[d&d4e] Puzzles in RPGs
otspiii:
Oh, oops, you were talking about the 'rules of the world' as opposed to the 'rules of the system'? What I meant was that it was awkward just going 'by the way, combat doesn't work here, you're going to have to resolve this scene as a puzzle' without any justification from the fiction. If you mean more like 'by the way, the gnolls are going to cooperate with you/not murder you if you're on the boat and they aren't', then go buck wild as long as you're not being contradictory with what you've already established. I still think it's awkward forcing the party to shut off the intuitive part of their problem solving minds and relying completely on computational problem solving when intuitive problem solving is the one thing RPGs do better than anything else, but as long as you're not flippantly contradicting 'rules of the world' you've already established in play, then yeah, do what you want.
Callan S.:
What would you do if it did flippantly contradict the 'rules of the world'? Reject the challenge? Because new material fitting into the game world actually has first priority, ahead of consideration of the challenge?
otspiii:
I wouldn't straight up reject it as a player, but I would find it obnoxious. It'd be like if a character in a movie's identity changed for a scene without reason or explanation, like if there was a scene in Conan where Conan inexplicably strides in wearing a robe and wizard hat and just throws fireballs at his enemies rather than using a sword, and then after that scene it was never done/referenced again. Fluid identity/setting can work well as a technique (Exit the King makes fantastic use of it, for example), but it's not something you can use unless the entirety of the game is built to facilitate/benefit from it. Compromising the consistency of the fiction or 'rules of the world' or whatever isn't the end of the world, but I wouldn't do it flippantly. I'd either do it for a crowd of players who are expecting it and agreed to it, or I'd build the entire campaign in a way that takes full advantage of the newfound fluidity. Doing it out of the blue without a plan would just feel sloppy to me.
Callan S.:
Well, there's another thing you apparently have to obey, coming up
Quote
but it's not something you can use unless the entirety of the game...
Again, where is the council of elders who decided it's not something you can use? This is what fiction first seems to do - it seems to simply generate what you can and can't do out of thin air. It's never attributable to a person, it's always just 'how things are'.
But I'm getting into all that again. I'll put it this way - if with a particular product, the instructions have not told the person to imagine stuff (which is clear from just reading it - and by clear I mean it has given no instruction to do imagine things) and yet they insist on imagining things and then when the next rules 'flippantly contradict the rules of the game world' they call it obnoxious, the problem was this person wasn't following the rules.
otspiii:
Quote from: Callan S. on September 26, 2009, 01:26:23 AM
Again, where is the council of elders who decided it's not something you can use? This is what fiction first seems to do - it seems to simply generate what you can and can't do out of thin air. It's never attributable to a person, it's always just 'how things are'.
But I'm getting into all that again. I'll put it this way - if with a particular product, the instructions have not told the person to imagine stuff (which is clear from just reading it - and by clear I mean it has given no instruction to do imagine things) and yet they insist on imagining things and then when the next rules 'flippantly contradict the rules of the game world' they call it obnoxious, the problem was this person wasn't following the rules.
What I mean is that the parts of the game it weakens, such as the ability to use past information to plan ahead (important to some flavors of gamist play), immersion (I don't think it's the be-all end-all of roleplaying like some players, but it's not something I'd toss away without a reason), and so on will usually detract from the enjoyment of the players more than whatever the benefits you're getting out of it unless it's a natural conclusion of whatever style of game you're running.
The 'unless the entirety of the game' bit is kind of related to my general GMing philosophy, that you should try to make every part of the game support every other part of the game. Have an experience in mind and give the players a world and opportunities that provides that experience. If the players aren't flowing well with what you had in mind you should try to match their tone, but once you've worked out an experience with them that works try to make sure everything you do enhances that experience rather than distracts from it. Err, this explanation is a little vague and probably doesn't communicate what I mean very well, but getting into it for real would be a pretty dire derail.
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