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Arbane
2014-07-20, 05:18 PM
http://www.catthulhu.com/rant-why-people-dont-play-rpgs/


So it goes around the table, with the most vivid imagery sounding something like this: “Whoa, a 23! They only have a 14, so with your plus five doubled, that makes negative three!” To put it mildly, this is not the captivating prose of the beloved fantasy books that inspire the players, and creators, of these games.

I thought this essay made a good point: Too much rules and numbers can choke the imagination and drama out of RPGs, and without that, all that's left is a skirmish boardgame and the occasional silly accent.

Esprit15
2014-07-20, 05:51 PM
Reads very much like someone who doesn't actually know what he's talking about, with a basically correct point being extrapolated far further than it should be. Excess rules are bad. So is overwhelming the new guy.

I remember when my friends ran a level 20 gauntlet game. A friend and I rolled up a wild shaping druid and he made a... I don't remember, something that hits things with a sword and forgot to buy an item for flight. My girlfriend, while she likes the game, has trouble with statting up a normal character, let alone someone sitting on the doorstep of epic levels. Rather than inundate her with rules and races and a dozen other things that would be confusing, the GM found a level appropriate, pre-statted monster. And that's how she got to play an angel.

Assuming you're welcoming a new guy into your group, you don't overwhelm them with stupid amounts of rules. You help them build something from core that doesn't have too much book keeping. If they want to play a caster, you point them to the sorcerer or the favored soul so that preparing spells isn't a worry. You help them play a not-crappy monk and don't say anything about it being unoptimized.

Knaight
2014-07-20, 05:55 PM
http://www.catthulhu.com/rant-why-people-dont-play-rpgs/



I thought this essay made a good point: Too much rules and numbers can choke the imagination and drama out of RPGs, and without that, all that's left is a skirmish boardgame and the occasional silly accent.

Freeform games exist. Incredible rules heavy long games exist. There's an entire spectrum between them.

I do think that this is a factor, if only because D&D is pretty much the one visible RPG, with WoD coming in second - neither of these are rules light, and if people don't find out about rules light games, potential RPG players may end up not playing.

Zombimode
2014-07-20, 06:44 PM
I do think that this is a factor, if only because D&D is pretty much the one visible RPG, with WoD coming in second - neither of these are rules light, and if people don't find out about rules light games, potential RPG players may end up not playing.

Thing is, whatever RPG system the linked text tries to reference, it is not D&D. Sure, it fits the way people who hate D&D for some reason like to portray D&D, but that doesn't make it in any way accurate.

Knaight
2014-07-20, 06:53 PM
Thing is, whatever RPG system the linked text tries to reference, it is not D&D. Sure, it fits the way people who hate D&D for some reason like to portray D&D, but that doesn't make it in any way accurate.
I'm saying that the core concept - rules keep some people out - is accurate. It pretty much comes down to the high visibility games being rules heavy, and thus people who would favor rules light games being more likely to be deterred before they find games they would enjoy. The exact same thing could happen if D&D (and WoD) were rules light, except for it's the people who favor rules heavy who would be driven away.

As for the reference, it's deliberately not using actual game terms from anything. That said, there very much are concepts there which are in D&D. Initiative came up pretty explicitly. Prestige classes, sourcebook limitation, etc. were all alluded to. What was described there is a pretty familiar look at D&D for newbies in particular veteran groups. It's not what it looks like all the time, but it really doesn't seem that off to me.

Sartharina
2014-07-20, 06:54 PM
While the rant is interesting, now I have to buy a new RPG.

Cannot resist the kittening!

Slipperychicken
2014-07-20, 07:00 PM
I have to agree with the article. It matches my experiences with 3.x, and makes me want to try lighter, simpler games.


As for the Catthulhu RPG, I hope it involves references to the Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, and other of Lovecraft's work involving cats. I'd be happy even if they simply gave us stats for Zoogs and Moon-Beasts as enemies.

Airk
2014-07-20, 07:10 PM
Thing is, whatever RPG system the linked text tries to reference, it is not D&D. Sure, it fits the way people who hate D&D for some reason like to portray D&D, but that doesn't make it in any way accurate.

Oh come on. Clearly the author was REFERENCING D&D even if he didn't say so specifically. Why? Because these problems are not SPECIFIC to D&D, though they do tend to crop up there.

I agree with the article entirely, unfortunately. These games are often sold as something they are not "It's a cooperative storytelling experience!" when actually it's a minmaxing exercise with a whole lot of numbers and not a whole lot of storytelling. Are there games that are cooperative storytelling experiences? Sure. But the odds of a newbie blundering into one on their first try are not very good.

This goes well beyond "Excess rules are bad. So is overwhelming the new guy." - your examples of how to deal with this situation are interesting, Esprit15, but they basically boil down to "make a bunch of exceptions and if you're lucky, your group can compensate for this mess by having the new player not actually play the same game as everyone else." This is not really a desirable option.

Even WotC recognizes this as a problem, as evidenced by their clear desire to streamline things for 5E.

Pluto!
2014-07-20, 08:22 PM
This is one of those articles that says it's about RPGs in general, but which is clearly talking about D&D specifically.

What it's describing are problems. Game designers know they're problems. And besides D&D, they haven't really been maintained in many games written in the past decade.

Knaight
2014-07-20, 08:45 PM
This is one of those articles that says it's about RPGs in general, but which is clearly talking about D&D specifically.

It's about why people don't play RPGs in general. D&D specifically is really relevant to that - it's pretty much the gateway game, and is frequently the only game non-RPG players even know about. People who try RPGs once almost always do so through D&D (again, WoD is in second place here, and I'd consider that article every bit as relevant to it as to D&D). It's hardly every new player - I've introduced a number through Fudge and a few through WR&M, and even if I were the only person to do that that would prevent it from being every player - but it's the trend.

Avilan the Grey
2014-07-21, 02:50 AM
Never heard of a person not playing RPGs because of the rules. EVER.
I have heard almost every other reason though, it being "for Dorks" as the number one, and "What is an RPG" as number two. But never, ever ever ever have I heard anyone except this person (and Knaight) say anyone won't play because of rules.

And as has been pointed out above the games on the market today goes from complete free form to extremely rule bound. Personally I prefer the latter, since I absolutely suck at anything acting-related.

Sartharina
2014-07-21, 02:53 AM
Never heard of a person not playing RPGs because of the rules. EVER.
I have heard almost every other reason though, it being "for Dorks" as the number oneAnd the reason it's "For dorks" is because of how the rules work.

NowhereMan583
2014-07-21, 03:10 AM
The article seems pretty spot-on to me. I knew a lot of people in college who approached RPGs in exactly that way, and at least one person who was turned off the hobby altogether because she came to one of those sessions with a character concept and got drowned in rules.

This ended up being why I GM far more often than I play -- for a significant chunk of time, my options were either to run a game for my friends, or play in a game where "serious" gamers constantly talked about their character's stats and how they could beat up everyone else. To this day, I don't seek out games to join because so many of them are like that, and I'd just end up wasting my time.

Avilan the Grey
2014-07-21, 03:17 AM
And the reason it's "For dorks" is because of how the rules work.

Please explain? I see no connection here.

Eldan
2014-07-21, 03:28 AM
Please explain? I see no connection here.

I've heard that one before, actually. People are throwing around a lot of calculations, sheets full of numbers, graph paper, pencils, oddly shaped dice... to a lot of people it looks really heavy on the mathematics. Which are for "the nerds" in a way that storytelling, maybe, wouldn't be.

Avilan the Grey
2014-07-21, 03:37 AM
I've heard that one before, actually. People are throwing around a lot of calculations, sheets full of numbers, graph paper, pencils, oddly shaped dice... to a lot of people it looks really heavy on the mathematics. Which are for "the nerds" in a way that storytelling, maybe, wouldn't be.

Huh. Fair enough, though to me it feels like saying "I am dumb, I go now". Or something. Honestly I would say 90% of the people that say that are not actually put off by the math, but by the image of dorks as such, and don't want to be seen with dorks or actively enjoy bullying others.

But again, I have never encountered (nor felt it myself) the idea that it's the rules that keeps people out. my point is that the people I have met that have never played RPGs fall in a number of categories, primarely "It's For Dorks" and "I have never heard of the concept of RPG before". The first category is a lost cause, since they basically are bullies (so you don't want them to join) or too afraid of bullies to try to play. The second category however are redeemable :smallwink:. Surpsingly many have "I can't find a good game group" as an excuse*.

As for the rules themselves... It seems to me that if this really is a problem, it's because someone sucks at explaining the rules, not that the rules are too contraining or "destroying the fun".
Again of course this comes from someone who needs rules to play, since I cannot stand anyting close to Free Form.

*It seems RPGing is, at least among people I have talked to, almost like the stereotypical (in sitcoms and movies) lesbian college experiment: A LOT of people I talk to admit they played some in college or university, and don't know how to find players / game masters / groups outside that circle.

Knaight
2014-07-21, 03:56 AM
Huh. Fair enough, though to me it feels like saying "I am dumb, I go now". Or something. Honestly I would say 90% of the people that say that are not actually put off by the math, but by the image of dorks as such, and don't want to be seen with dorks or actively enjoy bullying others.

