Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Social Pillar Mechanics: Where do you stand?
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="M_Natas" data-source="post: 9295406" data-attributes="member: 7025918"><p>I think, the problem could be the Setup of D&D. How is every game table set up? How does virtually any D&D player experience the game? By having his character sheet right in front of him.</p><p></p><p>And mainly page 1. No matter what else a player has lying around, he will have his character sheet in front of him in some form. They can see their attributes, skills, hit points, armour class, class features, name, race and so on. And it kind of makes sense to have that in front of you. Because then you can access it very quickly and find everything important very quickly.</p><p></p><p>But it also tempts (nudges!) you into certain behaviours. A player who is thinking about what to do is drawn to the nice list of skills. This tempts them to think of their next action in terms of a skill. You choose your skill and only then think about how the character might use this skill in the game world. This is not a conscious decision that you make, but one that is favoured by the fact that the character sheet is simply in front of you. </p><p></p><p>The player's thoughts on how to interact with the game are structured by looking at the character sheet. As a result, you automatically think in terms of game mechanics such as skill. You don't think "My character would now try to distract the guard with a compliment", but as a player you think "I could use my skill Persuasion on the guard, I have a +7 bonus". </p><p>You no longer embody the character and imagine that you are that character in the world, instead you see a game in front of you in which the aim is to press the optimal button.</p><p></p><p>And in my opinion, that's not ideal. Because it also restricts the player's creativity without them realising it. Actions that can't simply be assigned to one of the skills don't even occur to you anymore.</p><p></p><p>The basic principle of D&D is the following: </p><p></p><p>The DM presents the players with a situation in which the players' characters find themselves, the players say or act out how their characters react to the situation and the DM then uses common sense and the rules to decide the effects of the player characters' actions and then presents the resulting new situation back to the players.</p><p></p><p>The players say what their characters do, and only then does the DM decide whether a game mechanic such as the use of a skill comes into play at all. So here we have the basic principle that the story, the narrative, takes centre stage, that the focus is on what the characters do and that the rules are only there to support this narrative, while the structure at the gaming table with the character sheet right in front of you provides a nudge to apply the rules first. So the narrative is used here to support the rules.</p><p></p><p>And you can often see this happening when players say things like: "I want to ise insight", "I want to make a persuasion roll" and so on. They're speaking in game mechanics, not character actions</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="M_Natas, post: 9295406, member: 7025918"] I think, the problem could be the Setup of D&D. How is every game table set up? How does virtually any D&D player experience the game? By having his character sheet right in front of him. And mainly page 1. No matter what else a player has lying around, he will have his character sheet in front of him in some form. They can see their attributes, skills, hit points, armour class, class features, name, race and so on. And it kind of makes sense to have that in front of you. Because then you can access it very quickly and find everything important very quickly. But it also tempts (nudges!) you into certain behaviours. A player who is thinking about what to do is drawn to the nice list of skills. This tempts them to think of their next action in terms of a skill. You choose your skill and only then think about how the character might use this skill in the game world. This is not a conscious decision that you make, but one that is favoured by the fact that the character sheet is simply in front of you. The player's thoughts on how to interact with the game are structured by looking at the character sheet. As a result, you automatically think in terms of game mechanics such as skill. You don't think "My character would now try to distract the guard with a compliment", but as a player you think "I could use my skill Persuasion on the guard, I have a +7 bonus". You no longer embody the character and imagine that you are that character in the world, instead you see a game in front of you in which the aim is to press the optimal button. And in my opinion, that's not ideal. Because it also restricts the player's creativity without them realising it. Actions that can't simply be assigned to one of the skills don't even occur to you anymore. The basic principle of D&D is the following: The DM presents the players with a situation in which the players' characters find themselves, the players say or act out how their characters react to the situation and the DM then uses common sense and the rules to decide the effects of the player characters' actions and then presents the resulting new situation back to the players. The players say what their characters do, and only then does the DM decide whether a game mechanic such as the use of a skill comes into play at all. So here we have the basic principle that the story, the narrative, takes centre stage, that the focus is on what the characters do and that the rules are only there to support this narrative, while the structure at the gaming table with the character sheet right in front of you provides a nudge to apply the rules first. So the narrative is used here to support the rules. And you can often see this happening when players say things like: "I want to ise insight", "I want to make a persuasion roll" and so on. They're speaking in game mechanics, not character actions [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Social Pillar Mechanics: Where do you stand?
Top