D&D 5E With Respect to the Door and Expectations....The REAL Reason 5e Can't Unite the Base

Emerikol

Hero
Let me see if I can clarify the position of pemerton, Crazy Jerome, and TwoSix a bit. Their point is related to mechanics specifically. Forced narrative or a player imposing his agenda by way of bludgeoning the other players into submission is mechanics-neutral, and thus irrelevant to the discussion of what specific mechanics engender.

Each of the below mechanics will incentivize, and therefore frame the game around and operatively conditioning the players toward, a specific mode of operation which campaign style/genre and the accompanying fiction (in theory) then become an extension of.


Gold as XP: Attain the most gold possible while minimizing risk and through commitment of the least resources possibles toward that end so that further gold may be attained in the most efficient, and safe, manner possible.

Monsters as XP: Kill the most monsters possible while minimizing risk and through commitment of the least resources possibles toward that end so further monsters may be killed in the most efficient, and safe, manner possible.

Story/Plot-centric Quest as XP: Complete the quest, which requires specific (proactive) engagement with the fiction, while minimizing risk.


Use of each of these mechanical incentives attempts to prod the players (and their PCs by proxy) toward a specific end which, in turn, * tends to express itself within the fiction as a specific style (Heroic Adventure, Fantasy Vietnam, Mercenaries for the Highest Bidder, Amoral Raiders, etc).

Again, * can be undermined by an alpha player imposing their style agenda on the other players or a railroading DM imposing his story upon the players. However, this says nothing about what the mechanics themselves incentivize and thus attempt to engender.

Another option. The DM just levels up the group whenever he feels like it. To me that would be preferrable to your last story based option. The problem I have is that I want player/character motivations to be the same. I like sandboxes so I don't want to be too railroady.

Gold could work though if a "reward" is offered to complete a quest. Then the PCs know if they complete the quest they get the reward which is gold and xp.
 

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Another option. The DM just levels up the group whenever he feels like it. To me that would be preferrable to your last story based option. The problem I have is that I want player/character motivations to be the same. I like sandboxes so I don't want to be too railroady.

Understood. Many take this same position. However, again, the premise being discussed was not "what works best for my style?" The premise being discusssed was regarding mechanics, RAW, and their affect on intertable culture and gaming style (to quote myself in the post that you quoted):

Their point is related to mechanics specifically. Forced narrative or a player imposing his agenda by way of bludgeoning the other players into submission is mechanics-neutral, and thus irrelevant to the discussion of what specific mechanics engender.

And

Use of each of these mechanical incentives attempts to prod the players (and their PCs by proxy) toward a specific end which, in turn, * tends to express itself within the fiction as a specific style (Heroic Adventure, Fantasy Vietnam, Mercenaries for the Highest Bidder, Amoral Raiders, etc).

Again, * can be undermined by an alpha player imposing their style agenda on the other players or a railroading DM imposing his story upon the players. However, this says nothing about what the mechanics themselves incentivize and thus attempt to engender.

Your solution (one taken by many a DM) falls under the auspices of "mechanical-neutrality." It is (i) not within the mechanical construct of the ruleset and (ii) does not incentivize (therefore attempt to operatively condition the PCs toward) a specific, mode of play. Mode of play then evolves by way of:

- social construct (implicit or explicit accord)

- hard or soft fiat (subtle manipulation of the PCs toward a playstyle or dictatorial imperative)

- organic evolution by way of a healthy mix of the above two - alpha players imposing their style agenda or being annointed as "party leader", explicitly or implicity, while the DM massages the game toward this end or is at tension with it; the former option works beautifully if there is chemistry and compromise within the gaming group while this latter composition often manifests as a gaming culture whereby the two parties, alpha player and DM, attempt to passive-aggressively wrest control of the game agenda/style for the duration of the campaign)
 
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pemerton

Legend
I guess that depends on how many combats you typically engage in before you complete a major quest.
With a couple of exceptions (around the tier-progression levels), the number of XP required to advance a level in 4e is equal to 10 times the number of XP you get from an equal-level encounter.

So 10 encounters per level is the default.

The DMG suggests that some of those might be higher than equal level, making it 8 to 10 encounters. (In my own game, most of the combat ones are higher than equal level, making it more like 6 to 8.)

But the DMG also suggests one major quest per level, which is the XP equivalent of one of those encounters, bringing it down to 7 to 9.

The DMG also suggests that minor quests should probably be the equivalent of one encounter per level (roughly: one minor quest per PC per level), bringing it down to 6 to 8 encounters (4 to 6 in my case, given that I tend to use higher-level combat encounters).

