DMing is Not Storytelling

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And I would say "describing a scene" or "arbitrating player choices" or "playing out a conversation between characters in the gameworld" are not activities that I would personally describe as "storytelling".

Fair enough, and that is sufficient to make “collaborative, participative, extemporary storytelling game” not a useful way to describe RPGs to you. But I would personally describe those activities as parts of “storytelling”, and I would note that it’s absolutely conventional to analyse the content of stories into exposition, description, narration, and dialogue.

My beefs with the proposition that “DMing is storytelling” are
  • that it tends to imply that playing a character is not storytelling,
  • therefore encourages DMs to exert too much control instead of collaborating, and
  • therefore encourages DMs and adventure authors to predetermine too much instead of extemporising.
 
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What remarkable is that Dave Arneson, and Gary Gygax together figured out how to make a pen & paper holodeck years before the idea appear in fiction.

There’s a holodeck, used to play adventure games in groups, in Arthur C. Clarke’s The City and the Stars, It even has a problem with railroading adventure design — the protagonist of the stories gets into an argument with his friends because he wants to treat it as a sandbox. The original novella was published in 1956 and was collected into an omnibus with The Lion of Comarre in 1968.
 
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Except with a sandbox and the player driving the tempo and pace, I don't have the option of fiat. I have to build the mechanics so it flow naturally regardless whether a lot of campaign time passed in various session or only a small amount of campaign time. It not a me thing, I took a serious look at it after players noticed the discrepancy themselves.
It’s an interesting and frustrating issue. PCs being PCs they get in the shit. If you reward XP based on what they do, they’re going to catapult in ability the longer they stay active.

One of the easy ways to get them to be non-active is to make an interesting Living World with people to interact with. That generally gets them to do “non-PC” things, or things that don’t stretch their capabilities to the limit. Campaigns that require downtime for training/healing dovetail well with this. Everything’s good, then BAM! you find out you’ve walked into your own trap.

People being people, when they gather together, some of them are going to get up to some Bad Guy Fuckery. PCs being PCs they get in the shit which puts them on a collision course with those practicing Bad Guy Fuckery. Due to this being inside a city, as opposed to an ancient ruin of strange green stone, they can’t just level the place.

This leads to long-term conflict which puts a bullet in the brainpan of your planned downtime because the PCs are now engaged in a Cold War that threatens to turn hot at any time. Now the PCs are always engaged and they’re in danger of leveling like Usain Bolt.

So how do you fix this? Well, by simply not giving Cold War activities the same XP as Hot War activities. If you’re done the Living World right, players won’t care, because the non-exp rewards for succeeding in Cold War activities pay off in the long run, in all those non-number areas of the character sheet, where Friends, Family, Contacts, Enemies, Patrons, Hirelings, Henchman, etc go. Here’s where the Thinking and Talking characters can really earn their place at the table.

So if players are unwilling to do “you spend the Winter in Rivendell”, then you have to knuckle down somewhere, so make it in the XP dept for less than “out on the pointy end” adventures.
 
I don't disagree with the premise above, generally speaking. That said, I can't be the only one who finds it odd that, first, the ostensible goal of a sandbox is whatever the players get up to (no GM preference), while second the suggested rewards are very much indexed to preferring one kind of action over another. Now, first off, I completely agree that in the above example the players are unlikely to notice or care. That said, I really would prefer the reward mechanic in my game to actually match game expectations, rather than forcing me to find work arounds. So in the case above, I personally, would employ a mechanic that I don't have to jury-rig that also matches the overall pacing expectations.

On a separate note, I feel that PCs get in the shit, and Bad Guy Fuckery should enter the pub lexicon as treasured terms. Both precise and evocative.
 
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I don't disagree with the premise above, generally speaking. That said, I can't be the only one who finds it odd that, first, the ostensible goal of a sandbox is whatever the players get up to (no GM preference), while the suggested rewards are very much indexed to preferring one kind of action over another. Now, first off, I completely agree that in the above example the players are unlikely to notice or care. That said, I really would prefer the reward mechanic in my game to actually match game expectations, rather than forcing me to find work arounds. So in the case above, I personally, would employ a mechanic that I don't have to jury-rig that also matches the overall pacing expectations.

