I’ve been talking with Alex P. about the theory of multi-party Magic: the Gathering games. He brought up the idea of exploration of the design space as a valuable resource. Magic‘s designers have defined a large and interesting (but easy-to-grok) design space, and have gradually been exploring it.
So, I’ve been wondering how this might relate to RPGs. The well-explored routes seem to be either
- Release one book, that explains the design space as much as that space will be explored, or
- Release many books that, largely, tend to expand the design space, because what was previously defined was already full.
What I’m suggesting, I guess, is to release one book that doesn’t fully explore the space defined by the rules, and when more books come out, have them stay within the bounds defined by the premises of the rules, rather than add new space to the rules.