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lowkey13
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So, this seems to be one of a number of contentious threads going on right now (both this forum and the general RPG forum), but I wanted to note that this is a common and recurrent issue (see also the genius with the 8 intelligence, or whatever that thread was) and IMO it relates to a few issues that seem to crop up.
The first is the one that is common to the boards and that you are alluding to- the idea of "dumping," or, at least, specifically not putting a good stat in a particular ability because you don't care about the pure mechanical aspects and you feel that you can RP your way out of the low score. Call this the Charisma/Intelligence problem. I call it that because it was a common issue back in the old days with charisma and intelligence- neither ability had much of a mechanical impact*, so unless you had a specialized use-case (magic user, paladin, to name two), players would put their low rolls by default in those stats because the other abilities had decided mechanical advantages; moreover, there was an emphasis on, and allowance for, "skilled play" that would let you get around a low intelligence, and you could always talk your way around a low charisma.
So as people began to RP more, there was a natural divide with some people wanting to see people RP their stats; in addition, there was some lingering idea that dumping stats is ... well, distasteful. At least if you aren't accruing some actual disadvantage for it (it's not min/maxing, it's max/maxing?)- it would be like those systems where you trade slight disadvantages for awesome abilities, and people load up on the slight disadvantages to make OP characters. (I am not judging here, btw, just describing).
Of course, things began to morph as BECMI/1e/2e began to change into 3e and later editions. Abilities were no longer mostly static, but increased over time. In addition, while there were hints and various ways to do ability challenges or checks in the older systems, there was no formal system of DC checks like we later on. Which has a profound impact (again, IMO, and I hope I don't have to keep stating that) on the way various people approached the game, and the whole player/PC split.
Because I see references to this in multiple threads, as people attempt to articulate their various styles of play. And it really does seem to make a difference to them. And, to be honest, I think that there is a divide regardless of whether you approach it from a more RP or a more gamist POV. Basically, it's a question of the following:
Do you think that the PC is a separate entity, capable of solving problems with an independent base of knowledge?
Or do you think the PC is vessel for your play (the player)?
I was thinking about this when I was reading about the Blades in the Dark system on a different thread, wherein the inventory of a PC is determined by slots, and the items in those slots are determined by when they are needed.** The explanation for this is that the PC is a professional, and the professional will have appropriately planned and determined what items would be needed. Which is anathema to how I play, but it also makes perfect sense from another perspective.
It's the same here. How do you know what the PC knows (for example) or what the PC can do in 5e? You roll against their ability. That's how you find out. That's one perspective.
The other perspective is that the PC is a vessel for the player's play (an alter ego of a certain sense), and the player can (through, for example skilled play or role playing or narration) change or greatly influence the results.
Of course, I would guess that most tables use some combination of those two.
Anyway, I've been thinking about this for a while, and I thought I'd offer that up.
*Yes, there were some things, like languages and henchmen; but IMO most games did not emphasize this compared to the massive advantages of strength (carrying loot, combat, doors etc.), dex (combat, AC, etc.), con (HP, resurrection, etc.), and even wisdom (saving throws).
**To the extent I am mischaracterizing this, I apologize- I haven't actually played this game. This is my understanding based on how it was described.
"If a player dump stats an attribute and in your opinion doesn't suffer enough of a penalty for it, then it suggests that attribute doesn't actually have enough impact on play and possibly should be removed from the game entirely. If it really was the case that there was no mechanical penalty for low INT, why do characters and the rules system have INT at all? That sounds like a problem with the system and not with the players."The problem with this is that it is a standard trope of fiction that characters which aren't particularly clever often think of clever plans by doing the simple obvious thing that the more clever character didn't think of. This is the "kids say the darndest things" trope and related tropes. So there is nothing particularly wrong with a player who is intelligent, playing a mechanically "dumb" character in a "Forest Gump" like manner where he solves problems despite his lack of intelligence rather than because of it. Yes, there are artful ways to play this out and less artful ways of playing this out, but I'm not going to show someone the door simply because they aren't an artful enough of a thespian for my tastes.
What are you going to do, tell the player that their character is too dumb to have come up with this plan? Force the player to make an intelligence check to come up with the plan? Are you also going to make the 18 INT character make an intelligence check to come up with the plan? Because if you are going to do that sort of thing, why allow players to play their characters at all?
If a player dump stats an attribute and in your opinion doesn't suffer enough of a penalty for it, then it suggests that attribute doesn't actually have enough impact on play and possibly should be removed from the game entirely. If it really was the case that there was no mechanical penalty for low INT, why do characters and the rules system have INT at all? That sounds like a problem with the system and not with the players.
