Topic: [WARNING: Long] "Drive" rules aka a Narrativist twist to Rolemaster action

[ToM]

Interesting changes, thought I wouldn't penalize PCs for failing their goals. After all, they've already failed in something they deemed very important, so adding a penalty to all their actions seems like rubbing salt on their wounds 

Very interesting argument.
So, maybe failing to activate a trait successfully (maybe after you paid the Fate Point to activate it) should simply result in the loss of a Fate Point, and no other penalty. Maybe, the trait you've failed to activate will become unavailable for activation for a certain period of time...

Also, the GM seems to have the final word on everything: is it really necessary? Especially in the Wheel of Fortune option: why should ever a player spend a fate point for that? If nothing fun happens in the game the GM will feed him something interesting anyway, or are they going to sit down and bore themselves to death all the evening? 

Yes, you're right to some extent. Obviously, the GM will feed the party with events, altough sometimes this carries the game on the line of "I, the GM, point you - the players - toward a goal, and you simply hack your way through it". A Wheel of Fortune FP, instead, imply that the GM should serve the player(s) something unexpected. This is not necessary something strictly in the way of the main quests of the campaign: it should also be an event which opens up the players a side quest, an interlude, adding a narrative element which will help adding to the game a feel of uncertainty and suspend the disbelief. It is also a way to add some narrative expedient in the hands of the player, allowing them to build up the story alongside with the GM.

[Arioch]

It is also a way to add some narrative expedient in the hands of the player, allowing them to build up the story alongside with the GM.

But if it's the GM that introduce the new narrative element, IMO the players aren't really getting anything by spending that point.
What I mean is: the GM already has the power of introducing new stuff in the story. He can do that (almost) whenever he wants. If he wants to introduce a side quest or an interlude, he already can.

So, with you option a player can spend 1 fate point to "beg" the GM to introduce some new stuff. Can he decide what kind of event will be introduced? If it's an encounter, a side quest, or whatever? No.
Well, IMO a player already has the ability of doing the same without having to spend points: all he has to do is acting with his character inside the game world!
Does he want to find a sub-quest? He makes his character keep an eye for interesting job opportunities. The GM will tell him what he finds.
Does he want to meet someone new? Just go to the local tavern and see if he spot someone. The GM will tell him if he see someone.
Etc, etc..

Compare it to the others Fate Point options: cheat death, reroll dice, impossible accuracy... they all seem WAY better than this one to me, mostly because they all are things that normally PCs cannot do. So why you, as a PC, should ever think of spending your precious, life-saving FPs to make something random happen instead of just going around with his PC and make stuff happen by youself?

[ToM]

It is also a way to add some narrative expedient in the hands of the player, allowing them to build up the story alongside with the GM.

But if it's the GM that introduce the new narrative element, IMO the players aren't really getting anything by spending that point.
What I mean is: the GM already has the power of introducing new stuff in the story. He can do that (almost) whenever he wants. If he wants to introduce a side quest or an interlude, he already can.

So, with you option a player can spend 1 fate point to "beg" the GM to introduce some new stuff. Can he decide what kind of event will be introduced? If it's an encounter, a side quest, or whatever? No.
Well, IMO a player already has the ability of doing the same without having to spend points: all he has to do is acting with his character inside the game world!
Does he want to find a sub-quest? He makes his character keep an eye for interesting job opportunities. The GM will tell him what he finds.
Does he want to meet someone new? Just go to the local tavern and see if he spot someone. The GM will tell him if he see someone.
Etc, etc..

Compare it to the others Fate Point options: cheat death, reroll dice, impossible accuracy... they all seem WAY better than this one to me, mostly because they all are things that normally PCs cannot do. So why you, as a PC, should ever think of spending your precious, life-saving FPs to make something random happen instead of just going around with his PC and make stuff happen by youself?

Probably, you won't.
Or, let me be more accurate: probably, if you're a skilled and experienced player, you won't had to. Because you already know how to do the thing.
But, let imagine this stereotypical situation. The characters are tracking of a group of orcs into a subterranean cave complex. They failed quite some tracking rolls, and they got to a dead point: their way ends up against a stone wall. Normally, the character will ask to see if they can detect the entrance of some secret door or passage. They make their rolls, but they all fail. They are at a dead end. Either they turn their back and find another way, leaving the chase, or find another mean to go on. Feeling they want to go on, one of the players spends a FP to spin the Wheel of Fortune: he says he wants some clue to go on on the chase for the renegade orcs. I (the GM), lend him this: "while you're thinking about leaving, you notice with the back of your head the dim light of a torch in the distance: one of the orcs! It is far more high than you imagined: some sort of passage must exist to climb up the wall. You step aside from the wall and see why you weren't able to find anything: you were searching too close to the wall. A rough staircase of steep steps, merely visible, steps ups from the side of the cavern, climbing to more higher ground. This is the way the orcs used and you were searching for. But, there's another thing now to be worried about. The orcs spotted you, in the end. They're gathering upon your heads, some 100 feet away. They have bows, and they're about to use them!"

