Do you prefer rules light/narrative RPGs or crunchy/simulationist?

>>50467091
I prefer rule lite narrative. It's what role-playing is about.

With crunchy/simulationist, I might as well play a video game or boardgame

Rules medium gamist.

It has a little for everyone.

>>50467091

I'm an autist so I prefer simulationist games, but I prefer lite to crunchy and have no problem with meta stuff like "Fate Points".

>>50467091
Light. It's all about the story and the ideas that go into it.

>>50467593
Muh nigga

>>50467091
I like my games to have some crunch to them, but I'd probably be more willing to have something very light if it meant avoiding something straight up simulationist.

I kinda feel if a game "too specific" on the rules, it requires more work searching for specific rules on specific situations rather than being able to make a ruling from rules that are simple and apply to many different aspects of the game.

Rules light/narrative. I'm lazy and they're easier to plan for, and I can bullshit things more reliably without any rules lawyers chiming in.

Any.

Seriously, I'm tired of debating what to run. Get the fucking dice and let's roll.

>>50467091
Crunchy in a way that's coherent, thoughtfully written and laid out, skillfully edited, and has a clear focus and direction. The designer should know exactly what sort of game he's trying to make, and tailor his ruleset to encourage that.

The rules should be detailed, but not overbearing. They should use a small number of mechanics and guidelines to cover a wide range of situations without cluttering the book. They should avoid excessive legalese so that readers must think in terms of the author's intentions rather than how they can twist a poorly-written sentence. The designer should also understand which situations will not require dice rolls or table-lookups to adjudicate, and make that abundantly clear to the readers.

So I guess less D&D 3rd or SR 5th, more ACKs or RC.

When I was in high school I liked detailed simulation, but now (in my mid-20s) I really prefer simplified rules and a focus on narrative and role play. At this point, all the crunching makes my mind wander.

>>50467988
>They should avoid excessive legalese so that readers must think in terms of the author's intentions rather than how they can twist a poorly-written sentence.
I agree with everything you said but this.

It just doesn't fucking work. You should assume that, while your players can read, that they are also completely retarded when it comes to interpretation. A "poorly-written sentence" shouldn't exist; it should be patched out. When it comes to hard mechanics, you should leave as absolutely little to interpretation as possible.

Now fluff? You can just eat that plain, in my opinion.

>>50467091
Rules-lite, though I'll play either. I'm not big on crunchy games generally because bigger combats stop feeling like a roleplaying game and make it feel like I'm playing shit Necromunda.

>>50467988
Wouldn't 4e fit?

It's much more concisely written than its immediate brothers.

Crunchy simulation, with a heavy focus on the narrative during actual gameplay. Because fuck you, I can have both chocolate and peanut butter on my cake and eat it, too.

Light. Every game we play there's always one or two characters that come out as being "the best", so rules light systems make the difference between the best and the worst that much smaller.

>>50467956
One of the #1 ways you can tell no one here actually plays RPGs is the amount of time we spend arguing about systems. It's like debating which pasta shape is best. Even ignoring that the "right answer" depends entirely on your personal taste and your needs for the dish, it doesn't matter 1/10 as much as what you're topping it with.
>mfw /ck/ seriously argue about pasta shapes
If you think /tg/ is bad you clearly don't use the other boards.

>>50468178
Fuck you, now I want cake but I can't afford to buy one.

>>50468199
Hey fuck you man hollow star-shaped pasta is the best and cooks evenly with minimal effort, meaning I can eat it faster.

But seriously you're probably not too far off base. Shitposting about systems when you can't game is fun and all, but it's dumb if you're doing it when you COULD be gaming.

>>50468199
You obviously don't love pasta enough.

Then again, neither does /ck/ if they think there's a "best" shape, instead of the shape most fitting for the meal.

Of course if there was a 3.PF pasta, it would be like all uneven with pockets full of flour that we can agree is an acquired taste at best.

>>50468211
I heat ya, I want cigarettes and booze but can't afford either.

>>50467091

This is a false dichotomy. Games heavy on crunch can be focused on narrative, and simulationist games can be pretty light. Of course, games can be neither very good at either and still be bogged down in crunch, or they can be pretty good at things with a simple system.

That said, I tend towards the narrative, but like just a little more crunch than what usually constitutes "rules light" while definitely avoiding the crunchier systems.

>>50467091
I'm definitely more oriented to good narratives over super-dense game mechanics, but too often rules-lite translates to making half of the game up as you go. Ideally the game gives you enough rules to understand what your characters are and aren't capable of, and what your character in particular is and isn't good at, along with grounded principles or how the world around them operates. At that point I don't need any more rules, but I need at least that.

I do enjoy crunchy games, but they require a very specific sort of group to actually be fun in practice. The worst is when the group picks a crunchy game, so you go and learn the rules, and then they start playing and they very clearly did not learn the rules and are just playing it like whatever game they already know (usually D&D), and that works for most games, but when you're adjusting the TN for checks and we're playing Shadow of the Demon Lord I know the GM didn't read the rules, and it makes me question every call they make there after.