This is where I'm having the hardest time understanding your point of view. I don't think anyone has argued that for example in a social challenge you ought to succeed in difficult challenges regardless of your characters social skills. I think that regardless of the approach that a player takes for solving the problem, having high skill in social conflicts is going to make you much more likely to succeed. All people are suggesting is that approach does matter, in the same way that kicking down the door might be easier than picking the lock, or conversely the door might not even be locked and so opening it is easier than kicking it down.
I already know you and I have different processes of play, but typically what I'll do in a social encounters is allow the player a little bit to role play their character and then once I think they've reached a good point in the role play, I'll ask for a social check appropriate to their role play - intimidation if they were threatening, bluff if they were manipulative, diplomacy if they were trying to be persuasive. I'll apply a circumstance bonus based on how appropriate their argument was, whether they raised salient points, and how entertaining their role-play was (which means that if they are 8 INT and they played like their INT didn't matter and used a lot of big words and complex idea, I might penalize them). Then they have to roll. Success is far from guaranteed. If you are playing a misanthrope vermin sorcerer with multiple bloodline mutations, chances are you aren't going to succeed at anything regardless of what you role played. People are going to be too freaked out to even pay attention to you, and regardless of how apt you thought your language, what people heard is going to be uncanny and alien.
What I tell players is that what they hear as players in their own words isn't what the NPCs necessarily hear. I have a player who is socially awkward and stutters a lot when he tries to RP. Yet his character has very high diplomacy. Consequently, while the player may stutter and be awkward, the character doesn't. If the message is on point, the character will deliver it with the eloquence the player lacks. Conversely, if I had a player that is very eloquent, but has large charisma penalties, the character will deliver the message in a wholly awkward fashion. The player has in fact played out that trope scene from so many movies and TV shows where a character tries to achieve some brilliant oratory, but what has come out of there mouth has in fact made a fool of them.
Fortune at the beginning is a perfectly valid approach.
But my problem with it compared to fortune in the middle or even fortune in the end is that it tends to make the narration irrelevant and anticlimactic. There is a tendency that if the roll actually is everything and is all of the deciding factor for the narration to be deprecated and not really happen, because why bother? The results are known. Perhaps one sentence will be said to humorously explain the result of the roll, but since the narration adds nothing there is no more reason to do it than there typically is reason to narrate the specifics of what happens when someone swings a sword.
Point that I want to convey though is that just because you use Fortune in the Middle or Fortune at the End doesn't mean that the dice don't determine what happens and that you can make an end run around a games mechanics.
And the other point that I disagree with you over is that just because you have dump stated something doesn't mean that the proper way to play your character is failure.
You might get 10 different opinions - 9 of them negative - but I've only ever heard two meaningfully different definitions.Ask 10 different people what "min/max" means and you're likely to get 10 different answers, especially since it's obvious it's all wrapped in some emotional response you're having. If you want to talk about it, you'll have to define what it means to you.
In this case, specifically using speaking in character, alone, to resolve a social challenge, without reference to the relevant mechanical qualities of the character.What is the "talky talky?"
Given that the character has no key, that might be an example of a broader meaning. (This is about to get insulting to my fellow nerds): it's what goes on when a player-DM verbal interaction moves beyond what our high-conventional-IQ nerdbrains can process, due to the player possessing much greater emotional intelligence and social skills than we can even imagine, resulting in a DM ruling at odds with rules, stats, reason, and immune to any degree of logical rigour we might resort to in proving how wrong it is.Do you mean coming up with an efficacious approach to a goal? Such as using a key on the locked door instead of bashing it down with a portable ram?
What is the "talky talky?" Do you mean coming up with an efficacious approach to a goal? Such as using a key on the locked door instead of bashing it down with a portable ram? In a dramatic situation, the former approach likely doesn't require an ability check. The latter likely does.
What's the minimum Intelligence required to use a key instead of a portable ram to open a door?
This seems like a very easy challenge - choosing the highest bonus skill, randomly generating a number, then describing what you did. What's the DC for putting a key in a lock to unlock the door? Or do I not worry about that until I've said I want to open the door, roll some kind of ability check, then if I succeed say I used the key instead of the ram? What happens if I fail - did I use the ram instead or maybe the key breaks?
Well said.So, this seems to be one of a number of contentious threads going on right now (both this forum and the general RPG forum), but I wanted to note that this is a common and recurrent issue (see also the genius with the 8 intelligence, or whatever that thread was) and IMO it relates to a few issues that seem to crop up.
The first is the one that is common to the boards and that you are alluding to- the idea of "dumping," or, at least, specifically not putting a good stat in a particular ability because you don't care about the pure mechanical aspects and you feel that you can RP your way out of the low score. Call this the Charisma/Intelligence problem. I call it that because it was a common issue back in the old days with charisma and intelligence- neither ability had much of a mechanical impact*, so unless you had a specialized use-case (magic user, paladin, to name two), players would put their low rolls by default in those stats because the other abilities had decided mechanical advantages; moreover, there was an emphasis on, and allowance for, "skilled play" that would let you get around a low intelligence, and you could always talk your way around a low charisma.