Or "I don't have time to read several hundred pages for a game I might like", which I've heard a bunch. That said, this phenomenon is more of one where someone gives it a try, decides they don't like it, then doesn't come back. Exact reasons might not even be given, but it is a thing that happens, and I've definitely seen it happen because of the rules - it's not what people were interested in, so they leave.

Eldan
2014-07-21, 04:55 AM
It's not necessarily "those mathematics are too complicated for me". I mean, it's mostly some basic addition. It's more "Why would I want to do calculations in my leisure time".

Avilan the Grey
2014-07-21, 05:11 AM
Or "I don't have time to read several hundred pages for a game I might like", which I've heard a bunch.

Well that is not a failure of the game system, the rules or anything else than the DM / GM.
You should be able to just sit down and play. The DM (and the other players) explain as it goes along.


It's not necessarily "those mathematics are too complicated for me". I mean, it's mostly some basic addition. It's more "Why would I want to do calculations in my leisure time".

I understand this, in theory. I don't do things that feel like work to me to have fun. If it feels like work, it is work. However I feel sorry for people who feel that calculations as such always is work, no matter what you are calculating.

AMFV
2014-07-21, 06:42 AM
http://www.catthulhu.com/rant-why-people-dont-play-rpgs/



I thought this essay made a good point: Too much rules and numbers can choke the imagination and drama out of RPGs, and without that, all that's left is a skirmish boardgame and the occasional silly accent.

And to insist people be imaginative on command can cause people to have a social meltdown altogether. When I was in the military I introduced many people to roleplaying games. People have a lot, and I mean a LOT more trouble with "I'm a fantasy warrior in Elfland" than "I roll a 13 or higher and I hit". People are trained to play boardgames, they are not trained to play pretend, at least not anymore. In every single situation giving people tons of options in my experience or telling them "Your character can do whatever you want" results in a complete blank stare, whereas defined rules and objectives gives people the framework they need.

This isn't a statement saying freeform games can't work, but I think they are less welcoming to newer players because of a less defined framework.

Lycoris
2014-07-21, 09:02 AM
People are trained to play boardgames, they are not trained to play pretend, at least not anymore. In every single situation giving people tons of options in my experience or telling them "Your character can do whatever you want" results in a complete blank stare, whereas defined rules and objectives gives people the framework they need.

This isn't a statement saying freeform games can't work, but I think they are less welcoming to newer players because of a less defined framework.

I feel that it's more that people are trained to stop playing pretend, rather than not being trained in it. I believe that people are plenty imaginative to begin with, but that imagination gets dulled or dialed back for a myriad of social and personal reasons.

Definitely agreed that a certain amount of rules/objectives can give focus to a group or game though. Even freeform games rely on a certain amount of shared assumptions to work, even if they aren't always explicitly written as rules. Being able to say "I'm a fantasy warrior from Elfland" implies that to a certain extent, the group/game has accepted that fantasy warriors and elfland exist in the game, alongside everything they're likely to imply.

AMFV
2014-07-21, 09:19 AM
I feel that it's more that people are trained to stop playing pretend, rather than not being trained in it. I believe that people are plenty imaginative to begin with, but that imagination gets dulled or dialed back for a myriad of social and personal reasons.

Definitely agreed that a certain amount of rules/objectives can give focus to a group or game though. Even freeform games rely on a certain amount of shared assumptions to work, even if they aren't always explicitly written as rules. Being able to say "I'm a fantasy warrior from Elfland" implies that to a certain extent, the group/game has accepted that fantasy warriors and elfland exist in the game, alongside everything they're likely to imply.

Certainly, people are trained to stop playing pretend. But in that same context, the rules give them a framework to start again, and it's a framework that in my experience is much easier to understand than just telling people to jump in and go. Since the author of the rant is trying to get people to play games who don't already, I think his approach is exactly the opposite of what it should be.

Also not that people should be elitist jerks, but people are generally willing to accept even very arbitrary rules so the "you can't be a mountain jumper unless you're a [whatever-he-said] because we don't use those rules" is more likely to be accepted out of hand if people aren't familiar with the system, than it is for people who are extremely familiar with the system.

Airk
2014-07-21, 09:54 AM
Well that is not a failure of the game system, the rules or anything else than the DM / GM.
You should be able to just sit down and play. The DM (and the other players) explain as it goes along.


No, it's a failure of the game; The fact that the GM and players can mitigate it if they are on the ball does not make it not a failure of the game. If the game itself cannot present itself in such a way as to be comprehensible to someone in a "Read the rules on this sheet" sort of way, it is a failure of the game.



I understand this, in theory. I don't do things that feel like work to me to have fun. If it feels like work, it is work. However I feel sorry for people who feel that calculations as such always is work, no matter what you are calculating.

This is partly it; It's also partly "Why do I have to do all this math to be an elf warrior?" Fundamentally, when people show up expecting to go on a fantasy adventure, they do not expect to have to do a bunch of fiddly math.

AMFV: I don't think the author of the article is trying an approach at all, he is just criticizing the one that he sees used so often. I think you are putting in words in his mouth if you take it beyond that point. Also, I think that how much trouble people have "playing pretend" varies HUGELY from person to person. I submit that your experience in the army might not be a particularly good sample set.

AMFV
2014-07-21, 10:01 AM
No, it's a failure of the game; The fact that the GM and players can mitigate it if they are on the ball does not make it not a failure of the game. If the game itself cannot present itself in such a way as to be comprehensible to someone in a "Read the rules on this sheet" sort of way, it is a failure of the game.



This is partly it; It's also partly "Why do I have to do all this math to be an elf warrior?" Fundamentally, when people show up expecting to go on a fantasy adventure, they do not expect to have to do a bunch of fiddly math.

AMFV: I don't think the author of the article is trying an approach at all, he is just criticizing the one that he sees used so often. I think you are putting in words in his mouth if you take it beyond that point. Also, I think that how much trouble people have "playing pretend" varies HUGELY from person to person. I submit that your experience in the army might not be a particularly good sample set.

I was absolutely not in the Army (I was a Marine), furthermore I was in intelligence, which is full of people who are very into the sort of things that would indicate a willingness to "play pretend", such as a love of anime, fantasy novels, science fiction, video games, and my experience is still that way.

Well if the author isn't suggesting something different then he contributes nothing. I read it very clearly that he was pushing for a less rules heavy approach on his contention that he believed that lots of rules scare off new players. Whereas I submit less rules scare off new players. So I'm debating his statement, and the direction of action one might presume he would suggest from the things he states.

Also I'm debating his entire tone, which is contentious and not exactly productive, because if there's one thing that scares new people away from a hobby it's being an elitist jerk, whether you're an elitist jerk in favor of a rules heavy system, or no rules at all, elitism is practically guaranteed to shoo people off.

Terraoblivion
2014-07-21, 10:29 AM
I don't really think anything definite can be said either way. There are definitely people who really want to do the shared storytelling aspect, freeform fandom games are absolutely massive online, but there are also people who want to play a really complex tactical game and don't really care for the narrative aspects, they're pretty easy to spot if you're reading people discussing D&D online. The problem is when people who would favor one gets introduced to the other instead and get turned off by it. I agree that this mostly happens to the former group and that there appears to be more of an infrastructure to learn about the latter, but that doesn't mean that there isn't an audience for games like that among newcomers to RP'ing. It's ultimately a matter of taste and I wouldn't think that heavy championing of any specific amount of rules is going to help accommodate a greater range of potentially interested people. Being more open and aware of the different possibilities and what people are interested in will, not some form of definite view of what's the one true way to game.

Airk
2014-07-21, 10:34 AM
I was absolutely not in the Army (I was a Marine),

Sorry, my bad. I wasn't reading thoroughly.



furthermore I was in intelligence, which is full of people who are very into the sort of things that would indicate a willingness to "play pretend", such as a love of anime, fantasy novels, science fiction, video games, and my experience is still that way.

But clearly your own evidence proves this to be incorrect. Are you actually attempting to argue that since you didn't encounter this situation in the marines, that no one could ever possibly encounter this situation enough that it might be a problem? Because it sounds like you are, and that's...not very polite.



Well if the author isn't suggesting something different then he contributes nothing.

I disagree. The first step, as they say, is recognizing the problem, and clearly, some people even in this thread, don't even do that. So I think the 'rant' has value. I think you understand this, even if you claim otherwise, because you are addressing the issue as if you understand that there is value there.



I read it very clearly that he was pushing for a less rules heavy approach on his contention that he believed that lots of rules scare off new players. Whereas I submit less rules scare off new players. So I'm debating his statement, and the direction of action one might presume he would suggest from the things he states.

I think this is fundamentally incorrect and you are not even representing your OWN point properly. Are you suggesting, and I don't think you are, that more rules are ALWAYS BETTER for new players? Because that is clearly not the case, even though it sounds like you are trying to say that. What the author is clearly suggesting is that the current "norm" for RPGs has too many rules. He is not suggesting that "zero" rules is the correct number, but he is asserting that what is "normal" right now is too many.

