Game vs. Story

[Ourph]

Thats the thing. There's always an interesting story. I prefer it if I had players (which i do) who force me to consistently revisit plots, rebuild plots. If I am not reacting to the player, then I am not having fun. I think a good mentality for a DM is to hear that the 3 level dungeon that the pcs were going to and that you worked on won't be used because the pcs have decided to sidetrack because they want to visit the family of one of the pcs (to insure that the demonlord who vowed vengeance would not take it out on their families) and to be giddy to hear such a thing.

A good plot is living, meaning its versatile enough where players don't feel restricted, and you can shape it around whatever.

I'm not sure why you posted this in response to the comment of mine that you quoted. Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you are trying to say, but to me you've just reiterated the distinction that I pointed out as not being the point of the poll. Are you saying that the distinction is the point of the poll, or are you commenting on some other aspect that I'm just not seeing? :\

 

[Khairn]

I do my best to have the 2 balanced, but given the question in the OP, we tell a story and play the game towards that end. Without a good story to tie it all together and help focus both players and GM, any game is just a random series of encounters. Hardly worth remembering and certainly not epic.

 

[DonTadow]

I'm not sure why you posted this in response to the comment of mine that you quoted. Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you are trying to say, but to me you've just reiterated the distinction that I pointed out as not being the point of the poll. Are you saying that the distinction is the point of the poll, or are you commenting on some other aspect that I'm just not seeing? :\

Sorry, was inforcing your comment, not countering it. I know a lot of us use quotes to break down others arguments ,but in this case its to support your argument.

 

[DungeonMaester]

I'll go with what R.A. Salvador said in a D&D podacast. It was something to this effect:



Which to me means the Dm should enable the players to tell the story of the [character's life] with plots, but the plots should not be the focus of the game.

---Rusty

Sorry to threadjack, but how does every one feel about this quote from R.A. Salvador rather then the two options given which, I feel don't cover all the bases well enough to pick one or the other.

---Rusty

 

[Ourph]

Sorry, was inforcing your comment, not countering it. I know a lot of us use quotes to break down others arguments ,but in this case its to support your argument.

OK. I get it. I think I was thrown because you went on to talk about going with the flow of what the players decide to do, which isn't something I was particularly addressing, and I didn't know if that was a response to what I was saying or just an extension of your point. Sorry for the confusion.

 

[Rustam]

What he said.

I think this is better expressed as a scale than as a set of polar opposites.

hear, hear. well stated.

For me, it really is someplace in the middle - sometimes more, sometimes less.

The best choice, a red-herring and 2-3 valid options, these are used to help the PCs make their way to the quest goal. Not totally freeform and not railroad. Sometimes they end up "side-adventuring" for awhile but that's okay because the BBEG will be just as hard to defeat (relative/sliding CR/EL).

 

[Deuce Traveler]

Story, Mr. Q.

 

[Hussar]

Nope. The game is full of fudging to allow PCs to survive. We call them rules because they are codified by the game designers. The Evasion ability is fudging to cause some PCs to take less damage on a successful save than the dice say they should. Resist Energy is fudging to allow PCs to take less energy damage than the dice say they should. Dodge is fudging that allows a PC to avoid being hit by an attack that the dice says should hit, as is Mobility, or for that matter, Armor Class as a whole. Rules are codified fudging. Every time you add a rule, you're adding codified fudging.

In short, for me, fudging is when it's done arbitrarily. Rules are when it's not.

Ok, appologies for using the term gamist. That was my bad.

However, I do disagree with the point that codified hero points are greatly different from fudging.

In all the above examples, and the examples that others have given, the player (or the GM) has changed the odds before the result of the dice is known. I have no problems with that. Adding armor does not make me immune to damage, but, it does make me harder to hit. Fair enough. Taking dodge means that I didn't take Iron Will, so it balances in the wash anyway. Elements are added or subtracted before the die is thrown, and that will affect the odds, but not definitively determine the result.

Move away from D&D for a second and look at roulette. I can bet a single number and have a 1:36 chance of winning. I can bet 2/3rds of the table and get a 66% chance of winning. What I can't do is move the ball after it stops. And that's what hero points do.

Take a cleric with the luck domain. He can reroll a single die roll. Seems like he's moving the ball right? But, the problem is, he cannot know the result of the first roll before deciding to reroll. He might think he knows, but, he's not sure. Here's a forex: Our Lucky Cleric is making a save vs a death effect. After mods, he needs to roll a 13. Of course, he doesn't know this beforehand.

He rolls a 12. Now, he can reroll or he can stand pat. But, even if he rerolls, he has a 60% chance of not doing any better. Even on the reroll, all he has done is improve his odds, not determined the outcome.

Now, give that same cleric hero points. He knows that he fails on a 12 and THEN decides to use a Fate point. He automatically succeeds. He has taken his fail and mulliganned it into a success. He's retconned the results of the game.

He's fudged.

 

[hong]

He's fudged.

Psst. Resource management.

Psst 2. Constraints on hero point usage.

 

[Glyfair]

Edit: I'm just not seeing how there can be a balance there -- you either are willing to fudge the game for the story you want to tell, or you are willing to leave the story open to whatever the game gives you. Or a scale -- how much of the game are you willing to fudge for your story, or how much of your story are you willing to concede to the game?

How about...

I'm willing to accept what the game gives me, unless it creates an unsatisfying and non-fun situation?

A friend of mine is a fanatical fan of a great story. However, the die rolls or player choices at the table very often create a better story, in his opinion, than any directions he expected.

On the other hand, I know of entire campaigns that crashed because of unlucky die rolls that caused a complete crash from which there was no recovery.

One of the things that has me very interested in re-exploring Heroquest is that contests don't automatically end in death. The worst situation is "dying" and it's up to the GM (and maybe players) whether it actually ends in a death.