On a separate note, I feel that PCs get in the shit, and Bad Guy Fuckery should enter the pub lexicon as treasured terms. Both precise and evocative.

Whatever reward structure a game has is a strong indicator of what the game is meant to be about.

If that reward structure needs to be changed or avoided, then I think something’s off. Either the game design or the expectations/desires of the group.
 
On GMing as storytelling, I don't think it needs to be, nor do I think RPGs need to be about having a story, but they definitely can be and GMs definitely can be storytellers (there are people who run games that way and players who want that style of play). I think the problem arises when expectations around this aren't aligned or when people adopt a storytelling style without considering the other possibilities to see if those would be a better fit.

On sandbox and XP, I think there are a couple of considerations around why XP is in the game. Sometimes it is there to drive play in a certain direction (if you get XP for stealing things players are more likely to steal). Sometimes it is there to reflect a causal link between actions in the world and the character's increase in skill (sometimes it is a blend of both). So I can see a sandbox where players are freely going about and doing all kinds of things, and maybe they aren't earning as much XP, but people are okay with that because they aren't doing things that would realistically increase their abilities. And some sandboxes may be open but still have expectations. But what I find works is having categories that are open enough that they can apply to lots of different things. So while I will award 1 XP for defeating a powerful foe that session, I will also award 1 for growing your reputation or significantly impacting the setting in some way. I also have bonus XP which is where I have started to file the more specific things that come up in different types of campaigns (and bonus is pretty open). In my current campaign the players are constables, so for the 3 potential bonus XP, they can get that if they do something like bring one of the 10 or 20 most wanted to justice. If they were doing a lot of palace intrigue or politics, the bonus XP would probably be more related to those kinds of courtly activities (i.e. destroying a political adversary or getting a pet policy through)
 
I prefer potentially-sandbox campaigns where there is at least communication from the players about the types of things they're interested in doing, and where the experience system gives results that sort of make sense to me, which generally means that the PCs aren't super-heroes, don't expect to become super-heroes (or at least, not without doing things that would somehow logically lead to great powers), and that they would need to have significant experiences and/or training to significantly improve their abilities in related ways.

So if you want to become a bad-ass warrior, you'll probably need to actually do a serious amount of actually dangerous combat with foes who aren't greatly inferior to you. Which almost by definition tends to mean you might die or lose some body parts and/or mental health along the way. ;-)

That approach lacks most/all of the problems mentioned above, because it purposely does not want things like "zero to hero", "there is a planned schedule for PC improvement rate", "the game starts with level 1 PCs and it's expected will end when the PCs reach whatever the maximum level is", "every PC should improve at the same rate regardless of what they do" and/or "my PC should almost never be at real risk of death or loss of anything, but should significantly improve regularly or I'll get bored".
 
At least the second isn't in the sense its usually used in the hobby.
...contending with rival lords is not an adventure?!? Am I getting you right:shock:?

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It’s an interesting and frustrating issue. PCs being PCs they get in the shit. If you reward XP based on what they do, they’re going to catapult in ability the longer they stay active.

One of the easy ways to get them to be non-active is to make an interesting Living World with people to interact with. That generally gets them to do “non-PC” things, or things that don’t stretch their capabilities to the limit. Campaigns that require downtime for training/healing dovetail well with this. Everything’s good, then BAM! you find out you’ve walked into your own trap.

People being people, when they gather together, some of them are going to get up to some Bad Guy Fuckery. PCs being PCs they get in the shit which puts them on a collision course with those practicing Bad Guy Fuckery. Due to this being inside a city, as opposed to an ancient ruin of strange green stone, they can’t just level the place.

This leads to long-term conflict which puts a bullet in the brainpan of your planned downtime because the PCs are now engaged in a Cold War that threatens to turn hot at any time. Now the PCs are always engaged and they’re in danger of leveling like Usain Bolt.