>>50468232
For me what bothers me is how "hollow" it feels. People with literally no roleplaying experience latch onto a system they think sounds good and religiously defend it in the face of any criticism, even things most actual players admit are an issue. A game they've never played, probably never will play, and may very well realize they don't enjoy if they got to play it
>>50468262
>I agree with you but still can't resist the urge to make cheap jabs a system I don't like
Fuck off, you're part of the problem

>>50468403
>Fuck off, you're part of the problem

What problem? That people shitpost on 4chan?

>wheredoyouthinkweare.jpeg

>>50467091
Simplified crunchy with a focus on narrative, such as G U R P S

>>50468467
>wheredoyouthinkweare.jpeg
A board that used to be able to discuss things once in awhile before people decided it was SUPPOSED to be terrible

>>50468403
> People with literally no roleplaying experience latch onto a system they think sounds good and religiously defend it in the face of any criticism, even things most actual players admit are an issue.
That's true of literally everything, though. People defend shit they know nothing about because they think they know something about it and want to feel right and/or validated.

>>50468517
>A board that used to be able to discuss things once in awhile...

He says after
>One of the #1 ways you can tell no one here actually plays RPGs is the amount of time we spend arguing about systems.

I mean, you can't really do both, you know? You can't say if you argue about systems you are obviously a game-less sperg BUT how dare you insult a game you dislike, we can't discuss anything on /tg/ anymore!

That's just not kosher.

(In case you are not the same person, carry on I guess)

>>50467988
So Mutants and Masterminds?

Crunchy/narrative.
But it has to be a bad system.

>>50467091
I like playing with a light and narrative feeling game, but I also like having the more realistic outcomes of a crunchy system. So I run some complex rules through an automated spreadsheet. That way, the main focus of how I run the game is the narrative, but I have access to realistic results if I want.

>>50468537
Yes, but the difference is that people THINK they understand, say, economics. They KNOW they've never played an RPG before
>>50468574
>Endless, repetitive shitposting about systems has damaged the board
>Continuing to shitpost about systems continues to damage the board
I fail to see the contradiction. Are you really so desperate to cling to your easy target? Why not go on Youtube and whine about Justin Bieber in the comments sections of Queen videos? You'll get way more acceptance and validation there.

>>50467481
This.

>>50468652
Shitty troll threads that are about nothing but triggering D&D haters/fanboys and fishing for edition war shit damages the board. Actually discussing systems (which is what this thread attempted to do, as far as I can see) doesn't.

You don't care about them? Alright, stay out then, play the games you like, contribute to the topics you like. But saying that this particular discussion is just sperging, and then claiming that discussion is hurting?

I'm not the problem here.

>>50468869
>Shitty troll threads that are about nothing but triggering D&D haters/fanboys and fishing for edition war shit damages the board
I couldn't agree more. Here's a great example:
>Of course if there was a 3.PF pasta, it would be like all uneven with pockets full of flour that we can agree is an acquired taste at best.

>>50468966
I'd like to note that that's not a thread, and the only one who got triggered was you.

But w/e, I'm done pointlessly shitting this place up by replying to you. Cheers!

Light simulationist.
A heavy-ruled system often can prevent things you may logically be able to do in-game or irl.

>>50467481
>I might as well play a video game or boardgame
I will never understand the elitism some RPG players have against video games, board games, and war games.

I like me some crunch.

Games like Burning Wheel, Eclipse Phase, and L5R have good crunch that support the fluff. Like a candy bar with marshmallow and peanuts.

>>50468072
Ditto. I used to like crunchy systems, but as I grow older I dislike handling complex rules more and more. I want to get just to the story not mess with tons of busywork.

>>50468142
Anon doesn't want concisely written, he said he wanted to avoid legalese

>>50468471
Ahahahahahaha
Ha
Hahahahaha

Hahaha

>>50467091
The longer the campaign, the heavier the game. I.E. I'd play Legends of the Wulin for a long campaign, Feng Shui for a short campaign, and a napkin RPG for a one-shot.

There are some exceptions, such as games with minimal crunch that are still good enough to run long campaigns with, and once people know the rules of a system well enough you can run fairly crunch-heavy one-shots.

Why does Captcha think coffee is tea?

>>50467091
Depends what I'm in the mood for

>>50467956
This guy is on point desu

>>50470358
Not the guy you quoted, but what's funny? It's easy to run GURPS in a streamlined and narrative-style. It's how I'm running my current space western "NOT-Bebop" game.

>>50467091

I tend to dislike rules-lite, if only because I find them harder to play/GM well. Less "hard" options makes inventive characters and creative decisions feel too easily taken for granted, I guess? They're really there to encourage RP, but I feel like it makes the depth of game options suffer.

I don't like simulation-level complexity, either, but I lean towards crunch regardless. When you have more complex systems and tons of options, making unique/strong characters or making creative decisions within the game parameters feels more rewarding. Roleplay, I think, needs no crunchy rules, but slots neatly into just about any game regardless of nuance.

I also find it easier to subtract stuff from a more complex game for ease of use than it is to build up a fairly naked game.

>>50467091
I prefer a good compromise that lets me improvise and doesn't sperg on irrelevant details but also doesn't leave me bare butt nacked when the players get all feisty and shit.
Yes I'm a forever GM.

