D&D 5E How do you define “mother may I” in relation to D&D 5E?

[FrogReaver]

These things are distinct

• After a bad bout of insomnia I sometimes suffer from some cognitive impairment
• I am cognitively impaired, and I make choices about the style of play I prefer because of my cognitive impairment (as if those choices could not be made for any reason but being too limited to make better choices)

It surprises me hugely that you cannot see the problem here. That you've doubled down on it is really concerning. It sounds like you may be under other pressures and I hope you return refreshed and are able to see what I'm saying. @hawkeyefan @Campbell really? This line of argument is vile.

I don’t think that’s what they are saying.

All they are saying IMO is that sometimes we aren’t at our best cognitively. Heck, I often find myself more enjoy fighters and rogues because the cognitive bandwith used to play those classes is small and it can be applied more toward the fiction and thinking up memorable things for my character to do.

 

[pemerton]

Except when I tried to use it in a game, and the DM said "well, I don't think this particular noble has ever heard of you, or would be inclined to grant you an audience."

Sure, I read your post. I don't get how that isn't just an example of a GM ignoring the rules. Which is why, in my reply to @hawkeyefan upthread, I expressed doubt about the utility of trying to introduce more rules.

There are other posters in this thread who seem to be saying, or at least strongly implying, that your GM didn't ignore the rules, perhaps because the rule is in some sense unclear and so needs interpretation. I'm not really following their reasoning.

It goes beyond even that. @pemerton is essentially saying that a noble from the Known World of Mystara who ends up on Toril should be put up by nobles who would automatically recognize him. Every noble in the multiverse knows this guy is a noble, and not some imposter claiming to be one.

I'm not saying anything about Mystara or Toril. I'm saying what the rule says. If you want to house rule it, that's your prerogative - I don't think the posters who have actually posted about their background features being shut down were told about, or asked to express their opinions on, any house rules.

If you're suggesting it's absurd to posit that, in a fantasy world, one noble would recognise the nobility of another, I disagree. The trope is well established - see eg LotR, versions of the Robin Hood story, etc.

Even a noble in an distant land isn't going to learn the heraldry of a minor noble.

I don't see what heraldry has to do with anything. Heraldry is not mentioned in the Position of Privilege feature.

In most d&d groups the players also want the fictional world to make sense.

<snip>

So. to answer your question above - everyone’s creativity would be stifled. In 5e player creativity isn’t expressed by world building, it’s expressed by reacting to the world that is built.

But how does it not make sense that one noble would recognise the nobility of another noble? That's a pretty common fantasy trope - see eg the meeting between Aragorn and Eomer in Book III of LotR.

I also don't see how @James Gasik's creativity would have been stifled had his GM allowed his Position of Privilege to work as the rules text says it does. To me, that negation of the background feature, much like @hawkeyefan's experience with Rustic Hospitality, seems to have been used to channel play towards something the GM preferred; it doesn't seem to have fostered or responded to player creativity.

With all due respect, I think reading distant lands as including across the entire multiverse is putting hyperbolic words in their mouth, at least without more direct context.

I don't have strong view on the D&D "multiverse". There are obvious tensions between character features that seem location-based (some background features, some Ranger features, religious character features, etc) and play that involves travelling through the multiverse. But we tend to assume that the CHA of a character operates equally well throughout the multiverse, that the same gods and spirits hear the prayers of the characters throughout the multiverse, etc; and in that context I don't see why noble bearing should be treated any differently.

I think generally what he is saying is true. Mostly you expect that if you say I swing my sword, I will do so in the manner described in the PHB combat section. My point is simply that the combat system isn't absolute: the GM has final say. That doesn't mean the GM just declaring your attack misses and the Balor decapitates you would be a good use of rule zero (as me and others were saying it is largely there so the GM can adapt the mechanics to player declarations, ensure the system doesn't produce results inconsistent with what is established in the specifics of play or that are wildly unbelievable and to help the game match the desired aesthetics of the group in question. Just because rule zero exists that doesn't mean combat rules are meaningless. I think one of the key elements of how people judge a GM is how they use rule zero.

Here's what I don't get: how is it "wildly unbelievable" that one noble would recognise the nobility of another? Or that some villagers would shelter a Folk Hero?

Why are we saying that, when it comes to combat, we allow the rules to decide - even though, given that Gandalf took days to defeat a Balrog in combat, we might think it "wildly unbelievable" that a PC fighter could attempt it - but when it comes to Rustic Hospitality and Position of Privilege we set those rules aside and allow the GM to just decide what should happen?

