TTRPG combat with emphasis on *player* skill?

[Segev]

This is exactly why most fights to the death happen. Most people who die violently as the intentional act of another human being are either being killed in some kind of war-ish situation in which the immediate goal is just to get enemies out of the way so you can go do something else, somewhere else, or else they are murdered by someone for whom killing them is an actual goal of theirs, either out of passion or a calculated decision that their ongoing survival is a threat to the killer's interests. When two people both want the last copy of Xanathar's Guide to Everything at the local Barnes and Noble, it generally doesn't result in murder, because these kinds of incidental conflicts where everyone shows up for something but it turns out there's not enough to go around are not generally resolved through immediate lethal violence. Someone you're willing to kill is not usually someone you've just met, unless you are in opposing armies, in which case your ultimate objectives are probably miles away and odds are the only reason your side wants the city you're fighting over is so that they can march through it to another one.

How common is it that game fights are war, with battle lines drawn to claim the battlefield location?

On the contrary, most are encounters that have specific reasons for the appearance. Robbery, kidnapping, hunting, and the like in the surface and especially with random encounters. Burglary, spying, hiding things, and he like in dungeons.

Sure, killing is one solution to many of these. But there are other solutions. Allowing the situations to resolve with addressing the underlying goals makes it possible to win or lose without killing or dying.

And, when there are unkillable characters involved, those alternate victory conditions become the focus. Stubbornly remaining focused on kill-or-be-killed makes for dull combat in such situations.

[Tanarii]

To Tanarii: I think it could be come more and more skill based as everyone gets a feel for what type of plans we can agree on. Either because they make sense or because of rule of cool.

As I said, the player skill in question is convincing your DM. Getting a feel for what kind of things "make sense" to the DM or the DM "finds cool" are a heavy basis for that player skill. If you go with what makes sense or sounds cool to you, and the DM thinks it is stupid or not fun, you're going to fail (or have an argument).

And I'm in no way suggesting it must be a conscious attempt at manipulation of the DM. It's just how more free form games in which the DM has lots of leeway in adjudication and resolution go down.

It's can be fairly bog standard even in a rules heavy game if the rules are heavy at the tactical level, but not the strategic, and you play the strategic game extensively to gain advantages at the tactical. Aka Combat-as-War.

[Quertus]

Yes, I know you are calling it that, but it does not, in fact, work that way. Determining how to bypass perfect defenses is not a thing that you can actually do reliably nor is there any mechanical support whatsoever for figuring this kind of thing out.

Thank you for pointing out exactly why it qualifies. There is no system. Thus, player knowledge and player skill (aka "metagaming") is rewarded.

[Telok]

Yeah, B/X / BECMI and AD&D definitely had a lot of the "convince your DM of your plan is clever and win by DM fiat" kind of player skill.

I realize that probably reads like I'm bashing it, but I'm not. I like the player skill in old school D&D. But it's important to be honest about what kind of skill it was: convincing the "referee" to rule in your favor. It definitely was not clever application of the rules at hand.

Honest question here: Are there any games that have rules to cover mine fires, causing volcanic eruptions, smooshing monsters with steamboats or starships, buying all the MacGuffunite, and finding loopholes in marriage contracts? Not games where these things can happen, but games that have actual rules to work through these things? All that I'm aware of is some of the more rule-light ones that use narrative rules for everything.

The reason that I ask is because it means that, from you point of view as I understand it, the vast majority of games become "convincing the ref" games as soon as you encounter anything not covered by an on-sheet character ability. And like you said, it's not necessarily a bad thing, it just means that functionally all games are "convince the ref" games outside of basic combat (don't try to be inventive, it's probably not covered in the rules) and a few pre-defined skills/skill uses.

[Tanarii]

Honest question here: Are there any games that have rules to cover mine fires, causing volcanic eruptions, smooshing monsters with steamboats or starships, buying all the MacGuffunite, and finding loopholes in marriage contracts? Not games where these things can happen, but games that have actual rules to work through these things? All that I'm aware of is some of the more rule-light ones that use narrative rules for everything.

http://www.scratchfactory.com/Resour.../LavaRules.pdf

The reason that I ask is because it means that, from you point of view as I understand it, the vast majority of games become "convincing the ref" games as soon as you encounter anything not covered by an on-sheet character ability.

Not covered by the rules in the book. That's usually significantly more than an one-sheet character ability. But yes, you've got the gist of what I'm saying, I think.

And like you said, it's not necessarily a bad thing, it just means that functionally all games are "convince the ref" games outside of basic combat (don't try to be inventive, it's probably not covered in the rules) and a few pre-defined skills/skill uses.

Yeah, functionally there is a point in every game where "convince the ref" is necessary, since the ref must make a ruling outside the rules.

But various games have different levels or rules and built in mechanics for resolving such things. Some have universal resolution mechanics that can be applied to most things. Others, like Classic D&D and AD&D had no such thing. If there wasn't a subsystem for it, the ref had to make it up. And the point where the ref has to make it up is in clear "convince the ref" territory. The point where there's a clear and unabiguous rule that requires no arbitration at all is on the "system mastery" side. And some mechanics (typically universal resolution ones) are somewhere in between.

My main point was some people think a lack of rules makes for player skill. To others, it's knowing how to use the rules.

[ChamHasNoRoom]

How common is it that game fights are war, with battle lines drawn to claim the battlefield location?

Let's take a look at every combat in Star Wars: A New Hope.

-Imperial stormtroopers blow down the door of the Tantive IV. Imperial objective is to capture the hallway to pass through. Rebel objective is to prevent Imperials from passing through.
-Imperial stormtroopers corner Leia and stun her. Imperial objective is to incapacitate opposing force without killing them (note: this is not an escort - Leia is not being escorted by the opposing force, she is the opposing force). Rebel objective is to avoid incapacitation and escape.
-Imperial stormtroopers open fire on Han as he escapes. Imperial objective is to capture the Millennium Falcon before it can take off. Rebel objective is to leave.
-Firefight in the control room overlooking the hangar. Imperial objective is to hold the room. Rebel objective is to capture the room.
-Firefight in the prison block entrance. Imperial objective is to hold the room. Rebel objective is to capture the room.
-Firefight against reinforcements after freeing Leia. Imperial objective is to kill the enemy force. Rebel objective is to hold the room. (Outcome is a stalemate: Rebels find another way to flee, but doing so is a setback, and they would have preferred to kill all the stormtroopers and leave the way they came).
-Fight with the dianoga. Dianoga's objective is to kill the Rebels so it can feed on them in peace. Rebel objective is to incapacitate the dianoga to make the trash compactor safe while they find a way out.
-Ben Kenobi's fight with Darth Vader. Imperial objective is to kill the opposing force. Rebel objective is unclear, but probably either to stall for time or to defeat the opposing force and make it back to the Falcon.
-Tie fighter attack on the Millennium Falcon. Imperial objective is to destroy the opposing force. Rebel objective is to destroy the opposing force.
-Battle of Yavin IV. Imperial objective is to destroy all attacking fighters and the Rebel base. Rebel objective is to destroy the Death Star before they can do that.

