D&D 5E Player consent required -spoilers for new adv book

[Micah Sweet]

I always just assumed signs like that were there mostly to keep insurance companies and the legal department happy, so the ride operators couldn't be sued if something went wrong.

Yeah, I don't really see that as the same thing. Signs like that are about liability.

 

[Bedrockgames]

For all the talk about caring, and being sensitive to others, many people seemed uninterested in paying heed to the above account.
Or, you know, people's actual experiences with trauma. Your friend getting offended about something you said is not a traumatic response. Speak with therapists and people that have been affected by trauma before you enthusiastically parade sidebars as solutions.

yes, this is the kind of thing I am trying to say. The way people talk about triggers and trauma in the hobby, makes it seem like discomfort is being equated with a traumatic trigger.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I always hated it when the DM did things to my character that I did not want. That always felt abusive.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Of course this whole issue is not about you though. It is about those you need this, not those who don't.

I was answering a specific question that asked what I would do personally. The thread in general may not be about that, but the question was.

 

[Bedrockgames]

But it's much easier to speculate how friends meeting to tell a fantastic story might be harmful somewhere, somehow.
As an added bonus, it signals our virtue - and clearly anyone who doesn't subscribe to that narrative must be some sort of monster themselves. Please.

I think if we really care about the issue, we shouldn't trivialise it and we should not speculate about what people with trauma need.
That's what's harmful. So in that sense, superficial box-ticking exercises such as sidebars and "asking for consent for a,b,c,d...z" may be actually doing more harm than good.

The group of people that plays the game is best placed to find a consensus about what works for them. The thought police can go and find other, better hobbies.

For me a lot of my very negative reactions to safety tools and conversations like this one stems from my own experience with mental health issues and mental health issues in my family. I am very much coming from the opposite place of 'toughen up buttercup'. If someone in my life is going through a mental health issue, I am going to help them and be supportive. But being supportive doesn't mean you bend the world around their issues (that can actually do a lot more harm sometimes). It is complicated and it isn't something that a checklist from an RPG publisher or a sidebar can deal with. And I also think a lot of these conversations just further stigmatize people with mental illness, with phobias, etc, because it makes it sound as if things that make them slightly uncomfortable completely set them off. And again, can't emphasize this enough: triggers are not as cut and dry as 'person is set off by the color green, so don't mention green'. All kinds of things, often very nuanced, subtle things can trigger an episode (including thoughts in their own mind going from point A to point B to BAM!). This isn't something a game group is equipped to handle because they have a checklist and sidebar.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Not everyone is going to feel that way, especially if it's a character they've spent years on and collected various 'good' items on. When you're level 10, are you going to want to swap and get, per DMG p 38, 500gp + 1d10x25gp, plus normal starting equipment? Doubt it. You're going to want to make a new character equivalent to what you are replacing

As I said, the question asked was what I would do. I'm fine with playing a new character, and gold and items certainly don't enter into it. I've got plenty of new ideas for PCs. I don't expect everyone feels the same way.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Formalized safety tools, assumptions about how trauma works (and how triggers work), etc. I also think this is training and priming people to overreact to things at the table

While I think this is true, the possibility of a session 0 using these tools preventing a bad event later on is probably worth it. No strategy is without risk, and you have to play each situation individually.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I always hated it when the DM did things to my character that I did not want. That always felt abusive.

This is a very general statement. What are "things done your character that you don't want"? There are people who don't want their character to take damage, let alone die. Or you talking about level drain, or lasting injury, or mind control? Some of these are pretty common, even assumed, in some games.

 

[Bill Zebub]

Hopefully more people play BG3 and understand that there is room for players to be feel some angst and discomfort and they will actually be fine because its not real.

I have a lot of sympathy for people who have trauma/phobias that I don’t share and don’t really understand.

Maybe I would be a better person if I could learn to extend that same sympathy and understanding to people who get triggered by something as benign (and unenforceable) as this notice.

The books are full of declarative rules, and yet somehow this one is cause for outrage?

“We are here to confiscate your AR-15…and to make sure you are not requiring players in your make-believe elf game to undergo non consensual body transformations. Also we need to inspect your mattress tags.”

 

[Charlaquin]

For me a lot of my very negative reactions to safety tools and conversations like this one stems from my own experience with mental health issues and mental health issues in my family. I am very much coming from the opposite place of 'toughen up buttercup'. If someone in my life is going through a mental health issue, I am going to help them and be supportive. But being supportive doesn't mean you bend the world around their issues (that can actually do a lot more harm sometimes). It is complicated and it isn't something that a checklist from an RPG publisher or a sidebar can deal with. And I also think a lot of these conversations just further stigmatize people with mental illness, with phobias, etc, because it makes it sound as if things that make them slightly uncomfortable completely set them off. And again, can't emphasize this enough: triggers are not as cut and dry as 'person is set off by the color green, so don't mention green'. All kinds of things, often very nuanced, subtle things can trigger an episode (including thoughts in their own mind going from point A to point B to BAM!). This isn't something a game group is equipped to handle because they have a checklist and sidebar.

I basically agree with you; I think RPG safety tools are not necessarily just there to protect people from potential trauma triggers though. I mean, they might do that in some cases, but I don’t think that’s the best way to think about their intent. Rather, I think it’s more beneficial to think of them as tools to help keep the game fun for everyone. Using the Mind Flayer example here - is having one’s D&D character turned into a Mind Flayer potentially going to set off traumatic flashbacks for someone? Maybe, but in most cases probably not. On the other hand, I think it’s far more likely just to ruin the fun for some players. A huge part of the appeal of D&D is creative self-expression through creating and roleplaying a character. For some folks, having that character forcibly and permanently transformed into a purple squid-faced monster just isn’t going to make for an enjoyable way to spend their free time. So, it’s a good idea to check in with the players. Let them know, “hey, transformation is a major theme of this adventure, and there’s a real risk of your characters being permanently transformed against their will. If that doesn’t sound enjoyable to you all, let me know so I can pick a different adventure to run that will be more fun for everyone.”