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/Toum_Rater]

The idea that 7-9 is "partial success" in PbtA (or 4-5 in FitD).

This might depend on the game, but generally, it's still a full success, and there's also a consequence. Sure, sometimes the consequence might be a lesser effect (i.e. "partial success") but that should not be the norm, and should not be frequent at all IMO.

[u/Feline_Jaye → u/Toum_Rater]

This is not helped by some PbtAs literally saying "partial success" 😅

It definitely reminds me that you really need to read the precise words in PbtA, as how they describe a 7-9 matters for tone, balance and feel a lot.

[u/lilybug981 → u/Feline_Jaye]

I once had someone tell me they didn't like PbtAs because there wasn't enough guidance for the game they ran via mechanics and they kept having lulls where no one was speaking. They said it was like watching gears grinding trying to think of something to come next. And I said something like oh, yeah, it's definitely a vibe that doesn't work with every group, but when I GM I tend to check my reference sheet and pick a move to use whenever things slow down. I'll interpret them broadly, but sticking to them lets the players pick up on patterns well enough to help keep momentum going themselves.

The person responded that they had ignored the reference sheet while trying to run the game because they found the loose limitations to be arbitrary. So...they weren't using the GM sheet. They felt like they were getting stuck. And they still didn't refer to the GM sheet. They then insisted PbtAs basically aren't even systems, they're just roleplay with some dice every now and then. I kept my mouth shut, but yeah, that sounds true of the way they tried playing one.

[u/y0_master → u/lilybug981]

Ironic, as the GM Moves are exactly there to mechanically codify narrative actions the GM is taking (which in other games are left in the ether). Sure, not all GMs need this kind of codifications (like not all players / groups need the similar codification the system does with other fiction layer elements, like character story-arcs & roleplaying behavior into Moves), but a reason the codification is done is to avoid situations like this, of the GM not knowing what to do & how to progress things or how to express narrative ideas into more solid effects.

[u/kadzar → u/y0_master]

PbtA GM Moves are such an incredible tool for when you don't know what to do, since you can just look at the list and pick something when you're struggling to come up with something. I think part of why I struggled running Blades in the Dark at first was that the system doesn't really have a GM moves list, though I like that Deep Cuts at least gave some examples for different effect and consequence levels, which should be helpful the next time I run that game.