A discussion of metagame concepts in game design

pemerton said:

What would be a good name that was consistent with hp not being metagame?

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The name is fine. The mechanic is flawed. Change it to a percentage of max hit points, minimum of 1, or something similar.

Manbearcat said:

I’m looking for a response about the juxtaposition of the above two paradigms that engages with the thread topic.

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Both scenarios are fine, and neither requires meta-gaming. They just assume different things about how the world works. If the world doesn't actually work as described, and the character doesn't know those things, then the player would be meta-gaming by acting on that knowledge.

Manbearcat said:

A 10th level Fighter is challenging a trio of Stone Giants on the edge of their plateau which sits 70 feet above the ground.

Situation 1:

a) He has 100 HPs and the only chance the fall has to kill him is if he’s been significantly worn down in combat by interaction with the Stone Giants and their clubs (that are as big and weighty as him) and thrown boulders.

b) As he waded in he sees a show of strength by the Stone Giant Chieftain; the impact of one of these clubs and/or thrown boulders utterly ruins a rock formation of approximately his size. However, because of his HP pool relative to their attacks, he knows (for sure) it will take a large number of interactions with these mighty creatures before he is then under immediate threat of death and he’ll never be under threat of a collapsed lung, a crushed pelvis, or even a concussion.

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Hit Points are observable to the character. He knows how tough he is, and can approximate how hard he'll hit the ground, so he can make a reasonable guess as to how much it will hurt when he lands.

The description of HP damage varies between DMs. The fighter doesn't necessarily know that he won't break any bones during the fall, but he can be relatively certain that any injury he sustains will be non-crippling. Continuing to fight while injured is basic hero stuff. He can guess with reasonable certainty at what fraction of further attacks will be stopped by his armor, and he can guess how many of those successful attacks he will be able to endure before dropping.

If the DM describes ~20 damage from a giant's strike as being sufficient to shatter a boulder, and the superhero fighter knows that he can survive ~25 damage from falling, then he knows that he's more physically resilient than the boulder is. This is all based on in-game observations. If the world doesn't actually work that way, and the fighter isn't actually more durable than the boulder, then the DM needs to do a better job of describing things more consistently.

Manbearcat said:

Situation 2:

a) A fall from that height is almost surely going to kill him (Harm 4) unless his God spares him (a difficult chance for a Saving Throw). Even then, he’s going to come away from the fall with something grave that will stick with him for a long while (at best a couple of broken ribs and a concussion; both Harm 2 boxes filled which will cause x and y mechanical interactions for z duration of care/recovery).

b) As he waded in he sees a show of strength by the Stone Giant Chieftain; the impact of one of these clubs and/or thrown boulders utterly ruins a rock formation of approximately his size. He’s certain that his heavy armor will deflect the worst of it for an impact or two (say Heavy Armor can reduce Harm from those blows by 2 until it becomes useless), but after that, he can rely solely on his training, footwork, guile, grit, and the favor of the gods so that he doesn’t become pasted (Saving Throw vs Harm 2 for every attack, success outright mitigating it and a few times per combat he can knock Harm down one step due to his prowess).

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Harm boxes are observable to the character. He knows how tough he is, and can guess how hard he might hit the ground, but his guess is unreliable because he knows that divine intervention is a factor here that he can't account for. He's probably going to choose not to jump down, because he doesn't actually have faith that his god will protect him, even though he knows with absolute certainty that his god exists.

As he moves to engage the giants by ground, he estimates how hard their strikes are, and he compares that to what he knows about his armor. He knows with reasonable certainty that those strikes will pulverize his armor within the first few blows, but he doesn't know how long his skill will be able to save him after that point. He has a reasonable estimate of a worst-case scenario, where his skill is generally unable to cope with the assault, but even that estimate includes some benefit from his special mitigation technique. (That is to say, even if all of the attacks hit home, he knows that this special technique will work a few times during the combat.)

So the question is, where do you draw the line? Which of the following things are you least comfortable with allowing the character to know:

• How badly he'll be hurt after a long fall.
• That he can keep fighting effectively through any injury that isn't immediately fatal.
• The he is physically tougher than stone, and how many hits he can actually take from a giant.
• That his god exists, and actively intervenes with his life.
• How many hits his armor can absorb before failing.
• That his special mitigation technique is perfectly reliable, but only a couple of times per encounter.