A further complication that the DMG doesn't note is that many skill challenges will be of less than maximum complexity, and therefore less than one level-equivalent encounter. So in my game, of those 4 to 6 encounters per level, it's probably more like 3 to 5, plus another 3 or so less-than-maximum complexity skill challenges, per level.

I've found the XP part to be rather minor for most players. But things like, "I'm a wizard with 12 hit points at 5th level, and darned proud to have those," "my wand of magic missiles will run out any day now," "this is my third wizard character in two months, Bob A and Bob B RIP," and "the green slime just dissolved our thief, Fred"--those tend to push away from Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, big hero style play. :D You put starting over at 1st level, XP issues, spell access limits, etc. on top of that, it tends to compound.
Exactly this! And for even more compounding, add in encumbrance rules, ammunition tracking, effects that depend upon, and therefore mandate, detailed time keeping, and the like.

I don't need the rules to tell me that magic items might be handed out by friendly NPCs. There are tons of examples out there in the literature the game emulates and will likely inspire me to play in the first place.
No doubt. The example I mentioned, for example, is actually in the Foreword to the rulebook.

My point is that the rulebook not only gives no guidance on how to run a game in which that item is handed out, but actively discourages it, with its references to "rewards being commensurate with challenges" and the like.

items must be earned and appropriate. And if a character's destiny or previous actions earn him the Sword of McGuffin, which he will need in the Great Crunchberry Quest, then it makes sense to give it to him. The point is the awarding of the sword is well considered and logical and appropriate to the situation and not a cheap giveaway.
How does one "earn" something via one's destiny? Where was the challenge - all the player did was write some malarky down on his/her PC sheet about "dragon tyrant", "destiny", "found as a child in a bed of reads/at the doorstep of the monastery/etc", "mysterious portents", blah blah blah.

I agree that the handing out of the sword is not arbitrary. But the rulebooks don't say no arbitrary treasure. They see no unearned treasure; no treasure that is not commensurate with the challenge.

The contrast with (say) HeroWars could hardly be greater - which tells you exactly how to build into your PC mysterious items that relate to your as-yet unrevealed but portentious destiny.

But saying that something has thematic content doesn't say anything about the specifics of the theme. That's why saying "thematic content" really doesn't say anything valuable, particularly when trying to imply that wandering monsters are a waste of time and focus.
I didn't say that wandering monsters are a waste of time and focus. I said that they're a waste of my time and distract focus from my priorities for play, which include thematically engaging situations for the players to deal with (via their PCs).

I've got nothing against time, and the pressures of time and its passage, being the thematic focus of a game (although personally I don't think I would want to run it). But I wouldn't use wandering monsters to do that. Wandering monsters don't make time a thematic focus. They make operational pedantry a focus of play - as the players (who, at the table, have all the time in the world, however much or little time is passing in the fiction) work out techniques for optimising their dungeon exploration relative to the likelihood of meeting dangerous wanderers.

A time-and-motion report is very concerned with the use and passage of time. But it is not a work that evokes time, and its passage, as a theme.

A concrete example was provided by [MENTION=16786]Stoat[/MENTION]'s excellent Tomb of Horrors thread. On that thread, a fairly strong consensus emerged that the way to tackle the ToH is to play "bomb squad", "flying-thief-on-a-rope" D&D. Search everything carefully. Use 10' poles at every point. Always rope together, but never send more than one PC into a room at a time. Etc.

That is the sort of play that I am not interested in. And that is not a mode of play whose theme is caution. It doesn't have a theme. It's not a mode of play that is about evoking an aesthetic response, or an aesthetic product, at all. It's about something quite different. Trying to identify the theme of that sort of ToH game would be like trying to identify the theme of a game of chess. It would be a category error.

Your concrete example, I'm sorry, isn't offering any help in explaining what you mean. Is the damage range of a sword somehow related to the theme of the campaign?
A system in which damage, in combat, is mostly a consequence of weapon sizes and properties has action resolution mechanics (for combat) that do not push in favour of thematic play and, depending on the details, may push against it. Because the focus of play may instead become the mechanical details of the weapon rules, and their mathematical optimisation.

Conversely, a systrem in which damage, in combat, is to a significant extent a function of the emotional relationship between the protagonist(s) and/or the antagonist(s) is pushing in favour of thematic play, because it is making thematic content - human relationships, in this example - forefront to action resolution.

You are framing your question in terms of "what theme" as if every episode of RPG play had a theme. My contention is that this is not true, that much RPG play has not thematic content, and that whether or not it does is not unconnected to the mechanics in use. (Which takes us back to the examples that Crazy Jerome gave in the post I quoted - these are the features of classic D&D play that push against thematically rich play.)
 

