A discussion of metagame concepts in game design

Lanefan · Jul 13, 2018

Aldarc said:
Part of the issue is that the entire vancian magic system works in the meta economy of spell slots and levels where you can cast X number of times per day.

Agreed, but some baked-in meta elements kinda just come with the territory. This is one. Hit points, in many ways, are another.

I usually prefer magic as "skill" rolls/checks (e.g., Blue Rose, True20). Keep casting until you fatigue yourself. This would also be fantastic for a fail-forward or success-with-a-cost subsystem. So the caster could "fail" the ability check for the casting roll, but then force themselves to cast it no matter the cost to themselves because of its necessity to the mission.

Were it me, they'd already be committed to casting by the time the roll was made (in other words, the roll to succeed would come at the end of the casting process, at resolution, rather than at the start of it when the caster can still potentially bail out).

This is how I do it now, in situations where successful casting isn't guaranteed.

Lanefan

Lanefan · Jul 13, 2018

5ekyu said:
Inevitable use of info the character doesnt have to prepare spells?

Please provide examples?

I certainly have not seen this occur at all often enough to classify itcas inevitable.

When I played/ran games using pre-mem I saw it just about every time casters did their prep while in the field. Players would use info they had as players (e.g. knowing the DM's preferred monsters, seeing the module cover, etc.).

But, this is to me a minor issue compared to this: with pre-mem a caster is often stuck with spells she can't use and a party is often stuck because the spell they need to continue wasn't memorized. It's these things that eventually led me to drop pre-mem entirely.

Maxperson · Jul 13, 2018

Aldarc said:
Because there is a player awareness of most effective spells that are often best or most useful in the meta of D&D play, and that player awareness will form part of the strategy of "character choices." You can justify it as "character knowledge," but it still fundamentally operates as part of the metagame of D&D.

Character knowledge isn't a justification. It's quite literally the entirety of whether something is metagaming or not. If the character knows about something, the character making a decision based on the knowledge cannot be metagaming.

Also, the entire spell organization of spell slots and spell levels is pretty darn metagame.

I disagree. The entirely of the system exists with reasonable game world explanations of why it happens that way. Those explanations take away any metagame aspects of the system, because the PC is making all of the choices in character for in character reasons.

Maxperson · Jul 13, 2018

5ekyu said:
Are you saying the player is drawing conclusions here from other games in other settings... So that the invisibles in mountains is not established in the setting?

Sounds like a very bad bet to make, based on my experience.

If you know that the DM very often does use invisible creatures in the mountains, it's a very good bet to make. Your only loss if you are wrong is a see/detect invisible spell memorized that might have been something else. If on the other hand the high odds of encountering an invisible creature occurs, you are FAR better off with the spell than without.

Your games see this as inevitable?

No. Metagaming is never inevitable. It's simply a preference some people(not me) have. It's not allowed in my game.

Maxperson · Jul 13, 2018

Lanefan said:
Agreed, but some baked-in meta elements kinda just come with the territory. This is one. Hit points, in many ways, are another.

As are experience points and levels. A few things you kinda just have to accept. I don't agree about vancian casting itself, though. It's entirely in character.

Aldarc · Jul 13, 2018

Maxperson said:
Character knowledge isn't a justification. It's quite literally the entirety of whether something is metagaming or not. If the character knows about something, the character making a decision based on the knowledge cannot be metagaming.

The character can know about lots of things that would still nevertheless constitute metagaming. The character can "know" that they still have a single Second Wind available. The character can "know" that they have one level-one spell left. The character can "know" the placement of allies and foes in combat despite the fact that the character is operating from the players have a tactical advantage via miniatures.

I disagree. The entirely of the system exists with reasonable game world explanations of why it happens that way. Those explanations take away any metagame aspects of the system, because the PC is making all of the choices in character for in character reasons.

I disagree, as you're just putting lipstick on the metagame pig.

Maxperson said:
As are experience points and levels. A few things you kinda just have to accept. I don't agree about vancian casting itself, though. It's entirely in character.

It can be, but I don't think it inherently is. Like others have mentioned before, it's basis for not being metagaming seems more strongly rooted in familiarity and tradition than any real legit analysis.

The Crimson Binome · Jul 13, 2018

Maxperson said:
As are experience points and levels. A few things you kinda just have to accept. I don't agree about vancian casting itself, though. It's entirely in character.

Even experience points and levels are representative of in-game reality which the characters can observe. They know as well as we do that the path to greatness lies in adventure and overcoming challenges.

The only thing on the character sheet that doesn't correspond to in-game reality that the character can understand is "Player Name".

Maxperson · Jul 13, 2018

Aldarc said:
The character can know about lots of things that would still nevertheless constitute metagaming. The character can "know" that they still have a single Second Wind available.

No, this really isn't something that the character can know. It's nonsensical that you can only ever have one, and as an in-game thing, it defies reason. It's purely a metagame ability that the player uses that the PC doesn't know about. People can't decide, "Hey, I'm now going to get my second wind!!"

The character can "know" that they have one level-one spell left.

This is true. There is a reasonable in-game explanation for why this happens, so PCs can know it.

The character can "know" the placement of allies and foes in combat despite the fact that the character is operating from the players have a tactical advantage via miniatures.

This is one of those necessary evils. Combat just doesn't work without some metagame happening. Realistic combat is impossible to achieve without bogging the game down in hours or days(real life days) of combat. The PC really can't know where everyone is at all times. That's another thing that fails to have an in-game explanation, so is purely a metagame player ability.

Maxperson · Jul 13, 2018

Saelorn said:
Even experience points and levels are representative of in-game reality which the characters can observe. They know as well as we do that the path to greatness lies in adventure and overcoming challenges.

The only thing on the character sheet that doesn't correspond to in-game reality that the character can understand is "Player Name".

It corresponds to an in-game reality, but the PC can't know that it has 18000xp, or that he's level 3 vs. level 5. Those numbers are representative of metagame ideas. The PC has them and uses them, but doesn't really have a basis for knowing them. He can just know that he's capable of doing more now and has learned a bunch of stuff since he started.

Shasarak · Jul 13, 2018

Lanefan said:
I wasn't really trying to say that, but yeah - xp are a necessary-evil form of meta.

I'm more trying to argue that it's a higher degree of meta to assign the xp to a specific class after gaining a level (a la 3e) than it is to be assigning them to said class while working toward said level (a la 1e-2e).

I dont see it as any more or less meta. Infact I had a discussion with [MENTION=92239]Kobold Boots[/MENTION] regarding planning out 20 levels of your character progression in advance, is that not what a multiclass Cleric/Ranger has done? It effectively does not matter what they do to earn their XP because you know that you are going to level up in Cleric first irregardless of how much Rangering that you have done. And then you have an adventure where you are Clericing your heart out and get enough XP to level up in Ranger.

A discussion of metagame concepts in game design

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