Narrative focus but still more balanced than the extremely narrativist systems. I also don't like huge amounts of meta that usually accompany those. A BIT of non-intrusive gamist and sim mechanics don't hurt and may be source of some additional fun, but when they start to either slow down the story, ruin it's climax by dry resolutions or, even worse, grind against the story logic, it's a nope.

Oh, and I hate reading through crunch chapters of the rulebooks, so additional point for light ones.

And I still prefer sim than gamist, because sim is still about telling the story, though , different kind of story and with different means. While gamism is just about beating arbitrary obstacles through game mechanics which is usually boring for me. OK as a minor addition with low complication level, but if it get's worse it turns into yawnfest and "oh, it is my turn now?"

>>50469119
It's not elitism, many people who say that enjoy those other kinds of games It is more of an aknowledgement of fact that they are separate mediums taht don't mix well.

I like boardgames.

But... I also like skateboarding. And reading books. But reading book WHILE riding a skateboard is stupid.
So is playing extremely complicated boardgame and a story-game at the same time.

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>>50467091
I prefer a bit of crunch when getting new people into roll play. It turns out that alot of people arnt abstract thinkers so giving them something concrete like dice roll mechanics is a wise move.

For myself I like rules light. Blackbird Pie is a great game for this, letting you play any type of character and keeping power levels balanced.

>>50467481
>i cherrypick a definition of RPGing that fits my tastes
you, sir, are an asshat

>>50468322
>simulationist games can be pretty light.
examples?

>>50467481
>simulationism
>like a boardgame
>what is gamism?
learn the basics, pls

>>50467988
>So I guess less D&D 3rd or SR 5th, more ACKs or RC.

So basically, games that no one fucking plays.

>>50467091
I like my games rules-lite, but not necessarily narrativist. I just don't want to have to memorize so many goddamn rules.

Rules medium is okay, too.

>>50472972
Yup.

>tfw RPG hipster
>tfw no scarf or wide-rimmed glasses

>>50467091
>Do you prefer rules light/narrative RPGs or crunchy/simulationist?

You act like those are synonyms. They are not. Whether a game is rules-light or rules-heavy has nothing to do with whether it's narrativist, simulationist or gamist.

Fuck, pure freeform where the only rule is "DM decides" can be simulationist if the DM simply makes his decisions based on what would happen in real life.

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Okay, since there's some confusion in this thread let's go over the basics again.

A game is:
>Simulationist
if it's mainly concerned with "what would really happen (if the game situation was real)"
>Gamist
if it's mainly concerned with what would make it mechanically balanced and interesting ("boardgamey, videogamey")
>Narrativist
if it's mainly concerned with what would make for a cool story

These three are not exclusive, and almost every game that exists is some mixture of the three.

These three labels exist to describe the design goals of the system. They have no connection to whether a game is rules-light or rules-heavy. The terms for describing that are
>rules-light
>rules-heavy

>>50467091
Rules light != narrative

>>50473697
>2016
>still taking GNS theory seriously

>>50473822
You're free to take issue with any part of the theory you want, except for the definitions.

They've become common parlance in our hobby. No need to shit on someone trying to explain what the OP meant by their words.

>>50473697
The person who came up with it disagrees with your definitions.
>http://www.darkshire.net/~jhkim/rpg/theory/threefold/faq_v1.html
Using the terms is barely more functional than just describing the thing you're discussing and the person who came up with it is a twat.

>>50467091
I prefer a little of both. Too much of one or the other makes things annoying.

If I absolutely had to pick an extreme though? Crunchy rules heavy. It's easier to add narrative to a rules-heavy system than to homebrew good mechanics for a narrative system.

Neither direction is inherently better. A system should be as complex as it needs to be. The most important thing in game design is UNITY. All subsystems should run roughly analogously to one another, or as closely as possible while still simulating the things that you need them too.

Rules lite is easy to unify. The fewer the rules In the rules lite direction, there's such a thing as TOO lite. If there's so few guiding rules that the GM might as well not be even using them then you might as well not even be using them(see: Big Motherfucking Crab Truckers).

Everyone Is John is a good example of this in action. It's just as complex as it needs to be, and gives simple rules for adjudicating the actions and situations the players will encounter.

The danger with a simulationist system is that it can become too bloated. This is the real problem with F.A.T.A.L.; there's no unifying mehanic, so you need to look up everything.

Compare FATAL to Pathfinder or GURPS. Even if you don't like these systems, you have to admit that they're well designed and streamlined. If you're not sure how to do something, it's easy to adjudicate because you can infer what should happen based off other rules in the system.

>>50467091
Rules light. I don't play RPGs to simulate, I play to go on adventures.

>>50467091
Descriptive elements of gameplay with some crunchier, para-RPS combat sounds ideal.

>>50467091
Rules lite. Otherwise my groups get bogged down in combat really hard.

>>50467091
It depends on what kind of campaign I wanna run. I go with both very often

Rules light. Or just turn up the rule of cool and handwaving during pathfinder.