Note that, with the exception of the very last one, in every single one of these fights the Rebel objective is ultimately to find Princess Leia and get her to safety (well, keep her in safety for the first two). The Rebel side is constantly fighting to spring someone from prison and get them away safely, and yet several fights are simply to capture a room that is on the way to doing that. Leia herself is rescued between encounters and is immediately a fully functioning party member who makes plans and guns down stormtroopers afterwards, not a hapless escort who could be immediately recaptured if a single stormtrooper got past the front line. Most of the time, the Imperial objective is to capture a location or incapacitate the opposing force, and when the Rebels don't have the same objective, it's usually because they just want to run away.

Thank you for pointing out exactly why it qualifies. There is no system.

No, that is exactly not what the OP asked for:

Can anyone recommend me a ttrpg with a *combat system* that gets easier and easier the more the *players* know about the enemy and experience playing the game?

Emphasis isn't even mine. OP put the asterisks on "combat system" all by himself. Also, do you not know what metagaming is? Because it's clear at this stage that you are not referring to using out-of-character knowledge to inform in-character decisions, and while the first time you used it, it kind of made sense as a reference to the concept of the metagame in competitive games (not that this concept applies to D&D, since it's not competitive and there is no metagame), but at this point you're referring to a lack of rules as encouraging the metagame, which doesn't make sense for that context either, because a competitive meta only ever emerges because of rules.

The only skill that matters in a game with no rules is the ability to persuade other people that your plan should work. Actual understanding of the game, its setting, or any kind of planning ability is completely optional. The ability to engage in long term planning that actually means something is one of the principle reasons to use rules in the first place instead of just doing the easy thing and playing free form. And if you want to take the free form route, why the Hell would you burden yourself with several hundred pages of rules text?

[comk59]

The Street Fighter rpg has a surprisingly deep combat system. You each pick a maneuver card at the start of each round and reveal based on how fast you are, slowest first. Faster actions can interrupt slower ones. It gets a little hairy in group on group combats but I enjoyed it. And knowing what to play when is important.

So, what you're saying is spam tatsu into shoryuken?

[Tanarii]

Also, do you not know what metagaming is? Because it's clear at this stage that you are not referring to using out-of-character knowledge to inform in-character decisions,

That kind of metagaming is a red herring. It doesn't exist naturally. It has to be intentionally created by someone. If it does exist, it's because someone wants it to exist. Usually so they can then go on to have a nice case of screaming gamer herpes about the a 'problem' they created in the first place. Which always seems pretty counter productive to me.

[Florian]

Emphasis isn't even mine. OP put the asterisks on "combat system" all by himself. Also, do you not know what metagaming is? Because it's clear at this stage that you are not referring to using out-of-character knowledge to inform in-character decisions

This is basically why I used the Dark Heresy family of systems as an example. While there is a certain amount of mechanical "growth" by gaining and spending XP and there basically is no random loot to equip your team, the only way to meaningfully advance is by learning to handle your character better, become better at teamwork and develop tactics to deal with the various typical enemy types.

For example, for the typical D&D-trained player, a lot of equipment looks like utter trash and you have to wonder why it clutters the book(s). The mechanics only give you very vague hints, if at all.

Then you learn that the flimsy LasRifle is an E-type weapon and can actually blow up those suicide vests at range, which is easier that trying to mow them down with B-type guns or go for head-shots.
Or you wonder what's up with those ChainSwords, compare them to regular firearms, shrugs and drop the topic. The you learn how suppressive fire works, first for your team, than against it, and try to figure out way to deal with it. Suddenly, those JetPacks and GravChutes begin to make sense....

That's not regular system mastery, because that only has limited use, it´s also not regular meta-gaming, it´s just a solid learning curve on tactical, strategical and logistical matters.

[Segev]

Honest question here: Are there any games that have rules to cover mine fires, causing volcanic eruptions, smooshing monsters with steamboats or starships, buying all the MacGuffunite, and finding loopholes in marriage contracts? Not games where these things can happen, but games that have actual rules to work through these things? All that I'm aware of is some of the more rule-light ones that use narrative rules for everything.

The reason that I ask is because it means that, from you point of view as I understand it, the vast majority of games become "convincing the ref" games as soon as you encounter anything not covered by an on-sheet character ability. And like you said, it's not necessarily a bad thing, it just means that functionally all games are "convince the ref" games outside of basic combat (don't try to be inventive, it's probably not covered in the rules) and a few pre-defined skills/skill uses.

A lot of crunchy games actually do. The bad ones actually have specific rules and tables for every little thing, so there really is a section on "finding loopholes in contracts" and "attacking monsters with steamboats."

The better ones have fairly comprehensive rules for basic activities and for dealing with environments.

Mine fires are an environmental hazard, and how they spread is governed by the materials in the area. A more in-depth economic system than most games have would, in fact, deal with changing market values, but no, most don't. Any system with a bureaucracy subsystem or a good handle on the general uses of skills will allow for rolling intelligence or something to find loopholes in contracts. Many games have rules in them that can be USED to cause volcanic eruptions if one applies them right, though this does more commonly approach "convince the GM that this would work" territory.

Let's take a look at every combat in Star Wars: A New Hope.

Alright. Sorry for how long this post might get!

I'm going to actually do something fairly radical here, and pretend that literally every character in the following fights can spam Seven Shadow Evasion (and thus perfectly dodge any attack). This won't be true even in an Exalted 2E game, but I am doing it for illustrative purposes. This will actively make some things harder; I may digress to illustrate how a more "normal" distribution of such invulnerability would look.

-Imperial stormtroopers blow down the door of the Tantive IV. Imperial objective is to capture the hallway to pass through. Rebel objective is to prevent Imperials from passing through.

While killing the enemies certainly makes passing through work, it isn't required. Heck, if all involved are unable to be hit, the stormtroopers just walk straight through without worrying about the suppressive fire. The rebels need to actively physically block the passage, somehow, and the storm troopers' goal becomes crossing before they can, or preventing them from doing so.

