D&D 5E What DM flaw has caused you to actually leave a game?

[5ekyu]

No, that would be a bad DM call. The DC is 20. He succeeded. He found food. End of story. Why would he not find food after I set the DC and he succeeded? Why are you taking a success away from the player?

Exactly... tho should note the same can occur if the Gm withheld the Dc and the forager rolls 20 or above and when told nothing acquired he is surprised as well. (In my games, that "the 23 did not get you any game or water" would be narrated with descriptions of what the character saw like tainted pools, dried pools, poisoned carcases or maybe just a whole lot of stone animal statues not too far out from camp.) In other words the unusual result the unexpected result would be and should be seen as a "clue".

So, thats why i am not gonna dump on the player who says "i search for stuff over there" or "i search the room", gets a DC assigned openly or kept private, gets a high result and is surprised at a high result is resulting in nothing - because its exactly what would happen if the other character was outside and said " i go looking for food and water" and the same outcome occurred.

Thats why i use "wandering treasure" in my games. i see the "GM pre-determined key in drawer" type of example as the equivalent of set-piece outdoor encounters, not the *MINIMUM REQUIREMENT* for success of searches in general.

So again, to me, not as clear a "bad player" case as it may be to some.

 

[iserith]

Meh, so, if the player states, "I search the rubble to see if there is anything interesting there." you automatically assume that he's taking the most disadvantageous approach (using his bare hands)? I mean, do I seriously need to state, "Ok, I'm using a shovel to search the rubble."? I need to pixel bitch my way through every single action so that I don't miss the DM gotcha moments?

"I search the rubble, I got a 20 (or whatever) on my Investigate check, what do I find?", to me, is a perfectly acceptable thing for a player to do and, in fact, I would get annoyed with a player who didn't do this and waited after every statement for me, as the DM, to poke and prod for more information. I look at "I search the rubble" as a perfectly fine way of playing and I would not then spring the, "AHA GOTCHA! You didn't say that you were using your shovel to search! You just stuck your hand in a pile of rot grubs!"

I simply assume that the PC's are competent and won't do anything blindingly stupid and my players are confident in that and trust that I won't screw them over. "Oh, you didn't say you were buying cold weather gear before heading into the blizzard, I guess you all died of hypothermia." No thanks.

So, how many of my posts in this thread did you read where I was saying "gotchas" are bad? There were several. If it read even one such post, then you know my position on that. And if you do, then please explain the above. Because surely anyone who knows my position would not draw such conclusions, right?

 

[pemerton]

How else as a DM/GM expected to meaningfully adjudicate the consequences of success and failure except through fictional positioning? What you can find with just a close inspection of eyes will differ from sifting through it with your hands which will differ from using a shovel. Making decisions based on your reasoning about the fiction is like the core skill of playing a role playing game. I get that focusing on minute details of searching dungeons can easily lead to Greyhawking. That's why I choose to run in and play in games where that is not a focus of the fiction. Still, the idea that actually having to reason about the fiction is an overwhelming inconvenience seems off to me.

I've bolded that part of your post that stood out to me. I think the RPGing culture is still developing its understanding of what sort of fiction is or is not "compulsory" to engage with. Just to give one example, no one would regard it as compulsory for the GM to describe the colour or cut of the clothes NPCs are wearing; but it is widely regarded as compulsory to describe architecture and furnishings. (Of course in real life when one enters a room one sees both the furniture and the cut and colour of its inhabitants' clothes.)

Anyway, I agree with you that a big part of the solution to avoiding boring play is not to include boring fiction.

 

[5ekyu]

Meh, so, if the player states, "I search the rubble to see if there is anything interesting there." you automatically assume that he's taking the most disadvantageous approach (using his bare hands)? I mean, do I seriously need to state, "Ok, I'm using a shovel to search the rubble."? I need to pixel bitch my way through every single action so that I don't miss the DM gotcha moments?

"I search the rubble, I got a 20 (or whatever) on my Investigate check, what do I find?", to me, is a perfectly acceptable thing for a player to do and, in fact, I would get annoyed with a player who didn't do this and waited after every statement for me, as the DM, to poke and prod for more information. I look at "I search the rubble" as a perfectly fine way of playing and I would not then spring the, "AHA GOTCHA! You didn't say that you were using your shovel to search! You just stuck your hand in a pile of rot grubs!"

