I have traditionally liked GMing as running a setting, where players can do pretty much whatever they want. Sometimes in quite defined setting (http://s14.invisionfree.com/Tablets_of_Dleinr/index.php?showforum=1, sometimes a kitchen sink one (http://s14.invisionfree.com/Tablets_of_Dleinr/index.php?showforum=2).
I have used and designed basically two kinds of systems; those with a horde of rules and lists and stuff and minimum need for GM or player fiddling, and those with generic and broad rules that require creativity and adjudication in play and especially in character generation.
Of the first kind, most likely almost everyone has experience (think of D&D, GURPS, or most other published systems).
The second trend is something of an offspring of reading Over the Edge and realising just how great free-form ability setting can be.

Traditionally, the rules-heavy (sorry for using inappropriate words; is high points of contact what I am talking about?) systems have been dubbed simulationist or gamist systems.
So, here I was thinking, how do those huge lists of stuff promote simulationism? Creating them is simulationist (how would this work, and how do I best recreate it in this system?), but using them feels a bit bland. Think of playing chess with a computer program and having the option of "let the computer move". You are not doing anything, just seeing how something works or is done. Like watching a movie and not playing narrativist RPGs. You see something happening, it can be enjoyable, but is it really sim? As a GM, this applies to very defined settings (worlds), too.
When running a game in precreated setting, it feels like a huge mathematical formula (maybe because I am a would-be mathemathician, but anyway). The elves are here, the PCs hold something they want, they have this many and these kinds of agents there and there, what do they do?

As an AP content, just in the two previous weeks I have been running the heartbreaker I mentioned earlier. There is a link to the setting above. The PC dragon (young one, but not to be meddled with) was assaulting a group of bug creatures who were expanding a nest of theirs. She charged there and killed some. The rest run to hide (in the underground nest). Soon player (and char) realised that they had a hivemind or were one. After that, she sneaked there and killed one or two and flew away then.
My role? I compiled what I had decided about the creatures and thought of the most obvious countermeasures they could take. When I encountered something that hadn't been decided yet, I either made a decision on spot or made some neutral or ambiguous comment. It was an exercise in understanding how the bugs worked and how the setting worked.
Emphasis: how they worked.
I like doing that. Is this simulationism?

Usually I outline settings on broad strokes, leaving specifics to be desired during play or chargen. That gives something to do.
But, take some old ready-made adventure. Or town. Or setting, like Forgotten Realms. I don't see how a completed setting and ready, specific, rules promote sim. GM can't really adjudicate things because they are already outlined in the material. GM can't do that to rules, either, because they are ready, too. Players might be exploring the setting and liking that. What's a GM to do?
Players might be liking the gamist part in traditional games, and GM too. That wasn't the point.

Poorly defined rule and settings are favoured by me essentially because they give something to do to the GM. Apply the rules or think about the setting.

Is there a reason to create sim RPGs in the traditional way of covering as much ground as possible? Are there other ways of creating them?

Yes, there are other ways.  Simulationism isn't at all tied to exploring pregenned setting material or systems like GURPS (though my experience with GURPS has been heavily Sim, though I didn't know about such stuff at the time).  It's just that both of those things cater to a certain sort of sim.

If you like creating things like kooky hivemind monsters and then letting your players interact with them just for the fun of doing so, that sounds like sim to me.  What they are exploring is your content.  If they like what they're exploring then they'll continue to be satisfied by your games.  I don't know enough about your players to tell you if that's what they are doing, for sure, though.

The simplest way to understand Sim is to understand that certain aesthetic qualities of the game are more important to the players then their ability to conciously effect what is being imagined.  What that aesthetic quality is can vary from game to game, for you it's figuring out how the elements logically work together for others it can be enjoying and taking part in the gm's pre-planned plot line, or a 'realistic' system that gives true to life results.

The difficulty with sim is that with the aesthetic qualities varying from game to game what's important in one sim game is not so important in another.  That's why sim can seem to be a vast sea of different CA's yet behaviourly they are all the same.  Valuing x above the players concious desires for the game, where x is whatever is the valued quality.

So to answer your last questions the traditional method of covering lots of ground gives plenty of possible quantities or a very detailed single quantity to latch onto.  Are there other ways to create them, sure if you are more concerned with the system then a highly detailed setting isnt as important (see Gurps)

Hi Tommi,

I think you've made some astute observations. This quote is from the narrativism essay (in the articles section), but it's just as applicable to sim. It starts with a quote from the game 'Over the Edge', then Rons comments.

Ron Edwards wrote:

Over the Edge wrote: ... The first time I played OTE, I had a few pages of notes on the background and nothing on the specifics. I made it all up on the spot. Not having anything written as a guide (or crutch), I let my imagination loose. You have the mixed blessing of having many pages of background prepared for you. If you use the information in this book as a springboard for your own wild dreams, then it is a blessing. If you limit yourself to what I've dreamed up, it's a curse.

All I see, I'm afraid, is the curse. The isolated phrases "mixed blessing" and "(or crutch)" don't hold a lot of water compared to the preceding 152 extraordinarily detailed pages of canonical setting. I'm not saying that improvisation is better or more Narrativist than non-improvisational play. I am saying, however, that if playing this particular game worked so wonderfully to free the participants into wildly successful brainstorming during play ... and since the players were a core source during this event, as evident in the game's Dedication and in various examples of play ... then why present the results of the play-experience as the material for another person's experience?

