12/08/2025
So, according to ChatGPT, my initial text requires the trimming of polemics to reduce the confrontational nature of my prose, and my tendency to alienate. I think that my diatribes may be a bit like that -- contentious and in-your-face about what I see as deficiencies in the gaming culture. I can't argue that its version is much friendlier and approachable. Can I enlist you on weighing in? I'm not going to use the AI version; I intend on writing my own writing. However, I am considering revising my tone. Here are the two:
My diatribe:
"Setting difficulties
One of the tasks that the moderator is called on most frequently to do is to determine the difficulty of an action.
Gamebreakers – lack of immersion
When the players are not invested in the action and don’t know what is going on around them, it is hard to have fun, meaningful experiences at the table. There are many types of players who come to the table without the talent for accurately generating strong mental images from abstract and broken conversations. During the discourse and distraction of gaming, and the management of statistics and rules, it is easy for both players and the moderator to lose the thread of the scenario and the objectives of overarching plots. The moderator will be distracted and can easily overlook giving the players clear motivations, accurate descriptions, and relevant context.
This problem, identified early on, has spawned numerous editions, offshoot games, and thousands of attempts to rectify it. Not everyone shows up to the table with the perfect ability to distil discourse into a shared narrative world. Various tools have been deployed to address this suite of issues. There is nothing inherently wrong with these tools, just in how players, GMs, and rule designers have implemented them.
Battlemat and miniatures. Moving the game from a theatre of the mind to a tabletop was an early attempt to bridge this gulf, but if used carelessly, it can reduce the game and experience to nothing more than a board game with complicated rules and persistent characters.
Skill checks. Having players make skill checks for their characters using their in-world abilities can reduce the nuance of role-playing to rolling dice. While a character may have diplomacy and investigation skills, that should not rob players of their agency to make good decisions and experience the world. Here, slapdash rule systems and lazy GM’s allow the roll of dice to interfere with the promise of the RPG – that decisions matter, and the dice are there to plausibly return random results based on those decisions.
Giving the player a flat target, that is a target number on a die that they must exceed in order to talk their way past a guard, recall a crucial piece of information, or find a hidden object, is the final insanity that has ruined gaming and fractured the hobby into “Old School” and “New School.”
Our solution to this is the task system that allows players to peel back the onion of the adventure, still with the use of dice (character agency), but with value placed on decision-making (player agency). A player who is not good at oration can play a character who is, by identifying the “weak spots” of a targets emotional armor, gathering the right tools and events, and presenting them with the valuable context required to make decisions in a world that is not their own. Presenting players with their character’s in-world knowledge and skills, without robbing them of the role-playing is essential. "
Chat GPT's version:
"Setting Difficulties
One of the moderator’s most frequent jobs is setting the difficulty of an action. The number should follow the fiction: what’s happening, what matters, what the risks are, and how prepared the characters are. When players don’t have that picture—clear stakes, motives, and sensory context—immersion drops and choices feel arbitrary.
Common failure modes (it’s the usage, not the tool)
Battlemats & minis clarify space, but if they replace goals, stakes, or description, the experience flattens into a board game.
Skill checks are great when they resolve uncertainty after a decision. Used as a shortcut for thinking or talking, they can steal agency.
Flat target numbers that ignore approach, leverage, or evidence drift away from the fiction, making results feel disconnected.
Our stance
Dice are for uncertainty—decisions are for players. The moderator supplies vivid, relevant context and options; players choose; characters bring capabilities. No one’s agency gets sidelined.
The task system (how difficulty actually gets set)
Our task system lets players improve their position before they roll: uncover a guard’s “weak spots,” assemble the right tools or events, and bring in character knowledge without replacing role-play. Start from a fiction-based base difficulty, then adjust for approach (smart vs. clumsy), leverage/evidence (what you’ve learned or prepared), and risk/exposure (what happens on a miss). This keeps numbers tied to the world and rewards good decisions as much as good stats."