If any of those first three sound ridiculous to you, and you can't imagine a character actually having that knowledge, then it might seem like you're meta-gaming when you play through this scenario in D&D. If any of the second three sound ridiculous to you, and you can't imagine a character actually having that knowledge, then it might seem like you're meta-gaming when you play through this scenario in the other game.

Ratskinner said:

Well, If HP loss has no implications for the character's physical performance...then it can't be having physical effects that the character can notice, can it?

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It can. It's just slightly more cosmetic than you might expect. If you paint someone's left hand red, then they can see that their left hand is red, even if it doesn't affect their performance in any way.

It's the same thing, just applied to physical injury. If you give someone a small cut on their arm, then you wouldn't necessarily expect that to affect their combat performance at all, but they can still see it. And since DMs describe damage in different ways, I'm saying that at my table, you might get a fractured sternum and it wouldn't affect your combat performance; or rather, that it might affect your combat performance, but not to such a degree that it would warrant modeling mechanically.

The strawman exaggeration is that you could be impaled with a spear going through your head, and it wouldn't affect your performance enough to model. Nobody who actually uses the physical model for HP is going to describe damage in such a way - it's all just mild scratches and bruises, or maybe deeper cuts and broken bones - but either way it's physical (and thus observable to the characters).

Emerikol said:

So I captured some text from a blog at
http://socratesrpg.blogspot.com/2010/11/what-is-stance-theory-part1.html

Actor Stance: The person playing a character determines the character's decisions and actions using only knowledge and perceptions that the character would have. This stance does not necessarily include identifying with the character and feeling what he or she "feels," nor does it require in-character dialogue.

Author Stance: The person playing a character determines the character's decisions and actions based on the person's priorities, independently of the character’s knowledge and perceptions. Author Stance may or may not include a retroactive "motivation" of the character to perform the actions.

Director Stance: The person playing a character determines aspects of the environment relative to the character in some fashion, entirely separately from the character's knowledge or ability to influence events. Therefore the player has not only determined the character's actions, but the context, timing, and spatial circumstances of those actions, or even features of the world separate from the characters.


So I have gotten Director and Author mixed up at times. I want the Actor Stance and I do not ever want the Author or Director stance. Maybe another's words will help.

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Sure, but the problem IMHO is that I think that 100 percent pure Actor Stance is an inherent impossibility. In the context of theatrical drama, the Actor is a also a part-time Author and Director. The Actor is interpreting the character, but that interpretation will be guided by their own Authorial sense. And we may take "Authorial sense" here as a conglomeration of the Actor's understanding of the author's intent, the director's intent, and their own reading of this character. And I think that when roleplaying, Author stance becomes even more prominent while Acting than in a theatrical production. Because the person will be forcing the character to do things that may align more closely to the social contract that actually may deviate from sense of character: e.g., follow the GM's adventure, don't be a dick to the party, follow along with the party, gold/killing monsters helps you level-up, etc.

Edit: The author of the blog post you quoted even has a similar position:

Finally, the last common mistake I want to highlight is the assumption that people do or at least should maintain a consistent stance throughout play. As if idealized play is when everyone is operating in Actor Stance or in Director Stance. This is rubbish. Players are constantly moving from one stance to another as the needs of the situation arise, and I can see no benefit (or at least, very little) from rigidly maintaining only a single stance. I’ve played in campaigns where the Social Contract strictly enforced Actor Stance (talking in character, using only character knowledge, following the character’s alignment to a T). Anyone who broke Actor Stance was immediately penalized socially if not mechanically. Play devolved into a game of “Gotchya!” and those sorts of campaigns never lasted long for me.

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Maxperson said:

If that's your response to me, then you clearly did not understand what I was saying. What I said takes that all into consideration.

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Alright, I'll take your word for it, that I'm just not getting what you're saying.

In any case, I've hit my limit on the number of conversations I can follow within this thread, and I think that this is more an issue of semantics than principle. Of course, given that I'm not sure what you're trying to say, I could be wrong about that.

Aldarc said:

Sure, but the problem IMHO is that I think that 100 percent pure Actor Stance is an inherent impossibility. In the context of theatrical drama, the Actor is a also a part-time Author and Director. The Actor is interpreting the character, but that interpretation will be guided by their own Authorial sense. And we may take "Authorial sense" here as a conglomeration of the Actor's understanding of the author's intent, the director's intent, and their own reading of this character. And I think that when roleplaying, Author stance becomes even more prominent while Acting than in a theatrical production. Because the person will be forcing the character to do things that may align more closely to the social contract that actually may deviate from sense of character: e.g., follow the GM's adventure, don't be a dick to the party, follow along with the party, gold/killing monsters helps you level-up, etc.