-Imperial stormtroopers corner Leia and stun her. Imperial objective is to incapacitate opposing force without killing them (note: this is not an escort - Leia is not being escorted by the opposing force, she is the opposing force). Rebel objective is to avoid incapacitation and escape.

With everyone involved able to perfectly dodge any attack, the storm troopers can't even use force to stun and capture her. This would seem to make her job the easy one, and it does. But it means the game becomes one of again manipulating the environment, or of getting ahold of something she values that isn't invulnerable to harm to hold hostage. This scene didn't provide any such thing; in reality, Leia is already the victor in this scene even with her life on the line because her goal was achieved before she was cornered. R2D2 has taken the macguffin to Obi-Wan Kenobi.

-Imperial stormtroopers open fire on Han as he escapes. Imperial objective is to capture the Millennium Falcon before it can take off. Rebel objective is to leave.

Because the goal in this one is escape, disabling the Falcon is all that's required of the storm troopers. Han has to fly it out. But, even if it's destroyed, Han's still not out of luck; there are other ships he could try to steal.

However, Han values the Falcon greatly, so disabling it and threatening its destruction might get him to surrender anyway.

-Firefight in the control room overlooking the hangar. Imperial objective is to hold the room. Rebel objective is to capture the room.

Here is perhaps the most war-like of the scenarios. Though even here, it's a question of what their purposes for the room is. Both would obviously like the control it provides. Both would also like to deny that control to the other side. It's a minor or Pyrrhic victory to disable the controls in the room so the room is useless. Minor for the side that has the most to lose from the other side controlling it; Pyrrhic for the side that is at least denying a complete victory to the other.

Depending on what they need the controls in the room to do, it could even be a victory just to get somebody to the panels they need and enter the commands they want. Holding the right control for just a short period, even while a firefight is going on in the room itself, might be sufficient victory for the rebels, for example.

-Firefight in the prison block entrance. Imperial objective is to hold the room. Rebel objective is to capture the room.

This one's the one where fighting to deplete hp or mote pool is probably all you've got. Of course, there's the question as to what one does with control of the room; holding the room itself isn't important without the ability to use it in some fashion.

-Firefight against reinforcements after freeing Leia. Imperial objective is to kill the enemy force. Rebel objective is to hold the room. (Outcome is a stalemate: Rebels find another way to flee, but doing so is a setback, and they would have preferred to kill all the stormtroopers and leave the way they came).

Here, we actually have "kill the other side" as at least one group's objective. This is, so far, a rare exception.

Also, this is where most Exalted games' lack of SSE on everyone (i.e., only the PCs, most likely, have it) comes in. Presumably, the PCs are the rescue party. They need to get Leia out.

And, again, environmental manipulation becomes valuable in impeding escape. In this case, the stalemate scenario is a result of such.

-Fight with the dianoga. Dianoga's objective is to kill the Rebels so it can feed on them in peace. Rebel objective is to incapacitate the dianoga to make the trash compactor safe while they find a way out.

Sometimes, enemy monsters are too stupid to have self-preservation instincts and just go for the kill.

-Ben Kenobi's fight with Darth Vader. Imperial objective is to kill the opposing force. Rebel objective is unclear, but probably either to stall for time or to defeat the opposing force and make it back to the Falcon.

Vader's goal is to prevent escape. Obi-Wan's goal is to stall to allow for it. Obi-Wan actually wins, despite dying, because his goal is achieved and Vader's ultimately isn't.

This is actually a good example of the kind of stakes I'm talking about, since the death of one side is irrelevant to which side wins.

-Tie fighter attack on the Millennium Falcon. Imperial objective is to destroy the opposing force. Rebel objective is to destroy the opposing force.

They'd settle for disable and capture, honestly, but killing just seems easier. If killing wasn't an option, they'd still be trying to stop the flight of the Falcon.

-Battle of Yavin IV. Imperial objective is to destroy all attacking fighters and the Rebel base. Rebel objective is to destroy the Death Star before they can do that.

Note how we're not really dealing with individuals for most of this. We're dealing with units and unit movements. And yet, when the individuals enter the story, the battle stops being about "destroy the other side" and becomes "destroy the macguffin." (In this case, the Death Star, before it can be used to destroy the rebel base with its plot-cannon.)

Note that, with the exception of the very last one, in every single one of these fights the Rebel objective is ultimately to find Princess Leia and get her to safety (well, keep her in safety for the first two). The Rebel side is constantly fighting to spring someone from prison and get them away safely, and yet several fights are simply to capture a room that is on the way to doing that. Leia herself is rescued between encounters and is immediately a fully functioning party member who makes plans and guns down stormtroopers afterwards, not a hapless escort who could be immediately recaptured if a single stormtrooper got past the front line. Most of the time, the Imperial objective is to capture a location or incapacitate the opposing force, and when the Rebels don't have the same objective, it's usually because they just want to run away.

Indeed. And "escape" rarely requires that you kill the pursuers, and "prevent escape" rarely requires that you slaughter the escapees. Both will enable the goal, but it's not required in either case.

If we remove Leia as a PC, making her an NPC without perfect defenses, but leave everybody else with them, then the goal to protect her, keep her from being recaptured, rescue her, etc. makes the focus not on killing the PCs (or avoiding being killed, on their part), but on control of Leia's freedom. Leia is cooperative with one side and opposing the other, which complicates the dynamic in a good way (from an "interesting encounters" standpoint). But she is ultimately the "ball" in this game of sportsball. Sure, disabling the other team's players helps immensely, but if that's too hard or for some reason forbidden (as it is in most pro sports), that doesn't make the goal any different. Just changes options for how to achieve it.

[Cluedrew]

Sometimes I wonder why I'm here, why do I keep checking. And then I remember, this is Giant in the Playground where "What if all the main characters in Star Wars were Solar Exalts?" is not the question, but a supporting argument.

I love it.

I also agree with... at least some of the examples. There are definitely some cases where killing people might seem like the objective, but really that is more a convenient means. People die with relative ease and can do a lot to get in your way, so killing them can be a clean path forward. However remove either one of these conditions, otherwise add a way to get around them that doesn't involve killing them or add the condition that keeping them alive is important (ex. capturing Leia for interrogation) than that can change. So I guess I share the rarely is it actually a goal, more often a means.

[Quertus]

this is Giant in the Playground where "What if all the main characters in Star Wars were Solar Exalts?" is not the question, but a supporting argument.

