A GMing telling the players about the gameworld is not like real life

Maxperson · Mar 21, 2019

pemerton said:
You are posting as if those who disagree with [MENTION=23751]Maxperson[/MENTION] are spinning nonsense out of whole cloth. But in my case I have the whole of the play tradition that I started with on my side: the rulebook told me to read it, so I did; articles in White Dwarf, by people like Lewis Pulsipher and Roger Musson, told me that a skilled player is aware of monster weaknesses and factors that into choices (eg use Charm Monster on a troll or an ochre jelly, because few monsters carry oil or torches); and nothing ever hinted that I was expected to play my character ignorant of these things that I learned as part of mastering the game.

Those articles are just opinions by those people. They aren't rules.

So much this.

Yes, we are aware that you don't get our playstyle. That has been apparent for years. Maybe, you never understood it despite your claims to have run the playstyle long ago. Maybe you once understood it, but like the man of average income that wins the lottery, you now are out of touch. Whichever it is, you have shown repeatedly that you don't understand the playstyle enough to get why people enjoy it, and even in some examples a basic understanding of aspects the playstyle itself, which causes you to attribute negative things to it that aren't there.

Ovinomancer · Mar 21, 2019

Maxperson said:
Probably because that's what it said. The admonition was to play what the character knows, and that doesn't change just because you have one single example of real world knowledge. Especially given that the MM information is also knowledge gained in the real world, so it isn't any different in that regard than chemistry. You learn chemistry in the real world. You learn about the monsters in the MM in the real world. Knowledge of both of those things can be taken into the game world and used. Why would you think that one example of knowledge gained in the real world(chemistry) would be forbidden, but the other example of knowledge gained in the real world(MM info) isn't forbidden?

Real world chemistry does not exist in the game. Monsters from the MM do. My character has no way in game of discovering stoichiometry, but can learn, from many potential sources about trolls. There's a category difference, here, that you keep neatly eliding.

To take your example to the absurd, I know about breathing from the real world, how does my character possibly know about breathing? It's not in the rules (it's implied by the suffication rules, but there's nothing about what is beathed, how often, or through what mechanism -- do I breath through my eyes?). Yet, this is assumed character knowledge, because it makes sense of the world. So, clearly there are things that the character knows because the player does (walking, talking, etc) that are arbitrarily excluded from being badwrong. The question begged is why? I submit it's because breathing isn't in the GM's notes.

Maxperson · Mar 21, 2019

Lanefan said:
Troll #1: Do they taste good with salt? I heard yes, after 3 hours over a hot open fire....

Troll #2: Psh! That's just an old troll's tale to scare little kids. Uncle Oscar said that first you throw an old banana peel in front of them. Then when they are prone, you jump on them and rip off their arms. Then they can't fight, heal or cast spells. After that you wait a few minutes until they are done and dig in.

pemerton · Mar 21, 2019

Bedrockgames said:
It is very, very, very common IRL.

Are you suggesting that my life as a RPGer isn't "RL"?

Maxperson · Mar 21, 2019

pemerton said:
How do you know? I have no idea how to reason out either of the things you mention; and I certainly know more about troll vulnerabilities than some of the polearms listed on Gygax's weapon table.

I do. It's really easy. Are trolls as common as crossbows? No. Are trolls seen in villages and cities as often as crossbows? No. Do common people see crossbows used far more often than they see a troll? Yes. Is it likely that they have used a crossbow at some point as part of the village militia? Yes.

As for the bolded part, YOU would, but your PC would not. The PC grew up with those weapons being used by soldiers they see, guards they see, adventurers they see, and so on. Unless they grew up in or really close to a troll village, the same would not be true for trolls.

This is what I mean when I say you are making arbitrary assertions. Nothing in the rulebooks of any version of AD&D supports this claim. It's purely a table convention for your game.

Nyet! What I do is based on reason, so it is not arbitrary.

Maxperson · Mar 21, 2019

pemerton said:
But that generates my next question: these PCs know enough about what "dungeoneering" is to understand what a proper "combined arms" force looks like; but are completely ignorant of trolls' vulnerability to fire.

Sure, why not? Basic tactics is far more common for a group to understand than very specific monsters that are not seen commonly, or for the vast majority of monsters, EVER, in towns and cities. There's no good reason why you would treat them the same, other than perhaps that it helps you win the game easier to have that monster knowledge.