The only answer I've had is that "the setting needs to make sense" - but no one has explained why it makes more sense that a nobody fighter can kill a Balor than that one noble might recognise the nobility of another.

I strongly dislike railroading.

That's why I don't quite get why you're defending the GM's use of "rule zero" to shut down background abilities so as to railroad players into their preferred story.

Is it possible that the Toril noble would find the Mystara noble in their court, and dismiss them out of hand as an imposter of unknown name and house? Sure.

Is it possible that when the Mystara noble speaks, their bearing and poise clearly communicates something that the Toril noble recognizes... and that despite their concern, the Toril noble senses some form of kindred and decides to follow the practices of hospitality and treat this person as if they are the noble they claim? I would say sure.

So given that either of these things is possible, what does it say that a GM, when faced with this example, does not seek some way to make the ability work, but instead does whatever they can to shut it down?

It says that they love Mother May I and they want to drink it and bathe in it and rub it under their armpits!

Or in other words, this!

Maybe, but a minor noble(or someone claiming to be one) showing up so from far away is going to be highly suspect. Why would they believe the story and not think that it's someone posing as a noble to get free room and board, or perhaps even rob the place?

Whereas I read this, and all I see is a GM inventing new fiction to justify shutting down the players' ability and railroad them through their preconceived story. This is not showing how GM's can avoid Mother may I - it's advocating for it!

 

[hawkeyefan]

Yeah, I agree.


Perhaps. When thinking about "likely" we should remember that unlikely things happen in the game all the time, we just usually roll the dice for them. But some things, such as background features might in certain situations effectively grant you an autosuccess. However, that requires that the thing was at least somewhat possible in the first place.

Exactly… unlikely things will happen. So for me, when an ability says “X happens” barring X being an impossibility based on the fictional situation, it should happen. The unlikely thing happened!

I think evaluations like “less likely” and “more likely” come into these situations, and they shouldn’t. It’s understandable why they do… a GM has to consider that kind of stuff all the time. But better to set it aside in these kinds of moments.

"This happens now" without rolls is rather different than usual method of resolving things so it might feel jarring or counterintuitive to some. Granted, some spells do that, but fair or not, people are willing to let magic to do stuff that seems weird to them. After all, the definition of magic is that it can achieve things that are not normally possible.

There is certainly a tendency to let magic do more than other game elements, I agree. I think very often it’s not about the fictional element like magic, though, and instead just the actual play process at the table… that it feels jarring or counterintuitive as you mention because it’s different than what the GM typically does.

The game has so much work one way, that it’s hard not to approach other things that way.

 

[tetrasodium]

In general I have experienced a lot of cynicism around players utilizing their connections to the setting or nonplayer characters to solve their problems. I think there are a fair number of GMs who view it almost as bad sportsmanship. I have experienced a lot of scenario design, play of NPCs in other traditional games with backgrounds that give you allies, armies and the like where the GM obviates them - not because they want to force play in a given direction, but because they want the player characters to accomplish things like personally, not through intermediaries.

I personally think doing so largely ruins the point of like playing social characters, but I kind of get it. It's really not to my personal tastes though. A large part of the appeal of roleplaying games to me has always been the increasing stakes as you gain more influence over the setting. Like I do not want to be doing the same fundamental things in a high level D&D game as a low level one. Getting rid of strongholds and followers is something I largely view with a dim eye.

IME usually I wind up shutting those down because of a problem where those "social" characters who choose you automatically succeed/have a henchman to do x type abilities that directly causes them to get obliviated. Specifically the character is very much not at all "social" and the player has little if any interest in being one. From there the gm winds up with this horrible Frank Castle (punisher) /Goblin Slayer hybrid gestalted with Tony Stark & Bruce Wayne that expects to be treated as whichever of the four when one is most convenient at any given time and none when one is inconvenient but never expected to actually put in any effort or sacrifice to maintain any of the balance

 

[Gimby]

Sure, but 99.99999% of the time it's going to be a rogue or someone else with a high deception and persuasion skill trying to accomplish something nefarious by pretending a noble that can't be verified. No sane person would fall for that on the extremely off chance that the story is true.

And yet the Count of St Germain seems to have done precisely this, repeatedly, all across the courts of Europe in a way that suggests that travelling nobility would get a presumption of good faith. Hangers on as guests at stately homes are a fairly common character in Austen and similar period literature. Hospitality is an important theme in Arthurian legend. We've even got modern examples that suggest robust background checking isn't a big thing of people who claim certain backgrounds even today.

