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Old 02-25-2021, 04:47 PM   #26
whswhs
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Lawrence, KS
Default Re: Hit Points...to be, or not to be?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Lameth View Post
And I agree with you regarding story. My heroes earn that title. I do not believe in a hero bubble around them. No way. But I do not believe in a war gaming approach either of pluses, negs, and roles determining everything and the story serves no purpose. There is a line between and I think most experienced, good, and creative GMs (ST, DMs) find that sweet spot.
I think I may have to say that that doesn't apply to me. At any rate, I don't think my games have a "story."

At least, when I run a scenario, I haven't worked out in advance what is going to or supposed to happen. In particular, I haven't determined that the player characters are going to succeed, or even survive; nor have I decided on a set of specific victory conditions, or of actions that need to be performed. My approach is more in the spirit of Gregor Vorbarra saying, "Let's see what happens."

For me, the story element, so far as I have one, is in trying to make things interesting. I propose an interesting problem during the exposition; when the rules leave it open what happens, I look for the interesting choice. But I largely do that on the fly as I run the session. And I don't override the rules to make things interesting.

I do override the rules for a different purpose: to make things happen in a way that makes sense, either in terms of the way the real world works, or in terms of what I've established about the way the game setting works. But that's not based on "story." If "story" would require disregarding either real reality or game reality, I look for a different story.
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