So, we used the Wheel of Fortune to some imaginative extent. The player had what he asked for: a way to climb up the wall and get to the orcs. But, the wheel doesn't stop exactly were he want: the orcs left a guard to close the way, and he noticed the characters, spreading up the alarm.

[ToM]

Plus, many times trying to "make things happen" can become very boring.
You just run around here and there, talking to NPCs, doing random things to see what would happen. You have only a slight chance of finding/obtaining what you want. It is, in many players (and GMs) opinion, a waste of time, a lack of "story-driven feel", and something which can also end up very dangerous.
Many times I heard the players complain because (maybe not for they're own fault only) they've "run out of ideas". They can become very depressed at times, just sitting back with their characters letting thing happen. I thing this ruins the sense of wonder and kills the suspension of disbelief: a plausible, yet fictional, world, has a cause-effect consequence. If the players end up doing nothing, then nothing will happen to them. Or, worse, maybe the plots of their antagonists will go on while they just hang around doing stupid thing. This can be very frustrating.
It is something I call "the computer RPG syndrome". You have to take on and finish many silly side quests to have the main quest revealed, or to unlock some event which will let you go on. You have to talk to each and any single uninteresting NPC in town to have some clue. This is not entertaining, in my opinion. This is just a waste of time, for both players and GMs. The game (and story) should IMHO run much more smoother than this: escitement, combats, chases, clues, guesses... and all those thing. Sometimes, spinning the Wheel can help.

[Arioch]

Feeling they want to go on, one of the players spends a FP to spin the Wheel of Fortune: he says he wants some clue to go on on the chase for the renegade orcs.

Aha! So the players can actually ask for something specific to happen, rather than leave it all to the GM! This changes a lot of things and makes the option much more interesting. I think you should make it more clear in the rules.

On the "the computer RPG syndrome", I use a different solution: roll the dice only if failure can lead to an interesting outcome. Otherwise, the PCs always succeed (if what they're attempting is possible, obviously).
This saves a lot of time and spare us from a lot of useless rolls that lead to nothing. The PCs absolutely have to find the orcs' tracks to go on? No roll, they find them. They absolutely need to find someone who know something in town? They find him. If failure would bring a roadblock or a waste of time we simply do not roll.
Of course not everyone likes this approach (and the players still need to have some idea of what to do, or they won't get anywhere), but we find ourselves comfortable with it.

[ToM]

Aha! So the players can actually ask for something specific to happen, rather than leave it all to the GM! This changes a lot of things and makes the option much more interesting. I think you should make it more clear in the rules.

Oh, well. Yes. I think I should have been clearer on this point. My fault.

On the "the computer RPG syndrome", I use a different solution: roll the dice only if failure can lead to an interesting outcome. Otherwise, the PCs always succeed (if what they're attempting is possible, obviously).
This saves a lot of time and spare us from a lot of useless rolls that lead to nothing. The PCs absolutely have to find the orcs' tracks to go on? No roll, they find them. They absolutely need to find someone who know something in town? They find him. If failure would bring a roadblock or a waste of time we simply do not roll.
Of course not everyone likes this approach (and the players still need to have some idea of what to do, or they won't get anywhere), but we find ourselves comfortable with it.

Yes, the same approach as mine. When I want something to happen, I simply make it happen. Of coure, I'm the GM (BWAHAHAHAHAAH!)
But, on the other side, many times bad lucky rolls or wrong ideas lead the characters on a way they didn't want to go, in the first time. Once there, it is difficult for them to simply get back to were they deranged from the main route (or better: the route they wanted to follow: be it a side or the main quest/story). In a PC RPG, you'd simply shut the game and reload your last save. In a tabletop RPG, you can't simply undo certain thing you did. Like reviving a NPC you killed for error, or talk back to another you ignored, and isn't there anymore. But, this is a whole other issue, I think.

On the "Wheel of Fortune" Fate Point, again.
Characters can spend it to "bring back" into the story a NPC, or element, they already encountered in their background: either played or simply written down in their character sheet.
Example: one of the character has the "Master Warrior Friend" talent. During a fight against a tough foe (maybe too tough for them to handle), that character uses a FP to have is mentor appear on the scene and take on the combat alongside them.
They can also spend it to have a new, unpredictable element enter the story, such as NPCs, equipment which should be useful (but not durable: no "magic sword of orc-slaying that I can bring back with me" option), or natural/casual event.
Example: the woods are burning and they haven't got a chance to escape? Let use a Fate Point and it will rain hard, even if the sky was crystal clear a moment ago. They can't convince the guards they have the right credentials to let in? Let use a Fate Point to make the guards mistake one of them for a minor noble.

Hope I've been more clear on the subject, this time.

BTW, I'm about to playtest the rule simultaneously in my two gaming groups, AND, a friend of mine will test them with his two Pathfinder RPG gaming groups (adapting slightly the mechanics, but letting unchanged the basic concept). I'll be able to tell you more about how the playtesting went in a few weeks...