I simply assume that the PC's are competent and won't do anything blindingly stupid and my players are confident in that and trust that I won't screw them over. "Oh, you didn't say you were buying cold weather gear before heading into the blizzard, I guess you all died of hypothermia." No thanks.

Just to go back a bit about pacing. In my last Primeval Thule session, which was 3 hours, we did the following:

5 combats - exploring an abandoned Atlantean outpost that had been taken over by cyclopses (cyclopsi?).
1 social encounter - interrogating a prisoner to learn information.
2 exploration - exploring the abandoned outpost as well as investigating an entrance to a dungeon that was a 200 foot deep chasm that needed to be climbed down in the dark while avoiding the giant spiders that had strung webs across the chasm.

And that was in less than 3 hours because we actually ended the session early. A bit combat heavy, but, then again, I likes me the hack, so, not too bad. Fun session actually. This was for a 9th level party as well. So, when I talk about higher pacing, I'm not kidding.

In my tuesday game, they got a lot less done, only one real combat, a bit of exploration, discovery discussion and analysis and everybody had a blast without any worry that we were not getting as much done in a session as the folks on ENWORLD claim to.

Guess we just suck at this rpg stuff!

Really, this whole "how much do we get done" is starting to sound an awful lot like a measuring contest.

So, let me be clear, ours is smaller but when we play we have a whole lot of fun with it.

 

[pemerton]

Seems a bit much to dump a GM over just one instance of this.

<snip>

This is a standard trope in all kinds of fiction - the boss or patron isn't who or what you think s/he is - and has to be considered fair game.

RPGing is a leisure activity. I don't have a moral obligation to spend my leisure time with GMs who run bad, boring, and/or frustrating games. If a GM wants to run a game where the role of the players is to wait around to find out what is in the GM's notes (when has the GM decided we will learn about the kobolds' plans? when has the GM decided that we will learn the patron is a traitor?) that's his/her prerogative. But I'm under no obligation to be a player in that game.

 

[Valmarius]

But a close examination with your eyes is a Perception, not Investigate check. And either will reveal different information. The player has stated searching and used an Investigate check, which means he's getting hands on with whatever he's checking out.

You search the rubble. ((The DM knows that the DC for finding the Rot Grubs is X)) You got a 20. That's high enough to detect the rot grubs before they notice you. Roll for initiative. Roll too low and the rot grubs are now trying to eat you. Roll for initiative, and they have surprise. How is this a difficult adjudication?

So what happens when they roll low, you tell them the rot grubs are now trying to eat them, and they protest, saying, "I wasn't using my hands, i was poking around with my shovel!"
Do you:
Stick to your ruling, grubs squirm up the shovel handle to the investigator's hands.
Quickly retcon, it's only been 2 seconds since the ruling, so no big change here. Go to initiative with rot grubs adjacent.

Either way, knowing the approach before hand would've made for a smoother conversation.

 

[Hussar]

So, how many of my posts in this thread did you read where I was saying "gotchas" are bad? There were several. If it read even one such post, then you know my position on that. And if you do, then please explain the above. Because surely anyone who knows my position would not draw such conclusions, right?

So, how exactly do I avoid the rot grubs then? I need to state exactly what I'm doing every single time? I'm searching the rubble using this tool, taking this amount of time, while not doing X, Y and Z?

Like I said, I'd much, MUCH rather just that the DM assumes that I'm not a total incompetent and adjudicate accordingly.

In my tuesday game, they got a lot less done, only one real combat, a bit of exploration, discovery discussion and analysis and everybody had a blast without any worry that we were not getting as much done in a session as the folks on ENWORLD claim to.

Guess we just suck at this rpg stuff!

Really, this whole "how much do we get done" is starting to sound an awful lot like a measuring contest.

So, let me be clear, ours is smaller but when we play we have a whole lot of fun with it.

And, that's perfectly fine. I, in no way, am claiming any sort of superiority here. It's all about playstyle. I do not have the patience for the kinds of games that some like to play. That's groovy. Play what you like. I've been in games where the pacing is much slower and I don't enjoy them.

You do. And that's great. But, I'm trying to explain why, in the way we play, expecting players to stop all the time and explain every detail about what they are doing before the DM will call for rolls is not something we enjoy.

That you enjoy it is fine. But, does not mean that I have to enjoy it too.