Since you mentioned boardgames and how people are "trained" to play them, lets talk about boardgames. The traditional "gateway board game" is STILL Settlers of Catan, or perhaps something like Smallworld. Both of which are games with...wait for it...comparatively few rules. You do NOT, for example, try to get someone into boardgames by sitting down to play Terra Mystica or Advanced Squad Leader with them. I don't think you're going to argue that point either, because I don't think you can reasonably make a case for using super complicated boardgames as a teaching tool.

I also don't think you will disagree when I say that there is a "right" amount of rules. Neither the author of the rant nor anyone here here is seriously suggesting freeform, in spite of your efforts to set that up as a strawman. But there's a big difference between Savage Worlds, or Dungeon World, and Pathfinder, and I know which games _I_ would rather try to explain to a new player. And neither of them lacks the appropriate structure for someone who is looking for rules to latch onto.

If anything, the author of the rant is suggesting that there are more people who favor fewer rules than there are people who favor lots of rules. I think that's the most you can read into it.



Also I'm debating his entire tone, which is contentious and not exactly productive, because if there's one thing that scares new people away from a hobby it's being an elitist jerk, whether you're an elitist jerk in favor of a rules heavy system, or no rules at all, elitism is practically guaranteed to shoo people off.

Because things that are labelled "rant" are all about polite tone? Clearly, it has served its purpose.

AMFV
2014-07-21, 10:36 AM
I don't really think anything definite can be said either way. There are definitely people who really want to do the shared storytelling aspect, freeform fandom games are absolutely massive online, but there are also people who want to play a really complex tactical game and don't really care for the narrative aspects, they're pretty easy to spot if you're reading people discussing D&D online. The problem is when people who would favor one gets introduced to the other instead and get turned off by it. I agree that this mostly happens to the former group and that there appears to be more of an infrastructure to learn about the latter, but that doesn't mean that there isn't an audience for games like that among newcomers to RP'ing. It's ultimately a matter of taste and I wouldn't think that heavy championing of any specific amount of rules is going to help accommodate a greater range of potentially interested people. Being more open and aware of the different possibilities and what people are interested in will, not some form of definite view of what's the one true way to game.

And I'm not saying that one shouldn't be open to that, but even in your post (the bolded section), where you reference a specific system and then claim that people who play D&D "don't care for the narrative aspects", is a pretty elitist statement. It's implying that people who like narrative stuff, can't enjoy the complex wargame aspects, which is incorrect, or that this somehow takes away from the narrative aspects. Now I've been in lots of D&D games that were just hack and slash, but I've been in just as many that were deep political intrigue and developed world settings.

Now it's possible that a different game system would have done it better, but I doubt you'd be easily able to find one that can handle both a tactical minigame and have a developed setting in the same way (although I'm sure it exists).

My claim is that people tend to want to follow rules. The first thing you do when teaching anybody, any game in my experience is explain the rules, freeform tends to be so light on rules as to be overwhelming to most folks, in my experience. I'm not saying anything is wrong with freeform, I'm suggesting that it may be very, very overwhelming for people. That's been consistently my experience.


Sorry, my bad. I wasn't reading thoroughly.



But clearly your own evidence proves this to be incorrect. Are you actually attempting to argue that since you didn't encounter this situation in the marines, that no one could ever possibly encounter this situation enough that it might be a problem? Because it sounds like you are, and that's...not very polite.


That's not what I said at all, if you'll read more carefully I said I said in the majority of my experience it was the opposite. Not that there couldn't be cases where the reverse was true. But that my experience has been the opposite. Someone could, but I'd bet more people would find it difficult to work with no rules than with lots of rules.



I disagree. The first step, as they say, is recognizing the problem, and clearly, some people even in this thread, don't even do that. So I think the 'rant' has value. I think you understand this, even if you claim otherwise, because you are addressing the issue as if you understand that there is value there.


I'm claiming it's a non-issue, and that deeming it an issue will have a negative value, that doesn't mean the rant has value.



I think this is fundamentally incorrect and you are not even representing your OWN point properly. Are you suggesting, and I don't think you are, that more rules are ALWAYS BETTER for new players? Because that is clearly not the case, even though it sounds like you are trying to say that. What the author is clearly suggesting is that the current "norm" for RPGs has too many rules. He is not suggesting that "zero" rules is the correct number, but he is asserting that what is "normal" right now is too many.


And I'm asserting that what is normal right now has not proven to be too many for many people I've played with and has in the general case proven to be too few.



Since you mentioned boardgames and how people are "trained" to play them, lets talk about boardgames. The traditional "gateway board game" is STILL Settlers of Catan, or perhaps something like Smallworld. Both of which are games with...wait for it...comparatively few rules. You do NOT, for example, try to get someone into boardgames by sitting down to play Terra Mystica or Advanced Squad Leader with them. I don't think you're going to argue that point either, because I don't think you can reasonably make a case for using super complicated boardgames as a teaching tool.


The gateway boardgame is Monopoly, or Risk, or Chess, not Settlers of Catan. Which are much more rigid and formalized. There isn't a boardgame analogue for freeform roleplay, it doesn't exist, as such you can't make that analogy, my analogy was that boardgames in general have rules.



I also don't think you will disagree when I say that there is a "right" amount of rules. Neither the author of the rant nor anyone here here is seriously suggesting freeform, in spite of your efforts to set that up as a strawman. But there's a big difference between Savage Worlds, or Dungeon World, and Pathfinder, and I know which games _I_ would rather try to explain to a new player. And neither of them lacks the appropriate structure for someone who is looking for rules to latch onto.

Savage Worlds is from what I've read fine, it's a little rules light for my taste. I've read some of Dungeon World, and I'm not sure about it, but it should be fine to. Pathfinder is easy to explain as well. I'm arguing that less rules does not necessarily make a better new player experience, and that elitism makes a worse one.



Because things that are labelled "rant" are all about polite tone? Clearly, it has served its purpose.

Making me angry? Causing me to ignore his point because it was designed to make me angry? That seems like a waste of time.

Terraoblivion
2014-07-21, 10:51 AM
No, my claim is that a subset of people who play D&D are in it for the rules. And given how many people explicitly state that is their preference I don't think that's a terribly controversial statement. There are people who play D&D for the story or for the combination of the story and rules as well. I would even venture the assumption that of people making a conscious choice of D&D as opposed to simply playing what their friends are playing or the only system they know play for a combination of story and rules, rather than purely the story or the rules. If you hate rules you'll probably pick something lighter than D&D if you know about other options and are willing to seek out new people to play with, because it's ultimately both rules heavy and pretty dense in the coverage of the rules, so I think that people purely in it for narrative make up a smaller proportion of D&D players than most other systems.

In any case, I'm simply saying that people who don't care about the shared narrative exist in gaming and they are at least more vocal in D&D discussions than in discussions about other systems. Not that all D&D players are hostile or indifferent to narrative, I'm almost certain this group is a minority. People like this also exist with other systems complex enough that system mastery is a thing, they just seem proportionally more common among D&D players. Also, these people are perfectly legitimate and decent people, their fun is no less worthy than improvised storytelling and they're just as deserving of being catered to. That was my point. That pushing for lighter systems at all times would leave a different group just as hanging as the writer of the original blog post claims people who get overwhelmed by rules are.

Also, I do think that there is another point buried in the original rant that seems missed on the writer himself and most people discussing. It is that a lot of gaming groups are terrible at introducing things and explaining rules in a straightforward manner. Making a character for people and giving them what's "best" without proper explanation is being a controlling douche, expecting them to seamlessly drop into an established group dynamic and game with little explanation is rough on them and so on. It's not out of malice, but most people are not trained in teaching and it happens often enough to bear mention. Really, I'd suspect that rather than amount of rules, it's the feeling of being overridden and losing control like that which drives people off.

AMFV
2014-07-21, 11:03 AM
No, my claim is that a subset of people who play D&D are in it for the rules. And given how many people explicitly state that is their preference I don't think that's a terribly controversial statement. There are people who play D&D for the story or for the combination of the story and rules as well. I would even venture the assumption that of people making a conscious choice of D&D as opposed to simply playing what their friends are playing or the only system they know play for a combination of story and rules, rather than purely the story or the rules. If you hate rules you'll probably pick something lighter than D&D if you know about other options and are willing to seek out new people to play with, because it's ultimately both rules heavy and pretty dense in the coverage of the rules, so I think that people purely in it for narrative make up a smaller proportion of D&D players than most other systems.

Well I will concede that I like the rules aspects of D&D, but I also like the shared narrative as well. And many people, most of the heavy optimizers I've met are very much into the narrative aspects as well and not just the ruleset.



In any case, I'm simply saying that people who don't care about the shared narrative exist in gaming and they are at least more vocal in D&D discussions than in discussions about other systems. Not that all D&D players are hostile or indifferent to narrative, I'm almost certain this group is a minority. People like this also exist with other systems complex enough that system mastery is a thing, they just seem proportionally more common among D&D players. Also, these people are perfectly legitimate and decent people, their fun is no less worthy than improvised storytelling and they're just as deserving of being catered to. That was my point. That pushing for lighter systems at all times would leave a different group just as hanging as the writer of the original blog post claims people who get overwhelmed by rules are.

