I have been reading post here on the Forge for a little while now. I noticed that 99% of the posts in this area of the forums talk about mechanics.

This got me thinking what are your views on this, is there even an argument? Which is more important for a game, the setting or the mechanics?

I would like to hear everyone's opinion on this and how you judge what is a good mechanic and/or setting.

I didn't want to color the question posted in this thread with my feelings on the matter so I posted a reply to my post... ummmm yeah.

Anyway I think that setting is the more important of the two ingredients for a games success. I really hate to admit this but... I hate reading mechanics sections in rule books. I sneak off where no one can see me and read the world information first. Then if the setting really interests me I give the mechanics a read.

Please don't think that I feel mechanics are not important, they are. I just happen to think that they are there for the soul purpose of helping you immerse you self farther in the setting. An example would be the original version of Pinnacle's Deadlands, a game set in an alternate old West setting where players use a deck of cards and poker chips to resolve their game tasks. I thought this was great, it really help everyone feel like they were in the old West and made things that much more interesting for the players.

On the other hand generic rules systems don't really support any one setting and make the mechanics "stick out" in my opinion. I always feel like I am playing two different games when I play games like Steve Jackson’s GURPS. The game world you are exploring seems to fade when you are asked to roll dice and suddenly mechanics take over until the rolling is done.

There is my two cents on the matter, I still will never refuse a good RPG no matter what the system. But I will always play favorites.

It's always a good thing when the mechanics complement the setting. Dust Devils takes the idea of using cards and kicks it up a couple of notches.

Personally, I've lately become more enamored of systems that focus on situation rather than setting. Sorcerer and Paladin are great examples of this. Take the core concepts of the game (either one), and build a setting around it.

Orbit is shaping up to be one of the first sci-fi "we're out in space" kind of games I'd actually want to get into. I'm a great fan of sci-fi in general, but sci-fi games always felt a bit cold to me.

It still amazes me when I read Orkworld. If I had one complaint about the game (other than the printing being screwed up, which has nothing to do with design quality), it's that the system still falls prey to some of those old assumptions that people make about RPGs. If I were to rewite it, I'd make the mechanics even simpler, and try to incorporate some kind of single-roll conflict resolution rather than roll initiative/roll attack/roll damage. But I'd leave all the setting material as is.

One of the things that I appreciate in a game is when there is room to maneuver in the setting material. It can even be something as simple as leaving the names off the map, so you can plug in countries and empires as you see fit.

I know a lot of people love love love Glorantha, but just the thought of that sheer wall of paper that is everything that's been written about the setting is a little daunting. I'll get into it someday, when I have the time.

-- Ben

I think that setting and mechanisms should be very strongly mutually reinforcing. I think that congruence between mechanics and setting goes a long way to establishing a coherent imaginative construct among all participants.

I do not see you can have one without the other. I have for a good five years or better played in a game where the system regularly changes; charactrers I have from five years ago are hardly recognizable as being from the system, and even ones from a year ago would not fit. Likewise, we have played this game in many settings, through sundry campaigns. And ultimately, each time we gather to play, it is a combination of the setting of the moment and the mechanics of the moment that make the game. Mechanics tell a lot about what you want a game to do, but the setting is the living, breathing evidence of this, and allows the mechanics to due their duty. They are not indistinguishable elements, but they are locked in a symbiotic relationship, each bouying up and supporting the other.

What Gareth said. It's how the system puts us into the setting that's important.

Let's say you read up on this cool cyberpunk world in which they described all sorts of hacking, and life in the cyber-universe, but the system had no rules for it. Instead all the rules were about vehicular combat. Would you still be as interested in the game as if there were good rules about hacking etc?

System Does Matter means that, given a "setting" concept about what play is going to entail, one system may be better than another at making that happen effectively.

If the answer above is that the "rules don't matter as long as the setting is cool," then I suggest you take a stab at freeform. Just drop the rules, and play the setting. But in that case, all you're saying is that the way you want to play, "no rules" is the best system.

It's not that one is more important than the other, it's how they work together that make for a good game.

Mike

On the opposite end of the spectrum, I like system. To me, setting is only useful as an example of how to use the system.

