thread: 2005-04-06 : The Whole Point
On 2005-04-07, Chris wrote:
Well, we already know that no set of rules can cover every situation or tell you how your friends are, or every kind of possible social situation (and yes, laws, morals, philosophies, and religions are sets of rules in their own way)...
The best thing is to give people enough guidelines and tools so that they can work it out themselves. Unfortunately many games out there neglect to tell people about the fact that all play sits on the foundation of social interaction, and without being aware of that, it's like having a car and not realizing that it moves by way of having 4 wheels. You can change the engine, the paint, the transmission- but if there's no wheels, there's no rolling.
You lay out what play is supposed to be like, the core mechanics and techniques, support that with Setting, Color, Artwork, "soft" advice, etc. But all of it stands on social interaction. You point out that social interaction requres social solutions, that is, lengthening the ears of elves in your game won't fix Jim being a jerk("The Elven Ear Fallacy").
Since the rules are just negotation techniques for credibility, it makes sense, right?
