DaveB
Pubber
- Joined
- Apr 1, 2021
- Messages
- 5
- Reaction score
- 13
If I were to slap a Forgeist label on CofD / nWoD, it would be Simulationist, not Narrativist, despite the "storytelling" name. They're really not mechanically light *at all*, but the mechanical load is in service of making the thematic push of the game. Conditions aren't a FATE-esque narrative control for the player, they're one of countless examples in Storytelling (the CofD/nWoD ruleset, as opposed to Storyteller for the oWoD) of bribing players into having their characters act like they "should".
So whether it's a player being given XP for their character acting like a horror-movie protagonist against the character's own best interest, the fact that fights have a Willpower cap on progressing beyond a beatdown in an alley, the way Mage's spellcasting is designed to double-dog-dare players into risking paradox, the Vitae economy in Vampire, the milestones of Pilgramage mapping out a Promethean's self-actualisation or whatever, the mechanics are in service to that simulation-of-horror-fiction goal. Playing an nWoD game is the art of deliberately getting your own character into trouble, and if your group resists that the system starts to fail.
So whether it's a player being given XP for their character acting like a horror-movie protagonist against the character's own best interest, the fact that fights have a Willpower cap on progressing beyond a beatdown in an alley, the way Mage's spellcasting is designed to double-dog-dare players into risking paradox, the Vitae economy in Vampire, the milestones of Pilgramage mapping out a Promethean's self-actualisation or whatever, the mechanics are in service to that simulation-of-horror-fiction goal. Playing an nWoD game is the art of deliberately getting your own character into trouble, and if your group resists that the system starts to fail.