I'd previously only played/GM-ed pathfinder, and I think that while GM-ing pathfinder, my pc's really appreciated it when we just skipped a bunch of the hyper-detailed rules and played a rules light version of it. That campaign came to a close once we found out about dungeon world, which seemed to be the RPG we were looking for.

I'm currently a PC in a pathfinder game that is pretty crunchy, and its so easy to stop giving a shit when you miss, or have to take something out of your backpack, and are waiting another 15-20 min while the rogue is calculating damage or that inexperienced player is firing a cross bow bolt at something.

I think pathfinder CAN be a great system if you have a great GM and experienced players. But lets be honest, there are always new players coming and going in life. And under these circumstances PF (and probably other crunchy d20 games) cater to a sluggish, video game-like experience, except even less than that, because you get taken out of the fiction every 20 seconds to look up a rule or calculate some value.

Hand-waving narrative games do have a place in tabletop gaming.

>>50473884
first of all, i don't see the difference to that other anon here. secondly, we don't give a fuck. the anon you are responding to has been given a fairly accurate portrayal of how the terms are used these days.

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>>50467091
whatever dnd is.

I'm rules heavy, but like to play narrative. Rules are for GM to handle situations and to avoid arguments. I like to have rules which make difference between .22 LR and .44 Mag and grandma and army sergeant using those weapons. When there is difference between persons and their skills on rule level it is easier to guide and play their actions to avoid impossible things. So when there are rules for shooting and every aspect around it people (in my groups) tend to play more narrative than epic hero style. In rules light/vague people tent to try their luck in desperate situations. Also as a GM it's easier to keep track how people play their characters.

So gaming style and rules aren't tied together. I've seen rules light groups throw more dice than in our rules heavy group. Also in rules light group I have seen more hassling and less immersion than in rules heavy group. Basically more rules has ment to my groups more work to find loopholes in them and thus less time is spent discussing what can be done and what can't.

We have played mostly GURPS, which is thought to be rules heavy, but because you can create your character, not just trow dice randomly, people tend to spend more time look rules which apply their character. Mostly we played Cthulhu and Cyberpunk settings. In Cthulhu with Gurps rules characters felt different not just generic Ancient One feast, like with BRP's rules.

I had hear so much good about myBrother in Law's GMing skills and wanted to be in his game for ages. Finally when he and my sister accepted the challenge and we played a Cthulhu game together it was a disaster. Their style was very slow in real time action. Music, candle light check, but narrative was slow, monotonous and rules were followed strictly. Even though there was no much dice throwing, failure was failure and basically that ended a gaming session. Every thing was resolved thoroughly.

>>50467091
I prefer simulationism from the standpoint of someone who likes the game to actually be a game and not just a step away from freeform, but I usually end up playing rules light because I can't for the life of me actually remember the rules.

I've met a terrible fate.

>>50478695
gamist with simulationist elements

>>50478395
Playing with retards does, in fact, have a negative influence on the amount of fun you have. Being unable to remember what your own character does between every combat is pretty horrible.

Simulationist with some crunch, but a more narrative demeanor in play. Narrative games, for some reason, actually draw me out of the narrative.

>>50467091
Rules light/narrative I suppose, mostly because I feel like I'm more likely to find GM's and players who don't hopelessly mangle their own mechanics. I'd prefer a simple system run well than an absolutely amazing yet complicated system that becomes a terrible slog because the GM didn't read the book.

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I like rules-heavy stuff but nobody I play with can handle them or actually read anything ever.

>>50467091
If a human is running it, I prefer narrative.

I say this as someone who fucking loves crunch and will devote hours to it.

Crunch just isn't worth it in tabletop, it takes too long.

Now, if you get a computer to administer it, I can take a nigh infinite amount of crunch and demand more of it.

>>50467091
Gotta be crunchy.

When it's rules light, I find more often than not that GMs let their bad habits get in the way, either because they're letting the players get away with too much, or they're introducing too much because they feel adversarial towards the player.

So long as crunch binds everyone, it limits the ability of bad GMs to get out of whack.

(This is coming from someone who likes to GM and whose biggest pet peeve is fucking awful GMs)

>>50467091
Rules light/Narrativist, easily.

A crunchy simulationist game will still be shit with a shit group, but any game will be pretty good with a good group, so why pick the one that takes more prep and more dicerolling?

If I was in it for the mechanical challenge, I would play computergames like a normal person, role-playing games only strength is the actual role-playing.

Only retards and children play role-playing games to win or to "beat the system".

If you like to discuss balance and builds in role-playing games you've basically already missed the point. Go play Dota instead, and compete with people who are trying to win as hard as you are, instead of getting your retardedness all over other peoples escapist fun.

>>50488356
>implying because people like crunchy simulation they are "retards or children" trying to "beat the system" and the whole game has to be about challenge and "lol muh builds and optimization" instead of the story and characters
You're the retard child, here.

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>>50488356

>>50469119
Personally I have nothing against video games, board games or war games. I just don't want that kind of gameplay in my roleplaying games.

That's why I hated 4e. It felt way too much like a video game.

>>50488356
Agree 100%.

