If you don't have explicit stakes and intent, then you've got implicit ones. That is, you always have stakes and intent. Some results will be appropriate or not based on those stakes and intent.
My own experience - admittedly limited - is that there is no general tendency on the part of new roleplayers to assume that stakes and intent are confined to a process-simulation approach to resolution.
I think I might be OK with Schrödinger's Geographical FeatureTM if, as a player, I had been casting about for a short cut or some other place to lose a pursuer while riding. I sure wouldn't expect it as the result of a ride check. That just seems like an answer to the wrong question.
The point about expectations is important.
Certain games make it clear that narrating complications, such as the gorge, is part of their action resolution mechanics. And one of those games is 4e (although as I've frequently pointed out, the rules indicate this only obliquely, via the example in the Rules Compendium - see my post 138 upthread - rather than explicitly).
So if you were playing 4e, and were familiar with the rules, then presumably that counterfactual you
wouldn't be surprised by this sort of thing.
But this does give rise to the question - how can a failed ride check be narrated
without introducing something like the gorge? All I can think of is (i) you urge your horse to greater speed, but it ignores you, and (ii) some sort of equipment failure eg you forgot to tighten your saddle straps.
The horse pulled lame; the horse and rider are slowed by brush as you try to force through it; the horse leaves the path at a switchback; the horse fails a jump.
To me, these all seem like variants on the gorge. Where did the horse's weak leg come from? The player didn't ask for a veterinary check, did s/he? Or if the lameness is due to the horse stepping in a pothole, where did that pothole come from. Or the brush, for that matter, or the switchback? Or the terrain feature that necessitates a jump (perhaps a gorge!)?
I don't see how weak legs, potholes, bushes, switchbacks or whatever other elements of the fiction are being introduced in these examples are interestingly different, for the purposes of the current conversation, from a gorge. Or is it all about degrees? - gorges are more geographically extreme than brush? (As I said upthread, no one is saying that "Rocks fall. Everybody dies!" is good narration.)
Why would a skilled rider, who knows nothing of the geography of a particular place, run into gorges less often than someone not as skilled on horseback but who has grown up in the area and knows it like the back of his hand?
It seems to me that that way of framing the question is already imposing a process-simulation resolution system.
The game is not part of a process of running a series of random trials. The gorge narration is likely to occur once in a campaign. (Unless it becomes some sort of running joke or motif.)
The reason a player who has invested build resources in riding skill is less likely to have his/her PC confronted by a gorge is because, by investing those resources, s/he has purchased the privilege of having his/her PC be more likely to get what s/he wants when riding is involved.
That is not the only way to interpret PC build mechanics, obviously. But it is one implied by certain sorts of action resolution mechanics, including skill challenges.
Because the system, to a limited point, is very much concerned with the how and the effect.
Using 4e as an example, there are two ways I could go about choosing the skill I use as a player in a SC. The first is to go for the most mechanically sound skill (the one I have the highest bonus in that will apply) and then frame the fiction as a secondary concern. The other is to choose a skill I think fits the fiction framing or setup that I wish to invoke through player agency.
Now I won't say no player in the world would use ride and then narrate the appearance of a gorge, but for me if I choose to approach the SC through the lens of of using my "ride" ability (as opposed to nature) I am more interested in the fiction being framed and shaped around my riding abilities
I'm still confused as to which system we are discussing.
4e does not have a ride skill. Nor does it have an animal handling skill. Nor does it have a region knowledge or geography skill. It has a Nature skill. It also has rules for augments (so a Nature check can be augmented via a History check or Perception check, for example).
The systems I'm familiar with that have more narrowly defined skill/attribute lists (BW, HeroWars/Quest), and that use skill-challenge like mechanics, also have more robust augment rules than 4e.
So which system are we talking about involves a player (i) choosing to use a riding skill, and (ii) not being able to draw upon other relevant skills, like knowledge of the local geography, to augment?
Another thing I find myself curious about is whether this disregard for causal connections between the skill or ability used and the effect extends to players as well. Can a player use his stealth skill to evade some guards but narrate it as a cavern suddenly opening up in the ground and swallowing them? Would DM's be okay with that?
As per the DMG and PHB, in 4e it is the GM who, by default, has the authority to narrate consequences of checks. In both the DMG and DMG2, however, there is discussion of when/how one might cede some of that authority to the players.
D&D designers (both 4e and now) have to try and marry new ideas and mechanics with a sense of tradition - and it's not always a clean or easy fit.
Nicely put.
I think the situation is like this:
<snip>
The player has a vision of his character. The DM doesn't want to compromise that vision in any way. He wants the PC to remain true to the player's vision, which requires that he's an excellent rider.
But the dice show that his action requires a failure.
In order to maintain the... status? (there's a word I want here but I can't think of it edit: integrity, that's it) of the PC as an awesome rider, the DM decides that he didn't fail because his excellent riding skills let him down; he failed because of factors outside of his control. The failure is some other complication - a gorge that was out of sight - that wasn't related to riding, and thus the ability of the PC to ride is maintained.
Now because the PC's riding ability isn't in question, the player can choose to go back to the well - to use his riding ability to get out of this new situation.
Very nicely put. Both as to part of the rationale for narrating the gorge (another part of the rationale might because it is the most interesting complication the GM can think of), and also as to consequence - that the riding ability is still available to be used to progess through the situation.
<snip example>
To my mind, this approach does a better job at supporting player agency. You succeed because of your chosen shtick. You fail for a larger pool of reasons (which can include screwing up your shtick).
