hawkeyefan
Legend
It's not about a fear of abuse. It's about common sense and reason. It makes no sense for a group to want to use player knowledge about trolls out of a desire not to have to feign ignorance, but but okay with feigning ignorance about vampires and golems. It's not at all the same kind of situation as "Mother May I."
Sure it is. "If it can be done once, what's to stop if from happening every time?"
Perhaps I misremembered, but I thought you compared the troll bit to a unique monster and the players demanding to know about that, and that seems like an extreme example.
Vampires and golems and the established monsters? Yes, those would be similar; I'd just let the players act on what they know, and chalk it up to folk lore and word of mouth, and then think no more of it. I can't see the value add of halting progress to turn this into a metagame issue where it simply does not have to be one.
A troll is very unlikely to even be able to regenerate if the party knows the truth. They will use methods that take advantage of the weakness, to the xp value should be diminished if metagaming player knowledge is allowed.
Okay, cool. So then maybe tell the players that and see if they think the drop in XP is worth it in order to avoid pretending they don't know what they know. Or if they say okay sounds cool, then play the encounter with the intent of establishing a justification for using fire.
Of these two options, I know which I'd prefer, but I certainly wouldn't ever begrudge a DM asking for player input into how the game is played.
No, it's not an unfair advantage, because it's not guaranteed that they will find out. The game has rules for determining if players can find out, or it did. 5e leaves that in the DM's hands again. I believe that the players sometimes knowing and sometimes not is the balance point of monsters with weaknesses. Players never knowing would make them worth more. Players always knowing would make them worth less.
I think whether or not they find out through "reasonable" means is largely DM dependent, no?
Unless the players all get some kind of lore roll for every creature they encounter and then their knowledge is based on the results of the roll.
I think so. It may not be the only disagreement, but it seems like the largest one. I'm even okay with the player adding in background later if it makes sense for the PC, but not if it's done for immediate gain.
Fair enough. For me, I don't think my example was really about the gain so much as it was about moving the game along, but having said that, I don't even care if the player does something like that with gain in mind.
Especially playing so much Blades in the Dark lately, which allows for all kinds of player introduced content, some of which is about making things easier for characters or playing to their strengths, but just as much is about making things hard for the characters. I've stopped worrying so much about "advantage" or "disadvantages" and instead I'm more concerned about "interesting". I just have an open mind about players introducing things to the fiction in an attempt to make things interesting.
If I thought they were only doing it to gain an advantage, then I'd be more concerned. But then it's clearly about abuse, which brings us back to the beginning of this post and how that relates to the concern over "Mother May I".
I don't think you understood what I meant by "fluff," even though I provided an example that is similar what happens to Han Solo. Fluff just means "not mechanical." A fluff background can and will be very important. It can provide motivations, context, and become part of play. There's nothing wrong with being fluff. Fluff is often more important in my game than mechanics are.
I understood the term fluff....crunch and fluff and all that....it was the "Just" in front of it that made it seem unimportant.
No, because the player investment will be there. Fluff does not mean "unused" and "unimportant." It just means that it will not be mechanical in nature. Han Solo's background with Jaba had a huge influence, even though it was fluff. Leia's fluff background as a princess is important throughout the movies, even though her planet is destroyed.
Right.
Is this what you do with your player backgrounds? The only example I recall that you've shared at this point is that one PC had a hermit friend who you might have show up one day. If you have others, it'd be cool if you share them. If I missed any, my apologies...it's a long thread and I haven't caught up on all new posts yet.