System only matter to the point that it's decent at emulating the genre you're trying to play. But no system is going to make up for a lack of talent on the GM/Players part.
Or, a bad system with a great gm and group beats the perfect system with a shit gm and group.
The sad thing is, no system would ever fix the Forgies problems. Which is the lack of spine and feelings of worthlessness. No system is going to make the bad old GM wipe your nose and ass like Mommy does. Either A) confront your GM about their BS or B) sack up and run a game yourself. No system will fix behavioral problems in people. You fix it by talking to them or getting rid of them.
System matters, but posters on this board exaggerate the degree to which it does.
and
System only matter to the point that it's decent at emulating the genre you're trying to play. But no system is going to make up for a lack of talent on the GM/Players part.
Or, a bad system with a great gm and group beats the perfect system with a shit gm and group.
Because your system doesn't need to be absolutely perfectly matched to the game premise.
There's enough game ideas and rulesets out there, that even with help, you're unlikely to find the perfect one. And even then, you're still doing much the same with it. You roll different dice with different modifiers, in a sequence or pattern, and from the results you derive a narrative result.
At the end of the day, so long as you can use your brain a bit to apply dice rules to the desired story content, the system doesn't really matter, outside of some whiffs of probabilities and system comfort.
>At the end of the day, so long as you can use your brain a bit to apply dice rules to the desired story content, the system doesn't really matter, outside of some whiffs of probabilities and system comfort.
It kind of does though. Would you run a sanity system in a game without horror elements for example? Would you allow for death saves in a game with highly realistic combat? And so forth.
You NEED to match system to tone/genre. Beyond that, though, it mostly relies on the skill of the DM to pull it all together.
Beyond system/genre matching, some systems are just ass-- meaning terribly balanced, overly specific (see FATAL), or rules lite. If you're working with a bad system, no good game can arise because you'll be spending too much time fighting against the system instead of trying to make a game.
To this point, 5e is actually a good system, despite what trolls say, because you can run a decent game in it. That's the bar between bad and good-- can you actually run a good game in it. FATAL fails, for example, because every game ultimately becomes about how shitty the system is and laughing at it.
A system is a tool in creating the game. Some systems will give you different experiences, but generally the thing that people come to roleplaying games are system neutral.
Unpopular Opinion: 5e is fine and only needs a handful of specific little patches to make it less babby tier.
5e characters can also be brought into 3.5e/PF games with a handful of patches, or previous editions' mechanics brought in behind the screen very easily
He is quite wrong. A system can get in the way of what you want to accomplish. He's probably the type of idiot who thinks 'system' means 'core mechanic' and that the 'D&D System' means roll a d20 and add number.
A system is a toolkit but is not the experience. It should be chooses depending of what you want to do, but since toolkits can be modified, you can start with one and then modify it to fit your needs. People here get angry if you don't start with whatever system they feel is the most versatile because they see it as a failure when you modify it, instead of also a fun activity you can engage with.
This is largely true. Narrative players could not give two fricks about whether a system has "narrativist" mechanics - they just play vampire or (now) 5e.
GNS was an empirically wrong dead-end of a theory.
>GNS was an empirically wrong dead-end of a theory.
Agree, GNS was a descriptive theory at best, not a prescriptive one. It does not distinguish between how games appear and how to construct one that work.
So on first blush, it would seem that narrative is an important part of a game system because at least 1/3rd of game time is spent on narration. But this is useless for game designers since most, if not all, tabletop games do not design mechanics for narration. That is entirely left up to DM discretion.
So we end up with a theory that fundamentally doesn't understand what it is describing. Yes an actual game in practice relies heavily on narration, but this has nothing to do with the game system itself. And in other games which are not tabletop, that narration is often replaced by more interactive and visual elements, meaning GNS isn't even useful outside of the domain of tabletop. So a dead theory indeed.
System in a rpg is like sound editing in a movie, you only realize it's a thing when it has a mistake and even then it isn't enough for you to stop watching most times and some random guy online probably have a version with it fixed
System is secondary. What matters most is that everyone at the table is having fun. The system is just a vehicle used for that.