So what happens when they roll low, you tell them the rot grubs are now trying to eat them, and they protest, saying, "I wasn't using my hands, i was poking around with my shovel!"
Do you:
Stick to your ruling, grubs squirm up the shovel handle to the investigator's hands.
Quickly retcon, it's only been 2 seconds since the ruling, so no big change here. Go to initiative with rot grubs adjacent.

Either way, knowing the approach before hand would've made for a smoother conversation.

Not quite sure what you are asking here.

On a failed check, the Rot Grubs attack with surprise. On a successful one, roll for initiative. At no point are the rot grubs actually hitting yet. This is pretty cut and dried no? Since I never actually ask how the character is investigating, any reasonable description will do. And that description will likely be driven by the check that the player made without any input from me.

 

[Lanefan]

RPGing is a leisure activity. I don't have a moral obligation to spend my leisure time with GMs who run bad, boring, and/or frustrating games. If a GM wants to run a game where the role of the players is to wait around to find out what is in the GM's notes (when has the GM decided we will learn about the kobolds' plans?

When you catch a smarter Kobold? (if the DM is being obtuse here you can always have the PCs observe the Kobolds for a while and see who's doing the talking and-or leading, then capture that one)

when has the GM decided that we will learn the patron is a traitor?

Whenever it best suits the patron's motives, which 99% of the time is going to be after you've just done what he asked you to do.

But I'm under no obligation to be a player in that game.

In principle I suppose you're right, but in practice by joining the game in the first place you've kind of made a commitment to the DM and the other players that you're in for the long haul...the same commitment each of them has also made.

Bad games are one thing, though of your three examples only one comes across as demostrably bad and even that's just down to a single dumb move - though a big one - by the GM in what was by your owwn admission an otherwise good game.

Boring games? Well, if there's 4 players plus a GM at the table and the game is boring, 1/5 of the fault is yours...maybe even more, if the GM is intentionally trying to be just a neutral processor and to step back from being the entertainer so as to give the players the stage. That said, one person can't do everything and if the rest of the players are boring as well as the DM you're kinda stuck.

And as for frustrating - if there's no frustration and no large-scale setbacks, where's the joy in success? Never mind that in any good story most of the frustration and setback for the protagonators happens in the early and mid stages. Sorry, no sympathy at all on this one.

Lan-"last session: 2 combats, some travel, lots of useful exploration, and all this in between friends stopping by as it was my wife's birthday"-efan

 

[Lanefan]

So what happens when they roll low, you tell them the rot grubs are now trying to eat them, and they protest, saying, "I wasn't using my hands, i was poking around with my shovel!"

"I don't care what you were using, you've disturbed them and now they're coming up your legs. Roll for surprise."

Either way, knowing the approach before hand would've made for a smoother conversation.

Indeed.

Though in my game it likely never would have gone this way as they'd be rolling for surprise, not success, on searching the rubble pile.

 

[5ekyu]

So, how exactly do I avoid the rot grubs then? I need to state exactly what I'm doing every single time? I'm searching the rubble using this tool, taking this amount of time, while not doing X, Y and Z?

Like I said, I'd much, MUCH rather just that the DM assumes that I'm not a total incompetent and adjudicate accordingly.



And, that's perfectly fine. I, in no way, am claiming any sort of superiority here. It's all about playstyle. I do not have the patience for the kinds of games that some like to play. That's groovy. Play what you like. I've been in games where the pacing is much slower and I don't enjoy them.

You do. And that's great. But, I'm trying to explain why, in the way we play, expecting players to stop all the time and explain every detail about what they are doing before the DM will call for rolls is not something we enjoy.

That you enjoy it is fine. But, does not mean that I have to enjoy it too.



Not quite sure what you are asking here.

On a failed check, the Rot Grubs attack with surprise. On a successful one, roll for initiative. At no point are the rot grubs actually hitting yet. This is pretty cut and dried no? Since I never actually ask how the character is investigating, any reasonable description will do. And that description will likely be driven by the check that the player made without any input from me.

RE the bold addressed to me - please do not presume that i like whatever you have conjured up about my games that i have not said.

If you think i said i want my players to do what you just accused me of - i suggest you reread any number of posts to correct that false idea you put forth.

If you notice, my latest suggestion was treating it as a setback on a failed ability check per the PHb definition of a failed ability check - not the "pre-approach" scriptures some follow.

Character competence is assumed in my games but is confirmed by the character ability check results.