Why I don't like PbtA

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Another publisher the other day was fending off criticism that he was going soft by some of his fans by not reviewing games. It is that once you become a publisher, or whatever, give it up, not only is it an ethics violation, you can get sued, as what happened recently.
 
Someone got sued for reviewing another company's game?
 
Interesting. Tho it wasn't a review, more like two designers trading words, still that isn't what the court is going to look at it like.
 
oh that, yeah, it was a publisher running a kickstarter who interpreted quackalope's inquiries as threatening ('support us or we'll give your game a bad review")

Having read the original communications I don't think that was the intended message or tone, that it was mostly a miscommunication, but I also think the way Quackalope handled the situation after the accusation was clumsy and awkward and just made everything worse.
 
AsenRG said:
No, you're getting that ass-backwards. Neither of them is new, we know that. Neither is foreign. But would you say that both are appropriate for all playstyles?
Because I'd say they're very much not, and might actively work against the goals of some playstyles:thumbsup:.

And in this case, people who like those playstyles would be right to avoid games that rely on them, just as a player that likes the "build" aspect of PF2 would be right to avoid Wushu...:devil:

Where, exactly, does the GM turn to a player and asks "So, Jimmy, you made your History roll - tell me what's Sir Lancelot going to encounter in that family crypt:shock:?"
Likewise for Amber?

(Odds are good that if there is such advice, I'd have ignored it. But I'd like to know that I'm doing the ignoring...:grin:)

OK. We don't use IC in this way on my table, but I've encountered such usage.

Well, I ain't got a better idea, so I'd stick to my usage and wait until we get a better term, then possibly complain people are using different terms...:gunslinger:


Oh, definitely - I mean, there was a "best examples of PbtA" thread on the front page, but most of the PbtA players are here telling those that don't like it why they're wrong...:tongue:

Frankly, I wouldn't like that. But then I generally prefer Fortune-in-the-Middle for speed of play combined with flexibility.
Besides, people presumably wouldn't give you different complications once the dice have fallen..:shade:
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You know me well enough to know I'm not down on different playstyles or preferences. And I think you probably can guess where the accusation that these playstyles are 'entrist' (a term invented by ML for Trotskyists ironically) comes from.

As to Stafford and Wujick, I'll have to pull out my copy of Prince Valiant for reference, a big influence on storygames and lots of other designers, but for Wujick check out the appendix in Amber, Wujick discusses allowing players to create their own NPCs among other parts of the setting (pg. 79), options for rotating GMs and even discusses eliminating the GM entirely (pg. 234). He has an entire chapter on 'Story-telling Composition' on pages 122-124 and 'Tricks of the Story-Telling Trade' on pages 233-234. In those chapters he discusses the importance of having foreshadowing, a begining, middle, end and closure. He was not dogmatic about game design, as few (if any?) of the great designers are.
 
A Fiery Flying Roll said:
That's a common view on storygames/freeform but I think it's wrong.

With freeform play, the narration determines outcomes. Mechanics, if they're used (and they're often not in pure freeform, at least not beyond a coinflip) are treated as guidelines to be twisted or ignored as necessary. Final judgement on outcomes is generally determined either by group consensus or GM fiat.

Storygames are very different, they're mechanically driven. Designwise, they're arguably close to Euro boardgames; tightly designed machines that aim to produce a singular result and are very dangerous to tinker (AKA house rule) with. Storygames is a bit of a misnomer although it's stuck. It's the mechanics that determine all outcomes and the narration takes place around those mechanical outcomes.

I suspect the latter is more contentious than the former so I'll back it up.

Let's take My Life With Master as an example. I think it's a good one; it is or at least was an absolute darling of the storygame scene, it's won awards etc.

It does exactly what I've described. Everything, down to the endgame, is mechanically determined. It's not actually possible to alter the mechanical outcome of a scene through IC actions, merely how that outcome plays out. Now it's fans would say that's a feature not a bug; the whole point is to use the mechanics as a way of creating interesting narration. And they're right, but it's the exact opposite of freeform play.

