How "Complete" Do You Want Your Rules?

[Egonblaidd]

Vordark, I don't think they're being hostile so much as direct.  In my short time on this forum I've been at the receiving end of Luke's criticisms a number of times.  He doesn't beat around the bush, he cuts straight to the point, and it can sound like he's just telling you off for having a dumb idea, but I think his intention is for you to think about what you're doing and challenge assumptions that you've made.  Does an RPG need character advancement?  Does an RPG need combat?  Many of the things we take for granted in RPGs are actually optional, so he asks these penetrating questions in order to get us to see this ourselves, rather than just telling us.  Also, when I read MJ's post it didn't seem hostile to me.  He was merely clearing up your preconception of what marketing is (which, as he said, happens to be his job) and even said that your strategy was a good one.  Think of your own statements as akin to saying that RPG gamers are devil worshipers practicing occult magic (Spell: Feed Body; Components: slice of bread x2, smear of peanut butter, smear of jam; Ritual: use the sacred knife to apply peanut butter and jam to bread, then consume the ingredients; Cast Time: ~2 minutes; Effect: drives away hunger and invigorates the body); you can see how a purely negative view of something can rile up a person involved that thing.  MJ also made clear that he agrees with your opinion of "bad" marketing, which I think is something we can all agree on, unless you're actually in the business of selling... cars... or something (I hate those car salesmen commercials, you'd think by now they'd have improved them, even slightly).

I've noticed on the internet that words can be misinterpreted fairly easily, leading people to feel insulted or attacked when they actually aren't.  On another forum I've been involved in a thread about Science vs. Religion.  It's gotten heated at times, but for the most part it's been surprisingly civil, but there were a few times when I or another of the posters would apologize and clarify something we had said because someone misinterpreted it and took offense (it is an admittedly touchy subject).  This might be part of the reason I constantly inject humor into my posts, in the hopes that people will assume I'm joking rather than attacking them.  But then maybe it's just because I'm weird.  And funny.

Now, back to the point...
It would make perfect sense to include, say, a combat system in your system because many games do have combat in them, and for the most part combat is non-setting/genre specific.  Something like a magic system, however, would vary wildly across different genres and even specific settings within the same genre.  A magic system would then be inappropriate to include, or at the very most give a few different examples of optional magic rules that can be dropped in favor of a plug-in with it's own magic system.

Poison and disease seems like it would be fairly similar across genres and settings, but many games either don't have poison at all or only have a simplified system for it.  You could drop it and if someone wanted a poison system then they could write a plug-in whose sole purpose was to add poison and disease mechanics.  You could instead include poison and if someone didn't want to use poison rules they could just ignore it.  It seems like you could go either way, the question is which way do you WANT to go?  Do you want to include poison to make your system more complete?  Or do you want to leave it out to make your system more flexible?  The happy medium might be to leave poison out of the core rules but write a plug-in for poison.  The major problem with this sort of thing is getting plug-ins to integrate well into the rules, rather than having seemingly disjointed sets of rules that are used simultaneously (like a magic system that is completely separate from the combat system, something I understand is far too common in fantasy RPGs).  I'm confident that you can work around this problem and that thinking about this will help you to write your rules so that they are more capable of integrating plug-ins, and also to write plug-ins that integrate themselves into your system.  Just think about, "If I didn't include poison rules, how would I write a plug-in for poison that would integrate seamlessly into my rules?"  This is one of the major design goals, is it not?  To allow your system to accept plug-ins to alter the rules for specific genres, settings, and play styles?  Regardless of what you decide in the end, I think thinking about both sides of the problem will help you refine your game.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go cast Do Homework a couple times, followed by Feed Body, and then more Do Homework.
Spell: Do Homework
Components: paper x20, pencil
Ritual: bang head against wall, scribble illegibly on paper until pencil breaks
Casting Time: 6 hours
Effect: there is a chance to get a passing grade on the homework, improving your likelihood of graduating from college, this chance depends on your Intelligence
What, you didn't think it summoned a demon to do your homework for you, did you?  That's, like, cheating!  That's how people graduate from fighter school without knowing which end of the sword goes in the monster.

[Vordark]

I think the approach that would be best for the system is to provide a section for these optional rules and special circumstances and make it a sort of "grab bag".  Then I simply need to dump a few example systems, so to speak, in there and add to it as play-testers report omissions.  As long as each rule is kept relatively straight-forward and the entire section starts with a disclaimer along the lines of "These rules can help you get by, but if you think something is vital to your game you should use or design a more detailed plug-in."

[LandonSuffered]

In the games you play, do you prefer to have "all" the rules in one book or file, even if this means you could have twenty pages of rules for special circumstances, or do you want these somewhere else?  Some other option?

In the games you write, what do you do?

My answers to all your questions: It depends on the game (which, by the way, I believe is another way of phrasing what Luke was communicating).

Not all games require the same rules or even the same "spot rules;" even in universal game systems.  If you have a universal system that simply "does harm" to a player's character on a failed dice roll, then it will do harm regardless of whether that harm is caused by bullet or drowning or poisoned blow gun dart.

If the inspiration for your game is a game system that models many "real world" hazards, then you may wish to include rules that address these things. If some of these hazards (poison, for example) are intrinsic to the game, then it is imperative that you include rules for these hazards!  Check out Jason Morningstar's "Drowning and Falling" RPG which has very specific rules with regard to (duh) drowning and falling.

When I buy a game, I prefer all rules imperative to running the game to be included in one game book...specifically so that I only have one book to purchase. Whether or not the rules are in the main body of the book or tacked onto an appendix is a matter of style consideration, and I do judge some books for poor lay-out, but generally speaking style is unique to each individual game and there's no one style that's preferred over another.

In the games I write...well, I've yet to complete a single one (though I'm in the midst of several), each has a different lay-out that (I hope) makes the game book easy to use.  If character creation is important, you need to put that up front.  If the game setting is important then THAT needs to be up front. If the game rules are important (to the effect that they actually INFORM character creation choices) then THEY should be "up front."

Personally, I think it's good to include all rules regarding hazards in one section of your game...if you're going to include it at all.  But that's just my opinion, and may not even be the best lay-out for your game depending on your personal style.

[mjbauer]

...when I read MJ's post it didn't seem hostile to me.

If I did come across hostile I didn't mean to. I believe in honest critique, which sometimes means hearing things that are unpleasant or even frustrating. But, I don't believe in personal attacks, my comments aren't a judgement on you as a person. I hope they didn't come across that way.

And, sorry for derailing your thread.

[Vordark]

mjbauer:  No, I found your post to be well-reasoned and informative.  Not hostile at all.