I had never heard d&d players complain about "class balance" until 3.5. I feel like I'm reading the WoW forums sometimes. D&D isn't supposed to be balanced like a video game.

>>50488459
>>50488483

Truth hurts right?
The only thing role-playing games do better than other types of games is the role-playing and shared escapism/story telling part, and those depend more on he players than the system.

The idea of choosing a pen and paper rpg to mainly do dungeoncrawls or complex swordfights is laughable when other types of games provide a better challenge and more decision making that matters.

Don't get me wrong, I love videogames and boardgames, I just like picking the right tool for the job.

Playing role-playing games to compete, to kill a pile of monsters or to collect loot and level up is straight up laughable when there are games like Baldur's Gate, Divinity, DA, various MMOS and MOBAs, and tons of great boardgames like Arcadia Quest, Descent or Heroquest.

If you want to spread your butter with a fork, that's up to you, whatever rocks your boat, but please stop being surprised that others find it retarded.

>>50488588

Role-playing games stopped being a part of the Fantasy fandom and gradually shifted more and more towards gamers, because it's a lot easier to sell books when you need the complex rules and classes or pre-written adventures than it is when you basically introduce people to the idea of improv acting/storytelling with rules to make conflict flow smoothly.

The rules used to be there to prevent the story from grinding to a halt because people would argue about the outcome, but now there's a whole generation of people who think that the rules are the game.

The better the group, the less crunch you need, because you're not relying on the book to curb peoples excesses, that's all the argument you need really.

>>50488610
>>50488656
So do you have an actual complaint about rules-heavy games, or are you just going to keep bitching about gamism and pretending it's the same thing?

>>50488610
Simulation and the narrative are not at odds. For many, part of the joy of role playing is taking part in the believable facsimile of a real functioning world, which (for those people) can absolutely benefit from having believable, concrete, consistent and sometimes in-depth rules which support that style of play and immersion in the world, and therefore story and characters. I get that your preference lies in a singular aspect of the medium, but that's not the case for everyone. Your posts reek of "badwrongfun" and "one TRUE way" bullshit.
You can have your opinions, it just doesn't stop you from also being a close-minded knuckle dragger in this case.

You are making drastic preference-based value statements about factors which are neither actually diametrically opposed (e.g. narrative vs simulation) nor mutually exclusive, despite the vitriolic phrasing of your opinions attempting to pass off the opposite notion. Additionally, your characterization of people who like a differing style of play than yours includes such gems as "trying to win the game," "go back to DotA because vidya does 'your style' better," "right tool for the right job," which are all nonsensical depictions intended to demonize opposing opinions and undercut the preferences of others which actually have little or nothing to do with the garbage you're spouting. That makes >(you) either a moron or a dickhead, possibly both. Either way, jog on.

>lol if you wanna spread your butter with a fork
You are definitely a moron.

What's 13th age? I've recently started diving into it and I really like it.

>>50467091
I like both and all points in between just the same.

Yes, that is an option, not everything has to be polarized.

Friendly reminder that GNS Theory is bunk.

>>50489263
It's decent for talking about individual mechanics or general trends (like half the new games coming out using PbtA being a sign of increasing narrativism), but using it to describe whole games is misleading at best.

>>50489372
The terms "gamist" "narrativist" and "simulationist" have utility, but that's as far as GNS's validity extends.

>>50488830

You're being disingenuous, anon.
>>50488656 had a perfectly good complaint. Rules are used to sell books now, to the point you can't play a specific thing in shadowrun until the splatbook for it comes out.

It's sad. It's shit. It creates a culture where Shadowrun belongs to CGL, whereas a better culture would push for the idea that these games and settings belong to your table, even if that's bad for business.

>>50489468
>Shadowrun is shit and its producers are fags, news at 11
One of the two rule-heavy games I enjoy exists only as a single book, with a PDF of errata. The other one is worse about splats, but doesn't do anything half as bad as SR's "buy 4 splats or eat shit" model.

>>50489468
>to the point you can't play a specific thing in shadowrun until the splatbook for it comes out.
bullshit
t. SR 1E/2E gamer, a time when many splatbooks did not exist

Whatever GURPS is

I am enjoying the process of beating up monsters and investigating crooked nobles so far, regardless of labels

>>50467091
I wish people wouldn't want lump 'rules lite' and 'narrative' into the same category.

Call of Cthulhu for example is very much a simulation and that has a incredibly simple character creation and test resolution.

FATE core on the other hand is narrative is it gets and it's full of hundreds of aspect options.

>>50467091
I like a bit of crunch in my combat if only to give most characters more variety than "I attack with my sword/bow/wand because my Brawn/Agility/Magic stat is higher". Players should have situationally advantageous options and combinations of abilities that make them feel like they're all contributing to combat in one way or another, but not all ultimately doing the same thing. Mind you "a bit" should really just be a few action combos and sidegrades, linear progression should either be limited or come in a small but significant set of stages that are reasonably easy to climb with time, significant effort or help from powerful companions, and all the more so with two or all three on your side. If you want, you can trade combat for racing/politics/whatever as long as that thing is the main mechanical focus of your game (a game about managing a business and handling trade as an independent mount salesman would not benefit from being mostly comprised of rules about how to beat your opponent in children's card games).