So how do you fix this? Well, by simply not giving Cold War activities the same XP as Hot War activities. If you’re done the Living World right, players won’t care, because the non-exp rewards for succeeding in Cold War activities pay off in the long run, in all those non-number areas of the character sheet, where Friends, Family, Contacts, Enemies, Patrons, Hirelings, Henchman, etc go. Here’s where the Thinking and Talking characters can really earn their place at the table.

So if players are unwilling to do “you spend the Winter in Rivendell”, then you have to knuckle down somewhere, so make it in the XP dept for less than “out on the pointy end” adventures.
That is an option, but frankly, I find it distasteful to reward Living World-related activities by less XP. If anything, they should be worth more...who gets more access to various teachers, the PC living in Rivendell, or the one that has to keep on the move to not become Nazgul bait:shade:?
 
That is an option, but frankly, I find it distasteful to reward Living World-related activities by less XP. If anything, they should be worth more...who gets more access to various teachers, the PC living in Rivendell, or the one that has to keep on the move to not become Nazgul bait:shade:?
Well, remember we’re talking about some XP systems. 10,000 GP gotten from taking out an evil slaver and his henchman isn’t the same as 10,000 GP gotten by taking out a Spectre and his Wraith henchmen. If you’re going to kill a lich, it’s going to be a little easier to root him out of a sewer system then travel to the middle of the Desert of Desolation and get him out of The Black Pyramid.

Class-based games are going to have a problem, the abstraction can lead to weird situations. If you’re using a very specific XP system like Rolemaster, it’s not a problem as a lot of the “adventure” part of adventuring is factored in. If you’re using a BRP-based system, then again, it’s not a problem because you’re probably using different skill sets.

The idea isn’t to Pavlovize your campaign, or declare “This is what the campaign is about”, the idea is to rate the difficulty of the action’s context and have that be a factor.

The Rivendell example is perfect. Someone who stays in Rivendell and just trains, without any real practice, is going to take longer to rise then someone who spends his time keeping one step ahead of Khamul the Easterling.
 
Well, remember we’re talking about some XP systems. 10,000 GP gotten from taking out an evil slaver and his henchman isn’t the same as 10,000 GP gotten by taking out a Spectre and his Wraith henchmen. If you’re going to kill a lich, it’s going to be a little easier to root him out of a sewer system then travel to the middle of the Desert of Desolation and get him out of The Black Pyramid.
Don't see the problem. When travelling to the Black Desert, you're going to have 1-100 encounters more (slanted towards the number13:tongue:), each of which would also result in GP, XP and so on, for example, an encounter with the evil slaver and his henchmen might well double the amount gained by the lich. Thus, it would result in a higher XP total...although the guys in the ancient city (it's ancient if it has sewers, fantasy logic!) might have other encounters in the meantime, too. But they'd be unlikely to be as rewarding as the encounter with the slaver, GP-wise.

Class-based games are going to have a problem, the abstraction can lead to weird situations. If you’re using a very specific XP system like Rolemaster, it’s not a problem as a lot of the “adventure” part of adventuring is factored in. If you’re using a BRP-based system, then again, it’s not a problem because you’re probably using different skill sets.
Well...I suspect part of my lack of understanding might be due to the fact that I can't remember when was the last time I used the gold-for-XP model. As a GM... maybe never? Still didn't make sense to me as a player, though. Why is 100 GP gained in a dungeon equal to 100 XP, but the same 100 GP gained in a city aren't contributing to advancement?
But then I'm probably using a BRP-like model with, well, BRP. Or maybe a specific XP system, akin to Fates Worse Than Death. Or maybe an XP system tied to the PC's own goals, which doesn't distinguish between dungeons and social dungeons, a.k.a. courtly/guild intrigue.
So...maybe just a problem I've never encountered? Don't know, don't care.