I agree with that, and very similar to the point I was trying to make.



Also, I do think that there is another point buried in the original rant that seems missed on the writer himself and most people discussing. It is that a lot of gaming groups are terrible at introducing things and explaining rules in a straightforward manner. Making a character for people and giving them what's "best" without proper explanation is being a controlling douche, expecting them to seamlessly drop into an established group dynamic and game with little explanation is rough on them and so on. It's not out of malice, but most people are not trained in teaching and it happens often enough to bear mention. Really, I'd suspect that rather than amount of rules, it's the feeling of being overridden and losing control like that which drives people off.

My emphasis. I agree with that, and I think that is the biggest problem.

VoxRationis
2014-07-21, 11:28 AM
I personally don't think that rules-heavy systems inhibit storytelling at all. In fact, I think they provide for better storytelling by defining what can and cannot happen in the world. Without that, it's easy to fall into a childish argument about whether your PC or the NPC is the better fencer, or whether it's reasonable that your acrobat can jump 20 feet from a standing position.
Furthermore, the core rules for D&D aren't that tough to get into if you have supportive friends teaching you step-by-step. All the sourcebook-delving optimization, I admit is tough to follow (I don't even know what people are talking about half the time, though that's probably due to a lack of the sourcebooks being referenced). But playing a core-only, low-level character isn't hard, even if they're a wizard.
Also, the "calculations" are mostly basic arithmetic, usually 3rd grade or lower things. Do it on paper if you have to, but it's hardly a prohibitive element that prevents storytelling.

Kami2awa
2014-07-21, 11:29 AM
The article seems pretty spot-on to me. I knew a lot of people in college who approached RPGs in exactly that way, and at least one person who was turned off the hobby altogether because she came to one of those sessions with a character concept and got drowned in rules.

This ended up being why I GM far more often than I play -- for a significant chunk of time, my options were either to run a game for my friends, or play in a game where "serious" gamers constantly talked about their character's stats and how they could beat up everyone else. To this day, I don't seek out games to join because so many of them are like that, and I'd just end up wasting my time.

Yes, I'd like to say I agree too. In fact, as a veteran RPG-er I still experience this on introduction to new systems even occasionally new campaigns in the systems I've played previously - I'm not great at "rules mastery" so often am a bit swamped by the shear volume of rules and rules expansions in some systems.

In my experience one of the better RPGs to introduce new people with is Call of Cthulhu, since

1) the system is percentile-based, and most people have a more intuitive grasp of percentage probabilities than other ways of expressing probability, especially as we use percentages to express chance a lot in everyday life.

2) the characters are ordinary people and so are aware automatically of their abilities - there is no vast list of spells, vampire disciplines, or whatever to learn.

3) it isn't necessary to know much about the game world to play ... if you've seen a horror film or watched a supernatural-based TV show like Buffy or the X Files you know how it goes. In fact, horror settings often work better if the players are not aware of what they might encounter - facing the unknown is a major part of it.

Airk
2014-07-21, 12:18 PM
My claim is that people tend to want to follow rules. The first thing you do when teaching anybody, any game in my experience is explain the rules, freeform tends to be so light on rules as to be overwhelming to most folks, in my experience. I'm not saying anything is wrong with freeform, I'm suggesting that it may be very, very overwhelming for people. That's been consistently my experience.

Well, there's that freeform strawman again. Good job! You are the only person talking about freeform here, except for Knaight who made the difficult to dispute point that they exist. You will observe that he did not actually suggest USING them here.



That's not what I said at all, if you'll read more carefully I said I said in the majority of my experience it was the opposite. Not that there couldn't be cases where the reverse was true. But that my experience has been the opposite. Someone could, but I'd bet more people would find it difficult to work with no rules than with lots of rules.

Right, so since your experiences go one way, you do not believe that anyone else could have experiences that could be correct. Got it.


Making me angry? Causing me to ignore his point because it was designed to make me angry? That seems like a waste of time.

Getting people to discuss the topic. :) Which, for all your wasted rage, is in fact what you are doing.

Anyway, if Dungeon World and Savage Worlds are "okay" then you are AGREEING with me. Namely, that games with fewer rules work well for teaching. (Also, all the boardgames you list have relatively simple rules. But I disagree that they are the gateway boardgames, because everyone has already played them.)

draken50
2014-07-21, 12:27 PM
Ultimately as has been said, the amount/scope of rules is barely a deterrent to most players, in comparison to the complexity they are immediately presented with. I have heard of many people's first game being one where they started as a level 15 multiclass caster.

My first game was 3.0 after I played the crap out of the Baldur's gate series, and even then the transition threw me off a bit. I thankfully had a GM that had me roll up a 2nd level human fighter. Even then the explanations and differences took a bit to sink in.

Ultimately though, the game doesn't suffer from a new player starting off not knowing about tripping options, or disarming, or aid-another or innumerable other little actions they can take. I try to ease my new players into the system, and show them a new thing or two they can do in each encounter.

The books to me seem to assume you're starting at level 1. So having a confused player that starts at 12 with 2 base classes and prc isn't the systems fault.

ORione
2014-07-21, 01:15 PM
I understand this, in theory. I don't do things that feel like work to me to have fun. If it feels like work, it is work. However I feel sorry for people who feel that calculations as such always is work, no matter what you are calculating.

And I feel sorry for people who can't imagine being in a fantasy world without relying on numbers.

Airk
2014-07-21, 01:35 PM
And I feel sorry for people who can't imagine being in a fantasy world without relying on numbers.

But how will I know how awesome I am without numbers?!?!11

Terraoblivion
2014-07-21, 01:52 PM
Uh, guys, could you be a bit less judgemental about others? I'm hardly a charop type or obsessed with rolling dice and showing off, I'm in two freeform games and most of my other games have more time spent not interacting with numbers than with, but what you're doing is not having a preference, it's sneering at people who aren't playing the right way. People who like numbers are no dumber or less moral than you for having that preference, they just like a different thing.

ORione
2014-07-21, 03:34 PM
Uh, guys, could you be a bit less judgemental about others? I'm hardly a charop type or obsessed with rolling dice and showing off, I'm in two freeform games and most of my other games have more time spent not interacting with numbers than with, but what you're doing is not having a preference, it's sneering at people who aren't playing the right way. People who like numbers are no dumber or less moral than you for having that preference, they just like a different thing.

Yeah, sorry. I was just annoyed at AtG's patronizing comment. Nothing wrong with math games, if that's your thing. But there's nothing wrong with not doing math during your free time, either.

Terraoblivion
2014-07-21, 03:53 PM
Yeah, sorry. I was just annoyed at AtG's patronizing comment. Nothing wrong with math games, if that's your thing. But there's nothing wrong with not doing math during your free time, either.

Exactly. I've just felt that there is a tone of suggesting that one is inherently superior to the other in this thread.

AMFV
2014-07-21, 06:01 PM
Well, there's that freeform strawman again. Good job! You are the only person talking about freeform here, except for Knaight who made the difficult to dispute point that they exist. You will observe that he did not actually suggest USING them here.



But many more people, people perfectly open to play-acting and joining in imaginative scenarios and spending a few hours with friends in an enthusiastic session of pretending to be heroes, wander away from that table and see no reason to return. From a human being’s perspective, that decision makes perfect sense. From the hobbyist’s perspective, it feels like a tragedy.

If that isn't advocating freeform and rules lite roleplay I'm not sure what is.



Right, so since your experiences go one way, you do not believe that anyone else could have experiences that could be correct. Got it.


No, I don't agree that the experiences that this person is unscientifically attributing to the majority of people are really those of the majority. He's attributing a specific cause and claiming it's driving people away from the hobby, with no anecdotes listed save for his imaginary anecdote. I've introduced people to the hobby and have never seen this, have you? Have you introduced a friend to roleplaying and then had them leave because the rules were too difficult?



Getting people to discuss the topic. :) Which, for all your wasted rage, is in fact what you are doing.


But changing things due to this discussion would be more harmful than helpful, which is the problem.



Anyway, if Dungeon World and Savage Worlds are "okay" then you are AGREEING with me. Namely, that games with fewer rules work well for teaching. (Also, all the boardgames you list have relatively simple rules. But I disagree that they are the gateway boardgames, because everyone has already played them.)

You have misread my post. I said the complexity of rules is not really that relevant to the use of a system for a beginner, rather as Terra Oblivion pointed out, the quality of instruction is the key factor, you could start somebody on HERO system and if they could grasp the mechanical concepts they'd be fine with the rules if they were properly taught.