I find myself disagreeing with so many things in the original post; but some of that is because of what I have seen from so-called designers over the years.

I do a lot of design, and a great deal of that is setting; I put a lot into creating settings that are different, breaking the rules, pushing the envelope in one way or another. But I think setting is secondary.

I have seen so many people who have some setting idea that they're designing that goes on and on and either makes no sense to me or is so completely derivative that I'm not sure where it's different; then they think they're going to make a few tweaks to the mechanics of some ten to twenty year old game they know and have something original.

I don't really think that system is more important than setting. What I think is that setting is, pound for pound, easier than system--and although good setting is extremely difficult, good system is still harder.

I think if you can't do good system, one way or another, you probably shouldn't call yourself a game designer. Go write fiction; or write setting material for existing games. Both parts have to be well done; but too many people think that what they think is a great setting is all they need to write, and the system will just fall together without any effort, and the result is usually me wasting time trying not to hurt someone's feelings about his game.

That sounds a bit harsh, maybe, but I think system matters a lot more than many budding game designers imagine as they get all caught up in their marvelous settings.

--M. J. Young

ZeOtter wrote: This got me thinking what are your views on this, is there even an argument? Which is more important for a game, the setting or the mechanics?

The bread is the artwork, the in-book fiction, and the marketing blurb on the back!
(I agree with Jack)

-Marco (breakin' the code)

Setting is more important for the potential of creating products in the market. But each product is a game. And both setting and mechanics are important for a specific game. Star Wars, Star Trek, Middle Earth are settings whith many different products. Each product has its own mechanics that have to combine together with its setting to make the product the game it is.

To create and to judge a flawless setting for an individual at first glance is only a matter of personal taste. But to really judge a setting if it is flawless or not you have to study it in depth and the bigger it is the more you will have to do. The rest of it will allways be a matter of personal taste. So it is not so easy to be productive on public discussions about setting's flawlessness and pointless when it comes to taste. Pay attention that when the setting is too small the flaws will be seen at first glance so people won't bother a lot about it. Mechanics is just common language formulas. People discuss about the formulas if they can suppose that the setting is flawless to find out if the formulas have flaws or not. This happens because these formulas usually are enough complicated but also small enough to make a discussion easily attainable in a forum like this. This is why 99% of the posts around here deal with mechanics.

I have read all the posts on this thread and am pleased with the responses. Xechnao really hit the nail on the head with what I was trying to get at, here are the Forge a vast majority of the posts are about mechanics. I also notice a lot of the posts are for generic game systems.

M. J. Young and Mike Holmes posts had some really good points about why mechanics are important and reminded me that a game is the sum of it's parts.

I think that writing good setting is both the "peanut butter and the jelly" of the game, while the mechanics are the "bread". To put it succinctly mechanics exist to resolve a conflict, the setting of a game creates the conflict in the first place. Even generic game systems need to have a setting plugged into them or they mean nothing. I think M.J's was to dismissive when he said:

I think if you can't do good system, one way or another, you probably shouldn't call yourself a game designer. Go write fiction; or write setting material for existing games.

There is of course no definitive answers to this question but there are plenty of opinions and I am still very interested in hearing them.

quozl wrote: On the opposite end of the spectrum, I like system. To me, setting is only useful as an example of how to use the system.

As many people mentioned, both setting and mechanics are necessary for a good game. I think the relative difficulty of each depends on the personality of the designer. I.e. some people are better at making mechanics and some people are better at making settings. (Why I've never designed a game. Can't make a worthwhile setting, even when it sounds good on paper). People have been writing stories for a long time, so there is plenty of inspiration, while people have only been
making RPG mechanics for a few decades. Of course that makes creating a setting that 'pushes the envelope' harder.

Ze,

Maybe we just need a topic. What about setting do you want to discuss?

I think that setting is often left undiscussed because it's not technical. That is, it's often much more artistic than mechanics. So it's not easy to find topics that can be discussed at length, IMO. It's like asking "what should I paint?" Answers are likely to only be personal opinions, which may hold no value at all for you if you're not like the person responding.

But if it's a problem, start up some threads on some appropriate subjects and see what happens.

Mike