I like this too - and I think it nicely complements LostSoul's anlaysis.
Personally, I think it's important in this situation that the horse still matters in the fiction. Okay I'm backed into a gorge, but I have my horse so I still have all my possessions. I've ridden a while, so I've possibly put some distance between me and the pursuers. These things would not be the case had I used Athletics instead.
And another nice complement to what LostSoul said - the horse is still there, the distance is what it is, etc.
Until the final failure or final success is rolled you have no idea what state (as it concerns the resolution of the conflict) that you are in. If you need one more success but then roll 3 failures... you have failed the SC, so you weren't any "closer" to escape than you were the first time you rolled a die in the SC as it relates to the overall conflict.
I'm not sure why you say this. As chaochou said,
a success or failure in your SC ride roll is both a) creating a new situation and b) telling you whether or not you are closer to escape.
(b) is itself an element of (a) - part of the narration of the new situation will also convey what has changed in it such that you are nearer to escape. Even if the skill challenge fails overall, that previous narration, and the colour and fictional positioning that it has introduced, still stands. This point is a further complement to LostSoul's analysis - that the colour and fiction of decisions made by the player, and the way those checks resolve, remain established at the table and colour the overall consequence of resolving the situation.
I respect the work pemerton and others do in their 4e games. Personally, I just run Burning Wheel, FATE or Apocalypse World when I want player driven games (which is most of the time - I'm a very lazy GM!)
Thanks chaochou.
I am hoping to run Burning Wheel once my 4e campaign finishes. But 4e does different things (gonzo fantasy) from what BW does (more gritty). And 4e also uses different (and on the whole less formal) techniques for signalling player buy-in (eg race, class, paragon path, epic destiny). But within those parameters, I don't find it hard to run 4e in a vanilla narrativist way.
As a GM, I like to have the freedom to be lazy away from the table - minimal prep, for example - but am happy to work hard at the table! The long lists of monsters, traps etc, the skill descriptions, the gods, the maps - all make it fairly straightforward to frame scenes that respond to what the players are doing and where they are trying to take things, provided that I'm paying attention and have my wits about me. (My view of WotC's design strategy from a commercial point of view is: instead of giving players and GMs the tools to build the PCs/situations that will support their desired story/theme, they will sell lots and lots of books with lots and lots of lists of possible elements, from which players and GMs can choose the ones they want.)
I guess the real question is, is D&D worth it? To which my answer is: yes, provided you're happy with gonzo fantasy, with fairly traditional fantasy tropes and themes (if you're happy with these, the situations in 4e practically write themselves; if you're not, then I'm not sure that there's much else to work with), and with combat as the principal, and perhaps ultimate, site of conflict resolution (4e is D&D, after all!).
Finally, way upthread (post 108) I posted this - one of the earlier posts in this discussion of gorges and action resolution mechanics:
Taking the view that consequence must be related to ingame, pre-established causal precursors puts a severe (I'm tempted to say fatal) limit on what can be done with non-combat resolution systems. Conversely, comparing such systems with a metagame component to Toon is a little unhelpful - the better comparisons, as far as D&D is concerned, are HeroWars/Quest, Burning Wheel and D&D 4e (the example skill challenge in the Rules Compendium clearly relies on metagame-adjudicated consequences, even though - given the absence of helpful advice - the technique is not expressly called out as such).
<snip>
If you want creativity and variety in stat checks, players have to be willing to run the risk of failure. And this requires making failure a viable option (ie fun for the players, even if not fun for the PCs).
Other than perhaps adding a "tightly" into the first sentence ("must be
tightly related") I still stand by this. Comparing metagame/"genre logic" resolution to Toon is in my view unhelpful - suggesting, apart from anything else, that those who are GMing the game in such a way are not running, or don't care about, serious games. (For whatever reason, this is a recurrent pattern in discussions of 4e play on these forums.)
And likewise, no one has explained what action resolution mechanics they think will produce creative, non-highest-number driven play, if not the sort of resolution that I and [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION] have talked about. Before the gorge was introduced from another thread, I posted this example:
Suppose I am playing a dwarf fighter with a dumped CHA. And suppose my PC enters a new town, and wants to make a good impression with the mayor/baron/dwarven clan leader/etc. Having the bard or rogue do the talking isn't going to work. If I want my PC to make a good impression, I am going to have to say stuff.
<snip>
When it comes to out-of-combat resolution, the main requirement is to explain to GMs how to resolve the failed checks that will inevitably follow upon players making checks in which their PCs have poor bonuses.
<snip>
Judging from posts I read around here, the default narration for the dwarf fighter attempting and failing the Diplomacy check is "You open your mouth and spray your spit over the mayor - sucks to dump CHA, I guess!" - and then people complain that their players won't use anything but their biggest numbers!
If the fighter fails the Diplomacy check, then there are any number of ways of narrating that failure without making the PC look like a fool - from "The mayor listens briefly, but then excuses herself to go off to the next meeting" to "Of course the mayor would love to help you, but she swore an oath to her late brother that she would never do XYZ" to "As you begin your address, rain starts to fall, and the mayor's entourage usher her back into the city hall before you can get your point across".
If all narration of consequences must be tightly connected via process simulation, then failed Diplomacy checks by CHA-dumping fighters are always going to be narrated as those PCs being rude/uncouth/generally disgusting. Which will mean that players of those PCs will never initiate Diplomacy checks (except as a joke, I guess). Which means that play will default to only the face talking, only the rogue picks locks, the party can never attempt stealth or riding unless every PC is trained, etc. How is that good for the game?
