07-11-2014, 11:53 AM
I think we're really debating only semantics, here. We all come back to the campfire that BM is for us, for different reasons - but still we come.
The thing is just, looking at all the games I ran over the last decade, the freshness is not quite there, any more. Adventuring stories, especially interactive ones, like P&P RPGs, rely very much on an exploration of the unknown, and the more you present an element of story, like, say barbarian hordes, or ash goblin riders, or robotic servants of St. Stephen, the harder it is to elicit that sense of "not knowing".
Then again, it's always a two-edged knife: I stuck with BM so long precisely because of the setting was open enough to allow me to tell my stories - as opposed to getting clubbed to death by splatbooks that cover everything up to Elminster's favorite nosehair trimmer. - Well, we will see what the future brings for me, in that regard... :wink:
The thing is just, looking at all the games I ran over the last decade, the freshness is not quite there, any more. Adventuring stories, especially interactive ones, like P&P RPGs, rely very much on an exploration of the unknown, and the more you present an element of story, like, say barbarian hordes, or ash goblin riders, or robotic servants of St. Stephen, the harder it is to elicit that sense of "not knowing".
Then again, it's always a two-edged knife: I stuck with BM so long precisely because of the setting was open enough to allow me to tell my stories - as opposed to getting clubbed to death by splatbooks that cover everything up to Elminster's favorite nosehair trimmer. - Well, we will see what the future brings for me, in that regard... :wink: