A Change of Discussion

Warpiglet · Oct 10, 2018

With background in testing/test theory I am very aware that the way we measure things shapes the conversation about and perception of a 'thing' or construct.

With D&D, the conversation often centers on damage output and the many 'musts.' I am astonished at times at how vehemently people claim something is a 'trap,' when what might be more accurate is 'slightly lower bonus' to a particular roll. When new players read or hear this, I think it gives a skewed view of the game.

Often overlooked are other issues which are important to the game. There is exploration and social encounters and general problem solutions (utility) and so forth. However, we don't really have a metric for this sort of discussion.

I was thinking today about how much a character ability might shape a story. Sure, stabbing the enemy to death is important and we focus on that a lot. But there are a lot of other things we almost hand wave. I was thinking about disguise self recently. Or even think about a cantrip like mage hand...the ability to track in the wilds or detect evil. Some of these other abilities have the potential to do MORE to shape the story or solve problems than the raw power to physically murder (stab, scorch, freeze) the enemy to death. Damn! Think about teleport and scrying and even picking locks! Some of these things open up whole vistas of adventure and story.

And yet they get talked about so much less than DPR. I am in the camp of 'just play.' I have effective but not fully optimized characters you might say--and in the end, immersion plus the dice come together as a whole for me (I think this is pretty common). With this said...

What other ways could we, if so inclined, discuss character ability to move or shape a game other than DPR/DPS or whatever? No we don't have to...but for fun, how would we quantify it? What areas would be included? I am struggling to think of something as succinct as DPR/DPS perhaps because of the variability in actual play. But it seems that accessing, acquiring and avoiding targets and danger should be as important as DPR or whatever. I wonder if the difficulty in quantifying these constructs is part of the reason DPR gets so much press.

CrimsonCarcharodon · Oct 10, 2018

I don't know that you really can quantify things like disguise self. I mean, that spell may not play in at all in a standard dungeon crawl, but in a game centered more around social situations, it could be an absolute game changer. Damage per round applies in almost any D&D game - the game focuses so much around combat that it's nearly inevitable that it's going to come up at some point.

I'm not saying that we shouldn't talk about those abilities and their potential to change a game substantially. I just don't know that we can boil it down to hard, quantifiable numbers the way you can with combat stats.

Hawk Diesel · Oct 10, 2018

I think it's an excellent question to ask. But as [MENTION=6904790]CrimsonCarcharodon[/MENTION] mentions, quantifiable properties such as DPR are easier to assess and thus more heavily weighted than than qualitative abilities.

Additionally, since D&D evolved from wargaming, I think that part has always been more heavily focused on. Combat and killing things are not just easy ways to compare one character build to another, but it is a component of the game that is embedded in its genes. Do things like weather, terrain, and morale impact the outcome of battles? Yep. But none are a better marker than what army can kill the other quickest. So I think we still see the echoes of that influence in the focus of D&D on combat. Thus it might be easier to have the kind of conversation you would like to see in other games that are less defined in their history with combat and survival.

Ralif Redhammer · Oct 10, 2018

I’d agree that the discussion is a little more difficult to quantify. In part, because it relies on player creativity rather that character strength. But that sort of creativity, I’d hazard, has more power to shape the course of the game.

In a recent game, the use of a disguise kit enabled the PCs to get the drop on some bank robbers. Sure, a highly optimized character might have been able to take one of them out in one shot (this being first level), but this way, the entire party got a surprise round in.

And for me, that’s what’s exciting as a DM. Scoring a critical when it’s needed is pretty exciting, but not needing to roll that critical because of an inventive, left-field idea is even moreso.

The Crimson Binome · Oct 10, 2018

D&D is (nominally) a game of resource-management, so the obvious metric for utility abilities is in how many resources they conserve. If you can conserve two low-level spell slots and 30hp by talking your way past a fight, then you can compare that to the 15hp that the barbarian's power attack saves by ending the fight one round earlier, and it's obvious that the first ability is better in that instance.

The problem is that, in practice, the resource-management aspect of D&D is irrelevant. You get all of your HP and spells back every morning, and the party will call it a day before they actually run low enough that it would affect their performance, so it doesn't matter whether or not you conserve anything by bypassing a fight. In fact, it feels disappointing to go to bed with all of your HP, because you know you were playing too conservatively; you should have been able to accomplish more in a day, if you had actually expended your resources rather than conserving them (whether or not that's actually true).

Not to mention, you gain relatively little spotlight by spending a minute to bypass an encounter, compared to the barbarian with big numbers who gets the spotlight every round over the course of a twenty-minute combat. (If you care about that sort of thing.)

Mistwell · Oct 10, 2018

There should be a point system we can use to evaluate abilities and spells and magic items and such which do these sorts of things:

Bypass part of a challenge you're aware of (like one monster in a group of monsters)
Bypass an entire challenge you're aware of
Reduce the risk of having a random challenge you don't even know about
Aid the party's ability to prepare for a challenge or make it easier to overcome the challenge
Acquire treasure for you or the party
Reduce the need to use other meaningful resources of the party
[We can add more to this list]

How we calculate such a point system? Not sure. But there should be one.

Shiroiken · Oct 10, 2018

I have found such abilities to be extremely powerful in the right situation. In a prior campaign, the party opened the magical vault and found a sleeping maiden among the treasure. She seemingly woke up and was frightened of the party, but in reality she was a vampire fighter with high social skills (we were on Roll20, and I gm rolled her deception against their passive Insight, so they had no clues). The paladin, for whatever reason, was suspicious and used Detect Evil, so instead of her surprise ambushing the party, he surprised her.