So as people began to RP more, there was a natural divide with some people wanting to see people RP their stats; in addition, there was some lingering idea that dumping stats is ... well, distasteful. At least if you aren't accruing some actual disadvantage for it (it's not min/maxing, it's max/maxing?)- it would be like those systems where you trade slight disadvantages for awesome abilities, and people load up on the slight disadvantages to make OP characters. (I am not judging here, btw, just describing).
Of course, things began to morph as BECMI/1e/2e began to change into 3e and later editions. Abilities were no longer mostly static, but increased over time. In addition, while there were hints and various ways to do ability challenges or checks in the older systems, there was no formal system of DC checks like we later on. Which has a profound impact (again, IMO, and I hope I don't have to keep stating that) on the way various people approached the game, and the whole player/PC split.
Because I see references to this in multiple threads, as people attempt to articulate their various styles of play. And it really does seem to make a difference to them. And, to be honest, I think that there is a divide regardless of whether you approach it from a more RP or a more gamist POV. Basically, it's a question of the following:
Do you think that the PC is a separate entity, capable of solving problems with an independent base of knowledge?
Or do you think the PC is vessel for your play (the player)?
I was thinking about this when I was reading about the Blades in the Dark system on a different thread, wherein the inventory of a PC is determined by slots, and the items in those slots are determined by when they are needed.** The explanation for this is that the PC is a professional, and the professional will have appropriately planned and determined what items would be needed. Which is anathema to how I play, but it also makes perfect sense from another perspective.
It's the same here. How do you know what the PC knows (for example) or what the PC can do in 5e? You roll against their ability. That's how you find out. That's one perspective.
The other perspective is that the PC is a vessel for the player's play (an alter ego of a certain sense), and the player can (through, for example skilled play or role playing or narration) change or greatly influence the results.
Of course, I would guess that most tables use some combination of those two.
Anyway, I've been thinking about this for a while, and I thought I'd offer that up.
*Yes, there were some things, like languages and henchmen; but IMO most games did not emphasize this compared to the massive advantages of strength (carrying loot, combat, doors etc.), dex (combat, AC, etc.), con (HP, resurrection, etc.), and even wisdom (saving throws).
**To the extent I am mischaracterizing this, I apologize- I haven't actually played this game. This is my understanding based on how it was described.
I find their position puzzling. Sort of like being opposed to...oh, let's say freedom of speech, just because some people will say hateful things. Yeah, they will. But dealing with them is vastly preferable to not having that freedom. (Ok, against the best advice I've received I've now let that analogy loose in this thread...can't wait to see how it's tortured and abused to prove that I'm contradicting myself.)
You might get 10 different opinions - 9 of them negative - but I've only ever heard two meaningfully different definitions.
1) Minimize weaknesses and maximize strengths - fanciful under most build systems.
2) Minimize investment in some areas to maximize it in others (often one other)
Few build systems actually model anything like diminishing marginal utility, so they tend to encourage extreme trade-offs. If you've ever played an 8 STR 18 INT wizard or an 18 STR 8 INT fighter, you've min/maxed, and you've nothing to be ashamed of. It's just following a pattern that the system incentivizes.
In this case, specifically using speaking in character, alone, to resolve a social challenge, without reference to the relevant mechanical qualities of the character.
I think your questions are spot on, but I think I also know where Hussar is coming from. And at the risk of offending him (again), I'll guess that the "talky talky" is actually his past experience with high charisma (but socially dysfunctional) players browbeating or bullying the DM into getting their way. That is to say, I suspect that what Hussar is really guarding against is not problem solving in character per se, but a player playing the metagame where he tries to talk the DM into yielding to him.
And that is I agree totally dysfunctional and yes I've seen that in play, and Hussar's strategy of using fortune at the beginning seems designed to just kill that cold without the need to have a confrontation with that player about the way that they are playing, precisely because players like that prefer to negotiate at the metagame level and any confrontation like that is simply starting up the drama with them.
Again, what I really think Hussar is actually objecting to in play is not problem solving, as I suspect that in play he's not actually that far off what you or I do. I suspect what he is really objecting to is player's being jerks, and there is a particular class of player jerk that attempts to short cut the entire proposition->fortune->resolution cycle by first getting the DM to agree to the stakes, then getting the DM to agree that a plan works, and if they can't get that DM to agree to the stakes and to the plan working, then they back up and try again, until they finally browbeat the DM into simply validating that they get what they want. So you end up with a ton of argument over whether or not the DM is ruling correctly, and a ton of demands for do overs because the player would have never done this thing if he realized whatever. That is I think the "talky talky".