I love it.

Lol, yup!

No, that is exactly not what the OP asked for:

Ok, clearly, I need to increase my pedantry, to explain my position. Let's start with the OP:

Hello! Can anyone recommend me a ttrpg with a *combat system* that gets easier and easier the more the *players* know about the enemy and experience playing the game? Something where a very skilled low-level non-min-maxed party could go toe-to-toe with an adult dragon or equally impressive creature and win, say, 80% of the time.

Put another way, I'm looking for a tabletop game where all else being equal (level, equipment, etc) the power level of knowledgeable and skilled players drastically dwarfs the power level of unskilled players.

Please note:[*]I'm not talking about specific or narrow choices made during character creation;

Now, let's look at your claim:

Emphasis isn't even mine. OP put the asterisks on "combat system" all by himself.

Yes, there has to be a combat system. We're on the same page thus far.

Yet,

Determining how to bypass perfect defenses is not a thing that you can actually do reliably nor is there any mechanical support whatsoever for figuring this kind of thing out.

Here is where we differ.

You see, the OP said, "the more the *players* know about the enemy". My point is, there has to *not* be a system for *knowing things* in order for "the more the *players* know about the enemy" to matter. Again, note that it was the OP, not either of us, who put in that emphasis.

So, in Exalted, where there is a built-in combat system, but no built-in system for knowing what capabilities or defenses someone has, or how to counter them, you have what the OP asked for: the more the players know, the easier the game gets.

Is it clear what I'm saying yet, or do I need to try again?

[ChamHasNoRoom]

I'm going to actually do something fairly radical here, and pretend that literally every character in the following fights can spam Seven Shadow Evasion (and thus perfectly dodge any attack).

You say this, but you are lying. You actually assume this only when it would be beneficial to you, and then ignore it when it would not. This is pretty typical of how your arguments in this post go: You have to demote Princess Leia to an NPC to make several of the encounters work, you have to ignore Darth Vader's explicitly stated intention to go and find his old master and instead pretend that he's trying to thwart an escape attempt he is not even aware of until after Obi-Wan is dead, you have to pretend that PCs will ever run away from anything ever, you have to focus on the Rebel objective in the Death Star run so as to draw attention away from the fact that the Imperial objective is in fact "kill the dozen-ish individuals making the attack," you have to ignore the Rebels' obvious ability to just close doors behind them instead of in front of them to force a confrontation with stormtroopers on the Tantive IV, and so on.

All you're doing is confirming my original claim: That making Exalted 2e combat work requires rewriting the plot to contrive for a reason why simply killing enemies who stand between point A and point B is no longer a source of conflict. You have to make the side that benefits from forcing a confrontation behave stupidly so that they don't actually do so, have to demote someone who is clearly important and competent enough to qualify as an Exalt to being a puny NPC mortal, and most of all you must continuously pretend that killing the other side is impossible rather than boring, but it's not. Most of these conflicts are, in fact, easily accomplished by one side or another by simply killing all of the enemies because they will win a mana bar comparison fight, and thus they have no incentive to do anything else but that. Yeah, the Rebel side storming the prison block probably could win by just opening the cell and leaving, but why? Why take the convoluted approach when their interests are best served by just clearing the place out? Their objective in the original was to clear the room for a reason - holding the room is useful. It means that instead of burning motes constantly they're only burning them for the duration of the fight, and if they need a chance to regroup and reorient themselves, they don't need to expend resources on constantly dodging more attacks to do it. They can take the room without actually clearing it, but they have no reason to want to, and changing that requires rewrites of a story that already works. Which is exactly the problem. A good combat system is not one that is so dull that you have to rewrite every combat encounter you ever have around how boring a normal combat would be.

You see, the OP said, "the more the *players* know about the enemy". My point is, there has to *not* be a system for *knowing things* in order for "the more the *players* know about the enemy" to matter.

Yeah, no, I got that. But you're also claiming that this involves "metagaming" in a way that does not make any sense with either definition of the term, and your claim that there must be no system remains false. People have brought up Chess - Chess is a game of skill because both sides have perfect knowledge of each other's capabilities. The only hidden information is what the other side is planning, not what the other side knows, because both sides know that their opponent knows everything. The board's right there. People have also brought up double-blind maneuvers, basically a really complex game of Rock Paper Scissors. In a game of RPS, both sides have perfect knowledge of what moves are available and what the consequences of each one may be. The only missing knowledge is what the opponent might do.

This does not apply to the game you're proposing. GM knows exactly what the PCs are planning, because they make plans right in front of him. Even if they don't, the GM has copies of all the players' character sheets. He can decide the enemy is prepared for the PCs' plans, or not. He can decide they have discovered the PCs' weaknesses, or not. When there is neither a system nor any other common background knowledge to work off of, the GM simply decides which side is victorious. There's no skill at all, because "what the opponent will do" is not take specific moves whose consequences are understood in advance, but rather decide to be victorious or not in a way that the other side cannot thwart.

[Psikerlord]

It seems to me, for (i) player knowledge about the enemy, and (ii) increasing experience from playing the game, to be the primary determinants of a combat, you would need a system which has (a) very flat or no real advancement of PCs with predictable probabilities (eg plate is always a 3+ save on d6, a sword always does 3 damage), and (b) every monster has an important inherent weakness and strength vs certain kinds of attacks that players could exploit once they learn about them. So the more time they play, the more a player comes to learn monster vulnerabilities and threats, but there is no signficant level up to unbalance a fight between a newbie PC and a veteran one.

I cant think of an RPG that fits, as almost every RPG has signficant level up/advancement rules of some kind. What the OP is after feels more like a (complex) miniatures skirmish/war game to me.

[Quertus]

Yeah, no, I got that.

Ok, good. Let's stop right there.

See, I'm opposed to any of these "skill on skill" examples, as they seem opposed to what the OP is asking. They aren't asking, "show me a system where player and GM skill matter", they're asking for a system where player skill matters, and would let third level characters defeat dragons. It rather implies a play style where the GM isn't trying to "win", but simply present a static challenge, the difficulty of which is determined primarily by player skill.

If the challenge is, "defeat a red Dragon", "defeat an invisible troll", or "defeat this particular lunar Exalted", player skill factors heavily into resolving this challenge - depending on the system. In 3e D&D, build skill - which the OP called out as not what they wanted to emphasize - is often viewed as mattering more than player skill. In older editions of D&D, clever use of flour, torches, spikes, and poison could resolve many issues (although, admittedly, not always in ways explicitly covered in the rules). However, identifying a troll, and knowing to use fire against a troll, seems, to me, exactly the same player skill as identifying a foo Exalted, and knowing how to counter their prefect defenses.