The idea isn’t to Pavlovize your campaign, or declare “This is what the campaign is about”, the idea is to rate the difficulty of the action’s context and have that be a factor.
But it does Pavlovize the campaign, in that it incentivizes taking a harder approach than you'd need to, for a bigger reward (since it gives you not only GP, but XP as well). And that also introduces the dissociated element that the decisions you're making aren't based entirely on what the characters can perceive:shade:.
Because to the characters, less time spent adventuring leaves them with more time to actually practice skills. And it's practice that gives you skill, not life-and-death encounters. (Those teach you how to apply/use best the skills you do have, and might contribute to mental endurance - which are two entirely different matters that most systems don't address. GDW's Traveller and the related systems like Merc2000 at least tried to, but again, most simply leave the "how to apply" matter to the player's decision, and don't factor the mental side at all. Pendragon and The Riddle of Steel kinda do, but amusingly, many people think that's "unrealistic"...while I'm laughing my ass off:gunslinger:).
The Rivendell example is perfect. Someone who stays in Rivendell and just trains, without any real practice, is going to take longer to rise then someone who spends his time keeping one step ahead of Khamul the Easterling.
Let's just say I disagree. See above as to why.
(Also, practice can easily be made real enough for skill advancement. How? Blunt swords and battle armour are a combo that has been used for millennia. Acting for social skills...though you can actually practice those in a real environment. And so on and so forth).
 
(Also, practice can easily be made real enough for skill advancement. How? Blunt swords and battle armour are a combo that has been used for millennia. Acting for social skills...though you can actually practice those in a real environment. And so on and so forth).
To an extent, but not all the way.

I know black belt martial artists. I also know football hooligans. I know who I'd bet on in a pub fight.
 
To an extent, but not all the way.

I know black belt martial artists. I also know football hooligans. I know who I'd bet on in a pub fight.
...they're different people:shade:?

Also, I know boxers, wrestlers, and different martial artists who train hard. I also know football (and non-football) hooligans. And I don't need to bet on hypothetical fights - I know the outcomes of actual fights.
Let's say my statistics don't favour your bet:gunslinger:.
 
Black belts in karate don't train for combat. (Neither do football hooligans, who tend to prefer five-to-one beatdowns in any event.) They train to do their katas right. I get that it's a standard response in such things, but it's also a heavily flawed parallel. How long do you think your average football hooligan would last against your average MMA fighter?

The US Army, by contrast, boasts that its training is more rigorous than combat, and certainly there's a lot more of it.
 
I get that it's a standard response in such things, but it's also a heavily flawed parallel. How long do you think your average football hooligan would last against your average MMA fighter?
There's thousands of clips on youtube, you know?
The average time one-on-one would be circa <5 seconds from the moment the trained guy gives himself permission to "go at it". After that it's time for a song...and can you guess which song I'm thinking about:thumbsup:?


Now, this gets muddied by the fact that, as alluded to above, those aren't necessarily two distinct characters...some street fighters do train their moves, whether they've learned them in a formal setting or not. The formal setting might be an MMA gym as well...or karate gym, judo gym, boxing gym, wrestling gym, arnis gym, whatever. They're well-known for making any style work for them. OK, I doubt many street fighters practice aikido, but if any does, rest assured he's making it work for him:grin:!

The other part of it is that street fighters try their level best to blindside anyone who even looks like he might put up a decent opposition. Or they use numbers. Or weapons, if it's about Serious Business (though their definition might not be the same as yours or mine). So "one-on-one, unarmed and both are forewarned" seldom happens...which does muddy things a lot. And sometimes the trained fighter loses not to "superior opposition", but to the loopholes in his own training - lack of gloves, lack of gi, uneven surface making some moves less desirable, whatever. But that's them losing, not the other guy winning. He can't make them commit a mistake, can he?
So basically, as I said before, nothing replaces training. Practical experience teaches you how to apply the training...and might suggest you ideas about moves that you can train later.

The US Army, by contrast, boasts that its training is more rigorous than combat, and certainly there's a lot more of it.
Funny, the exact same phrase is used in some "martial arts clubs" that I've visited. And I've certainly never passed out from exhaustion in a fight:shade:!
 