Crazy Jerome

First Post
You are framing your question in terms of "what theme" as if every episode of RPG play had a theme. My contention is that this is not true, that much RPG play has not thematic content, and that whether or not it does is not unconnected to the mechanics in use. (Which takes us back to the examples that Crazy Jerome gave in the post I quoted - these are the features of classic D&D play that push against thematically rich play.)

Mosty agree with this whole post, though I'd say that classic D&D can have a thematically rich play, even in the terms you use here. It is, however, a very odd theme, with a lots of strange twists and holes in it. Of this, I think, emerges the "D&D genre." :D

It's funny, but you can play Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser in classic D&D and easily get the expected results--if the characters are the kinds of people that the twain routinely mow down. If you read that kind of sword and sorcery with the theme that "life is cheap and everyone knows it," then the characters don't really play the heroes until they start pushing name level. They can thematically explore a world where people take great risks because life is so cheap anyway, perhaps.

It's a gradual process, with some early glimpses, to get to something more traditional. Thus again those twists and turns in the theme. Maybe Bob C or Bob D or Bob Z will eventually play the hero. And then he'll miss a saving throw against poison and get to start over again. ;)

Fantasy Vietnam can be thematically rich. It merely isn't a theme implied by 90% of the material in Appendix N. Trying to play some of those other themes ends up working about like doing a Tale of Two Cities with Monty Python jokes. It might be fun, but it is always odd.
 


pemerton

Legend
I want player/character motivations to be the same.
Huh? Suppose a fight is on in the game: the PC's motivation is to survive; what is the player's motivation? It can't be survival, can it? The player's life isn't in danger.

I can understand the thought that the player shouldn't have the PC act on any motivation other than the PC's own (imagined) one. But presumably this rule would itself have some motivation that is external to the PC: an aesthetic one, perhaps.
 

JamesonCourage

Adventurer
Huh? Suppose a fight is on in the game: the PC's motivation is to survive; what is the player's motivation? It can't be survival, can it?
I think what he means (which seems obvious to me), is that, in this case, both the PC and player are thinking "the PC needs to survive" as their current motivation. The player is thinking "the PC needs to survive" and the PC is thinking "I need to survive"; these motivations line up. This is key to a type of immersion that many players enjoy, and breaking this line of thought can be a detriment to the game for some (obviously; but styles of play do differ quite significantly). As always, play what you like :)
 

Emerikol

Hero
Huh? Suppose a fight is on in the game: the PC's motivation is to survive; what is the player's motivation? It can't be survival, can it? The player's life isn't in danger.

I can understand the thought that the player shouldn't have the PC act on any motivation other than the PC's own (imagined) one. But presumably this rule would itself have some motivation that is external to the PC: an aesthetic one, perhaps.

The key is that the player is not choosing actions that a character could never choose. That is the key thing. It's not two way. You are playing a character. When you make choices for that character those choices as much as possible should be choices the character can make. The character is not playing you. The character does not say 'I need a bathroom break' and then you the player go to the bathroom. It's not two way.

The dissociative mechanics link was posted recently. Go to that link and read that article. If you still don't understand it then I don't think I can improve on that article. We'll just have to agree we can't understand each other.
 

Underman

First Post
I think what he means (which seems obvious to me), is that, in this case, both the PC and player are thinking "the PC needs to survive" as their current motivation. The player is thinking "the PC needs to survive" and the PC is thinking "I need to survive"; these motivations line up. This is key to a type of immersion that many players enjoy, and breaking this line of thought can be a detriment to the game for some (obviously; but styles of play do differ quite significantly).
I feel obligated to pre-counter the usual counterpoint, which is that the character does not exist and isn't thinking anything. The character thinks whatever the player wants the character to think, so goes the counter-argument.

I don't like that counter-argument because it's pretty obvious to me that the author and reader or director and audience would prefer some types of actions over others. Thus the expression "true to character".

The PC could be thinking many things that are potentially "true to character". Like "I want to survive so I'll give my utmost to survive the next battle" or "I want to survive so I'm going to leave the dungeon now".

If the player wants a new character, he/she can have the PC leave the dungeon at any time. However, that would be "disassociated" if the PC had up to this point showed a keen resolve and strong motivation to adventure. Most of the time, however, the players are coming up with "true to character" reasons for why the PCs are starting a new adventure.

(Of course, there is a category of players who move miniatures on a grid during combat and don't care a whit why the PC is doing that, and that's fine, as long as those players aren't dictating to me that none of it matters just because they aren't into "immersion")
 

TwoSix

Master of the One True Way
The dissociative mechanics link was posted recently. Go to that link and read that article. If you still don't understand it then I don't think I can improve on that article. We'll just have to agree we can't understand each other.
You must be new if you think [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION], of all people, hasn't read that article.
 

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