Now, I care not what you call that skillset; call it "Frank" for all I care. I just gave a name to it to distinguish it from character building skills, or other skills that others were leaning on.

Honestly, other than the live dueling example, I'm not aware of any other skills that can make as much of a difference in any of the systems I've played that isn't involved in character creation, and that allows one to directly interface with the combat system, than knowing what's what, and how to leverage that information. Although skill at cheating at dice (or cards) comes in a close second, in some systems.

And, IME, I've not seen a system where this knowledge can matter as much as it can in Exalted 2e, where it could turn a slow, painful, 50-turns-from-now defeat into a one-shot victory.

[Knaight]

I cant think of an RPG that fits, as almost every RPG has signficant level up/advancement rules of some kind. What the OP is after feels more like a (complex) miniatures skirmish/war game to me.

Having no advancement rules is relatively rare (outside of games explicitly intended for one shots anyways), but there's a lot that have very slow and/or very mild advancement. Fundamentally human scale characters that stay fundamentally human scale are pretty common, D&D style zero to god characters pretty rare.

[Telok]

Wasn't there a game that used poker hands to run combat?

[Knaight]

Wasn't there a game that used poker hands to run combat?

Deadlands used them for magic in combat. That's the only case I know about.

[Telok]

Deadlands used them for magic in combat. That's the only case I know about.

Hm. Too bad.

It's an interesting thought though. One round of combat to one hand of poker. Bid hits/damage with your character's ability as your stake. Folding is an abort to saftey move. Maybe implement some sort of fractional scoring so it's not a single winner-takes-all deal but the top two are still serious winners and the losers split the pain based on how badly they did.

Interesting to think about.

[ChamHasNoRoom]

However, identifying a troll, and knowing to use fire against a troll, seems, to me, exactly the same player skill as identifying a foo Exalted, and knowing how to counter their prefect defenses.

The troll and its weakness to fire exists independent of the GM's decisions and are codified into the game. They aren't there because of a lack of rules, but specifically because there are rules. Not only that, it's one-way: Trolls cannot defeat players by discovering their hidden weakness. If they could, if the main point of the game were for players to discover enemy weaknesses before enemies discovered theirs, then there would need to be some means of determining how quickly enemies discover player weaknesses. If there isn't, the GM is simply deciding whether or not the players win. At that point, better to get the combat system out of the way entirely.

On the other hand, if the players are the only ones bothering to try and find enemy weaknesses, then there is still no player skill involved. They simply go on a quest to find the enemy's secret weakness and then use it to instantly vaporize him. The weakness was concocted by the GM, the quest to find it was created by the GM, and the players' only involvement was to follow the plot until they succeeded. That's not a bad way to play a game, but it's not what the OP asked for. He asked about players being rewarded for skill in the combat system, not for their willingness to follow plot hooks before the fighting even gets started. There is no possible reading of the OP that suggests "go on side quest to find secret weakness in order to obliterate them so thoroughly that you pretty much don't even need to roll dice" is an actual solution for their problem, when they are clearly asking for a system in which decisions made during the combat make the difference between victory and defeat even for drastically lopsided match-ups (and no, decisions like "use our instant win button or don't" don't count because picking the optimal move is so obvious and straightforward that it doesn't even matter).

The best way to go for this kind of thing is almost certainly going to be the double-blind RPS approach. There's ways to improve on the basic RPS formula to give it more complex and interesting decisions (easy place to start: Give different payouts based on different matchups, so rock beating scissors has a different payout than scissors beating paper), but that's probably the place you want to go. Apparently Burning Wheel does this, according to Knaight earlier in the thread. I don't know the system, but what they describe does sound like the kind of thing where your choices made during the combat 1) make a significant difference to its outcome and 2) can be optimized such that a knowledgeable player would do better than someone rolling dice to select moves completely at random (or picking the same move over and over again because it's always superior).

A "system" whereby players must convince the GM to give them information that only the GM has and which players cannot reasonably acquire except as a story award which is then used to immediately trivialize a combat fulfills none of these goals.

[Quertus]

The troll and its weakness to fire exists independent of the GM's decisions and are codified into the game. They aren't there because of a lack of rules, but specifically because there are rules.

Yes, we're on the same page so far.

Not only that, it's one-way: Trolls cannot defeat players by discovering their hidden weakness.

And here's where we diverge.

The Dragon absolutely could defeat third level characters if it leveraged its abilities wisely. The point is to treat it as a static threat, regardless of what it theoretically could do. The PCs weaknesses generally only come up if that's what the monster would do anyway (ie, a red dragon breathing for on what happens to be a troll PC), not if the GM was playing 5-dimensional chess against the players.

The point I keep trying to make is, there *is* a system for combat, and there *isn't* a system for 5d chess. The GM presents static challenges, and the players "read the monster manuel" to let them defeat dragons with third level characters.

None of the rest of what you posted, about convincing the GM to give them information, convincing the GM to let things work, double blind systems, etc, etc, have anything to do with what I'm talking about.

[CharonsHelper]

The point is to treat it as a static threat, regardless of what it theoretically could do.

It's always static? Even when it makes sense that it shouldn't be? That's kind of lame.

If the dragon knows that the PCs (likely famous/infamous to some degree when they're a major threat to the dragon) are gunning for it and that they have a favourite tactic, of course it should come up with a counter. As long as it's not a baby, it's likely at freakin' genius level intelligence.

It shouldn't be 'cheating' if a red dragon has item/spell defences against cold damage, or if they are prepared to avoid the party's uber-charger (or whatever). That's playing a dragon as a dragon rather than as a "static threat".

Not that a troll should act the same way. Or someone who would have no reason to know anything about the PCs.

[noob]

It's always static? Even when it makes sense that it shouldn't be? That's kind of lame.

If the dragon knows that the PCs (likely famous/infamous to some degree when they're a major threat to the dragon) are gunning for it and that they have a favourite tactic, of course it should come up with a counter. As long as it's not a baby, it's likely at freakin' genius level intelligence.

It shouldn't be 'cheating' if a red dragon has item/spell defences against cold damage, or if they are prepared to avoid the party's uber-charger (or whatever). That's playing a dragon as a dragon rather than as a "static threat".

Not that a troll should act the same way. Or someone who would have no reason to know anything about the PCs.