This is why a session 0 or campaign handout is huge. If the game is likely to be more social or exploratory in nature, these abilities are much more relevant. Having disguise self might not be useful in the standard dungeon crawl (unless you speak the language of whatever you try to become), but in a city adventure it can make or break a plan.

Of course, several of these abilities require the player to have a quick imagination that can come up with ideas on the fly (oddly, something I'm good at as a DM, but awful at as a player). Another thing to take into consideration is the DM flexibility, since several of these ideas can be easily nixed by a harsh DM. Both of these combined make such abilities much less desirable for most players than simple dpr.

5ekyu · Oct 10, 2018

Warpiglet said:
With background in testing/test theory I am very aware that the way we measure things shapes the conversation about and perception of a 'thing' or construct.

With D&D, the conversation often centers on damage output and the many 'musts.' I am astonished at times at how vehemently people claim something is a 'trap,' when what might be more accurate is 'slightly lower bonus' to a particular roll. When new players read or hear this, I think it gives a skewed view of the game.

Often overlooked are other issues which are important to the game. There is exploration and social encounters and general problem solutions (utility) and so forth. However, we don't really have a metric for this sort of discussion.

I was thinking today about how much a character ability might shape a story. Sure, stabbing the enemy to death is important and we focus on that a lot. But there are a lot of other things we almost hand wave. I was thinking about disguise self recently. Or even think about a cantrip like mage hand...the ability to track in the wilds or detect evil. Some of these other abilities have the potential to do MORE to shape the story or solve problems than the raw power to physically murder (stab, scorch, freeze) the enemy to death. Damn! Think about teleport and scrying and even picking locks! Some of these things open up whole vistas of adventure and story.

And yet they get talked about so much less than DPR. I am in the camp of 'just play.' I have effective but not fully optimized characters you might say--and in the end, immersion plus the dice come together as a whole for me (I think this is pretty common). With this said...

What other ways could we, if so inclined, discuss character ability to move or shape a game other than DPR/DPS or whatever? No we don't have to...but for fun, how would we quantify it? What areas would be included? I am struggling to think of something as succinct as DPR/DPS perhaps because of the variability in actual play. But it seems that accessing, acquiring and avoiding targets and danger should be as important as DPR or whatever. I wonder if the difficulty in quantifying these constructs is part of the reason DPR gets so much press.

Imo DPR gets attention cuz it's easy to put a number on after you slap on enough assumptions.

For even combat, imo and imx, the outcome is often decided by more than "assumption laden dpr" because some many things impact the actual damage done. Teamwork, blocking and locking, effective use of scenery, plans for escape, surprises, distractions, diversions all turn an actual in game combat into a very vibrant affair much different that the typical DPR monologs do.

When I build pcs, I look for and prioritize "doors" or " keys" that let that character do things, engage things and be "important" to the scene more often over options which let me engage the same ways as before but with a few more plusses.

Mistwell · Oct 10, 2018

Might be worth pointing out this is a problem which isn't unique to RPGs or D&D. In comes up in sports discussion a lot as well.

For example, if a basketball player scores a basket, this is a very clearly recognized statistic you can measure against other basketball players.

However, if a basketball player is very good at doing things which cause opposing players to take higher risk shots which have less chance of going in, or to pass the ball to someone in a worse position to take a shot or who are worse shooters, or to pass the ball to someone at the last second before a shot clock runs out making their shot rushed, it's much more difficult to measure even though it might prevent a basket or result in a basket for your team. You can sort of measure it, but all the other measurements of it (like value over replacement player, plus minus, etc..) are somewhat imperfect as they depend on what other players did more than most things do.

Often they go unnoticed by fans because they are so difficult to measure. For an example of this, the New York Times did an article called "The No Stat All-Star" about a basketball player (Shane Battier) who at the time made his teams much better, but his addition to the team wasn't well measured by statistics.

Blue · Oct 10, 2018

CrimsonCarcharodon said:
I don't know that you really can quantify things like disguise self. I mean, that spell may not play in at all in a standard dungeon crawl, but in a game centered more around social situations, it could be an absolute game changer. Damage per round applies in almost any D&D game - the game focuses so much around combat that it's nearly inevitable that it's going to come up at some point.

I'm not saying that we shouldn't talk about those abilities and their potential to change a game substantially. I just don't know that we can boil it down to hard, quantifiable numbers the way you can with combat stats.

This reminds me of setting goals / KPIs for my employees. HR keeps on about measurable goals - but oft times what you want to encourage and reward aren't measurable in terms of here's an objective number. If I have one guy who's always dependable, will work the hours needed, and will stay with a problem with the tensity of a bulldog, what's the objective measurement I can put in vs. the guy who cherry picks the easiest tickets and turns in more of them than anyone else?

So white room DPR is something easy to calculate and compare, but just a portion of what we're looking at, just like number of tickets is a poor indication. It's the parts that are harder to numerically evaluate, or even more, vary by DM and table, that oft get overlooked because they aren't easy to evaluate.

A Change of Discussion

Warpiglet

Adventurer

CrimsonCarcharodon

Explorer

Hawk Diesel

Adventurer

Ralif Redhammer

Legend

The Crimson Binome

Hero

Mistwell

Crusty Old Meatwad (he/him)

Shiroiken

Legend

5ekyu

Hero

Mistwell

Crusty Old Meatwad (he/him)

Blue

Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal

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