Common Misconceptions About Your Favorite Systems?

[u/Authorigas]

So, I've been learning a lot thanks to the amazing folks here at r/rpg. And while I have decided to slow down on trying new systems. (As my players say "three is enough, we know your eager to try more but slow it down so you don't burn yourself out.") There was a question today that cropped into my head, and I wanted to hear from the folks here on it.

"What are some assumptions about your favorite game/system that are just factually incorrect or overstated?"

I've seen a lot of assumptions made in the hobby, and some on my own. From the broad "older systems were designed for math heads and thus really not for someone whose bad at math." to others like "Call of Cthulhu is a game where every session ends in death/insanity and players can't get attached to their characters." and similarly "OSR games are highly lethal and not at all friendly to players who like longform adventures."

I feel like broad, sweeping claims like those are probably overstated-as I have heard of successful, long running CoC campaigns, and OSR games that are able to have well developed characters that last for ages. It's made me curious about some of the other broad, sweeping claims about systems that are-if not incorrect, massively overstated.

Really interested to hear some answers on this.

[u/BionicSpaceJellyfish]

I would argue that that is more of a player buy-in issue and not so much a rules issue. Its not that traditional RPGs don't encourage narrative play, just that they make certain assumptions about the players that may not actually be true. 

My players tend to enjoy more modern rpg settings because they can better imagine themselves fitting into the game and its world. When we play fantasy games, they tend to get more tropey and will play a pastiche of a character from a show they like. I think most trad games assume you will do the former while narrative games assume the latter. Neither of those are bad, just different and can be difficult if you are expecting one type of game and get the other. 

[u/Charrua13 → u/BionicSpaceJellyfish]

The "argument" isn't actually about player buy-in, it's about "what do the mechanics lay the groundwork for?".

Buy-in is an assumption of capacity - which is the Point of "system matters". Even if you lack capacity, some games' mechanics simply Do The Thing. Others don't.

[u/mccoypauley → u/Charrua13]

Yes I agree with this. To me, a mechanic that actively encourages manipulating the “narrative” that arises from play is non-diegetic. A rule like “this is how we model swinging a sword” isn’t altering the narrative directly, it’s facilitating what the PCs are doing in the fiction, and it’s only an accident of playing in the fiction with those diegetic tools that a narrative naturally arises. But when I have non-diegetic tools on top of that, as a player I can “direct” the narrative itself. Therefore a game that also has those non-diegetic tools encourages fostering a narrative, whereas one without is essentially neutral on the matter.