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Unless the social contract is "play your character as it would act were it a real person" (my preference) and let the chips fall where they may.

Edit: The author of the blog post you quoted even has a similar position:

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The two parts of the blog you quoted are a bit contradictory in how they view Actor Stance. In the definition it says this stacne "does not necessarily include identifying with the character and feeling what he or she "feels," nor does it require in-character dialogue" yet in the example it indicates Actor Stance does incude talking in character, among other things.

Personally, I think Actor Stance does include thinking like the character, identifying with the character, and in-character dialogue...if only because none of the other stances include these things and they need to be included somewhere as they are an important part of playing a role (or, you guessed it, role-playing).

100% Actor Stance is probably impossible, but that doesn't mean we can't take whatever opportunities present themselves to make that %-age as high as we can: character knowledge = player knowledge, play the character true to itself, speak in character rather than out of character if there's an option, and so forth.

Lanefan said:

Unless the social contract is "play your character as it would act were it a real person" (my preference) and let the chips fall where they may.

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Which you could also do from an Authorial or Directorial stance. These are not necessarily contradictory stances, as it were, when it comes to the expectation of "acting like a real person." But my point was that the social contract of expected play (e.g., "please go along with the GM's adventure that they put work into," or "my character is being too disruptive to the enjoyment of other players") may also guide how one performs the character.

The two parts of the blog you quoted are a bit contradictory in how they view Actor Stance.

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I'm not sure why you are replying as if I was the person who supplied the blog post in question.

In the definition it says this stacne "does not necessarily include identifying with the character and feeling what he or she "feels," nor does it require in-character dialogue" yet in the example it indicates Actor Stance does incude talking in character, among other things.

Personally, I think Actor Stance does include thinking like the character, identifying with the character, and in-character dialogue...if only because none of the other stances include these things and they need to be included somewhere as they are an important part of playing a role (or, you guessed it, role-playing).

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I'm not sure how this is a categorical contradiction. The bold seems to indicate that this stance may include these things but does not necessarily include them. May and can does not mean that it doesn't include, just that it's not necessarily included. As he writes, "It is also sometimes treated as the same thing as talking in-character or “Immersion.” But Actor Stance is SO much more." So here he does appear to make a distinction between simply talking in-character and Actor Stance.

A hamburger may and often does include a meat patty, but not all burgers are meat patties (e.g., veggie burgers). Keeping in mind here the obvious point that 'hamburger' does not etymologically designate a "burger composed of ham" but derives from the German city of "Hamburg."

100% Actor Stance is probably impossible, but that doesn't mean we can't take whatever opportunities present themselves to make that %-age as high as we can: character knowledge = player knowledge, play the character true to itself, speak in character rather than out of character if there's an option, and so forth.

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I don't know. You seem to presume that this should be the goal of all roleplay. But I don't think that it should, particularly when it comes to different styles of play and levels of comfort that players have when approaching the game. I also dislike the implied presumption here of putting this stance on a pedastal or hierarchical supremacy for preferred play stance. I know many players who are not comfortable speaking in-character, and I would object to the idea that those who speak in-character roleplay better than those who don't.

Shasarak said:

I dont see it as any more or less meta. Infact I had a discussion with @Kobold Boots 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.

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Hi Shasarak -

Dropping in due to the mention. I think that there's a different definition of metagaming that I subscribe to which is ever so slightly different than the definition of the OP. Additionally, I've not read the first 28 pages aside from the OP, so there's a good chance this is going to go tangentially to the original reason for your post.

Definition of metagaming for me is: Player makes a decision that his or her character could not reasonably make because it requires player knowledge of the rules that the character could not logically make due to lack of similar knowledge in game.

So a player building his character out for 20 levels in advance with all bells and whistles before game start is definitely metagaming.
The same player making plans for his character five levels out because the character has developed his or her relationships with their guilds or trainers and knows more or less where they want to spend their time is not metagaming.

The difference is obvious, but it's not likely to come up unless you've got an older school DM that bakes that stuff in due to habit from the old days. I've some players in my contacts list that prefer it, and many more who would look at me funny if I suggested it.