They know that dungeons have traps that the "sneaky-types" might spot and disarm; they know that dungeons have monsters who will hurt them, thus generating a need for healing; but they don't know which of those monsters is vulnerable to what sort of damage the wizard might do.

Again, sure, why not? Knowing dungeons have bad things in general is not even close to being the same as somehow having knowledge of which specific monsters are in the dungeon, or what the even more specific knowledge of their vulnerabilities are.

That's a very arbitrary set of stipulations about "common knowledge".

There's nothing arbitrary about it. It's very reasoned. The fact that you keep going back to calling it "arbitrary," is just another example of how you seem to be compelled to belittle things you don't understand or dislike, rather than just discuss those things.

Bedrockgames · Mar 21, 2019

pemerton said:
Are you suggesting that my life as a RPGer isn't "RL"?

No. I am saying it is exceedingly common in real life. That is literally all I am saying.

Maxperson · Mar 21, 2019

Ovinomancer said:
Hitpoints are not metagane, they are abstract. They are a way to summarize fir the player a huge wealth of in fiction information available to the character. As such, while the player knows how many hitpoints his character has left, the character knows how tired/bruised/motivated/blessed they are. The player says hitpoints but the character translates this into fictional terms.

It doesn't have to be one or the other, though. Hit points are both metagame AND abstract. They are knowledge that only the player has, and they are abstract in their usage. In the fiction, the fighter is going to be worried about being crushed by the giant's fist at both full hit points and a quarter hit points. He might be a bit more fearful at a quarter, since he is moving slower now, but he's not going to have any idea about what hit points are. Hit points are metagame, even if there is some vague way that they show up in the fiction for the PC's to experience.

If you are using a game mechanic (hitpoints) to make decisions within the scope of the game (combat and the resource management subgame), then you are just playing the game, not metagaming. Hitpoints aren't explicitly understood by the characters, sure, but the fiction that is abstracted into hitpoints for the players is.

I've seen some players have their PCs jump off a 30 foot wall, because 3d6 cannot kill their 40 hit point PC. Using hit points in game is metagaming. Using that vague fiction you are describing is not, but it's also not hit points.

Maxperson · Mar 21, 2019

Numidius said:
Having multiple Gms is so cool. I believe this single feature would have solved most of the problems and saved most of the tables I been playing at.

Yeah. It's VERY nice to take off the DM hat once in a while and just play one character.

If I had prepped Demons, and Players wanted Pirates, I'd probably got very bitter

LOL A lot of people would. I've just done sandbox for so long that it doesn't bother me. Besides, some the specifics of what was prepped can be salvaged for later use as encounters if I want to, so it hasn't all gone to waste.

If you had to start a new campaign, would you discuss with Players the theme in advance, mindful of the Demon-Pirates episode, or would it be considered like an immersion-breaker? I know many players that would refuse to discuss themes, plots, goals, in advance with the Gm.

90% of the time we have a session zero where we all brainstorm ideas, putting the top 10 in the pool. Then we all individually rank them from 1-10, with 10 being the most desired, and 1 being the least. Then we add up the top 3(or occasionally 4 if there is a tie) and discuss which of those 3 will be the next campaign for me to prep. However, sometimes they just ask me to come up with something, like I did with the demons. And equally rare, I will have an idea that I know they will like and want to surprise them with and ask them to trust me. They haven't been disappointed with that and gone off to do something else yet.

Maxperson · Mar 21, 2019

Ovinomancer said:
Real world chemistry does not exist in the game. Monsters from the MM do. My character has no way in game of discovering stoichiometry, but can learn, from many potential sources about trolls. There's a category difference, here, that you keep neatly eliding.

Yes it does. Gunpowder and other chemical reactions have been described in the DMGs, as well as modules.

To take your example to the absurd, I know about breathing from the real world, how does my character possibly know about breathing? It's not in the rules (it's implied by the suffication rules, but there's nothing about what is beathed, how often, or through what mechanism -- do I breath through my eyes?). Yet, this is assumed character knowledge, because it makes sense of the world. So, clearly there are things that the character knows because the player does (walking, talking, etc) that are arbitrarily excluded from being badwrong. The question begged is why? I submit it's because breathing isn't in the GM's notes.

Why are you begging a question that has been answered at least 20 times, probably close to 50-60. I've said why and let you know what metagaming is. Hint, it's not something like breathing.

A GMing telling the players about the gameworld is not like real life

Maxperson

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Bedrockgames

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