If dragons were not utterly infinitely inept in tactics then instead of having a hoard they would carry all their wealth under the form of magic items and/or pay huge teams of mercenaries for striking against adventurers(and they would follow the strike team to ensure success).
In their stat block they do not have "strike team" in their list of organisations nor do they have written "all their wealth in carried magical items" in their treasure line
Therefore dragons are tactically inept according to their stat block.
Saying that dragons would prepare oppose directly what their stat block says and oppose the written wizard of the coast scenarios with dragons.

if you say that monsters adapt then you would make a system where it would be more or less the following flowchart are you known -yes> you die
-no> you beat the opponent if you have the appropriate tactic.
Punishing people for being known is bad because it makes the game feel unepic when you are just a team of adventurers nobody ever heard about and doing the ritual for becoming vecna blooded every day.

[CharonsHelper]

Dragons were not utterly infinitely inept in tactics then instead of having a hoard they would carry all their wealth under the form of magic items

They generally should have some of their wealth in magic gear. But - they also enjoy big piles of gold for dragon-y reasons, so they don't want to spend it all. In 3.5/PF I pretty much always kitted out older dragons with decent gear such as rings of prot. and an AoMF.

and/or pay huge teams of mercenaries for striking against adventurers(and they would follow the strike team to ensure success).
in their stat block they do not have "strike team" in their list of organisations nor do they have written "all their wealth in carried magical items" in their treasure line
Therefore dragons are tactically inept according to their stat block.

1. Why would they trust a strike team? And why wouldn't they do the job themselves - they're a dragon!

2. Sometimes dragons DO hire a strike team. Being hired by a silver/gold dragon is a pretty common story hook.

Saying that dragons would prepare oppose directly their stat block and the written wizard of the coast scenarios with dragons.

WoTC has a lot of foes set up really dumbly. I agree 100%.

except that then you would make a system where it would be more or less the following flowchart are you known -yes> you die
-no> you beat the opponent if you have the appropriate tactic.
Punishing people for being known is bad because it makes the game feel unepic when you are just a team of adventurers nobody ever heard about and doing the ritual for becoming vecna blooded every day.

Or you use different tactics than your standard ones? One trick pony = fail.

Or you cast dispel.

Or you do your own research on the target and figure out that they're smart.

Etc.

To me having 100% static challenges is lame because it ruins all verisimilitude.

[noob]

Or you use different tactics than your standard ones? One trick pony = fail.

Or you cast dispel.

Or you do your own research on the target and figure out that they're smart.

Etc.

To me having 100% static challenges is lame because it ruins all verisimilitude.

Sorry but the dragons are tactically inept according to their stat block.
Being skilled at tactics is different from being smart.
Adapting is different from being smart.
Do you see a line with written "tactical knowledge" among the skills of a dragon?
No there is not.
Dragons are also super old creatures that had a lot of time to fall in routine and lose ability to adapt over the centuries I mean someone 80 years old is already a lot less good at adapting now imagine someone 800 years old that would be even worse.
Also read the stories there is often a hero who goes and sword the dragon to death or shoot an arrow straight at its heart.
That would not happen if dragons did learn and start fleeing heroes and recruiting an army to attack the hero with but it never happens because dragons are supposed to be unable to adapt.
If you want a opponent supposed to be able to adapt do not pick one which have not done that in literature until very recently and still does that rarely.
maybe pick "an army with a general" or another thing that is more able to adapt.

[CharonsHelper]

Also read the stories there is often a hero who goes and sword the dragon to death or shoot an arrow straight at its heart.
That would not happen if dragons did learn and start fleeing heroes and recruiting an army to attack the hero with but it never happens because dragons are supposed to be unable to adapt.

1. You're assuming that dragons in all stories are as smart as D&D dragons. I know that Smaug always came off as a bit thick to me.

2. Right - those are the stories you read about. You don't read about the 80 guys who strode in with sword bared only to die horribly. If a dragon hired an army to deal with every one of those guys, he quickly wouldn't have a horde left.

[noob]

1. You're assuming that dragons in all stories are as smart as D&D dragons. I know that Smaug always came off as a bit thick to me.

2. Right - those are the stories you read about. You don't read about the 80 guys who strode in with sword bared only to die horribly. If a dragon hired an army to deal with every one of those guys, he quickly wouldn't have a horde left.

I think that the fact dragons have high mental stats was because the creators of the dnd manuals were not aware of what people did think about mental stats.
But when wizard of the coast manages dragons they do nothing more smart than humans with straight tens(actually they are often like people who have a penalty to wisdom).
Also there is ways to know how strong someone is if you track people by popularity you can see that there is groups of 4 guys who have a reputation of killing 20 bandits by burning their camp + ambushes and also did beat 20 other situations like that and guess those people are the skilled ones and make a strike team against those people.
However when the guy you never heard about is going with a sword in your cavern you just flee with your wings and if that person fly to pursue you then use teleport and know that it is a dangerous person and then start planning a strike team against that person since that person must be strong to have access to flight.(if that person does not fly nor seems to have clearly visible super arrows then you just do more research about that person that now you have seen)
If dragons were good at tactics it would involve a lot of running(most scenarios with dragons would involve "the dragon flee as fast as possible each time he meets you until he have sufficient resources to beat you and if he find out you become too strong the dragon goes to another country or even to another plane of existence") but I think that dragons are bad at tactics and also have an actual wisdom of something like 1 but have a high written wisdom because the creators of the dragons did not want to give an arbitrary boost to will saves nor wanted dragons to be too easy to trivialize with a will based attack.
Also most of the stat drains are either to mental stats or to con or to str with some to dex and since they did not want dragons to be beaten by one spell(shivering touch appeared after the core manuals) they gave high stats all around(except dex but that is probably because they believed it would make too much dangerous creatures and in fact their dex progression is fast but compensated by increase in size categories).

After dragons there is a lot of other creatures that have super high mental stats while being described as bestial or similar oddities simply because wizard of the coast decided to give high stats to many high cr monsters for avoiding them to be annihilated by attacks to stats

[Segev]

You say this, but you are lying. You actually assume this only when it would be beneficial to you, and then ignore it when it would not.

I'm not sure if this is intentional, and thus a clever (but underhanded) rhetorical trick, or just a bit of anger and frustration creeping into your argumentative tone, but you do realize that accusing people of lying when they are debating with you is a very strong position to take, and generally not conducive to actual discussion, right?