So again, I said nothing that agreed with you, I just said that virtually any system can be used to teach people if it has rules. And that in my opinion having no rules (or a very light rules layout is bad). When I was a kid and I was just getting into roleplaying games I can remember trying to figure out some of the more freeform ones, and they were complex and difficult for me, and I used to play pretend all the time, I had no power or running water, so I was very experienced at that sort of thing, and I still found rules light systems (I believe it was some early FUDGE incarnation, but don't quote me on that) to be more difficult to use and less logical than MERP (which is bad off the notoriously rules heavy Rolemaster. So I cite again, the vast majority of my personal experience has been to the contrary. So have you introduced people who found the rules daunting?

sktarq
2014-07-21, 06:04 PM
As someone who has introduced many a person to various RPG's id say the rules issue being overwhelming is as much an aspect of the single hardest part of a new player..."What do I do"". RPG's rarely have a "right" answer and this throws many people. Rules can either provide a menu of possible actions or can seem like a maze of translating an idea. People freeze up alot or treat it like a battle game - because killing enemies must be winning right? A really heavy co-op storytelling experience can be just as intimidating, very jargon laced, and equally likely to drive people away-just without the excuse of the math. The social expectations of more "role" playing style games can be probably worse at pushing people away. In both cases it is a matter that people experienced in the game treat the game as easy/intuitive an don't treat it as something to be taught-because everyone knows how to play pretend and do third grade math. I think that is wrong-its a skill that takes introduction and once the basics are covered then can be taught by experience. No matter what the style or system it takes work to bring somebody into the hobby and have them enjoy themselves, and that expectation is not necessarily part of the social norms of the game. and yeah the stereotype of the RPG player being socially maladroit show up here-painfully often

Terraoblivion
2014-07-21, 06:26 PM
So again, I said nothing that agreed with you, I just said that virtually any system can be used to teach people if it has rules. And that in my opinion having no rules (or a very light rules layout is bad). When I was a kid and I was just getting into roleplaying games I can remember trying to figure out some of the more freeform ones, and they were complex and difficult for me, and I used to play pretend all the time, I had no power or running water, so I was very experienced at that sort of thing, and I still found rules light systems (I believe it was some early FUDGE incarnation, but don't quote me on that) to be more difficult to use and less logical than MERP (which is bad off the notoriously rules heavy Rolemaster. So I cite again, the vast majority of my personal experience has been to the contrary. So have you introduced people who found the rules daunting?

It's factually untrue that people as a whole need to have rules in order to learn to RP. There are tens or hundreds of thousands of people involved in freeform fandom RP'ing who have never so much as touched the rulebook of an RP system. Some people need rules and some people wouldn't touch them and most people can work with either if the introduction is good and catches their interest. Neither fewer rules nor more rules is universally true and can be applied to literally every new player. People are individuals with individual interests, aptitudes and preferences. These range from pure freeform to pure tactical system mastery and everything in between. Both sides of this debate has a nasty habit of insisting that their preferences are universal. They're not. I know people from across this spectrum.

kyoryu
2014-07-21, 06:40 PM
As someone who has introduced many a person to various RPG's id say the rules issue being overwhelming is as much an aspect of the single hardest part of a new player..."What do I do"".

For new players, I'd say the best thing I've found is to make the situation as simple, direct, and relatable as possible.

"You're in a new town. What do you do?" - Bleah. Experienced players might have an idea, but new players literally have nothing to base that decision on.

"You're in a new town. A fight breaks out in the tavern across the street". Better.

"You're in a new town, at the tavern. Some drunk guy comes up to you, pulls back his fist, and is ready to throw a punch. What do you do?"

Simple, immediate, direct, and doesn't require a lot of "world knowledge". It's relatable by even non-gamers.

Jay R
2014-07-21, 06:51 PM
People don't like the same things I do because they don't all like the same things I do.

And that's fine.

I don't know why most people don't enjoy American football. I do, and they don't have to.

I don't know why most people don't enjoy fencing. I do, and they don't have to.

I don't know why most people don't enjoy hard-core science fiction. I do, and they don't have to.

I don't know why most people don't enjoy bicycling. I do, and they don't have to.

I don't know why most people don't enjoy hiking and camping. I do, and they don't have to.

And I don't know why most people don't enjoy role-playing games. I do, and they don't have to.

They can have their pastimes, and I can have mine.

AMFV
2014-07-21, 08:32 PM
It's factually untrue that people as a whole need to have rules in order to learn to RP. There are tens or hundreds of thousands of people involved in freeform fandom RP'ing who have never so much as touched the rulebook of an RP system. Some people need rules and some people wouldn't touch them and most people can work with either if the introduction is good and catches their interest. Neither fewer rules nor more rules is universally true and can be applied to literally every new player. People are individuals with individual interests, aptitudes and preferences. These range from pure freeform to pure tactical system mastery and everything in between. Both sides of this debate has a nasty habit of insisting that their preferences are universal. They're not. I know people from across this spectrum.

You'll also note that I didn't make that claim. You'll also note that I said exactly that, I said that the rules density of a system was to my mind not important when compared to the ability of people to teach it. I just said that in my experience people tend to do better when they have more rules. Which isn't a universal but at least for me is a fairly strong contradiction of the statement that more rules is driving people away from the hobby. I'm fairly sure elitism, a fractured base, and the ready accessibility of online alternatives are driving folks away much more quickly than complex rule systems.

Arbane
2014-07-21, 09:39 PM
As another datapoint, consider Vampire: the Masquerade. Whatever its merits, I think I can make two statements about it:

1: It got a LOT of people interested in it who wouldn't have played RPGs otherwise.
2: It appears to have been designed by a mathophobe.

AMFV
2014-07-21, 09:51 PM
As another datapoint, consider Vampire: the Masquerade. Whatever its merits, I think I can make two statements about it:

1: It got a LOT of people interested in it who wouldn't have played RPGs otherwise.
2: It appears to have been designed by a mathophobe.

While V:tM is not very math heavy (potentially reinforcing in part one minor segment of his argument) it is extremely, extremely, extremely heavy on the rules dictating your character type. You can't take certain Merits and Disciplines if you aren't the right Covenant or Bloodline (and yes I know it's just the one in VtM, most of my actual play experience is VtR), "Well you want to be able to use Nightmare... tough you're not a Nosferatu, and we're playing a Coteri of Deava", things like that.

The rant was less focused on math and more focused on complex rules, and VtM definitely qualifies in that regard. Although to my mind it's a good game (I'm not saying anything against it, I enjoyed nWoD immensely, and I enjoyed reading oWoD immensely although I've never found a group), I'm just saying that it's popularity and existence do not support the rant. If anything they make the opposite point, "people will be willing to tolerate fairly absurdest rules if it allows them to better simulate what's currently popular"

Knaight
2014-07-22, 12:01 AM
As another datapoint, consider Vampire: the Masquerade. Whatever its merits, I think I can make two statements about it:

1: It got a LOT of people interested in it who wouldn't have played RPGs otherwise.
2: It appears to have been designed by a mathophobe.

I wouldn't call it rules light. Sure, the individual calculations are even simpler than in D&D (at least until you start trying to calculate probabilities), but there's still a whole bunch of them. It's not exactly rules light, between it's nine attribute you need to memorize, long lists of clans, etc.

Lord Raziere
2014-07-22, 12:09 AM
I wouldn't call it rules light. Sure, the individual calculations are even simpler than in D&D (at least until you start trying to calculate probabilities), but there's still a whole bunch of them. It's not exactly rules light, between it's nine attribute you need to memorize, long lists of clans, etc.

yeah. there are people who classify Storyteller being on the same wavelength as DnD rules-wise, even though their intents and focuses are completely different

now Fate Accelerated, THAT was designed by a mathophobe. or Nobilis, that one doesn't even have rolls, so either one of those...and those are just ones I know of and have read. there is apparently something called Amber Diceless somewhere out there, but I have no idea how that works...

Avilan the Grey
2014-07-22, 01:10 AM
And I feel sorry for people who can't imagine being in a fantasy world without relying on numbers.

Not sure if I get your point here?

Edit:
So apparently you thought I was condesending somehow? I either suck at english, or you read WAY too much into that sentence.
Still doesn't explain your comment above, though.

Fiery Diamond
2014-07-22, 02:20 AM
If that isn't advocating freeform and rules lite roleplay I'm not sure what is.



No, I don't agree that the experiences that this person is unscientifically attributing to the majority of people are really those of the majority. He's attributing a specific cause and claiming it's driving people away from the hobby, with no anecdotes listed save for his imaginary anecdote. I've introduced people to the hobby and have never seen this, have you? Have you introduced a friend to roleplaying and then had them leave because the rules were too difficult?



But changing things due to this discussion would be more harmful than helpful, which is the problem.



You have misread my post. I said the complexity of rules is not really that relevant to the use of a system for a beginner, rather as Terra Oblivion pointed out, the quality of instruction is the key factor, you could start somebody on HERO system and if they could grasp the mechanical concepts they'd be fine with the rules if they were properly taught.

So again, I said nothing that agreed with you, I just said that virtually any system can be used to teach people if it has rules. And that in my opinion having no rules (or a very light rules layout is bad). When I was a kid and I was just getting into roleplaying games I can remember trying to figure out some of the more freeform ones, and they were complex and difficult for me, and I used to play pretend all the time, I had no power or running water, so I was very experienced at that sort of thing, and I still found rules light systems (I believe it was some early FUDGE incarnation, but don't quote me on that) to be more difficult to use and less logical than MERP (which is bad off the notoriously rules heavy Rolemaster. So I cite again, the vast majority of my personal experience has been to the contrary. So have you introduced people who found the rules daunting?