In most elements of the game outside of this focus or a few closely related systems, however, the fewer hard rules the better. Guidelines are nice and a few generic all terrain abilities (see: a simple skill subsystem) can be useful but they shouldn't detract from the ease of learning the basics of the game, should be easy to use intuitively and if they interfere with the main game at all should be a complement to that system used by clever players and GMs, not an absolute necessity for players to master on top of their existing rules.

neither

>>50467091
What if I like tight/gamist?

>>50489617
It depends on how detailed your DM is getting.

At its crunchiest, GURPS is extremely simulationist. But GURPS is so modular and filled with options that the GM can make it as light or as heavy as he wants.

>>50489593
Bullshit? Tell me how you play an animal handler in 5e with no listed prices? Before the book came out? There's character concepts that were possible in 4e that become impossible in 5e.

You're the bullshitter.

>>50489550
What are the two games?

>>50490277
Legends of the Wulin (although, there are other reasons for it being kept to one "book") and Ars Magica. There are some other medium-leaning-heavy games that I enjoy, but most of them have heavy crunch as optional rules.

>>50488610
I agree with your sentiment. It's retarded to be using tabletop RPGs for plain dungeon runs and loot gatherings in this day and age when we have infinitely superior options in the way of video games.

>>50490373
>thinking video games are in any way comparable to Tabletop games, even just for dungeon crawling
Opinion discarded.

>>50488939
The problem with your argument is that there's no game system complex enough that it does the job better than simply having a DM and group of players who are on the ball about logic and keeping things reasonable. The best, most complete system is still at the mercy of the players, so if you are good to go with good players, and fucked with bad players, why pick a system that makes you go through so many motions just to arrive at the result you all wanted to begin with?

The most complex and detailed combat system will still not account for every conceivable situation, but a player with a cool idea and a DM who's willing to make a ruling can accomplish anything you feel like.

Just as an example, if realistic, believable combat is very important to you, writing a deep, gritty combat system is still not only half the job, the rest is up to the player, how they present their characters actions, and the DM how he presents the consequences and challenges. You can write a system that will make some HEMA enthusiast or whatever jizz himself with joy, and it will still sound atrocious if you hand it to some troglodyte without any other reference points than playing a lot of MMOS.

But I promise you that a DM who are deeply interested and knowledgeable about the subject can make even something ultra simple like D6 fantasy sound amazing in play, so again, why shackle yourself to a collossus of a system when something simple and nimble will make things flow smoother and let you fill in the details yourself?

At the end of the day, the rules don't magically make the events taking place during a session feel believable and real, the people at the table do, and the more rules you throw at them, the more you draw them out of their shared vision and into the gamey side of things.

And I absolutely stand by my opinion that if you are playing pen and paper rpgs "to win" you are absolutely a moron.

>>50490676
>If I pretend like other peoples actual arguments don't matter, I don't have to present any of my own!

Genius.

Honest question; favourite system?

>>50490676
For the standard combatative dungeon crawling? Absolutely. And the fighting is much more engaging and fast.
If you're going with some real complicated grimlock shit, maybe tabletop is better. Otherwise? Vidya all the way.

>>50490688
>if you are good to go with good players, and fucked with bad players, why pick a system that makes you go through so many motions just to arrive at the result you all wanted to begin with?
Because my group tried a light, generic, narrative-focused system and felt it was mediocre at best compared to heavier, more specific systems, even though we're a bunch of narrative-loving fags.

Also
>collossus
There's a middle ground between Pathfinder and Fate, my man.

>>50490703
There's no need to "present an argument," there's nothing to argue. Your "opinion" is so unarguably stupid and grossly misguided that even addressing you further is a waste of everyone's time and wasting perfectly good post space in an otherwise fine thread.

Opinion discarded.

Whatever the 40k FFG RPG's are, for the most part.

Our group is weird, we like somewhat lethal un-heroic adventures of horror and suffering.

>>50470430
>The longer the campaign, the heavier the game.
This is absolutely correct. Crunch keeps things consistent and interesting across many, many sessions with the same character. Rules light has less overhead (in terms of learning the game) but can spiral out of control or get boring much more easily.

Personally I like crunch since I consider long campaigns to be the "real experience", but I still like a short, rules-light narrative thing once in a while.

>>50490908
Nah, I agree with him. Videogames have tabletop beat for combat.

>>50490373
Like what? I don't see video games with nearly as many character creation choices, tactical turn based combat options, scenarios, and overall content and choice as RPGs can and do have.

>>50491244
roguelikes easily eclipse the actual written rules of most systems. And that's if you want something absolutely devoid of twitch combat.

>>50467091
I can do both to some extent.
I play GURPS, and I'd say I lean more towards the narrativist attitude.
Details are important, but when dealing with very simulationist games I often find that they reach a level of detail where I kind of stop caring. If I'm trying to climb a wall, my interest is usually not going to reach much further than "Did I do it?", and you don't need the world's most advanced climbing rules system for that. But it's hard to generalise, and I do think a level of detail are at home in for example combat.