Hi Tommi,

It looks to me, by your post count, as if you are relatively new to the Forge so I would like to offer you a hearty, “welcome!”

Tommi wrote: Traditionally, the rules-heavy (sorry for using inappropriate words; is high points of contact what I am talking about?) systems have been dubbed simulationist or gamist systems.
So, here I was thinking, how do those huge lists of stuff promote simulationism? Creating them is simulationist (how would this work, and how do I best recreate it in this system?), but using them feels a bit bland. Think of playing chess with a computer program and having the option of "let the computer move". You are not doing anything, just seeing how something works or is done. Like watching a movie and not playing narrativist RPGs. You see something happening, it can be enjoyable, but is it really sim? As a GM, this applies to very defined settings (worlds), too.

My role? I compiled what I had decided about the creatures and thought of the most obvious countermeasures they could take. When I encountered something that hadn't been decided yet, I either made a decision on spot or made some neutral or ambiguous comment. It was an exercise in understanding how the bugs worked and how the setting worked.
Emphasis: how they worked.
I like doing that. Is this simulationism?

Usually I outline settings on broad strokes, leaving specifics to be desired during play or chargen. That gives something to do.
But, take some old ready-made adventure. Or town. Or setting, like Forgotten Realms. I don't see how a completed setting and ready, specific, rules promote sim. GM can't really adjudicate things because they are already outlined in the material. GM can't do that to rules, either, because they are ready, too. Players might be exploring the setting and liking that. What's a GM to do?

Poorly defined rule and settings are favoured by me essentially because they give something to do to the GM. Apply the rules or think about the setting.

Is there a reason to create sim RPGs in the traditional way of covering as much ground as possible?

Are there other ways of creating them?

Callan wrote: Lists of equipment and unending rules are sort of like narrativist relationship maps. Imagine instead of hundreds of bits of equipment listed, you had hundreds of relationships listed.
"Jim has the hots for Jane"
"Jim also has the hots for Jill"
"Jill is suppressing feelings for Jims brother"
"Jane has the hots for Jill"

This sort of list shows up relationship problems that can inspire play. In simulationism it's much the same, you might have lists of equipment, but there are certain causal irregularities amongst them. Like Axes are worth 8 gold, but swords do far more damage and are worth 4 gold. What's up with that? It inspires the simulationist to invent how the game world works.

Although I think many simulationists often try to iron out these issues before play, so as to present a beutiful dream, when really these problems being ironed out should be the meat of play itself, IMO.

Jay,

Maybe you want to PM that list of Sim threads to Ron if he is still compiling RPG theory/GNS threads together now that those boards are closed?

Silmenume wrote:
Hi Tommi,

It looks to me, by your post count, as if you are relatively new to the Forge so I would like to offer you a hearty, “welcome!”

To no surprise to anyone who was involved in the theory boards over the previous 2 years, I agree with you completely that what you described is most certainly not coherent Sim.  I should let you know ahead of time that for all practical purposes I am pretty much a loner on this particular understanding of Sim so make sure you take that into account when or if you file any of my response away.

Absolutely – and in spades no less!  From my reading, it was not a process of trying to make sense of someone else’s writings about their bugs and how the author explained how they worked, but rather you, as the GM, creating the understanding of how the bugs worked as you saw fit.  You, and the players, are creating the world and all its important elements through the Shared Imaginary Space.  IOW not by sitting around “discussing” the matter out of character, but rather by my making decisions and manifesting them through actions within the “Game space/SIS.”

A phrase that has been employed on these boards before that might be more fruitful is “deliberate ambiguity.”

Now, this is the million-dollar question!  One, unfortunately, that I don’t have much to say on at the moment.  It is a question that I am deeply interested in and one that I have been pondering for over a year, but as the central process of Sim play has yet to be understood clearly it would be darn difficult designing a system that facilitated something that we didn’t understand.

For example, bricolage is a rules “building and altering” process.

I think the answer is plainly, “NO.”  I believe that such systems actually stymie Sim play.  Again my opinion is hot contested, but like your opening questions, what is a GM or his players, to do if everything is already worked out?

Hi Tommi,

Tommi wrote: Well, a beginning needs to be established. What kind of system do you use?

Hello,

Jay, I think you have that backwards. Tommi is the final judge of what's being sought, via this thread. You don't have the "answer." You have your own experience to offer in comparison, that's all.

Best,
Ron

Hey Tommi,

Tommi wrote: Universalis? I don't have it, but something to that effect might work.
Personally I use the established rules quite precisely, and suggest changes after playing. A bit of lag there, but more aggressive altering would hurt immersion that my players appreciate.

Alternating sessions between redefining rules through something resembling Universalis and using those rules, perhaps? A bit clunky and not one coherent system, but it could work.

Hey Tommi and all those who have read this thread -

Ron wrote:
Hello,

Jay, I think you have that backwards. Tommi is the final judge of what's being sought, via this thread. You don't have the "answer." You have your own experience to offer in comparison, that's all.

Best,
Ron

Silmenume wrote:

Tommi wrote: Well, a beginning needs to be established. What kind of system do you use?

I only have a moment to dash off a quick reply, but here is a link of my 1st AP thread where I do talk about the system I play in - [Middle Earth - home brew] 1st day in July 4 week of play.

I hope there is enough in there to give you a feel for what you are looking for.  Feel free to ask any additional questions you see fit.

No miscommunication, as far as I am considered.