Bah, the age old martial artist vs guy who knows how to fight canard. Yawn. Lots of people with high belts in a huge range of arts couldn't actually fight their way out of a paper bag. Others are wood chippers in an actual throw down. The problem here is the supposition that 'martial arts' or 'martial artist' is somehow a monolithic idea or set of folks. It isn't. No more than hooligan is in this particular context. I know a couple of guys who's only real training is bar fights and those guys are still bloody magnificent in a real throw down. They aren't breaking the mold about bar idiots not really being able to fight though. Anyway, this is a silly argument IMO.
 
It's rather why I said "average MMA fighter" instead of "guy who puts in two hours a week at the local dojo, is plenty proud of his pretty colored belt, and has never been in a full-contact fight."

For one thing, a trained MMA fighter not only trains in multiple disciplines, he's trained to expect multiple disciplines. This isn't a case like with just about every stylized combat art where of *course* Move A is only countered by Defense B, Riposte C or Counterstrike D.
 
It's rather why I said "average MMA fighter" instead of "guy who puts in two hours a week at the local dojo, is plenty proud of his pretty colored belt, and has never been in a full-contact fight."

For one thing, a trained MMA fighter not only trains in multiple disciplines, he's trained to expect multiple disciplines. This isn't a case like with just about every stylized combat art where of *course* Move A is only countered by Defense B, Riposte C or Counterstrike D.
The problem with MMA is, it's still a sport. Eye gouging, biting and application of foreheads to noses are shall we say frowned on. But are also fairly standard brawl approaches, going by what I remember from the taxi rank and outside the late night kebab shop back in the 90s.

Like a boxer, you have the advantage on that you're more used to being hit. But you also have a rule set that you're used to dealing with. And that means that things from outside it are unexpected and you have no real experience dealing with them in a stressful situation.

Also, going to the ground in a brawl is often the biggest mistake you can make. Very few people who get into fights are alone. And the ground makes you very vulnerable to third parties.
 
The problem with MMA is, it's still a sport. Eye gouging, biting and application of foreheads to noses are shall we say frowned on. But are also fairly standard brawl approaches, going by what I remember from the taxi rank and outside the late night kebab shop back in the 90s.

Like a boxer, you have the advantage on that you're more used to being hit. But you also have a rule set that you're used to dealing with. And that means that things from outside it are unexpected and you have no real experience dealing with them in a stressful situation.

Also, going to the ground in a brawl is often the biggest mistake you can make. Very few people who get into fights are alone. And the ground makes you very vulnerable to third parties.1
Of course, nothing is perfect but MMA still has less "abstract" elements than many, if not most, other schools (among those available to civilans, at least). Also, MMAers do expect having to deal with unconventional stuff, because surprising people is a big part of their sport - even if it doesn't happen all that often, lately.

And sure, there are schools that actually teach you "no holds barred" fighting, where nothing is forbidden. But then I've seen preciously few of them.
So as a basic for comparing trained vs untrained, I'm fine with MMA being the baseline for "trained unarmed fighter":shade:.
 
Khamul the Easterling is known for his love of midwest diners
Talk about genre muddling.... (Wintering in Riverdale is not the same as wintering in Rivendell) :tongue:

I was going to say something about story being emergent from roleplaying, but that ship sailed a long time ago.

On the most recent tangent, I have to say that my Dad (who was a black belt in Judo who had done both Golden Gloves boxing and Catch Wrestling in his teens) always said that the key to a "real" fight was being willing to hurt someone else, potentially badly. If you didn't have that attitude, getting away was definitely better than getting in a fight.
 
On the most recent tangent, I have to say that my Dad (who was a black belt in Judo who had done both Golden Gloves boxing and Catch Wrestling in his teens) always said that the key to a "real" fight was being willing to hurt someone else, potentially badly. If you didn't have that attitude, getting away was definitely better than getting in a fight.