Be well
KB

Edit note for detail only.

When playing 1e there were optional rules in the DMG for requiring training before fully leveling up. Additionally, the XP totals for some classes to level were higher than others (I remember it taking more XP to level as a mage, but there were other examples).

So sometimes a player would meta level because they knew they passed a XP mark for fighter and didn't want to wait to level as the other class. Other times, the player would need to make a contact that could train them for their next level and it got harder as they advanced beyond what they could get regionally.

This all goes back to the kinds of things that we discussed in the other thread and why the behaviors you find problematic in DMs I likely wouldn't. Coming up as a 1e player with a "to yearn for it is to earn it" DM, is way different than coming up with a 3e DM that didn't have Gary's advice to rummage through. (Assuming that's the case, you could be way earlier and I'd never know.)

Aldarc said:

Which you could also do from an Authorial or Directorial stance. These are not necessarily contradictory stances, as it were, when it comes to the expectation of "acting like a real person." But my point was that the social contract of expected play (e.g., "please go along with the GM's adventure that they put work into," or "my character is being too disruptive to the enjoyment of other players") may also guide how one performs the character.

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I got your point; but Author and Director stance point away from playing the character as a person and more towards playing it as a pawn...which while fine for playing the game as a game doesn't meet my definition of playing a role.

I'm not sure why you are replying as if I was the person who supplied the blog post in question.

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You didn't write the blog, but as you're who quoted it in here who else am I supposed to reply to?

I'm not sure how this is a categorical contradiction. The bold seems to indicate that this stance may include these things but does not necessarily include them. May and can does not mean that it doesn't include, just that it's not necessarily included. As he writes, "It is also sometimes treated as the same thing as talking in-character or “Immersion.” But Actor Stance is SO much more." So here he does appear to make a distinction between simply talking in-character and Actor Stance.

A hamburger may and often does include a meat patty, but not all burgers are meat patties (e.g., veggie burgers). Keeping in mind here the obvious point that 'hamburger' does not etymologically designate a "burger composed of ham" but derives from the German city of "Hamburg."

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Yes; and in my opinion a veggie-burger isn't a real hamburger, it's a fake.

I don't know. You seem to presume that this should be the goal of all roleplay.

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Well, yes.

But I don't think that it should, particularly when it comes to different styles of play and levels of comfort that players have when approaching the game. I also dislike the implied presumption here of putting this stance on a pedastal or hierarchical supremacy for preferred play stance. I know many players who are not comfortable speaking in-character, and I would object to the idea that those who speak in-character roleplay better than those who don't.

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First off, note than when I say "speaking in character" I'm not referring to using a different voice or accent or whatever, I'm referring to simply saying the actual words that your character would say rather than using player-speak.

I'm playing Jocinda in a combat situation, Falstaffe is one of my fellow party members. The DM has just informed me that I've noticed an enemy sneaking up on unaware Falstaffe...

1. "Falstaffe, look out on your left!"
2. "I warn Falstaffe that he's got an enemy sneaking up on him."
3. "Jocinda warns Falstaffe that he's got an enemy sneaking up on him."

See the difference? The first puts me in the action - I'm playing the role of Jocinda and saying what she would say. The other two leave me remote from Jocinda the character, the third a bit more so than the second, and in some situations (probably not this specific example) both might even bog things down if the DM or another player for whatever reason needs to know exactly what words I'm using.

The first is role-playing. The third is game-playing. The second is somewhere in between.

Lanefan

p.s. Another aspect to this: at times in the past a hard-line enforcement of "if you say it, your character says it" has been the only way to shut down all the disruptive side-chatter and table talk.

Kobold Boots said:

Definition of metagaming for me is: Player makes a decision that his or her character could not reasonably make because it requires player knowledge of the rules that the character could not logically make due to lack of similar knowledge in game.

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Fine as far as it goes, but it also applies to situational knowledge disconnects as well as rules, hm?

Ignored in all these defninitions (not just picking on yours here ) is the type of metagaming where a player knows something about the non-rules-related in-game situation that the character doesn't, and acts on that. Example: party Thief scouts ahead alone and gets ambushed and slaughtered by some Ogres well out of sight and hearing of the party. Other players then act on their knowledge of the ambush even though their PCs have no idea it's there = metagaming = bad bad bad.

Lanefan