I absolutely get your point that it seems illogical, but a player who is more thinking about the kind of conventions that some literature suggests may find a flat denial capricious. An introduction or some proof may be needed, but the Noble background starts with a signet ring and a scroll of pedigree, so they should have that available to them.

 

[pemerton]

Not like landless knights weren't a thing.

Just trying to think whether we have any examples of this in the core literature that inspires the fantasy genre - oh yeah, that's right, we've got Robin Hood, Aragorn, Lancelot, King Arthur before he drew his sword, etc, etc.

 

[pemerton]

they want the player characters to accomplish things like personally, not through intermediaries.

This is a thing in some of the literature - basically, the S&S antecedents like REH's Conan, or (as I understand it from others' accounts) Elric.

But a game that includes social backgrounds like Folk Hero or Noble is clearly not mandating S&S play!

 

[pemerton]

DM's hate surprises. It puts them on the spot, and they can make snap decisions that are probably more conservative than if they had time to consider what's going on. So despite the common advice of "say yes, but..." what you get is "no, because I don't have time for this".

So chances are great that your Background ability, even when it could be relevant, won't be.

This sort of thing is often the reason a player might "feel" that a game is MMI, even with a good DM.

To me, this reads like a description of how (some? many?) GMs find themselves adjudicating in a Mother May I fashion.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Here's what I don't get: how is it "wildly unbelievable" that one noble would recognise the nobility of another? Or that some villagers would shelter a Folk Hero?

I am not saying it is or it isn't. I haven't been following the example with your noble. And it may well be in that particular case, the GM isn't making a good call. I don't know.

Why are we saying that, when it comes to combat, we allow the rules to decide - even though, given that Gandalf took days to defeat a Balrog in combat, we might think it "wildly unbelievable" that a PC fighter could attempt it - but when it comes to Rustic Hospitality and Position of Privilege we set those rules aside and allow the GM to just decide what should happen?

The only answer I've had is that "the setting needs to make sense" - but no one has explained why it makes more sense that a nobody fighter can kill a Balor than that one noble might recognise the nobility of another.

Again, I said very clearly even combat isn't absolute. That there are general expectations around it (and we could have a whole thread on why, and we'd all probably disagree on why, but I think it is very sensible to have more procedures for combat than non-combat elements of the game). Also I think here you are equating 'make sense' with 'realistic' and that isn't what people are saying. They are talking about believability in terms of consistency of what has happened in the setting, fidelity to the setting, etc. A warrior being able to defeat a powerful demon is something you would expect to see a typical fantasy story or movie. It is something we also expect to see as a possibility in a fantasy game. Especially when the combat system makes that hard.

But like I said, combat isn't absolute. If something in the Balor description or in its nature would make them immune to a warrior's attack, then the GM has every right to invoke rule zero and say the attacks don't land, or don't cause damage.

In your particular Balor example, there may be an issue I would have, I don't know. With all of these things they are case by case. It is all about the specifics of the case in question.

That's why I don't quite get why you're defending the GM's use of "rule zero" to shut down background abilities so as to railroad players into their preferred story.

You are putting words in my mouth. I am defending rule zero, not defending railroading players into a GM's preferred story. This simply isn't something I have asserted at all. Rule zero can be used for bad rulings and for good ones. My argument is that I think it is better to have a rule zero, even if there are going to be instances of GMs making rulings I wouldn't agree with. Now you and I also probably disagree over whether a particular judgment or result constitutes "preferred story" but that is because we have very different ideas and beliefs about gaming, gaming terminology etc. And when it comes to a term like story, you and I tend to use it very differently. I would say doubly so when using it to describe the GM adjudication of what happens in the campaign. But I think the main reason I would use rule zero to countermand an ability like that is to keep events in the campaign sensical (ie. if using the ability introduces a contradiction from something that arose before), because it just doesn't make sense in the setting or with what has been established (i.e. there wouldn't be farmers in the area willing to do what they ability says they do). There may be other reasons that could emerge, but those would likely be the prime ones, and I probably would never have to use rule zero for that. I certainly wouldn't use it though to keep things on track with something I have planned (i.e. I need the players to get captured because I have a scene in mind with them imprisoned in his lair: I just don't run games this way). But that is just me. People can use rule zero for what they want (that is going to vary from group to group).

 

[pemerton]

You are putting words in my mouth. I am defending rule zero, not defending railroading players into a GM's preferred story. This simply isn't something I have asserted at all.

Do players get to use rule zero if they think the GM is making a call that doesn't make sense, given the fiction etc?