As an aside, this is why MLWM bombed when I tried running it. I believed all the stuff about it being about story and thought I could run it in my normal improv heavy loosy goosy with the rules style. Spoiler: It will break down if you do this and do so badly.

Now, very little of this is true of PbTA. Because PbtA is a narrative RPG not a storygame.

And, quite honestly, it's only just a narrative RPG. There's a few player facing decisions which would qualify for me (do you die? being the most significant). And the restrictions placed on GMs, although it's way less strong on that than something like AGON. Most of what people see as "narrative" is stuff like the discussion of agendas and philosophy. And frankly that's just GM advice under another name. So it might suggest taking GM input about the world. But it doesn't mechanically reinforce that mostly, unlike something like FATE.

So yeah, a narrative RPG, but less narrative as narrative RPGs go. The reason I think that isn't recognised is mostly associations people have with its creation. Vince was a prominent Forgie = the Forgies were known for storygaming = PbtA must have strong storygame elements.

That's aggravated by the claims like "PbtA isn't a system, it's a design philosophy". Actually, it's neither, it's a marketing brand. Vince himself has said it's just the term he uses to describe his IP policy.
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Excellent points although I'd say later (and earlier) post-Forge storygames are not all as tightly tied to their mechanic and hard framing as you see in the early games coming out of the Forge.

The line gets blurrier with lots of cross-pollination of later 'storygames,' freeform, larpscripts, etc. 1001 Nights by Meg Baker, Skeletons by Jason Morningstar and many of the games (and larpscripts) of Emily Care Boss come to mind.

Not surprising as there is a fair bit of overlap between those scenes, among designers at least: Emily Care Boss, Jason Morningstar, Tim Hutchings, etc.

Much of my favourite work by all three are in their larpscripts actually.
 
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A Fiery Flying Roll said:
That's aggravated by the claims like "PbtA isn't a system, it's a design philosophy". Actually, it's neither, it's a marketing brand. Vince himself has said it's just the term he uses to describe his IP policy.
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Baker specifically referred to PbtA as a design philosophy in his series of blog posts about PbtA design theory. So there's that.
 
Ladybird said:
"Moves" would just be called "rules" in other systems, though. They're really not doing anything new, it's just presentation.
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Moves are like Feats in that other game. Because they provide a mechanical benefit, players are incentivised to use them. Sure, they're not a new idea - but they're reinforced in the game like Special Ability cards. Just not to my taste because I can see the ingredients of the sausage I guess.

Ladybird said:
The core concept still works great when you strip it back to "roll dice, high is success, low is fail, middling is a bit of both; if you don't feel it's worth rolling, GM decides whether it happens or not". Add in a mechanism for character differentiation and a mechanism that stops PC's endlessly trying again and you're good.
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That's the bit I liked about PBTA (though it wasn't invented by them, it certainly was simplified)
 
DornKratz said:
Moving the conversation a bit, how do you all feel about weak hit/partial success/success at a cost? Do you feel having more degrees of success reduces the number of rolls you make? Do you struggle to come up with complications? What kind of mental adjustment a GM coming from other systems needs to make to have a smooth session and not feel exhausted?
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I struggled to run it for a while, but now I really like it. It’s one of the things from PbtA that influenced my homebrew system (along with having codified principles and a principled orientation towards play). What really helped me grok it finally was playing with a GM who was really good about foregrounding possible consequences. I view it as a kind of shortcut for what the character is experiencing as well as a tool for keeping me honest (since a non-foregrounded and non-obvious consequence would obviously be bullshit).
 
DornKratz said:
Moving the conversation a bit, how do you all feel about weak hit/partial success/success at a cost?
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I've loved the James Bond 007 resolution system since 1986. "Yes, but…" or "success at a cost" slots right in as a possible interpretation of the Quality Rating 4 (partial success), alongside "50% of usual yield" and "success, but takes double the usual time", and formalises what I had been doing for a dozen years to interpret QR4 results on non-quantitative tasks. So I think it is absolutely fine. State of the art since 1983.
 