If your table has more fun playing, I dunno, L5R using the 3e D&D rules than the actual L5R RPG's rules, then you should use those 3e rules even if arguably the L5R RPG rules are better.
This is the same argument people make when they bring out monopoly.
Yes you can have fun with friends with a shitty game. But why play the shitty game?
System matters up to a point. A good system is like a good music instrument-- a bad musician can't produce good music on a good instrument no matter how much they try. But a good musician can use their talent to help compensate for the flaws on a bad instrument.
>what is good and what is bad
Systems are like instrument types. You can play rock music on a flute, but doing so is a little twee compared to playing it on an electric guitar. In general, you should try to match system to genre and understand if there is a mismatch, it is on your skill as a DM to compensate for this.
He's not. System matters an awful lot, more than people in this thread will say in an effort to try and look smart and detached. It defines what characters your story will be about and what actions happen within your story. You will only ever be able to tell DnD stories within DnD without ignoring the system to do so. I'm not about to run a grimdark dungeon crawl in Golden Sky Stories and, for that matter I'd never think to run Golden Sky Stories if it didn't exist as a system. Playing different systems is awesome. Anything else is an attempt to try and look more 'accepting' and anti-gatekeeper while keeping people mazed in bullshit ruts that don't benefit them in any way.
System matters from a knowledge perspective. As a DM, I have to go out of my way to make 5e more like 3.5e for my players to have fun. If I had no knowledge I could steal from 3.5, then my 5e game would be worse off. So systems do matter; they are like tools in your tool kit. A DM who knows multiple systems can get creative with how they go about running the game. So read homie read. Only stuck-up bad DMs are too arrogant to think they can't learn things from different books.
>Why is he right
Because, as your DM, he has the right to decide what you think.
Maybe he's shit and no system can help him run a decent game.
Because *you* are a useless moron, as posting this sort of shit proves this conclusively. Kill him, change DM's or shut up about it.
System only matter to the point that it's decent at emulating the genre you're trying to play. But no system is going to make up for a lack of talent on the GM/Players part.
Or, a bad system with a great gm and group beats the perfect system with a shit gm and group.
Depends on what he actually means by it. People throw that phrase around but never elaborate so it's impossible to tell what's being discussed.
Because "system matters" as a slogan is a relic of the days of the Forge and Usenet flamewars.
The sad thing is, no system would ever fix the Forgies problems. Which is the lack of spine and feelings of worthlessness. No system is going to make the bad old GM wipe your nose and ass like Mommy does. Either A) confront your GM about their BS or B) sack up and run a game yourself. No system will fix behavioral problems in people. You fix it by talking to them or getting rid of them.
>No system will fix behavioral problems in people.
Wrong.
Oh? And what is this mythical system that will make people behave better? (And no, a shock collar isn't a game system)
You're wrong.
thread image clearly says "YOUR WRONG" dude
System matters, but posters on this board exaggerate the degree to which it does.
and
sum it up fairly well.
Because your system doesn't need to be absolutely perfectly matched to the game premise.
There's enough game ideas and rulesets out there, that even with help, you're unlikely to find the perfect one. And even then, you're still doing much the same with it. You roll different dice with different modifiers, in a sequence or pattern, and from the results you derive a narrative result.
At the end of the day, so long as you can use your brain a bit to apply dice rules to the desired story content, the system doesn't really matter, outside of some whiffs of probabilities and system comfort.
>At the end of the day, so long as you can use your brain a bit to apply dice rules to the desired story content, the system doesn't really matter, outside of some whiffs of probabilities and system comfort.
It kind of does though. Would you run a sanity system in a game without horror elements for example? Would you allow for death saves in a game with highly realistic combat? And so forth.
You NEED to match system to tone/genre. Beyond that, though, it mostly relies on the skill of the DM to pull it all together.
Beyond system/genre matching, some systems are just ass-- meaning terribly balanced, overly specific (see FATAL), or rules lite. If you're working with a bad system, no good game can arise because you'll be spending too much time fighting against the system instead of trying to make a game.
To this point, 5e is actually a good system, despite what trolls say, because you can run a decent game in it. That's the bar between bad and good-- can you actually run a good game in it. FATAL fails, for example, because every game ultimately becomes about how shitty the system is and laughing at it.
