and he references this article by Seraphina from Dice Exploder on 14 October 2026 titled, "Pawn Stance is Objectively Correct and if you disagree you're doing it wrong."
Let us consider the article first.
The article defines Pawn Stance thusly, "Pawn Stance is an approach to play that treats the characters and events of your game as tools for accomplishing your goals."
Seraphina goes through a brief history of narrative stances in table top role playing games discussing ideas put forth by Kevin Hardwick, Sarah Kahn, and Ron Edwards. What I know of the various stances, I do not tend to think this deeply about RPGS, is from interactions with Che Webster of Roleplay Rescue https://roleplayrescue.com/ , Anthony Boyd aka Runeslinger of Casting Shadows https://castingshadowsblog.com/ and more recently from discussions with Gabe Dybing https://volcanicfortressofsurt.blogspot.com/ and https://www.blackgate.com/author/gabe-dybing/ and others on the BS Landia RPG Community Discord.
The article's main thrust is that you should be playing games to have enjoyment and that Pawn Stance objectively is the straightest path to that enjoyment.
Mr. Milton's video hits a lot of the same notes, in fact he reads from the article, but he also addresses the low lying fruit of a stance where the player is "only considering the perspective of their character when deciding on actions" which is "but that is what my character would do."
Pawn Stance allows you to avoid those situations. Interestingly enough the DMG (Advanced Dungeon & Dragons 1st Edition Dungeon Masters Guide) supports the idea of the players using Pawn Stance. All you have to do is look to page 86, Gaining Experience Levels and the performance rating system the DM is supposed to apply to the players. Consider this paragraph,
Clerics who refuse to help and heal or do not remain faithful to their deity,fighters who hang back from combat or attempt to steal, or fail to boldly lead,magic-users who seek to engage in melee or ignore magic items they couldemploy in crucial situations, thieves who boldly engage in frontal attacks orrefrain from acquisition of an extra bit of treasure when the opportunitypresents itself, “cautious” characters who do not pull their own weight — theseare all clear examples of a POOR rating.
Yes it is clear Gary wants the DM to consider how well the player had the character act within their alignment, but as the above states clearly the DM also has to consider how well they played as an archetype of their class. If a player wants to stick in character as a Thief that does not skim a little off the top they are to get a poor rating regardless of the personality they have assigned to their character! That surely does not support anything but Pawn Stance.
To be honest I normally play as Mr. Milton describes in the video, probably one of the reasons I do not get worked up over character death. I think the interesting thing from both the article and the video is the idea that Pawn Stance actually can allow better investment in the game than only putting yourself into the character's shoes. I look forward to being corrected by Gabe or perhaps Kevin Borrup of Saltheart RPG https://www.saltheartrpg.com/ and Analytic Dice (also featuring Gabe) https://www.saltheartrpg.com/podcastsmedia but Pawn Stance is perhaps the intended stance for games that heavily use meta currency such as the 2D20 line by Modiphius.
I would love to hear other people's thoughts on the matter either here on the blog, discord, at nerdsrpgvarietycast "at" gmail "dot" com or even Speakpipe but make sure to tell me if you do not want your message shared otherwise I may post them here, read them on the podcast or play voice messages on the podcast.
Until next time be excellent to each other!
P.S. Interestingly enough this past week Che Webster, mentioned above, released episode 362 of his GM's Journal for his Patreon subscribers. Near the end of that episode, and I am paraphrasing, he talked about his perceived difference between role playing games (emergent narratives solely through playing as the characters and accepting the results of the dice) and story games (where the narrative is guided by the use of meta currency or other means to achieve a result). Edit: Those clarifications in parentheses are my words not Che's. I had written this blog post prior to listening to that episode but thought the way he separated the two types of games makes a lot of sense, at least to me. I personally do not see one type as better than the other as I enjoy both kinds of games but find that simple distinction very helpful when thinking about one's goal when playing. Knowing the kind of experience your group wants can be invaluable in choosing the correct game to play.
