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A conversation with an RPG industry colleague over dinner led me to think some about different ways roleplaying games handle the actual mechanics, or in-game effects, of roleplaying, measured on a continuum from implicit to explicit:
The “implicit” approach essentially assumes roleplaying “just happens,” as sort of a by-product of playing the game and essentially no rules are needed to cover it. This is how most RPGs initially dealt with the issue: by not dealing with it, at least, not directly. So, 1st edition D&D, for example, has virtually no roleplaying mechanics. How you choose to roleplay your character, his personality, attitudes, history, likes and dislikes, and so forth, have no real impact on game-play. About the only roleplaying mechanic in the game is alignment, and even that is more of a general behavioral guideline than a game sub-system.
The “explicit” approach encapsulates some of the roleplaying experience in the rules of the game. Perhaps one of the earliest examples is Call of Cthulhu’s Sanity system, which not only measures a characters descent into madness, but mandates a certain kind of roleplaying as the character’s sanity deteriorates. A great many explicit roleplaying rules systems provide mechanical incentives for “appropriate” roleplaying, which usually means in accordance with genre conventions and established character traits. They’re systems where how a character thinks or feels is often as important as what the character does.
Interestingly, there’s a perception that implicit RPGs do not “support” roleplaying in-game because they don’t incentivize it in any way, as if roleplaying won’t occur if there’s no clear game system reason for it. However, it could be said that implicit games are the most open-ended, since players are entirely free to play their characters as they see fit, without having to worry whether or not their portrayal syncs with the mechanical requirements of the game. That is, they can make unexpected choices, go against established character traits, or come up with entirely new things on the fly without needing to shoehorn them into their character’s game stats.
When dealing with the “roleplaying experience,” one wonders: Which approach actually “supports” it more?
The “implicit” approach essentially assumes roleplaying “just happens,” as sort of a by-product of playing the game and essentially no rules are needed to cover it. This is how most RPGs initially dealt with the issue: by not dealing with it, at least, not directly. So, 1st edition D&D, for example, has virtually no roleplaying mechanics. How you choose to roleplay your character, his personality, attitudes, history, likes and dislikes, and so forth, have no real impact on game-play. About the only roleplaying mechanic in the game is alignment, and even that is more of a general behavioral guideline than a game sub-system.
The “explicit” approach encapsulates some of the roleplaying experience in the rules of the game. Perhaps one of the earliest examples is Call of Cthulhu’s Sanity system, which not only measures a characters descent into madness, but mandates a certain kind of roleplaying as the character’s sanity deteriorates. A great many explicit roleplaying rules systems provide mechanical incentives for “appropriate” roleplaying, which usually means in accordance with genre conventions and established character traits. They’re systems where how a character thinks or feels is often as important as what the character does.
Interestingly, there’s a perception that implicit RPGs do not “support” roleplaying in-game because they don’t incentivize it in any way, as if roleplaying won’t occur if there’s no clear game system reason for it. However, it could be said that implicit games are the most open-ended, since players are entirely free to play their characters as they see fit, without having to worry whether or not their portrayal syncs with the mechanical requirements of the game. That is, they can make unexpected choices, go against established character traits, or come up with entirely new things on the fly without needing to shoehorn them into their character’s game stats.
When dealing with the “roleplaying experience,” one wonders: Which approach actually “supports” it more?
