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[AoshimaMichio]

    The GM (Game Master) posts a situation the players are in. The players then post their actions, according to the conditions GM sets. The GM then rolls for the actions' results, and writes them out in his post. Then the players post actions again, ad infinitum.

    The action results are defined by a six-sided die roll:
    [1]: Epic Fail. Your efforts only worsened your situation.
    [2]: Fail. Your skills or luck were insufficient.
    [3]: Meager success: The situation didn't improve by as much as you have intended.
    [4]: Success: Your efforts were sufficient to achieve your goal.
    [5]: Epic Success: Your skills and luck have combined to ensure your success.
    [6]: Overshot: Your efforts were more than required for the goal's completion, and your luck is such that unfortunate side-effects are inevitable.

    If at any time something threatens a player, that player may make a roll to avoid the threat.

This is the basic idea of Roll to Dodge. Now the question is how far game can go before it stops being a RTD and starts being just another die controlled game? How much it can deviate from this before it should be moved to upper board? Where is the breaking point(s)? Is the limit different in PvP games than in PvE games?

What makes you say "This game doesn't belong on this sub-board"?

[Fniff]

What makes you say "This game doesn't belong on this sub-board"?

Good question. Answer: you could have anything and call it an RTD if you dressed it up right.

[Dermonster]

Ideally, it should be an interactive story with elements of random chance, but clear and simple rules.

Having to spend thirty minutes on a backstory, appearance and stats is completely contradictory to the mission statement. If I open the character maker in a spoiler and have to scroll down I'm closing the damn tab.

Similarly, having almost no content or effort in deciding action and having said action have no lasting impact makes the game worthless as well. No characters, no world... no care. (Lookin' at you minimalists)

The early days of RTD's had the right idea. Sean Mirrisan pulled stories straight out of his ass near the end, out of only one or two lines of 'I do this', and Gatleos did the same. If you want to know how to do an RTD right, do not look at the board now. Look at the beginning. Create a map. Create a setting, and leave it open. Put the world on the brink, and then plonk down four to six bastards with one line of 'who I am' and let them create waves and invent themselves.

RTD's should ultimately be a pinnacle of community driven storytelling, fun for GM, player and reader alike. This is what I believe.

[LuckyKobold]

Ideally, it should be an interactive story with elements of random chance, but clear and simple rules.

Having to spend thirty minutes on a backstory, appearance and stats is completely contradictory to the mission statement. If I open the character maker in a spoiler and have to scroll down I'm closing the damn tab.

Similarly, having almost no content or effort in deciding action and having said action have no lasting impact makes the game worthless as well. No characters, no world... no care. (Lookin' at you minimalists)

The early days of RTD's had the right idea. Sean Mirrisan pulled stories straight out of his ass near the end, out of only one or two lines of 'I do this', and Gatleos did the same. If you want to know how to do an RTD right, do not look at the board now. Look at the beginning. Create a map. Create a setting, and leave it open. Put the world on the brink, and then plonk down four to six bastards with one line of 'who I am' and let them create waves and invent themselves.

RTD's should ultimately be a pinnacle of community driven storytelling, fun for GM, player and reader alike. This is what I believe.

It's so fricken' beautiful 

[AoshimaMichio]

--snip--

This answers to my other unasked question: Why does Derm hate minimalists?

My original idea was to get more discussion in sense of game mechanics, but you bring very good points about spirit of RTD.

[Fniff]

RTDs are about the spirit, really, more then the mechanics.

[Dermonster]

--snip--

This answers to my other unasked question: Why does Derm hate minimalists?

I want a story, not a scribble.

[Harry Baldman]

I'm pretty sure Derm doesn't actually hate minimalist RTDs as a concept, since most of what he seems to like about RTDs stems from what could be described as minimalist techniques, since minimalist games are all about emergent stories from minimal premises.

Rather, what he seems to dislike is random goofy inside-joke games with no consistency or persistence. You can do a minimalist game that features none of those properties - I think I did it with that History game I did a while back, and people seemed to like that quite a bit (even if it was possibly altogether too much work by the end). It was a very fun learning experience that let me identify the strengths and weaknesses of the play-by-post format more clearly.

At any rate, I think I read Sean Mirrsen explain what I thought was a fairly good description of the RTD concept over at Roller's Block (which is, incidentally, where the things that have been and are discussed in this thread would actually belong) - and that is that the main feature of the RTD is the roll to dodge - if something threatens the player, the player gets a roll to dodge it. And that's basically it. I find I agree with this idea, since dice and their meanings can vary, but without the roll to dodge the game isn't really an RTD. So there.

RTDs are about the spirit, really, more then the mechanics.

But there's serious RTDs, silly RTDs, half-assed RTDs and elaborate RTDs, and I'm fairly sure none of them are inherently any less RTD-like than the others. So what would this spirit be, if you would care to elaborate?

[Fniff]

RTDs are about the spirit, really, more then the mechanics.

But there's serious RTDs, silly RTDs, half-assed RTDs and elaborate RTDs, and I'm fairly sure none of them are inherently any less RTD-like than the others. So what would this spirit be, if you would care to elaborate?

Well, as Sean Mirrisan said, the spirit is to roll to dodge: you always have a chance if something threatens you.

[Harry Baldman]

Well, as Sean Mirrisan said, the spirit is to roll to dodge: you always have a chance if something threatens you.

No, you see, that's a mechanic, not a spirit of the game. Spirit is more what Derm described.

[AoshimaMichio]

I did consider posting this to Roller's Block, but since it seemed to be more about ideas for games I decided to create new thread for this. And that pile is a bit too big to read through.

That said, do you happen to have link to the post you mentioned? I'll try my google-fu on it but your memory might work better and faster.

[Fniff]

Well, as Sean Mirrisan said, the spirit is to roll to dodge: you always have a chance if something threatens you.

No, you see, that's a mechanic, not a spirit of the game. Spirit is more what Derm described.

Yeah, I used the wrong word.

Does anyone have any examples of good old RTDs? I know of Perplexicon and Fight Club RTD, but that's about it.

[Harry Baldman]

I did consider posting this to Roller's Block, but since it seemed to be more about ideas for games I decided to create new thread for this. And that pile is a bit too big to read through.

That said, do you happen to have link to the post you mentioned? I'll try my google-fu on it but your memory might work better and faster.

Here you go!

All it took was searching for Battletech on Roller's Block. So yeah, I do see your point. But Roller's Block hosts several philosophical conversations about the underpinnings of games that I've observed (haven't read the thread), and the game ideas are just the standard dumping material. And you probably shouldn't worry about rehashing past stuff there. I'm pretty sure everyone else has at some point.

[Dermonster]

Roll to roll to dodge, the defining moment.

A current one is 'Roll to be a hero'

The big ol Multiverse ones.

Old ones... Arcanum octet?

There are a few others that I've been in that were good, I can't seem to quite find them though.

[AoshimaMichio]

I did consider posting this to Roller's Block, but since it seemed to be more about ideas for games I decided to create new thread for this. And that pile is a bit too big to read through.

That said, do you happen to have link to the post you mentioned? I'll try my google-fu on it but your memory might work better and faster.

Here you go!

All it took was searching for Battletech on Roller's Block. So yeah, I do see your point. But Roller's Block hosts several philosophical conversations about the underpinnings of games that I've observed (haven't read the thread), and the game ideas are just the standard dumping material. And you probably shouldn't worry about rehashing past stuff there. I'm pretty sure everyone else has at some point.

Thanks for the link. You were much faster.

I have to agree, Sean's point makes perfect sense. I accept that as an answer for my question.