On Tue, 20 Dec 2005, Carl D Cravens wrote: CDC>If the player understands his own motivations, then there just needs CDC>to be open communication among the players and GM. If, yes. CDC>This is one of the things the Forgeites have been big on, and one of CDC>the areas that I think they're doing something of real value. They CDC>recognize that there are a million assumptions about how we're going CDC>to play, and that people don't talk about them enough. Bankuei gives Yep. That comes back to my own preferences: horrendously detailed character generation (and before that, campaign description), then no rules after that. Get all the assumptions out on the table and the rest of the game should flow. CDC>And I think the bit of discussion Karen captured and brought over here CDC>is a portrait of that... the player takes the biggest combat skills he CDC>can get because he wants something from the game that involves this, CDC>but you can't be entirely sure what it is he wants. The gamemaster, CDC>thinking this is somehow damaging to the game, is on the defensive and CDC>tries to figure out how to neutralize it, but doesn't outright forbid CDC>taking it. The GM _punishes_ the player for making a choice that was CDC>legal in the rules and not forbidden by the GM. And many GMs seem to CDC>be assuming that this is a _natural reaction_ to the player's choices. Some of it's part of the adversarial relationship, some of which is normal and some of which is dysfunctional. But yeah, it's back to the unwritten vs. written rules. -- Karen J. Cravens silver@phoenyx.net ---------------------------------------------------------------- GAMERS Home Page: http://www.phoenyx.net/gamers/