I don't have any real rules about what I think is a good mechanic or not, but if I tried to come up with one it would be something like:
"Does the level of detail have dramatic significance?"
A game usually doesn't need a Lumberjack skill that calculates how fast you can chop down trees of various sizes, because in just about all conceivable situations it's going to be irrelevant to our adventure to calculate that cutting down an old Oak takes 135 or 160 minutes.

>>50468199
I visit /mu/ occasionally because it's the most autistic board I have seen. Even more so than /r9k/.

Crunch-heavy because I have no soul and have a hard time really putting myself into a role. Probably because I'm Chinese or something but I'm better off with numbers and formulas over narratives and roles.

Crunchy Sim systems where the game revolves around the story and characters more than combat and numbers + phat lewt and etc. Not that those are unwelcome per se but I prefer campaigns where they play a minor supporting role if any. I find narrative games somewhat unsatisfying. It usually ends up feeling more like straight playing pretend or cooperative back-patting than an actual RPG. I guess I think that the role playing and game parts of >RPG both deserve to be there to some extent and if they are at an extreme imbalance like say Fate or Phoenix Command as polar opposites, then much of the magic of an RPG is lost.
Moderation in all things I guess is how I feel about it.

>>50470358
Have you ever actually read the rules for GURPS? All the silly over-complicated stuff people make fun of is in designing characters and campaigns, the actual gameplay itself is fairly streamlined. Most situations are resolved using only a single, fairly simple mechanic; roll 3 six-sided dice and compare it to a skill score with modifiers.

It's only for the GM that GURPS can be a nightmare, for other players it's not too different from any other system really.

>>50488356
>Only retards and children play role-playing games to win or to "beat the system".
Only retards and children believe in the concept of badwrongfun.

>>50488656
>think that the rules are the game.
Are we all being trolled? If so 10/10, had me going.

>>50467091
With people who I know to be good role players #1 is great. With people I don't know, or people who are bad role players? I have to rely more on crunch for enjoyment.

>>50489404
There was more to it then that?

>>50489468
> to the point you can't play a specific thing in shadowrun until the splatbook for it comes out.
But you can still play that thing it's just that you probably won't do as good a job writing rules for it as actual professional full time writers who's entire career is writing rules for rpgs so most people would just wait for their take on it instead. Nobodies putting a gun to your head and forcing you to only use the official rules and not ever take out rules to make a game more simple and streamlined.

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>>50467091
I like rules light but anything lighter than Savage Worlds (my preferred system) I would probably not play or more than a one-shot.

>>50490688
>The best, most complete system is still at the mercy of the players, so if you are good to go with good players, and fucked with bad players, why pick a system that makes you go through so many motions just to arrive at the result you all wanted to begin with?
What a horribly depressing way of viewing the world.

>>50492747
Hardcore narrativists are actually gamists in disguise, though most would vehemently deny that accusation. The collapse of the Forge still ripples throughout the hobby.

I like crunchy RPGs that put lots of crunch in things other than just combat abilities.

For example, while Exalted is shit in a lot of ways, it has a ton of interesting rules crunch about using diplomacy and persuasion with people in ways that aren't just rolling high numbers, about traveling in ways that have trade-offs instead of just "everybody in the party can fly eventually", about curing diseases and injuries in a way that's more in-depth than just "I cast cure wounds", etc etc

>>50493023
Also, Exalted 2e has some brilliant stuff where simple bits of crunch influence roleplay, like powers with clauses that say stuff like "you always get a bonus to lying but a penalty to telling the truth" or "you never have to sleep again, but if you ever try you lose a Willpower point" or, my favorite, "you get an armor bonus based on the number of people you personally hate deeply".

>>50488588
No, not like a video game for sure. But it does need balance. And perhaps "balance" is not the right word for it. Let's go with role protection. See, if you are going to use a class system in your rpg (and even to an extent if you do point buy or the like) then each class needs to have something that it does either exclusively or much better than the others. This may mean striker vs controller vs buffer vs healer etc in a combat exclusive game or in a more rounded game (such as dnd) i can mean striker, nuker, party face, skill monkey, etc. The problem with 3.5/pathfinder in terms of "balance" is that there are several classes which not only do other classes "big thing" better and easier than those classes, but also have their own "big thing" on top of that. This is made far more noticable and far worse when some of those classes are actually pretty terrible at their "big thing" even when other classes are not considered because of poor maths checking and/or simulationism run rampant.

>>50492837
It also begs the question "why even use a system at all"? All these "narrative is the only reason to play RPG's exist, go play a videogame for a combat Sim loser fag" posts seem to miss a couple things, too.

Sure. An RPG is meant for role playing, not for emulating videogames. But neither is it intended to emulate movies, books or "stories" in the same preconceived, well thought through and edited sense. So it could equally be said that "if you want a good story with well developed characters then go read a book, fag".

An RPG is many things to many people. I would argue that the best RPGs make some proper use of all of these elements, and do not go out of their way to abandon any inherent facets of the unique medium that is roleplaying. The best games (IMO obviously) are the ones which acknowledge/provide for each facet and interest which people enjoy about RPGs without overly focusing on or ignoring any without good cause (a more focused game like Everyone is John might do, for example); scratch the itch for the method actor, the tactician, the drama queen, the jester, the romance writer and yes, even the guy who didn't show up to make a character so now he's either playing the loyal donkey or the feisty barmaid.

