Cannot stand cutesipoo terms like "vanilla" and &q

[MK Snyder]

OK, in computerland, those are steps in a procedure. How is this:

"Some games use complicated procedures involving more steps than others; the different steps themselves can reflect differing degrees of detailing of the events being resolved.

For example, some games focus on move by move martial arts combat, resolving each blow and block individually. Others may focus in a similar fashion on scoring the witticisms employed in a verbal debate (Dying Earth)."

[MK Snyder]

I think we're talking about different levels of focus in Exploration.

When the action being resolved (and Explored) is in narrow/fine/close/detailed focus, that involves procedures of more steps than when the action being resolved is in wide/coarse/far/gross focus.

Game systems vary in the number and complexity of their resolution procedures. They may be combat detailed, but light on character emotionality. There may be detailed or coarse procedures for magic.

(Note:magic in "real life" also varies in terms of detail or coarseness of procedures between cultures, religions, and social strata.)

Level of focus tends to reflect level of attention; that is to say, procedures should be more  complex concerning those activities that serve the Premise.

Complex resolution procedures that do not address Premise diffuse Exploration; games with this problem are considered incoherent.

(Or Why Vampire Should Not Have Detailed Combat.)

[Ron Edwards]

Hi MK,

Beauty. I agree. A lot of this harks back to some early reactions to Sorcerer, let's see ... not too too long ago, Benjamin (bailywolf, yeah, same guy I mentioned earlier) was initially aghast at the concept of "one score" to describe physical effort and capability. I believe Ralph (Valamir) and he kicked it about for a while to arrive at a conclusion very much like your above post.

Guys, any thread linkage to help me out on that?

Stepping back a bit further, I can't over-emphasize how shocking this was back in 1994, when I first put Sorcerer together and starting playing it at local cons and stores. Games like Over the Edge were rare enough that most people could not conceive of playing without a full quantitative profile of a character at various layers. But I digress ... back to the regularly scheduled discussion.

Best,
Ron

[Ian Charvill]

I realise I'm coming into this rather late, and this may have already been discussed somewhere I missed, but isn't the whole 'points of contact'/pervy-vanilla issue about handling time.  That more vanilla systems with fewer points of contact have a lower handling time (also a lower handling complexity, to extend the concept) and more pervy systems with more points of contact have greater handling times (and/or complexities).

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Ian,

Yes, those are related concepts, but they're not synonyms. Points of Contact can be about any aspect of System, and Search & Handling Times are found among those aspects.

So we can look at Search and Handling Times for a given game, and identify how many Points of Contact each one contains. Clearly, the number and nature of those Points is going to affect the extent of the Times themselves directly.

Best,
Ron

[xiombarg]

I realise I'm coming into this rather late, and this may have already been discussed somewhere I missed, but isn't the whole 'points of contact'/pervy-vanilla issue about handling time.  That more vanilla systems with fewer points of contact have a lower handling time (also a lower handling complexity, to extend the concept) and more pervy systems with more points of contact have greater handling times (and/or complexities).

Ian, you might want to spin this off into another thread rather than ressurrecting this one... (Forge SOP)

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

I'm OK with letting Ian's followup stick to this thread for now. Just within the window of opportunity, I'd say.

Best,
Ron