Finding them "daunting" and finding them off-putting are not the same thing. At all. So, to answer the ACTUAL question, which is "have you introduced someone to role-playing through a particular RPG and had them leave because the rules were off-putting due to their complexity?" - yes, absolutely. This particular friend vastly prefers freeform, actually, and by freeform I mean no system at all. I was trying to introduce her to D&D. She found the rules, by their nature, abundance, and complexity, to be off-putting.


It's factually untrue that people as a whole need to have rules in order to learn to RP. There are tens or hundreds of thousands of people involved in freeform fandom RP'ing who have never so much as touched the rulebook of an RP system. Some people need rules and some people wouldn't touch them and most people can work with either if the introduction is good and catches their interest. Neither fewer rules nor more rules is universally true and can be applied to literally every new player. People are individuals with individual interests, aptitudes and preferences. These range from pure freeform to pure tactical system mastery and everything in between. Both sides of this debate has a nasty habit of insisting that their preferences are universal. They're not. I know people from across this spectrum.

Thank you for this. My aforementioned friend is one of those people you mention at the beginning of your post. (Though she doesn't actually do stuff with fandoms, though she may have started that way - it's much like collaboratively writing a novel the way she does it. Which, by the way, makes doing a 2-person RP much easier than it is in almost any system I know of.)


You'll also note that I didn't make that claim. You'll also note that I said exactly that, I said that the rules density of a system was to my mind not important when compared to the ability of people to teach it. I just said that in my experience people tend to do better when they have more rules. Which isn't a universal but at least for me is a fairly strong contradiction of the statement that more rules is driving people away from the hobby. I'm fairly sure elitism, a fractured base, and the ready accessibility of online alternatives are driving folks away much more quickly than complex rule systems.

I actually disagree that that's truly how you should interpret your experience. For the purposes of "tend to do better when they have more [X]," rules =/= guidelines. People do better when they have more guidelines. These guidelines don't need to be in the form of formalized rules. They just need to be presented in a way that is clear and understood.

People need, at base, the following:

WHAT: What they, as a player, can do. What they, as a character, can do, be, perceive, and such.
HOW: How they, as a player, get their intentions accomplished. How they, as a character, can go about accomplishing their intentions.
NORMAL: What is normal for the game? This can refer to anything from tropes, genre conventions, attitudes, physical capabilities of characters, and anything else that might differ from game to game. What are the expectations that are brought to the table for what is normal, possible, and so forth.
RANGE: Now that they know normal, how much are they allowed to deviate? If normally a swordsman can run thirty feet and slash twice at a single opponent, which might or might not kill them, is it okay to leap sixty feet and slash through a flying foe or is that too far out? If normally you can haggle for a better deal, is it possible to talk the king into supplying your party with half of the treasury to fund your "defense of the kingdom" expedition or not? If normally the tone is dramatic and serious, is it okay to occasionally have slapstick comedy or not?
WHEN: Now that they know the range, when are they allowed to deviate? What circumstances or conditions are necessary for a particular deviation? And so forth.
FORBIDDEN: They know what they can do, how they can do it, what's normal, what range of deviation they can have, and when they can deviate. What things are outright forbidden, and why? Are they forbidden for logistical or stylistic reasons (no, your knight of the round table can't have ninjutsu abilities)? Are they forbidden for social or cohesion reasons (no, you can't wantonly murder all the peasants, no, you can't murder your fellow players' characters, no, you can't give people cancer, no you can't mind control people)?
FROWNED ON: They know what's forbidden. What's not outright forbidden, but is frowned upon? How much are such things allowed, and what are the consequences for doing them?

You'll note that some of these are things that, in a rules-heavy game, would be pretty explicitly covered by the rules, but that others have more to do with the social structure of the gaming group. Some categories include both things. All of these apply equally to rules-heavy, rules-lite, and freeform games. Many people do a poor job of presenting this information to new players, especially the last category, which often gets left unspoken entirely and can lead to all kinds of conflict. Rules-heavy games tend to make some of this information easier to present, but they also have the tendency to accidentally convince people that the things that aren't part of the rules are less important or unimportant.

Seppo87
2014-07-22, 02:56 AM
I wouldn't call it rules light. Sure, the individual calculations are even simpler than in D&D (at least until you start trying to calculate probabilities), but there's still a whole bunch of them. It's not exactly rules light, between it's nine attribute you need to memorize, long lists of clans, etc.
the system is light, the setting is large

having a large setting does not scare away people the same way an heavy system does. That's the whole point of the OP

Knaight
2014-07-22, 03:43 AM
the system is light, the setting is large

having a large setting does not scare away people the same way an heavy system does. That's the whole point of the OP

I'm contesting the system being light. It's lighter than D&D 3e, yes. There's still a fair number of steps to character creation, plenty more to doing things like combat, etc. The actual mechanics don't live up to the reputation of lightness at all.

Rolero
2014-07-22, 07:27 AM
It is very clear that the article is referencing D&D and its encyclopedia of rules. The fact is that this game can be pretty intimidating and boring for new players, who will sit at the table hearing how things happen without contributing to any of them, and some discusions about rules from time to time.

In my experience I have had a few potencial players who never came back to the table after a sesion or two of D&D. IMHO, the best way to introduce newbies is making the game as narrative as posible, and skiping as much rules as you can. When rolls need to be made, roll for them or tell them what to roll omiting any unnecesary rule explanation, and enforcing fellow players to do the same. Then, little by little, as the new guy grows attached to the game, start to ask him to get used to how the game works.

Another option, is trying a complete different game to get their attention. For my part, classic world of darkness works great. If played well, you can play whole sesions with very few rolls and little explanation on the system.
If people like to play heroes easy to understand, 7th Sea is excellent. Anyone who have seen Pirates of the Caribean sea or The three musketeer will inmidiatly get the setting, and the rules are easy to learn and fast to play. This works too for Leyend of the five rings, if the players like oriental miths and samurai folklore.
If into horror, Call of Cthulhu or Kult can be amazing. Make the players going with normal persons who get to discover the horror hidden in their worlds. I played a whole campaign of Kult without reading the manual, learning everything I know in gameplay only, and to this day, is one of the best games I've ever played.

I could go on forever, but the point that many people forget is that in its core a role playing game is just that, role playing. Forget about the rules, let the new people have fredom to act and experiment and build a game around the narrative and the plot twists, and the new guy will be hooked forever.

Raimun
2014-07-22, 10:29 AM
I don't think anyone likes numbers, really. Numbers are at best of instrumental value.

At the end, people like hard and fast limits to their character's abilities. That is what the numbers and rules make possible.

People don't like dices and announcing numbers, either. They like the unpredictability they introduce to the game. "Is there someone sneaking behind me? If there is, am I able to hear it approach? I roll perception!"

The problem I have with freeform is that it lacks hard and fast limits and unpredictability.

The GM might just announce that some attempts to do stuff fail every time, because "No one would be able to do that." Or the reverse, someone succeeds every time because "Well, you know these things because you have some training." The former is especially my experience with people who prefer freeform: they don't *usually* have a good frame of reference:

Me: "Ok, so, we're all tied up and inside big glass tubes. There's no one around, we just woke up and they took all of our gear. Oh, heck, I'll try to break free from my restraints and the glass tube I'm in."

Freeform-player: (Clearly out of character) "Heh, good luck with that, Raimun, no one would be able to do that."

Me: "You forgot I'm a cybernetic clone soldier who fought gallantly in interstellar wars. I'm rolling the dice... 17. Three raises."

GM: "Huh, that's more than enough. You're out of the tube. What are the rest of you doing."

Me: "I think I should help them out."

With rules, numbers and dice rolling people can make sensible predictions about the things they attempt to do but at the same time, the results are also unpredictable. In the above example, even though my character had great strength, my escape was not automatic, I merely had a chance to get out and I just happened to roll high. Very high, in fact.

AMFV
2014-07-22, 10:41 AM
I don't think anyone likes numbers, really. Numbers are at best of instrumental value.

At the end, people like hard and fast limits to their character's abilities. That is what the numbers and rules make possible.

People don't like dices and announcing numbers, either. They like the unpredictability they introduce to the game. "Is there someone sneaking behind me? If there is, am I able to hear it approach? I roll perception!"

The problem I have with freeform is that it lacks hard and fast limits and unpredictability.

The GM might just announce that some attempts to do stuff fail every time, because "No one would be able to do that." Or the reverse, someone succeeds every time because "Well, you know these things because you have some training." The former is especially my experience with people who prefer freeform: they don't *usually* have a good frame of reference:

Me: "Ok, so, we're all tied up and inside big glass tubes. There's no one around, we just woke up and they took all of our gear. Oh, heck, I'll try to break free from my restraints and the glass tube I'm in."

Freeform-player: (Clearly out of character) "Heh, good luck with that, Raimun, no one would be able to do that."

Me: "You forgot I'm a cybernetic clone soldier who fought gallantly in interstellar wars. I'm rolling the dice... 17. Three raises."

GM: "Huh, that's more than enough. You're out of the tube. What are the rest of you doing."

Me: "I think I should help them out."

