Mechanics and Setting

General Brolynn looked out over the battlefield. The war had been a tough one, but the final battle was taking place, and he knew his unit was going to be key to victory. An ogre stepped out of the mass of fighting bodies and leered at Brolynn and his unit of soldiers.
"Attack!"

One of his knights rushed forward and began attacking the ogre.  The rest stood still.

"I said, Attack!"
Another knight rushed forward to begin swinging at the ogre.  Brolynn just stared at the others.
"Uh, what did you want us to do, General?" asked one.
"Attack!"
"Oh, okay!"  A third knight rushed towards the ogre.  The ogre took a swipe at one of the knights.
Brolynn looked at the other two knights under his command.  "Well?"
"Hey, General?" asked the first one that had joined the fray.  "What did you want me to do again?"

Epic storytelling at its finest, right?

The mechanics of an RPG should help the characters to act in accordance to the setting.  In other words, if it would make sense to happen in the setting, the mechanics should facilitate this.

 

"If it is something that you should be able to do, then you should be able to do it."

 

What the mechanics should not do is specifically hinder or stop an action which would make sense. If it does, then you might want to consider changing or eliminating the mechanic. Especially if the only reason the mechanic exists is for "balance".  If that's the only reason the mechanic exists, and all it does is prevent or hamper an action to the point where it isn't fun, it's a bad mechanic. 

General Bronwynn commands a squad of knights.  He wants the squad to attack the enemy.  Nominally, this means his squad goes where he commands, and they do their job. This should not "take an action". It definitely shouldn't take "one action per soldier", and it most definitely shouldn't have to be done "each round", just because they're NPCs under his command.

 

Is it "fair" he has a unit under his command?  Not relevant. Does it give him an advantage?  Of course.  That's why people have minions or units under their command.  It's the entire point.

There's plenty of mechanics that can be used to facilitate the command of a unit that doesn't involve the commanding PC burning through actions like water.  If you don't want to have to make a bunch of rolls for the unit, then you make it a 'mob'.  Small Mob of 5 to 10 people?  x5 hit points, x5 damage.  Large Mob of 20-50?  x10 hit points, x10 damage.  Huge Mob of 100-500?  x25 hit points, x25 damage.  They get 1 (small), 2 (medium), maybe 3 (large) rolls. Done.

 

Or maybe one person attacks with an 'aid another' or 'advantage' or some other bonus from the other soldiers attacking the same opponent.  1, 2, or 3 rolls maximum, with a buff. Easy.

 

Or maybe the general gets into the fray, and gets augments based on the type of unit he commands, with a bonus to hit and damage to represent his allies attacking the same target.  Puts him at risk, but he's going to be more effective.

The mechanics should say, "hey, you're doing this cool thing, let's make it cool", not "hey, while you should be able to do this cool thing, we don't want you to, so we're going to punish you."

 

I remember playing an adventure where you wound up in a 'no-win' situation.  You're facing a person with noble blood, who had been cast out into peasant society as a youth, and grew up bitter. She killed an enemy of the family in revenge and you're in the final confrontation... you try to negotiate.

If you try to treat her as a noble, she says she's been cast out of noble society and should die as a dog.  She attacks.

If you try to treat her as a commoner, she says she's got noble blood and should die like a noble. She attacks.

The adventure is set up so there's no way to save her. It doesn't want you to. No matter what you do, you're expected to cut her down. "Because this is a tragedy."

I really didn't like that adventure. The PC party I was running had a 'plan C'.  They knocked her out, took her off someplace, found out her story, and faked her death, then took steps to integrate her back into society.

Imagine an RPG that wanted bloody, visceral combat where people take lots of injuries.  So what they do is this:

 

Armour comes in None, Light, Medium, and Heavy.

For every step above "none", you suffer -5 Movement, Initiative, Skill Checks, and Saves.

The bonus against being hit has diminishing returns the heavier the armour is.

You eventually get to the point where you go  "why the hell would I wear armour?"  Rather than, say, just making armour expensive, or restricted by law, or very hard to find. Or maybe make piecemeal rules for armour, so the PCs can use a bit of this and a bit of that to protect themselves.

How about a fantasy RPG that penalizes mages, by throwing more and more complications on them the more useful the spell they want to cast?

Spellcasting takes a number of rounds to cast equal to the level of the spell. If you take damage, move, or have to make a Saving Throw or Skill Check, the spell is lost.  You must then make a Skill Check once you have completed casting, with a Difficulty of 10 + 2 x the Spell Level. If you fail, the spell is lost.  If the spell requires the enemy to make a Saving Throw, targets an ally, or heals damage or inflicts damage, you take one damage per die you roll for healing or harming, plus the spell level. If an enemy caster counts your spell, you take damage equal to the spell's level.

Now imagine that with the normal D&D spell list. Why would anyone want to play a spellcaster?

Really, if you want a game to flow a certain way, what you should be asking yourself is 'how do I make doing this thing cool, not how do I make these other things suck.  You want people to be awesome in melee, then you make going into melee awesome.  If you want people to engage in combat more, you make combat look awesome.  You want people to do awesome things with magic, you make doing magic awesome.

Or, you know, you let players do the stuff they want, and you make all of it awesome.  Different people have different things they find cool.  Some people like doing cool stuff with magic.  Some people like to talk their way out of fights. Some people like sneaking around threats and never being seen. Some people like to command mobs of minions to fight for them. Some people like to rush in and slaughter their enemies with abandon. Some people like to be a hundred metres away, dropping their foes with a single shot.

And these are all viable ways of playing. They should be celebrated.