thread: 2011-09-08 : Trad vs Indie: FIGHT! pt2
On 2011-09-29, Vincent wrote:
I get that you may not enjoy the kind of play I'm advocating. Chomp your cigar! Fine by me.
But if you want to understand, back up! I'm not advocating ad-hoc decision making. Far, far from it.
You keep lumping preparing scenarios and encounters with predetermining outcomes into "planning," when the fact is that different circumstances, different creative projects, demand different things planned and left unplanned.
In tactical D&D play, predetermining outcomes is bullshit, utterly destructive to the point of play. Of course it is: the point of play is to FIND OUT, for the GM just as much as for the players. You can't play to find out if you're rigging the game to get the outcome you've planned.
Prepping scenarios and encounters is, nevertheless, crucial to D&D.
In the kind of play I'm advocating here, same thing: predetermining outcomes is bullshit, but prepping scenarios and encounters is crucial. Planning is crucial, for the reasons you say! But you don't plan outcomes, because the point of play is to find out the outcomes. You plan other things.
So here's me: I agree with you that planning is essential. You're absolutely right.
Now I'm trying to talk about different things you can plan. I've mentioned one: scenarios and encounters. There's another thing that's just as important to plan, that I've touched on but haven't named, which I'd love to talk about next.
Yeah?