Especially since I said, in the same paragraph you quoted, that I would back off of it at times. I get that you don't like my arguments, but you're not addressing them; you're too busy working yourself into righteous indignation to do so. (See, attacking somebody's good faith is a great way to make them want to agree with you! You want to rush to agree with me, now, right?)

This is pretty typical of how your arguments in this post go: You have to demote Princess Leia to an NPC to make several of the encounters work,

No, I state that she's a macguffin. In most encounters, she would not be immune to capture. If you really want to make her so, then the capture-game becomes one of environmental manipulation and hostage-taking of things she cares about (e.g. Alderan).

you have to ignore Darth Vader's explicitly stated intention to go and find his old master and instead pretend that he's trying to thwart an escape attempt he is not even aware of until after Obi-Wan is dead,

You're the one who brought up how Obi-Wan was stalling to allow the escape attempt. I haven't seen A New Hope in more than a decade, and don't like the movie enough to want to rectify this. I was going off of what you said happened and very fuzzy recollections, and was more than happy to accept your description of events over any memory I might have as I assumed you knew the material better than I did.

Don't blame me for not knowing the material better than you described it, please. Feel free to correct me, but assigning a disingenuous motive is needlessly hostile.

you have to pretend that PCs will ever run away from anything ever,

"Pretend," yes. See, here is where you're leaping off the precipice you accused me of, and start changing the scenario to suit your needs. True, many players aren't even aware that fleeing is an option, because they're used to fights where the only way to end it is for one side or the other to die. It is a GM's responsibility, if he is designing encounters to be more interesting than that, to get that message across in his encounter design. Make the goals clear.

If your goal is to get the Orb of Destiny out of the Star of Doom's vault before it can be united with the Star of Doom's core in the ritual ceremony of devastation next Tuesday, then it doesn't matter if you kill all of the mooks guarding it or not; only that you get it out. The same is true if it's Princess Leia whom you're rescuing before she can be interrogated to a breaking point/executed/whatever.

you have to focus on the Rebel objective in the Death Star run so as to draw attention away from the fact that the Imperial objective is in fact "kill the dozen-ish individuals making the attack,"

My purpose is to point out the win/loss conditions. The Imperial objective is to get rid of the attackers. This is most likely to be achieved by killing them. Driving them off would also work, though their escape would be a lesser victory (because, yes, killing rebel attackers is a goal for the Imperials).

The Imperial loss condition is not "through exchange of basic attacks, have all our soldiers and ships shot down." It is, "losing the Death Star." It honestly wouldn't matter if the rest of the Imperial fleet survived; losing the Death Star is losing that engagement.

Sure, killing everybody on either side is one way to win. Having all your guys killed is one way to lose. But even if literally everybody were unkillable, taking out the Death Star would be a win for the Rebels and a loss for the Empire. Destroying the Rebel planet would be a win for the Empire and a loss for the Rebels.

But yes, war is one of those rare times when it may well be that "kill the other side" is the primary goal in and of itself. I have maintained that that sometimes is the case. Just that it is rare in situations players find their characters in in RPGs.

you have to ignore the Rebels' obvious ability to just close doors behind them instead of in front of them to force a confrontation with stormtroopers on the Tantive IV, and so on.

You've lost me, here. I don't know this scene off the top of my head, and have trouble matching it to your list from before. Why do the Rebels want to force this confrontation, and if they do, why don't they do so? I'm really not sure what your point here is, because I don't know enough about this scene (what its stakes are, the staging, the environment, or who's involved) to make a coherent comment, and your accusation of me "ignoring" things doesn't provide a clear enough picture.

All you're doing is confirming my original claim: That making Exalted 2e combat work requires rewriting the plot to contrive for a reason why simply killing enemies who stand between point A and point B is no longer a source of conflict.

Nope. You're having to ignore what I said in favor of pretending I lied to you in order to make that argument, and even then, it doesn't hold water.

Killing people is a source of conflict. But it needn't be the only one. Nor even the primary one. Killing people is usually a means to an end, not an end in and of itself. That's my point. Identify the actual end goal, and you can find ways around killing people. Whether you wish to bother doing so is, of course, up to you, but as killing people gets harder (see: Exalted 2E perfect defenses), those alternate stakes become the focus.

If everybody were invincible in those scenes, then would there be conflict? Would the Empire and the Rebels have nothing to fight over? Are the Imperial forces and the Rebels only seeking each other out because they want to murder each other, like some sort of Red vs. Blue reenactment of Halo PvP? (Even that has some sort of capture-the-flag mechanic, now that I think about it.)

If Leia is impossible to capture, certain scenes are nonissues, yes. If Obi-Wan and Darth Vader both cannot be hit, then there's no motive for Darth Vader to go face his old master; both know that's futile. If anything, Vader would be suspicious that Kenobi was coming after him, when Kenobi wouldn't waste time like that. But I digress.

Why do the Imperials want Leia taken alive? You say that repeatedly, but never specify why that is. We still haven't gotten to the real goal. IIRC - and I might not - it was to find out where she'd sent the Death Star plans. Keeping her on the ship long enough to inform her that they're holding Alderan hostage would likely be enough to get her to, if not surrender, at least join Vader on the bridge for a...conversation. (After all, she cannot be grabbed or held, so they can't actually capture her beyond tricking her into a lockable room.)

You have to make the side that benefits from forcing a confrontation behave stupidly so that they don't actually do so, have to demote someone who is clearly important and competent enough to qualify as an Exalt to being a puny NPC mortal, and most of all you must continuously pretend that killing the other side is impossible rather than boring, but it's not. Most of these conflicts are, in fact, easily accomplished by one side or another by simply killing all of the enemies because they will win a mana bar comparison fight, and thus they have no incentive to do anything else but that.

I never denied that, in the story as presented, it was viable to kill the other side to win.

I can point to the fact that, in most situations, the heroes didn't kill every opposing storm trooper (and certainly didn't kill Darth Vader), and yet they still accomplished their goals...and that proves my point that running fights as if the only way to win is to wipe out the other side to a man is not necessary for tension.

In fact, the more there's something at stake other than character deaths, the more tense the viewers will find it. Nobody is going to believe that you're going to kill off Leia, Han, or Luke as they fight those storm troopers. We all knew they'd find a way to beat the monster in the trash compactor, or at least escape from it. The tension was there, but it was excitement of "how will they get out of this?" rather than "will they survive?"

Every time there's something other than character death at stake, the tension ratchets up higher: we don't know, through meta-narrative understanding, whether the heroes will succeed or fail, will win or be defeated. Because losing the encounter isn't going to end the use of the characters in the story.