As far as things I don’t like about PbtA go, I don’t like moves. Specifically, I don’t like the way player moves implicitly encode the process of play. I prefer the skill-oriented approach of traditional systems or action-oriented ones like like Blades in the Dark along with having explicit procedures of play. (And I think I just didn’t like the move design in Stonetop.)
 
kenada said:
As far as things I don’t like about PbtA go, I don’t like moves. Specifically, I don’t like the way player moves implicitly encode the process of play. I prefer the skill-oriented approach of traditional systems or action-oriented ones like like Blades in the Dark along with having explicit procedures of play. (And I think I just didn’t like the move design in Stonetop.)
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I also get on way better with FitD which interestingly has more disassociated mechanics than PbtA. As does FATE, which I also prefer. I think it comes down to the fact that if I'm going to play a narrative RPG I actually want it to commit to that. PbtA feels like neither fish nor fowl at times. Not a trad RPG, but it doesn't have many of the narrative elements it promises either.
 
Baker is *at least* as much of a marketer as Foxy Dan. He's just a lot more genial so people don't mind as much.
 
SJB SJB the design philosophy in question is one that is used iteratively to produce specific results, not one an overarching one that applies to all games designed using the design philosophy. If you were actually familiar with the philosophy in question this might not have felt like such a gotcha moment for you. Sorry!
 
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Fenris-77 said:
SJB SJB the design philosophy in question is one that is used iteratively to produce specific results, not one an overarching one that applies to all games designed using the design philosophy. If you were actually familiar with the philosophy in question this might not have felt like such a gotcha moment for you. Sorry!
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That might be the aim. Let's be honest though, the vast majority of PbtA games out there are "bung together some custom moves and playbooks and call it a day". I don't even think most PbtA fans I know disagree that it has a really shovelware problem. Like, d20 levels of shovelware.
 
A Fiery Flying Roll said:
That might be the aim. Let's be honest though, the vast majority of PbtA games out there are "bung together some custom moves and playbooks and call it a day". I don't even think most PbtA fans I know disagree that it has a really shovelware problem. Like, d20 levels of shovelware.
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No argument from me, there are a rather a lot of PbtA games and a many of them suffer from something between bland and outright poor design. If they were actually designing their games rather than simply reskinning some things and adding other willy-nilly the results would be different.
 
Agemegos said:
I've loved the James Bond 007 resolution system since 1986. "Yes, but…" or "success at a cost" slots right in as a possible interpretation of the Quality Rating 4 (partial success), alongside "50% of usual yield" and "success, but takes double the usual time", and formalises what I had been doing for a dozen years to interpret QR4 results on non-quantitative tasks. So I think it is absolutely fine. State of the art since 1983.
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Rolemaster had a 'partial success' (that was more like 'mostly failed') and 'near success' as an option from somewhere around 1982-4 (I don't have the oldest printings of Character Law, so I can't say when exactly the option first appeared). It also shows up in MERP (1984).

I think the thing I got out of reading AW was of presenting things to the players as "X happens. What to you do?" I already did this, but it brought this to my attention as a tool for prodding players into doing something.
 
TristramEvans said:
well, with 3 PBTA threads extant the last few days here, two are directed at fans of the system, and one is directed at people who dislike the system.

