Wednesday, June 15, 2011

12 Ways to Stop Sounding Metagamey

Written by not me.  Not even found by me.  I read them in excellent Roleplaying Tips Weekly.  Who included them with permission from www.leonineroar.com/

Several are 4edisms and a couple I don't agree with But the "spirit" of the list was good enough for me to blog it.  Click to get the original full article, it's worth a read.


12. Stop talking party roles.
11. Stop calling D&D a game it’s not.
[yes it is]
10. Describe your actions instead of reading off a skill and rolling a die.
9. Roleplay your social skill checks.
8. Stop giving gamey play-by-play.
7. Stop calling them short and extended rests.
6. Don’t go ‘Bag of Numbers’ on us.
5. Roleplay during combat.
4. Abort Tactical Metagame Mission Conference Discussion Delta Niner.
3. Stop calling them powers.
2. Stop saying “I Spend an Action Point!”
1. Stop Sleeping in the Damn Dungeon.

3 comments:

  1. Interesting. I wonder what the author this D&D is if not a game?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Well, if it's a religion we get tax exempt status.

    He forgot, "0. Stop playing a damn system that encourages all those things."

    ReplyDelete
  3. Actually I'd disagree with all these items, because they put the responsibility on the players rather than the DM.

    For example I think 9 should be something like this:

    9. The DM should choose what skill is used based on the player's description of their character's behaviour. A player saying something like 'I use Diplomacy' does not cause their character to take any action. The DM should apply penalties or bonuses so that the player's role-playing has an actual mechanical effect.

    In the specific case of 9, there's a set of rules for Diplomacy on the Giant in the Playground site which I want to adapt for 0e in the future.

    ReplyDelete

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