games which premises I love but cant see myself playing because they fall in this problem are Runequest 6 and Tenra Bansho Zero.

[Aryxbez]

Being super aggressive at everyone isn't very conductive to actually discussing things though, pretty much the other side of the coin when it comes to passive-aggressiveness.

Understandable, I do feel like some posters like Kaelik may jump the gun to placing insults in discussion, but do feel its fine when warranted. Such as when posters are dealing out idiotic behavior, asking for help but then passively-aggressively keep deterring it because it wasn't a certain answer they secretly wanted in their head and so on. Otherwise, getting displeased with people using cursewords as explicitives is odd, since that's what adults do (regardless if you dislike that sort of thing in real life).

I gave a perfectly reasonable set of guidelines for examining game quality on page 2, and was met with deafening silence.

It got some response, and it didn't seem entirely clear, but I'll attempt a response as desired.

Anyway... What makes a good game? Well, brace yourself for a bit of subjectivity...

1. Does it do what it says on the tin? Savage Worlds promises ERMAGERD CINEMATICNESS, which sorta doesn't mean anything to begin with, and the game includes a dice mechanic so swingy that no particular range of results can be anticipated. Meanwhile, GURPS and D&D 3.X offer adventures in a world where you can be Fighting Man or Sauron. That's pretty much what you get.

2. Are the rules clear? AD&D had people rolling on the floor, stabbing each other in arguments over backstabs and illusions. D&D 3.X has a LOT of rules, so you may have to look things up, but the rules are pretty clearly explained and things are easy to find.

3. Did I need to pay money for this? I swear to fucking God that I will kickstart a "Ranchers vs. Native Americans" ultra-rules-light RPG that will spend 200 pages telling people to go outside and play Cowboys & Indians. People like Silva will gush about how it's fucking genius. Most incarnations of D&D, GURPS, HERO, etc. all offer you an actual game that does stuff. If the answer is "roll 2d6 and make shit up," then people shouldn't be giving you money. Anus World should be a blog post, not merchandise.

1.)RPG-fans nowadays will believe in the mantra of what the game is about irrregardless of the ruleset. Simply because they're bought into the concept, "want it" to work and will Mind Caulk it all ways to rationalize it. I do agree with this notion, and I find it odd in RPG-land culture people are fine with buying a game that doesn't do as advertised. It's so dumb this is a "revolutionary" thought, RPG-culture shouldn't be so damn backward.

2.) I mentioned before that a game should showcase its RNG, and what the values of numbers all mean in the game world (Kinda like how 3.5 did w/attribute to monster/animal comparison, or Shadowrun's attempt at skill ratings in world). Having a clear ruleset combined with this, would help people learn the game so they fully enjoy the experience, and put aside worry of the rules, and focus on the Roleplaying.

3.) I realize ties with what I said on #1, I do want a game to help guide me in running it. Opposed to making me create stuff from scratch, it's easier for me to come up with ideas when I have a context of which I can bounce inspiration off of. The gameplay is part of this, as it's what helps build how action sequences would play out when I'm fantasizing them in my head. Setting can also help with this as well, but they're something that should be entwined with each other, none of this separation of setting & gameplay BS we got back then with cutscenes & games (it was fine for the time of technical limits, but not so much nowadays). Especially since Tabletop is a game in your head, and doesn't have a SFX budget, so it 's just poor writing on Designers part.

Otherwise, if specifics ye want discussed, could you mention them?

[Mord]

That's what Standard format MtG feels like to me.

Do you know Netrunner ? Its awesome. Its from the same author of MtG.

Hah; yeah, I guess my list does actually describe a CCG, with the exception of the last point - being able to improvise stuff outside the box; that one's pretty important though. If there was an RPG that did that and still used MtG-like mechanics, I think I'd enjoy it.

Have you heard about Thornwatch? It's by the Penny Arcade guy. The drawey one, not the writey one.

[MisterDee]

whatever it's shadzar

Interesting point, and I agree.

Pretty much sums up why I don't engage on those *World discussion

[Zaranthan]

Pretty much sums up why I don't engage on those *World discussion

You can engage in the ShitWorld threads. While there's not much to say on the game itself, we usually manage to find something interesting to talk about. Just put shillva on ignore and don't fall for the temptation to click his posts.