So ask yourself, what is the ratio of posters jumping into the fan threads to insult PBTA because they can't restrain themselves from threadcrapping at the very mention of PbtA vs those threadcrapping in the thread about disliking PBTA because that's something they can't abide?

yeah.gif
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You mean Tuesday?
 
lategamer said:
Moves are like Feats in that other game. Because they provide a mechanical benefit, players are incentivised to use them. Sure, they're not a new idea - but they're reinforced in the game like Special Ability cards. Just not to my taste because I can see the ingredients of the sausage I guess.
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They really aren't. Feats are triggered by the player. Moves are triggered by the narrative. You don't just say, "I use move in shadows" to creep stealthily. Instead you say "I'm sneaking up on the guard" and if applicable, the GM might trigger "Defy Danger".
 
chuckdee said:
They really aren't. Feats are triggered by the player. Moves are triggered by the narrative. You don't just say, "I use move in shadows" to creep stealthily. Instead you say "I'm sneaking up on the guard" and if applicable, the GM might trigger "Defy Danger".
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I think it depends on the game and the moves.

In the PbtA games I've run/played, the basic moves are generally as you describe. Playbook moves tend to be more like powers, spells, or feats... not all of them, but some for sure.

But it really does depend on the game.
 
hawkeyefan said:
I think it depends on the game and the moves.

In the PbtA games I've run/played, the basic moves are generally as you describe. Playbook moves tend to be more like powers, spells, or feats... not all of them, but some for sure.

But it really does depend on the game.
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And I view most of those as badly skinned PbtA games, trading on the PbtA name while not going all in.
 
chuckdee said:
And I view most of those as badly skinned PbtA games, trading on the PbtA name while not going all in.
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I'm certain there are examples of that, for sure. But I'm thinking of Stonetop, primarily. I think most probably straddle the line in that they can still be described as what you're attempting to do... that they can still be triggered by what happens in the fiction (GAH!), but they also are like special abilities.

So when I play my Judge in Stonetop, I may say that I declare one of my enemies as an agent of chaos, and that triggers the Censure move. But I could also say I Censure the demon, and I don't think it's an issue.
 
hawkeyefan said:
I think it depends on the game and the moves.

In the PbtA games I've run/played, the basic moves are generally as you describe. Playbook moves tend to be more like powers, spells, or feats... not all of them, but some for sure.

But it really does depend on the game.
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Only in much the same way as, say, non-spellcasters don't use the "spellcasting" section of D&D rulebooks.
A Fiery Flying Roll said:
Baker is *at least* as much of a marketer as Foxy Dan. He's just a lot more genial so people don't mind as much.
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He's also an edgelord (Or he was? And is maybe over it now?), whereas Foxy Dan just pretends to be one, for money.

i'm the world champion at finding penii in zweihander books
 
hawkeyefan said:
I think the tone of Apocalypse World is 100% edgelord. I don't think that's actually what Baker is like, though. It certainly doesn't seem to be from what I've seen, anyway.
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That, KPSF, Poison'd...

I don't think being an edgelord makes you a bad person or anything though, it's just an amusing personality quirk.
 
chuckdee said:
They really aren't. Feats are triggered by the player. Moves are triggered by the narrative. You don't just say, "I use move in shadows" to creep stealthily. Instead you say "I'm sneaking up on the guard" and if applicable, the GM might trigger "Defy Danger".
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I was definitely under the impression that I could choose to trigger a Move or not.
 
lategamer said:
I was definitely under the impression tin hat I could choose to trigger a Move or not.
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That's the case specifically for some moves, but usually not for others. That said, in a well-designed PbtA game most of the things your character will choose to do will pretty obviously fit into one of a very short list of moves so by declaring action X you are, in effect, shortening the list of moves the GM might trigger down do probably just a couple.
 
Ladybird said:
That, KPSF, Poison'd...

I don't think being an edgelord makes you a bad person or anything though, it's just an amusing personality quirk.
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KPSF and Poison'd? I haven't heard of those.
A Fiery Flying Roll said:
Oh, so Vince gets to post like a 14 year old and it's all arty and cool but when Kevin Siembada does we all make fun of him.
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... I'm not touching that one.
 
JAMUMU said:
Nothing against edgelords and this is obviously just anecdata, but I've never met an edgelord who could fight. I've always found them to be a cowardly, superstitious lot.
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Wattie from the Exploited was alright with his fists back in the day.
 
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