Not to say more specialized games can't be good, just that they serve a more specialized interest. There is no "best" or "true way" to play an RPG, aside from the one that you and your friends enjoy the best.

>>50493128
Anyway, IMHO I prefer crunchy/generalized systems that I can ignore or overrule as I feel without things breaking down. Provides some of the good of both worlds, as examples: quick fluid play without getting bogged down, 'realistic' or 'objective' rules if we feel we need them, and otherwise the rules are our bitch and we use them when and how we want to, not the other way around. We go fast and loose but if shit gets important we 'serious face' up and drag out the stuff for range and kidney shots or whatever with the BBEG running away, or the rules for social conduct and dress and status/rank stuff if we're at a royal ball to try to sway the queen or something. Simply making drama-based rulings all the time without exception feels, well, silly and nonsensical to me... this coming from someone who plays and runs RPGs almost entirely for the characters, the story and the worldbuilding (in that order).

>>50489018
Gamist with slight narrativist.

Crunchy Narrative like Chronicles of Darkness.

>>50490688
this logic is just as applicable to game rules in general as it is to detailed rules

Rules light does my head in. I don't need to learn a system that tells me to roll a d6 for a target number. Simple solutions like coin tosses I can do myself.
give me interesting, genre specific rules to flesh out a game, like sword styles, magic systems or gun rules
Then, write the book well so it inspires good stories. A decent enough storyteller won't even need this, but it doesn't hurt.

>>50488552
What is that kind of gameplay though?

>>50467091
Depends on the context really. Though I generally want nothing more crunchy than Champions, that kinda hits a sweet spot.

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Remember guys. Narrativist does not necessarily mean rules lite.

>>50499884
VtM is simulationist with narrativist trappings. It doesn't really give you any control of the narrative, aside from maybe willpower. I guess powers that last a scene could be considered narrativist, but that's very minor.

>ctrl+f genre simulation
>0 hits
damn shame

>>50500203
second

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Maybe this makes me a fucking pleb but I just like really slick rules.

Like even if a game is kinda trashy but it has one or two cool rules I'll forgive the whole system.

I don't remember the name but there was one system where you run out of ammo if you shoot twice in a combat encounter. It went something like this;
>Shoot once, and you're being careful
>If you shoot twice, might as well just keep shooting because you aren't being careful and will run out at the end no matter what

I like this rule because it means that you can still use something without worrying about 'losing ammo' for your guns but when you want to unleash you can, you just suffer for it after. It's also simple and easy to remember.

I also love the rules in old OSR games where treasure recovered = exp. That way you encourage players to lie, cheat, sneak and steal their way through dungeons to get money and distract or trick monsters instead of killing them, since that tends to be easier and a better way to avoid deadly encounters since monsters are worth much less XP.

Things like that are great.

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I'm in an online group of sorts, and our whole setting is actually split into two. Our world is "persistent", we have a character list of a ton of people, and anyone who can make a quest and submit it to a bulletin page is welcome to DM it. Somehow, everything's remained surprisingly balanced through all of it, since I guess everyone's a good sport.

Anyhow, for something like this, we divide the actual RP into both quests, which are done through Roll20, and casuals, which take place in hubs and in characters' homes and stuff, and as far as quests go I certainly like to be mostly game-ist, since I like to see a party employing strategy and working together to actually beat things, but I reward creative thinking to varying degrees as well, as long as their choices are on the right track.

Casuals are obviously narrativist/simulationist since it's mostly just characters interacting and maybe developing with each other, but I tend to really get stuck on those more than the rest. I tend to have a lot of fun when there's an objective, endgoal, or puzzle to solve, but so far I haven't found a good way to create a "just jump in and join"-type scenario that employs this well.

On that I'd actually like some advice. Has anyone had fun experiences while the PCs are just in town or a public center and not necessarily fighting evil? Something I've had to realize is a lot of things that are fun IRL, like playing vidya or watching movies and such, don't translate at all into written RP, but I'm also a shut-in who isn't too familiar with what fun outside the house actually is. Our setting is just about modern, though with advancements in some areas such as transportation and power. A casual scenario doesn't need to be mundane, but it would probably at least start that way before it gets escalated by shenanigans.

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>>50503155
I guess to add to this: The reason I even ask is, naturally, a quest can only include 3-5 players or so at a time, a DM can't handle much more than that, and they require planning. Not so much with activities in town, especially since everyone self-moderates rather well. Even though it's still a limited amount of people at a time in a single setting, since otherwise things get chaotic, it's still available at any time and people can come and go.

I just need to learn how to write a good kicker-offer for the stuff.

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Does this look about right?

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>>50503483
Whoop, meant to put 1e a little farther left

>>50503499
Gurps should be peak Stupid/pretentious. Allll the way down south

>>50503583
Its mechanics have been about the same since the 80s and the first releases, though.
Put it dead center.

>>50503583
GURPS is good even despite all the memeposting.