[Aiwendil]

ex-Dungeonmaster here, I have been there bigtime, and enjoyed it too

Okay, I guess my character reading skills aren't my strong point. Moving on . . .

Basically that means, whatever you like best, is the best. Or, if something is better than something else, you will like it more.

What I think it really means is that in music what sounds best is best. I do think that if something is better than something else, it will be better liked (assuming that factors such as reputation, etc. are not present.) Of course, since we can like different things and also disagree on which is better, this argument remains subjective. But I do think that if I consider one book or piece of music better than another, that is equivelant to saying that I like it more. If my favorite composer is Mozart and somebody else's is Bach, then we not only have different likes; we disagree on which music is superior.

So you can't challenge Britney being better than LotR to those that enjoy her more

Yes I can. I'm not saying that someone's liking of something makes them right about it being good (not even right to them). I'm just saying that someone's liking for something implies that they think it is good. Thus, if someone likes Britney Spears, all I'm forced to say is that that person believes her to be a good musician. I could still disagree with that belief.

Actually I do think the development of RPG worlds IS an act of creativity. But there is a jump from creativity, as it manifests in many areas of life, and literature, as one of the fundamental mediums of communication. But we are back into definitions here

Well it seems we differ not so much in how we treat RPGs as in our definition of art. According to mine, RPGs are clearly art. I'm not sure exactly what your definition of art is, so I can't really argue that.

Finally, your start points - that to entertain is the essential nature of art ; and that the measure of aesthetic quality is how much art is liked - are pretty postmodern.

But isn't the postmodern view on these points really just a revival of a far more ancient view? Certainly Homer thought he was writing to entertain.

I spent hours on maps and contextual notes, I constructed certain laws of magic that were structured and constrained in the same way physical laws were, and I tried to provide as many choices and scenarios as possible to minimise the number and importance of dice rolls.

Sounds like you're describing my process of creating a world as well. Except that when I began to fashion my main AD&D cosmos, I was too young to appreciate the need for well-planned, consistent mythology and metaphysics, and I've spent a lot of time working these deeper consistencies backward into a pre-existing world.

BTW, my early gamesmasters included Steve Jackson (before he created Eidos) and the other founders of White Dwarf

Wow. Okay, I'm suitably impressed.