My grandfather told me something similar, though he put it much harsher: "There's people who fight to win, and there's people who fight to kill"
 
On the most recent tangent, I have to say that my Dad (who was a black belt in Judo who had done both Golden Gloves boxing and Catch Wrestling in his teens) always said that the key to a "real" fight was being willing to hurt someone else, potentially badly. If you didn't have that attitude, getting away was definitely better than getting in a fight.
My grandfather told me something similar, though he put it much harsher: "There's people who fight to win, and there's people who fight to kill"
I've been told that same thing in a martial arts gym, by someone whose expertise I didn't doubt one bit. But then PCs rarely have any issues with taking this approach, as the many threads about murderhobos might witness, so to them it's about skills and physical abilities:thumbsup:.
 
I've been told that same thing in a martial arts gym, by someone whose expertise I didn't doubt one bit. But then PCs rarely have any issues with taking this approach, as the many threads about murderhobos might witness, so to them it's about skills and physical abilities:thumbsup:.


You know, I took martial arts from the age of 8 until 16, and the rest of my life I've made every effort to avoid any situations involving physical violence at all costs. I don't have any opinions on MMA fighters vs anyone else, but I know what I want from my RPGs is cinematic Hollywood combat, not anything like realistic fighting. Fantasy combat is fun and exciting, real life combat is messy, chaotic, and 9 times out of ten just ends up with two people just rolling around on the ground.
 
You know, I took martial arts from the age of 8 until 16, and the rest of my life I've made every effort to avoid any situations involving physical violence at all costs. I don't have any opinions on MMA fighters vs anyone else, but I know what I want from my RPGs is cinematic Hollywood combat, not anything like realistic fighting. Fantasy combat is fun and exciting, real life combat is messy, chaotic, and 9 times out of ten just ends up with two people just rolling around on the ground.
If there's one thing Hugh Hefner's version of MacBeth got right, it was that final "duel".
 
You know, I took martial arts from the age of 8 until 16, and the rest of my life I've made every effort to avoid any situations involving physical violence at all costs. I don't have any opinions on MMA fighters vs anyone else, but I know what I want from my RPGs is cinematic Hollywood combat, not anything like realistic fighting. Fantasy combat is fun and exciting, real life combat is messy, chaotic, and 9 times out of ten just ends up with two people just rolling around on the ground.
The fights I've seen with people just rolling around on the ground have all been people who are not trying to actually kill each other, and/or who do not know how to fight.
 
The ground is a bad place to be. Its tactically useful sometimes but you need to bounce right back up. Rolling around on the ground is mostly for amateurs who want to get hurt. In a crowd anyway, one on one is very different.
 
...
And sure, there are schools that actually teach you "no holds barred" fighting, where nothing is forbidden. But then I've seen preciously few of them.
So as a basic for comparing trained vs untrained, I'm fine with MMA being the baseline for "trained unarmed fighter":shade:.
Isn't pretty much every military martial art training about no holds barred? Hapkido is full of moves that have to be barred in fighting as they are all about breaking bones and dislocating joints...frankly a majority of them if you don't hold back, also blows to the throat and eyes. I suspect other marital arts that were nto developed for sparring have such moves as well. Thing is we don't allow competition with moves that result in permanent injury or death these days, so not very visible, that doesn't mean these moves are not taught.
 
Isn't pretty much every military martial art training about no holds barred?
Only if you are using "no holds barred" in the figurative sense? If you're using it like most people are, "an unarmed fight where all kinds of holds and strikes are permitted", then I'd say no, the military shouldn't teach you stuff like this.
For starters, in the military the assumption is that the opponent is armed (if he's not using a weapon, he at least has one on his waist). Also, he probably has back-up nearby who is going to show up if you tarry (and also be armed). And then we get to the part where the same is true for you as well, so there are team tactics as well, and you're wise to be using your own weapon.
Oh, and if possible at all, you don't want him to be prepared for you being nearby:shade:.

