Yora wrote a short blog post, saying that “If you want that, you really should be running a different game” is the most useless RPG advice ever.
the most useless RPG advice ever
The quote sounds like something I could have said, but I don’t remember where I might have said it. In my podcast, perhaps? 🤔
Apparently not on this blog. Weird. I wonder if that was generic advice or game design commentary. Because as generic advice it might be not particularly helpful, but from a design perspective clearly everything is intended for a particular purpose and thus at least telling somebody a thing was not designed for a particular purpose simply helps them save time: they don’t need to investigate every dead end.
intended for a particular purpose
If my game has property X, and somebody wants something without X, I think it’s perfectly valid to say “this game is not for you” without having to add: “and actually I have some cool suggestions for you, namely Y and Z and here’s my explanations…” as our goals don’t necessarily align. I want to talk about my game with property X, and they are not in my target audience. We should part ways as quickly as possible.
“If you want that, you really should be running a different game” might be bad advice for somebody who wants *that* but it can still be valid point to make if your goals do not align.
#RPG