With rules, numbers and dice rolling people can make sensible predictions about the things they attempt to do but at the same time, the results are also unpredictable. In the above example, even though my character had great strength, my escape was not automatic, I merely had a chance to get out and I just happened to roll high. Very high, in fact.

Well that's one of the problems with Freeform... But there are people who love dice and rules and calculating the best way to figure things. I love figuring out rules points.

tomandtish
2014-07-22, 05:24 PM
Actually one thing I haven't seen mentioned (maybe I missed it?) is cost. D&D especially is expensive. Looking at 5th edition, one set of Player's handbook, Monster Manuel, and DM's guide is going to cost your group about $100. And if you're just getting into roleplaying, you'll need all three for a good start. That's a LOT of money for something you aren't sure if you'll be interested in.

(I've heard they've released some of the basic play rules as a free download, but I've also heard they are insufficient for anything but a taste, and aren't that friendly for players who aren't familiar with RPGs to begin with. Maybe someone who has seen them can comment?)

AMFV
2014-07-22, 05:55 PM
Actually one thing I haven't seen mentioned (maybe I missed it?) is cost. D&D especially is expensive. Looking at 5th edition, one set of Player's handbook, Monster Manuel, and DM's guide is going to cost your group about $100. And if you're just getting into roleplaying, you'll need all three for a good start. That's a LOT of money for something you aren't sure if you'll be interested in.

(I've heard they've released some of the basic play rules as a free download, but I've also heard they are insufficient for anything but a taste, and aren't that friendly for players who aren't familiar with RPGs to begin with. Maybe someone who has seen them can comment?)

I think that's why the SRD for both PF and 3.5 are amazing, because they allow people to begin playing at a much cheaper level.

sktarq
2014-07-22, 06:14 PM
For new players,.... It's relatable by even non-gamers.

I don't really think it is necessary to strike any particular play-style with a new player. It is more a matter of actually being a decent teacher for whatever style of game is being run.

I think of it rather like learning to whistle or trill one's r's-hard until you get it. then very easy.

veti
2014-07-22, 06:53 PM
(I've heard they've released some of the basic play rules as a free download, but I've also heard they are insufficient for anything but a taste, and aren't that friendly for players who aren't familiar with RPGs to begin with. Maybe someone who has seen them can comment?)

I've seen the free version of 5th Ed. It's fine as far as it goes, but it's too obviously just a tiny taster meant to sucker you in to paying serious money for the "real" thing. It's the kind of book you read, and then think "Yes? And then what happened?"

For instance, it only has four classes. That wouldn't be so bad, if you could multiclass freely and there was a bit of latitude about choosing level abilities - but neither of those two conditions is met, so basically you're going to play one of four characters, who for all practical intents and purposes are pregenerated.

I'm also willing to bet that all four of these base classes will be overshadowed by higher-tier variants available in the core books at release, and rendered increasingly obsolete as more and more supplements come out.

Edit: the free rules are here (http://media.wizards.com/downloads/dnd/DnDBasicRules.pdf). To me it looks like one of those MMOs that's "free to play", but if you actually want to get anywhere it'll cost you one arm, one leg, apes, peacocks, your house, the soul of your firstborn child, and a lifetime subscription to "I'm A Nerd, Get Me Out Of Here".

ZenoForce88
2014-07-23, 10:57 AM
I honestly don't think the writer of that rant was talking about Rules-Heavy vs Rules-Light. But rather the apparent mentality of most gaming veterans, expectantly when it comes to face-to-face, and in some cases, skyped or Roll20 Online games. I can't speak for everyone, because I haven't been in everyone's games, but in my own experiences there is no narrative beyond "I smack it with my stick." For just about every face-to-face and Roll20 game I've been in it was just the stats, rather it was rules heavy or rules light, no one played a role beyond the typical MMO Roles of DPS, Tank, Healer and so on. It was about the numbers and ONLY the numbers, no character personality no sense of immersion into the games world. Sure a lot of the ranter's examples could be tied to D&D, but I could tie them to any number of other games as well, but D&D is the MOST well known Game on the market, as far as I know, so it would make sense to use D&D-Like examples, as it would be more likely that people connect with the rant.

So to sum it up, the issue the Ranter is speaking of has nothing to do with the rules, but the PLAYERS, who would rather Rollplay then Roleplay, and that was very much my experience when I started out in the hobby.

AMFV
2014-07-23, 11:06 AM
I honestly don't think the writer of that rant was talking about Rules-Heavy vs Rules-Light. But rather the apparent mentality of most gaming veterans, expectantly when it comes to face-to-face, and in some cases, skyped or Roll20 Online games. I can't speak for everyone, because I haven't been in everyone's games, but in my own experiences there is no narrative beyond "I smack it with my stick." For just about every face-to-face and Roll20 game I've been in it was just the stats, rather it was rules heavy or rules light, no one played a role beyond the typical MMO Roles of DPS, Tank, Healer and so on. It was about the numbers and ONLY the numbers, no character personality no sense of immersion into the games world. Sure a lot of the ranter's examples could be tied to D&D, but I could tie them to any number of other games as well, but D&D is the MOST well known Game on the market, as far as I know, so it would make sense to use D&D-Like examples, as it would be more likely that people connect with the rant.

So to sum it up, the issue the Ranter is speaking of has nothing to do with the rules, but the PLAYERS, who would rather Rollplay then Roleplay, and that was very much my experience when I started out in the hobby.

Rollplay and roleplay are not mutually exclusive.

Edit: Furthermore he doesn't discuss immersion, but rather having lots of rules thrown at you. Which he sees as offputting.

ZenoForce88
2014-07-23, 11:36 AM
Well it would be, no matter how Rules-Heavy or Rules-Light the system is. Because the players care only for the numbers, not the supposed characters these numbers are meant to represent.

AMFV
2014-07-23, 11:49 AM
Well it would be, no matter how Rules-Heavy or Rules-Light the system is. Because the players care only for the numbers, not the supposed characters these numbers are meant to represent.

But in the rant they do care about what the characters represent. The player is driven off because they haven't approved certain rules, from what I can tell it results from RP restrictions or could as easily as from rules restrictions.

Furthermore it is again possible to care about both of those things. And still yet, it's fine to want only the mechanical aspects of the game with only thin veneer of roleplay, that can be a totally acceptable game as well.

ZenoForce88
2014-07-23, 12:25 PM
I'm not saying that you can't blend the two, just that they weren't in my specific experiences which had me agree with the rant. Or even that focusing only on the Crunch is BadWrongFun, just that for most people who WANT to roleplay, The typical group, again from my own experiences, will focus only on the crunch which would drive off the new player.

As for the player not getting what they wanted due to rules, that was only part of an example of someone ready to jump in and hit the ground with their legs running, who is put down partly because of the rules, but if it goes on, to show it's the OTHER older players going into the crunch of an optimized standpoint, mixed with one player already having that class/roll within the game, that truely shunts the new player from getting what they want, beyond a compromise.

Pluto!
2014-07-23, 09:07 PM
The biggest obstacle I have getting people to play RPGs is finding a routine time that 3-5 people can set 3-4 hours aside every week or two.

Or convincing potential players that hanging out inside and pretending to be an elf is a semi-reasonable pastime.

AMFV
2014-07-23, 09:13 PM
The biggest obstacle I have getting people to play RPGs is finding a routine time that 3-5 people can set 3-4 hours aside every week or two.

Or convincing potential players that hanging out inside and pretending to be an elf is a semi-reasonable pastime.

The first problem is pretty difficult to surmount. As to the second problem if you supply free drinks that can be easily fixed, although that may present it's own problems.

Knaight
2014-07-23, 10:49 PM
The biggest obstacle I have getting people to play RPGs is finding a routine time that 3-5 people can set 3-4 hours aside every week or two.

I suspect this is true of most people. I can say that it's been my biggest issue, though logistical skills among my friend groups tend to be rather lacking.

russdm
2014-07-23, 11:46 PM
It is possible that possible players are being attracted to other games like WoW or Computer RPGs. Most of these are both easy to get into and have pretty compelling stories, or in the case of WoW allows the player to really do whatever they want.

Take Elder Scrolls Oblivion or Fallout 3; you can pretty much have complete freedom to do whatever you want as long as you can deal with a few minor obstacles. Neither game really requires learning a bunch of new rules to even start playing and the game teaches you everything that you will need from the start, leaving you to explore how much of the rules you want as you decide.

Computer RPGs tend to be more time free in that I can take aside however much time I want to play. For most real life games, you run into issues of coordinating times and dealing with no-shows plus the players might not be all that wonderful. Compared to dealing with that, spending an hour or two to play WoW looks like a better investment, or maybe a few hours of another game that still looks better.

D&D 3.5 isn't really newbie friendly even with level 1 characters and can be expensive, plus its not really all that fun at the level that much. But higher levels than 1 are hard to get started quickly. The best starter classes, Barbarian/Cleric/Rogue/Sorcerer, still require some explanation to get started.

There is also the fact for D&D that it doesn't fit any of the actual stories that would interest people in playing the game and that might throw people off. After reading actual heroic fantasy and approaching D&D, one catches very quickly on that the heroic fantasy stories aren't actually represented in any way by the game. D&D may call itself "Heroic fantasy" but it doesn't really fit much.

