thread: 2011-02-07 : Design scales: to the text!
On 2011-02-09, Vincent wrote:
In The Shadow of Yesterday, I like how the refresh rules bring in other people. It connects strongly to the idea that your character isn't isolated, that the population of Near is a meaningful part of play.
In Spione, I had to take it on faith that the very particular card manipulation rules connect to the overall thrust of play. They do - well, they set up a later manipulation that connects strongly to "no one person dictates," that I personally find quite tasty - but there's this point in the text and in play where I'm like, "okay, I'm going to take your word for it, Ron, and do this complicated thing. I hope you're not just leading me on."
In Maschine Zeit, what's the connection between spending Dramatic Elements the way you do and the inspiring business about survival horror characters at their most raw? Can someone who's played the game explain it to me? It seems kind of counterthrusty to me, like I go into the game wanting to spill my guts and splatter my blood, and instead I'm supposed to spend points to buy my safety.
Buffy and The Burning Wheel make for a good comparison. I can see The Burning Wheel's guiding vision in every single Burning Wheel rule I read, where in Buffy I can barely see its guiding vision at all, and when a rule happens to line up it seems like an accident. I need to organize my thoughts about this, though, maybe with some pictures, before I can really make my case.
