{"id":723,"date":"2023-12-04T08:25:19","date_gmt":"2023-12-04T13:25:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/?p=723"},"modified":"2025-09-11T07:09:20","modified_gmt":"2025-09-11T12:09:20","slug":"back-of-someone-elses-hand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/?p=723","title":{"rendered":"Like the Back of Someone Else&#8217;s Hand"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>This morning (that being the morning I&#8217;m writing this, not the morning of its scheduled posting), I was scrolling through the Pathfinder 2e subreddit over breakfast and ran across a post asking why readers prefer PF2 over rules-light systems.  Several someones made the point which I would have made if I were going to comment: that different game systems are different tools for achieving different storytelling experiences and outcomes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The comment thread that prompted <em>this <\/em>post, however, was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/Pathfinder2e\/comments\/189ha11\/why_do_you_prefer_pathfinder_2e_over_ruleslight\/kbr4yop\/\">this one<\/a>, in which the OP expressed surprise that someone could be capable of running more than one game system without getting rules crossed up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I had a bit of an &#8220;oh, sweet summer child&#8221; reaction to that.  It never had occurred to me that this might be a problem.  I&#8217;ve been <s>collecting<\/s> <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">accumulating<\/span> TTRPGs since my childhood in the early &#8217;80s and studying and running them semi-regularly since the early &#8217;90s.  Each one still occupies a measurable amount of my brain.  While I can&#8217;t claim to be able to run anything 100% off-book, the RPGs for which I could play or run tomorrow without much fumbling, unfamiliarity, or pre-session review are, off the top of my head:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><em>7th Sea<\/em> (original)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Dungeons &amp; Dragons<\/em> (5e, 3e as a stretch)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Feng Shui<\/em> (either edition)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Legend of the Five Rings<\/em> (original through 4th)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Shadowrun<\/em> (2e and 3e)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Spycraft<\/em> (original and 2.0, including Stargate SG-1 as an intermediate member of that line)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Trinity<\/em> (original)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Twilight: 2000 <\/em>(v2.2 and v4)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Vampire: The Masquerade<\/em> (original through Revised and 20th Anniversary)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>At one time or another, I&#8217;ve spent enough time at the table for each of these to develop a decent familiarity with the mechanics.  I can make a spontaneous rules call at the table and be fairly confident that my off-the-cuff decision will be consistent with the game as written.  Of equal importance, I also know each of the <em>settings <\/em>(or genre assumptions, in the case of setting-less games like <em>Spycraft<\/em>) well enough to improvise plot and the world&#8217;s responses to the PCs&#8217; actions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In a pinch, I also could do passably-good GM work with the rest of the original World of Darkness (strongest in <em>Wraith: The Oblivion<\/em>, weakest in <em>Changeling: The Dreaming<\/em>), <em>Dark Conspiracy<\/em>, <em>Earthdawn<\/em>, <em>Star Wars<\/em> (WEG or FFG), and a good cross-section of the Powered by the Apocalypse family.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This morning (that being the morning I&#8217;m writing this, not the morning of its scheduled posting), I was scrolling through the Pathfinder 2e subreddit over breakfast and ran across a post asking why readers prefer PF2 over rules-light systems. Several someones made the point which I would have made if I were going to comment: [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[113],"tags":[66,55],"class_list":["post-723","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hobby-musings","tag-the-dark-arts-of-gming","tag-the-hobby-in-all-its-glory-and-horror"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/723","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=723"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/723\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1006,"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/723\/revisions\/1006"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=723"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=723"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=723"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}