A better explanation of what I mean is the experience of playing the Knights of the Old republic games and playing the saga edition game. Both are supposed to all for playing in the cinematic style of the star wars movies, but only one really hits it. The computer game works, while the saga edition frequently slows down and really doesn't feel too star wars-y. Knights of the Old Republic does during its whole play through.

I think that most game groups presume that new players would be able to just jump right in, and so don't bother to explain anything. There is also a slight thought, I think, that new players will buy the books and read them thoroughly and maybe be able to pass a quiz before they even start trying to play the game which is rather odd.

Beleriphon
2014-07-24, 05:27 AM
I think that most game groups presume that new players would be able to just jump right in, and so don't bother to explain anything.

I think that's the biggest hurdle. The expectation that new players are on the same page the old ones. New players are so not on the same page, they aren't even the book yet. So what ends up happening is that the new player is given information in an extremely haphazard way which makes the game seem hard to grasp, and also makes the existing players look like jerks. Its nobodie's fault per se since most people are terrible teachers unless they have some background in providing training to adults.

As for 5E the Basic Ruleset is a complete game. I could play D&D with just that as a full 1 to 20 campaign. It isn't going to have every option in it, and the class options are the most basic, but it is a complete game.

VoxRationis
2014-07-24, 07:03 AM
, or in the case of WoW allows the player to really do whatever they want.
Minus do anything important or permanent in the setting.


Take Elder Scrolls Oblivion or Fallout 3; you can pretty much have complete freedom to do whatever you want as long as you can deal with a few minor obstacles. Neither game really requires learning a bunch of new rules to even start playing and the game teaches you everything that you will need from the start, leaving you to explore how much of the rules you want as you decide.

Computer RPGs tend to be more time free in that I can take aside however much time I want to play. For most real life games, you run into issues of coordinating times and dealing with no-shows plus the players might not be all that wonderful. Compared to dealing with that, spending an hour or two to play WoW looks like a better investment, or maybe a few hours of another game that still looks better.

D&D 3.5 isn't really newbie friendly even with level 1 characters and can be expensive, plus its not really all that fun at the level that much. But higher levels than 1 are hard to get started quickly. The best starter classes, Barbarian/Cleric/Rogue/Sorcerer, still require some explanation to get started.

Why is the Barbarian a better starting class than the Fighter? For a beginner, I would think that the constant changing of your basic stats would make a Barbarian more complicated to run.



A better explanation of what I mean is the experience of playing the Knights of the Old republic games and playing the saga edition game. Both are supposed to all for playing in the cinematic style of the star wars movies, but only one really hits it. The computer game works, while the saga edition frequently slows down and really doesn't feel too star wars-y. Knights of the Old Republic does during its whole play through.

Well, that's interesting, considering KotOR was pretty much just the older d20 Star Wars game with a graphics engine and a premade plot. In that light, your comparison seems more like an edition preference.


I think that most game groups presume that new players would be able to just jump right in, and so don't bother to explain anything. There is also a slight thought, I think, that new players will buy the books and read them thoroughly and maybe be able to pass a quiz before they even start trying to play the game which is rather odd.
Don't assume that, then. I was introduced to the game gently enough, and work hard to introduce new players carefully and slowly.

russdm
2014-07-24, 07:36 PM
Why is the Barbarian a better starting class than the Fighter? For a beginner, I would think that the constant changing of your basic stats would make a Barbarian more complicated to run.

Because it requires less to get started and has a fluff concept that can be quickly understood to play with? Barbarians get rage plus some other skills and you really can't do them wrong, plus saying "I rage" in some form is always fun.

The stat changes involves doing a small amount of adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing that happens to be rather easy, so how it is difficult? You can use calculators while you play, after all.

Fighters aren't newbie friendly unless you just go with power attack and cleave, otherwise you have to pick what x career of y options the fighter has, plus you have to plan ahead or end up with a fighter with feats all over the place. Plus the fluff doesn't really apply much or any because it is simply too broad to make sense of.

Barbarian fluff: Wild man/woman that wears animal skins and can rage, while being unable to read. Very in tune to nature too.

Fighter fluff: Can be an archer or soldier or some merc or any other combat focused description.


Minus do anything important or permanent in the setting.

Really? Considering that would apply against all game campaign settings as well, I don't see the argument. Only your actions in the individual game affects the campaign setting you are using, so its nothing different than what WoW does.

Knaight
2014-07-24, 10:19 PM
Really? Considering that would apply against all game campaign settings as well, I don't see the argument. Only your actions in the individual game affects the campaign setting you are using, so its nothing different than what WoW does.

It's totally different from what WoW does. The campaign setting in question essentially only exists for the group of people at a given table - even if it's from an existing setting somewhere, it's being interpreted in a particular way, particular material is being added, etc. That campaign setting is highly malleable, and the PCs can actually affect it. in WoW, that's not really there. You raid a dungeon, and everything in it comes right back. Overworld areas (which aren't even that large, really) seem to be completely resistant to population changes, mining effects, etc. Plenty of ways to interact with the world, such as by building things, the vast majority of social maneuvering, and any real direction of populations aren't even there.

russdm
2014-07-24, 10:47 PM
It's totally different from what WoW does. The campaign setting in question essentially only exists for the group of people at a given table - even if it's from an existing setting somewhere, it's being interpreted in a particular way, particular material is being added, etc. That campaign setting is highly malleable, and the PCs can actually affect it. in WoW, that's not really there. You raid a dungeon, and everything in it comes right back. Overworld areas (which aren't even that large, really) seem to be completely resistant to population changes, mining effects, etc. Plenty of ways to interact with the world, such as by building things, the vast majority of social maneuvering, and any real direction of populations aren't even there.

Being that WoW is an MMO played by lots of people at the same time, I don't really think that they could have what you do affect everyone else's play.

In Star Wars the Old Republic though, you apparently are playing, in my experience, a single player experience in a multiplayer world. Which is rather strange yes, but that's really how it works a lot. There are areas available for everybody together and some that only you can go into by yourself with your companions.

It has, in my experience, been better than the average tabletop game experience in terms of fun. Again, in my experience.

Knaight
2014-07-24, 11:05 PM
Being that WoW is an MMO played by lots of people at the same time, I don't really think that they could have what you do affect everyone else's play.

The feasibility of implementing meaningful changes is completely irrelevant to the matter of their actual presence, and it's their actual presence that matters to their utility as a substitute.

VoxRationis
2014-07-24, 11:17 PM
Fighters aren't newbie friendly unless you just go with power attack and cleave, otherwise you have to pick what x career of y options the fighter has, plus you have to plan ahead or end up with a fighter with feats all over the place. Plus the fluff doesn't really apply much or any because it is simply too broad to make sense of.
A fighter is simply that; a person who is trained in fighting. How difficult is that to make sense of?



Really? Considering that would apply against all game campaign settings as well, I don't see the argument. Only your actions in the individual game affects the campaign setting you are using, so its nothing different than what WoW does.

Except that the basic game for most MMOs (and WoW in particular) is static, barring those which are completely player-driven (I think the one I'm thinking of is called Eve...); borders don't change, alliances don't shift, dungeons repopulate, etc. By contrast, if I play my cards right when my DM runs something in Forgotten Realms, I can overthrow the Lords of Waterdeep and carve out my own realm along the Sword Coast, and the repercussions of that action will continue to be felt through the whole campaign.

russdm
2014-07-24, 11:50 PM
A fighter is simply that; a person who is trained in fighting. How difficult is that to make sense of?


Very, apparently to WotC. To probably run a fighter, you have to pick all of the feats and make sure everything works, whereas the concept says you can just have the character pick up a sword and get started.

This is something the barbarian can do really quickly with little fuss, but the simple fighter requires more. Unless you use the starting package which has you ready instantly.

oxybe
2014-07-25, 01:38 AM
I will agree with 3.5, the barbarian is generally the better "newbie friendly" class. It can wear decent armor and tends to have the most HP for high survivability.

For most things, the effects strength and con bonus can be easily done in shorthand form beforehand and explained to the player

Whenever you rage you get:
+2 to hit
+3 damage with your greataxe / +2 damage with your handaxe
your HP raises by 2/Level (but take note of how much damage you've taken!)
+2 Fort save
+2 Will save
-2 AC

Just make sure they understand where these bonuses come from and they're pretty much good to go. Recalculating the skills for the rather short period of the rage is generally overkill unless you're raging in the water or something.
As for combat values, I've taken the habit of doing a few pre-made stats based of if I'm power attacking or whatnot so I don't have to recalculate beforehand so a new player can have

Greataxe +5, 1d12+6
Greataxe (rage) +7, 1d12+9
Greataxe (Power Attack) +4, 1d12+8
Greataxe (rage & PA) +6, 1d12+11

Beyond that there's generally less feats to worry about so telling our newbie to just pick something like power attack enhancers and slowing working him into being comfortable with the mechanics will allow him to feel strong with a rather straightforward PC.

If you think power attack might over-complicate things, just give him things like weapon focus/static boons for now and keep giving him big, magical axes.