Yeah, the Rebel side storming the prison block probably could win by just opening the cell and leaving, but why? Why take the convoluted approach when their interests are best served by just clearing the place out?

That depends on the situation. Obviously, in this movie, they judged as you did: killing everything that moved between them and Leia was the optimal way to go.

But being outmatched, out gunned, or simply being much better at stealth and sabotage might be good reasons not to bother killing things and risking their own lives that way.

The guards being literally unkillable (just like the heroes) might be another.

You're accusing me of lying about changing the scenario, then complaining that I treated the scenarios as changed.

You're also insisting that the "kill everything" approach used in the movie is optimal in the movie's scenarios as if that somehow proves that it's always optimal and that thus anything which makes it non-optimal is...somehow bad writing? Design? Mechanics?

In all, you're not really making a point I can follow, here; it reads more like you're ranting to justify dismissing my points without actually examining them.

"Not all blackbirds are crows," I say.

"Well, let's look at this movie about birds," you rejoin, "and I can show you that each of those black birds are crows."

"Sure," I agree. "In that movie, as shot, that's true. But what if some of them were ravens? THen not all of them would be crows."

"Hah! You prove my point!" you gloat, "because you're having to change the movie to make there be non-blackbird crows! It would make no sense for there to be ravens in this movie; it's about crows fighting pidgeons!"

This is the tenor of your argument as far as I can follow it; do you see how this is impossible to debate not because it's a good point, but because it's swerving off into things unrelated to my argument?

Their objective in the original was to clear the room for a reason - holding the room is useful. It means that instead of burning motes constantly they're only burning them for the duration of the fight, and if they need a chance to regroup and reorient themselves, they don't need to expend resources on constantly dodging more attacks to do it. They can take the room without actually clearing it, but they have no reason to want to, and changing that requires rewrites of a story that already works. Which is exactly the problem. A good combat system is not one that is so dull that you have to rewrite every combat encounter you ever have around how boring a normal combat would be.

O...kay?

Look, you can't both accuse me of lying about making everybody have SSE and then pretend that, if I do so, the scene can't possibly change.

I never said the fight for this room - whatever it is (because, remember, I am running only off what minimal description you've given, because I don't remember this particular scene at all from the last time I endured the movie) - didn't make sense. You postulated that the tension arises from the need to kill or be killed. That without the ability to kill or be killed, there'd be no tension. I responded by pointing out that there was a goal other than killing everybody on the other side: controlling the room. So of course I accept that holding the room is useful.

Killing everybody is a good way to do it in the movie. If it wasn't a good way to do it, there still could be tension over the control of the room without death being on the line. You're not really arguing against my point if you're getting so stuck on the scene being somehow perfect as-is, and thus any change to it being unacceptably editing the movie.

I'm not denying that. I'm also not agreeing with it. I don't care, because the purpose of discussing the scene is to use it to analyze my thesis that one can have tension in combat over things other than the deaths of the characters you care about. Yes, I'll discuss changes to the scene to help illustrate that point. I'm not trying to change Star Wars; I'm trying to discuss how that scene could have tension if killing the PCs were off the table for some reason. Getting hung up on the notion that the scene is great as it is and using that to object to any discussion of alternative sources of tension is missing the point, and probably a sign that A New Hope is too much a favorite of yours to use in this analysis.

Now, if you want to have an honest discussion, I'm happy to. But you're spitballing all over the place and not addressing what I'm saying, preferring to attack my integrity and get defensive over the quality of A New Hope and its individual scenes.

While I am not a fan of the movie, I am in no way criticizing it here. That's not my goal. I'm not accusing the heroes of doing anything stupidly, nor the writers of having poorly depicted the motivations nor goals in the conflict scenes.

I'm discussing how those scenes could have had tension in them even without the imminent threat of the main characters' demise. How there are victory and loss conditions other than "kill or be killed."

The fact that using killing to achieve those ends is perfectly rational and optimal in any given encounter is beside the point.

[DE5PA1R]

Wow. This blew up.

Thanks for all the input thus far. And also that sidebar about Exalted 2E and 3E.

I'll be looking into several systems mentioned in the thread like Legends of the Wulin, the Street Fighter RPG and Exalted.

What a weird question. Player skill = meta gaming and any gaming system with pronounced mechanical drawbacks and benefits can be "gamed" in that way.

Ok smartass, thought experiment time: You're playing DnD 5e as a 3rd-level adventurer. Any and all character options found in the PHB, along with equipment and treasure appropriate for your level, are available to you. You, the player, as well as the character you're playing, know everything you could possibly know about a dragon. You are in its lair, it is awake and aware of you, and all exits are blocked off (ie, there is a *combat happening* between *your character and the dragon*).

Now win.

Player skill = meta gaming

I know I'm using the same quote twice but I wanted to address this specifically because I saw it echoed by several others in the discussion.

Is player skill metagaming? Probably not, because all the knowledge in the world doesn't mean you always make correct decisions. But it's hardly important and also irrelevant to the original question.

I'm looking for a combat system (that's the turn-by-turn fighting bits, y'all) where players can leverage their in- or out-of-character knowledge to make a night and day impact on in-game outcomes. You might call it agency if you were a game design snob. That's why I proposed the thought experiment above; if you know 100% there is to know about a powerful creature and can't toe-to-toe (that's a combat where everyone's awake and aware of each other, y'all) beat it 80% of the time, the combat system has not given you the agency I am looking for.

I'm a little surprised that no one here has pointed at the design philosophy of OSR (literally, Old School Revival/Renaissance). One of the core tenets is that player skill should be rewarded. Shadow of the Demon Lord and Lamentations of the Flame Princess are both prime examples. There tends to be a decent amount of discussion about OSR over in the rpg subreddit, where you can find ZakSabbath (the creator of Lamentations of the Flame Princess) posting pretty frequently.

I think this has been alluded to already, but I'm looking for a codified rule system - one where the players know how the rules work and can predict (to a reasonable extent) what will happen if they try X, Y or Z. Obviously the rules couldn't predict every possible PC action so the GM/DM would adjudicate where appropriate. But, I'm looking for a system where most player options are codified and aren't generally resolved by GM fiat - if only because more predictability allows for greater player agency.

[Tanarii]

You've got some basic misunderstandings regarding Player Agency, DM Fiat, and Metagaming. Or at least some strong prejudices wrapped around the trigger word / internet meme versions of them.

But at least you answered the question of what you think player skill is: knowledge of how to use the rules effectively.