Unless that's a label you stick on a wrong
>you're
Because when you are a shitter anything will allow you to shit.
>your
He isn't.
If system doesn't matter for a GM then he's effectively running freeform.
got a problem with freeform diceroll interpretation?
My wrong?
He's wrong but not in any meaningful way.
A system is a tool in creating the game. Some systems will give you different experiences, but generally the thing that people come to roleplaying games are system neutral.
Unpopular Opinion: 5e is fine and only needs a handful of specific little patches to make it less babby tier.
5e characters can also be brought into 3.5e/PF games with a handful of patches, or previous editions' mechanics brought in behind the screen very easily
He is quite wrong. A system can get in the way of what you want to accomplish. He's probably the type of idiot who thinks 'system' means 'core mechanic' and that the 'D&D System' means roll a d20 and add number.
A system is a toolkit but is not the experience. It should be chooses depending of what you want to do, but since toolkits can be modified, you can start with one and then modify it to fit your needs. People here get angry if you don't start with whatever system they feel is the most versatile because they see it as a failure when you modify it, instead of also a fun activity you can engage with.
This is largely true. Narrative players could not give two fricks about whether a system has "narrativist" mechanics - they just play vampire or (now) 5e.
GNS was an empirically wrong dead-end of a theory.
>GNS was an empirically wrong dead-end of a theory.
Agree, GNS was a descriptive theory at best, not a prescriptive one. It does not distinguish between how games appear and how to construct one that work.
So on first blush, it would seem that narrative is an important part of a game system because at least 1/3rd of game time is spent on narration. But this is useless for game designers since most, if not all, tabletop games do not design mechanics for narration. That is entirely left up to DM discretion.
So we end up with a theory that fundamentally doesn't understand what it is describing. Yes an actual game in practice relies heavily on narration, but this has nothing to do with the game system itself. And in other games which are not tabletop, that narration is often replaced by more interactive and visual elements, meaning GNS isn't even useful outside of the domain of tabletop. So a dead theory indeed.
System in a rpg is like sound editing in a movie, you only realize it's a thing when it has a mistake and even then it isn't enough for you to stop watching most times and some random guy online probably have a version with it fixed
System is secondary. What matters most is that everyone at the table is having fun. The system is just a vehicle used for that.
If your table has more fun playing, I dunno, L5R using the 3e D&D rules than the actual L5R RPG's rules, then you should use those 3e rules even if arguably the L5R RPG rules are better.
System doesn't matter for what? roleplaying? Combat? basketweaving? I don't even know what the question is trying to reference.
Play free form then.
my wrong what?
This is the same argument people make when they bring out monopoly.
Yes you can have fun with friends with a shitty game. But why play the shitty game?
System matters up to a point. A good system is like a good music instrument-- a bad musician can't produce good music on a good instrument no matter how much they try. But a good musician can use their talent to help compensate for the flaws on a bad instrument.
>what is good and what is bad
Systems are like instrument types. You can play rock music on a flute, but doing so is a little twee compared to playing it on an electric guitar. In general, you should try to match system to genre and understand if there is a mismatch, it is on your skill as a DM to compensate for this.
He's not. System matters an awful lot, more than people in this thread will say in an effort to try and look smart and detached. It defines what characters your story will be about and what actions happen within your story. You will only ever be able to tell DnD stories within DnD without ignoring the system to do so. I'm not about to run a grimdark dungeon crawl in Golden Sky Stories and, for that matter I'd never think to run Golden Sky Stories if it didn't exist as a system. Playing different systems is awesome. Anything else is an attempt to try and look more 'accepting' and anti-gatekeeper while keeping people mazed in bullshit ruts that don't benefit them in any way.
System matters from a knowledge perspective. As a DM, I have to go out of my way to make 5e more like 3.5e for my players to have fun. If I had no knowledge I could steal from 3.5, then my 5e game would be worse off. So systems do matter; they are like tools in your tool kit. A DM who knows multiple systems can get creative with how they go about running the game. So read homie read. Only stuck-up bad DMs are too arrogant to think they can't learn things from different books.
He's not, you're both moronic.
>System doesn't matter
As long as it does not impede the players and DM having fun.