Hapkido is full of moves that have to be barred in fighting as they are all about breaking bones and dislocating joints...frankly a majority of them if you don't hold back, also blows to the throat and eyes.
Actually...the hapkido holds aren't barred in MMA fighting (blows to throat and eyes are). But many of them don't translate well to a sport environment, either.
Of course, those moves are kinda useless for the kind of dominance fights that many practitioners actually want to win...:evil:
Also, I've heard that some non-insignificant number of hapkido practitioners have no idea how to actually land those forbidden blows:devil:.
Bottom line - the places that both teach moves forbidden in MMA and actually train them to the point where they can be applied...are almost vanishingly rare, IME.

I suspect other marital arts that were nto developed for sparring have such moves as well.
Sure, marital arts have to have attacks under the belt, at least...:tongue:

Thing is we don't allow competition with moves that result in permanent injury or death these days, so not very visible, that doesn't mean these moves are not taught.
Thing is, a lot more people train for fitness, competition or for winning "dominance fights" than for fighting where the outcome is likely to be permanent injury or death for the losing side. And schools that want to stay in business teach what their customers are looking for.
So most people aren't taught this, AFAICT:thumbsup:. Maybe some in the military...but even there many would be taught some kind of MMA instead. Why? Because the most likely opponent those moves would be used on are other people in the same regiment. For the enemies, they give you guns:gunslinger:.
 
AsenRG AsenRG I guess I mean moves that are intended to put out an eye, cripple, kill, etc. Sure you may be told to hold back on them when training with comrade but pretty sure they are taught in the military boot camps (not just special forces) after all the whole idea is to kill or be killed. Maybe times have changed.

Maybe my Hapkido instructor was old school. The guy taught like thousands of students though and a couple US Olympic teams. Almost every "hold" was meant to maim, break or dislocate something. In fact he was very much against holds as in the dominance kind of thing you see in sport fighting/MMA. We were taught all sorts of strikes to knees, throat etc., also to bite. Standard punches and kicks were taught as well, but also taught in a real fight to not kick above the waist. There was a lot of what to do in a fight to incapacitate an enemy fast, none of it allowed in any kind of sport competition for good reason.

Now in sparring only certain things were allowed, more being allowed the higher you were and generally once you got a certain hold you released and "won" as in the holds that the natural next move would break a bone or dislocate a joint.
 
How about an experiment? Try going all 1st person a session and see how many would follow and how often they'd revert?

I don't think it should create much drama, and you could tell them after the session if they seem surprised:thumbsup:!

Yeah, I can certainly try it out and see what happens. We have had discussions at times in the past about play style and I know the general preference is for way we do things now but we haven't tried entirely in first person and there's no harm in trying it.

I can't believe this discussion was over 3 months ago... I've been pretty busy in the meantime and intending to reply for, well, a while now.

So I tried the experiment and, while it wasn't a terrible failure, it wasn't a success either. I tried my part and the players followed in kind sometimes. So there was a slight increase in 1st person interaction but it wasn't dramatic. They also noticed a change in style from me after a certain point and it was questioned. Perhaps highlighting a failure on my part? Anyway, I told them exactly what I was trying and they weren't particularly bothered by that but did ask "can't we just carry on as normal?" and I, obviously, said "of course." After the session we had a quick chat about it and it was agreed that everyone could just stick to their preferred way of playing. Given what I've read here and in a couple of discussions elsewhere I think our usual play style is actually pretty common.
 
I can't believe this discussion was over 3 months ago... I've been pretty busy in the meantime and intending to reply for, well, a while now.

So I tried the experiment and, while it wasn't a terrible failure, it wasn't a success either. I tried my part and the players followed in kind sometimes. So there was a slight increase in 1st person interaction but it wasn't dramatic. They also noticed a change in style from me after a certain point and it was questioned. Perhaps highlighting a failure on my part? Anyway, I told them exactly what I was trying and they weren't particularly bothered by that but did ask "can't we just carry on as normal?" and I, obviously, said "of course." After the session we had a quick chat about it and it was agreed that everyone could just stick to their preferred way of playing. Given what I've read here and in a couple of discussions elsewhere I think our usual play style is actually pretty common.
Fair enough. It's not like we were going for a 3rd Person Roleplayers Rescue (:devil:), just an experiment - so any result is a success here:thumbsup:!
 
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